All New X-Men #1 triptych Cover - Stuart Immonen

This triptych (wrapped cover of ALL NEW X-MEN #1 and cover of #2) is from one of my 3 favorite X-Men runs of the last 25 years (along Whedon's and Morrison's). With their insane concept (still going strong after the Secret Wars reboot), Bendis and Immonen made the X-Men the top selling comics again, getting back old fans and converting new ones.

I had been on the hunt for a great piece of that run for years, but all my favorite pages were systematically unavailable so my feelings went from "maybe I should settle for a lesser one" to "the run is not over, maybe there'll be a perfect one next month". I had a few targets but I never could have thought I would one day score that piece...

Because I get only one page from each of my favorite runs, it needs to have what makes their run iconic for me and I could not ask for more than this one : the 1st appearance of the classic X-Men in the middle of 2 contemporary and rival X-Men teams, Wolverine's and Cyclops' (and what a cool team!). This gigantic cover of the landmark issue has been haunting me for years as it's also been used for the previews about the 2 new Bendis series, their launch, countless variant covers, trade covers, articles about the series, its end, etc.

This series and this piece got me out of my semi-retirement from the hobby and this X-Men fanatic (since Giant Size #1) could not be happier to own one of the most iconic and famous X-Men team shots in years.