Avengers #21 sends the team to a surprising conflict with the X-Men, which sets the stage for a whole new era for Marvel's two biggest teams

Avengers #21 page — (Image credit: Marvel Comics)

Avengers #21 pits Earth's Mightiest Heroes against the X-Men in a surprising conflict that starts to make good on the potential of Avengers writer Jed MacKay also writing the X-Men. Along with artist Valerio Schiti, color artist Federico Blee, and letterer Cory Petit, MacKay sets the stage for the next era of Avengers/X-Men relations.

And following the antagonism and skepticism that has followed off and on since 2012's Avengers Vs. X-Men, it's looking like it could be a new era between Marvel's two top teams indeed. We'll explain it all right now.

Spoilers ahead for Avengers #21

In Avengers #21, the team travels to confront Cyclops and the core X-Men team in their new Alaska base, with their newest member, the mutant Storm, along with them. And though it's played up like there's going to be a big dust-up, instead, it's a good old-fashioned baseball game between the teams.

The game is all in good fun, but it winds down when Juggernaut takes a massive swing that decimates their last ball, leading to a feast cooked by Glob Herman. After sitting down to the meal, a series of meetings take place between members of the Avengers and X-Men.

Magneto confronts Wanda Maximoff, his adopted daughter, lamenting the illness that is ravaging his body. At the same time, he affirms that his new purpose and belief is that the struggle of all oppressed peoples - be the mutants or otherwise - are one intersectional struggle.

Beast asks Tony Stark why he didn't stop his old self from becoming a villain. Tony tells him it's because he stopped knowing him - but that from this day forward, Hank gets the chance to be a new person and make new choices. Idie asks Storm if she still believes in Xavier's dream, which Storm says she does - but not for what it is, for what it could be.

And most importantly, Captain Marvel asks Cyclops if the Avengers can count on the X-Men as allies as they deal with the impending cosmic cataclysms that were foretold to them as Tribulation Events. While Cyclops bristles a bit at Carol's insinuations that there are still secrets that the X-Men are keeping, he does indeed pledge that the X-Men will be the allies of the Avengers in the days to come.

That agreement sets the stage for a new relationship between the Avengers and the X-Men, who have been rocky allies at best in the years since they went to war in Avengers Vs. X-Men, and have often been downright antagonistic. As for what those foreshadowed Tribulation Events may actually be, we'll have to wait and find out.

Avengers Vs. X-Men is one of the best Marvel Comics events of all time.

I've been Newsarama's resident Marvel Comics expert and general comic book historian since 2011, and now I'm the Entertainment Writer at GamesRadar+. I've also been the on-site reporter at most major comic conventions such as Comic-Con International: San Diego, New York Comic Con, and C2E2. Outside of comic journalism, I am the artist of many weird pictures, and the guitarist of many heavy riffs. (They/Them)