Marvel to honor Native American Heritage Month with its heroes

(Image credit: Jeffrey Veregge (Marvel Comics))

Marvel Comics will be spotlighting the heritage of Native Americans with a series of variant covers to some of its major ongoing series this November. This will coincide with the United States' recognition of November as National Native American Heritage Month.

S’Klallam writer/artist Jeffrey Veregge has drawn eight solo illustrations of Marvel heroes. Here are the issues they will appear on:

Marvel's Voices: Indigenous Voices #1 (Dani Moonstar)
Iron Man #3
Amazing Spider-Man #52
Captain America #25
Avengers #38 (Black Panther)
Immortal Hulk #40
Thor #9
Widowmakers: Red Guardian and Yelena Belova #1 (Black Widow)

Here are those covers:

Image 1 of 8

"The story of the hero is an ancient one. Starting with the very first cave drawings, artists and writers from across the globe have both captured and shared the fateful acts of their people’s heroes," Veregge said in the announcement.

"Being from the Pacific Northwest, my own people, the S’Klallam Tribe, have used the art style known as Formline to record and share the stories of our people since time immemorial," he continues. "The art style I use in my own work today is an extension of the same shapes and forms used for hundreds of years by Native artists from and around the very same region."

The publisher also plans to release a 24"x36" poster by Veregge for the initiative as well. The artwork for that has not been released.

An exhibit of Marvel illustrations by Veregge was recently exhibited at the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian, titled 'Of Gods and Heroes.' The artwork was created for the exhibit and depicted a battle between Marvel heroes and aliens in the streets of New York City.

Veregge is also helping Marvel lead an anthology spotlighting Indigenous characters and authors for November, titled Marvel's Voices: Indigenous Voices.

“As a lifelong comic fan, artist, and Native American, I am truly honored to work with Marvel Comics today. Not only to create pieces that represent a voice for Indigenous People in honor of Native American Heritage month, but also for the opportunity to share the same storytelling spirit of my ancestors by sharing the tales of some of today’s heroes."

Chris Arrant covered comic book news for Newsarama from 2003 to 2022 (and as editor/senior editor from 2015 to 2022) and has also written for USA Today, Life, Entertainment Weekly, Publisher's Weekly, Marvel Entertainment, TOKYOPOP, AdHouse Books, Cartoon Brew, Bleeding Cool, Comic Shop News, and CBR. He is the author of the book Modern: Masters Cliff Chiang, co-authored Art of Spider-Man Classic, and contributed to Dark Horse/Bedside Press' anthology Pros and (Comic) Cons. He has acted as a judge for the Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards, the Harvey Awards, and the Stan Lee Awards. Chris is a member of the American Library Association's Graphic Novel & Comics Round Table. (He/him)