The Exiles comic books definitive issue-by-issue collecting guide and trade reading order for omnibus, hardcover, and trade paperback collections. Find every issue and appearance! Part of Crushing Krisis’s Crushing Comics. Last updated April 2023 with titles scheduled for release through August 2023.
The launch of Exiles in 2001 by writer Judd Winick with penciler Mike McKone was Marvel’s first long-running ongoing with a continuously-told story combining reality-hopping and alternate versions of heroes.
Prior to the launch of Ultimate Comics in 200o, Marvel Comics had a slim list of ongoing titles that lived permanently in alternate continuities. Exiles was nothing like Ultimate Comics.
Ultimate had the goal of the alternate universe as verisimilitude – the same main Marvel Universe only more modern, and the fascination was watching it splinter.
The pitch for Exiles followed the debut of Ultimate Comics and swiped the title of a 1990s Malibu series, but it had much more to do with Marvel’s classic series What If. What If never told a consistent story – in fact, there were hardly ever two issues which focused on the same tale! Each one-shot issue hopped to a new reality to imagine the most twisted possibilities.
Exiles combined that reality-hopping approach with a somewhat consistent team, much like Chris Claremont’s classic Excalibur story “The Cross-Time Caper.” Instead of starting with a team of known 616-reality heroes, Winick & McKone drew inspiration from Age of Apocalypse.
Age of Apocalypse had presented four months of an alternate reality full of X-Men reimagined to take advantage of their best and worst qualities. Exiles would do the same, only with a palette of infinite realities from which to choose.
Lead by the short-lived but hugely-popular X-Men character Blink (from Age of Apocalypse – not the main universe version!), the adventures of these alternate-reality X-characters had no impact on the main X-continuity (though Nocturne, a founding member, would briefly cross over to main 616 continuity).
Despite that, the book is regarded highly by fans – at least, it was when it was helmed by creator Judd Winick. By contrast, any issues penned by Uncanny scribes Chris Claremont and Chuck Austen aren’t as popular. [Read more…] about Exiles – Definitive Collecting Guide and Reading Order