The origin of Superheroes: X-Statix

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-Statix

X-Statix are a fictional team of mutant superheroes appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. The team was specifically designed to be media superstars. The team, created by Peter Milligan and Mike Allred, first appears in X-Force #116 and originally assumed the moniker X-Force, taking the name of the more traditional superhero team, who appear in #117 claiming to be "the real X-Force."

n 2001, the X-Men family of titles were being revamped by the newly appointed Marvel Comics editor-in-chief Joe Quesada, with the aim to make the titles more critically and commercially successful. Former Vertigo editor Axel Alonso hired writer Peter Milligan, best known for his surreal, post-modernist comics such as Rogan Gosh and Shade, the Changing Man, and Madman artist Mike Allred, as the new creative team for X-Force, starting with issue #116. Prior to Millgan and Allred's first issue, X-Force sold well[1] but, hadn't been the critical success Quesada wanted.[citation needed]

Milligan and Allred completely revamped the series, designing a team more akin to popstars or reality TV contestants than the gritty, violent paramilitary group originally portrayed in the series. The title was laced with Milligan's satirical take on the superhero team as well as general cynicism toward the entire genre. Milligan and Allred would regularly play with killing off the title characters: In their first issue, they wiped out the entire team with only two exceptions. This dramatic revision of the series was not universally accepted. Many readers wanted "their" X-Force back, a complaint Milligan later parodied in the pages of the title.[2] However, the title was receiving mainstream media coverage in titles like Rolling Stone.[citation needed]

X-Force was canceled with issue 129 in 2002 and renamed X-Statix; it restarted with a new issue #1. X-Statix carried on the same themes as X-Force, but with an increasingly satirical tone. Milligan planned to deploy Princess Diana as a character in a story-arc beginning in X-Statix #13: she was slated to return from the dead as a mutant superhero. However, when news of this leaked out to the media, a series of objections followed, most notably from the British tabloid newspaper The Daily Mail.[3][4] Quesada and Marvel announced[citation needed] that they would alter the character, replacing her with a fictional pop star named Henrietta Hunter.

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