Nothing New for the New Mutants

In a universe where characters don't age, what does the "new generation of mutants" really mean if the old generation never goes anywhere? This is an issue that has plagued the X-Men franchise since the beginning. At the core of it's premise, X-Men is about a school, a school that teaches young gifted mutants to use their powers for good. Since a school always needs a new batch of students, there have been numerous groups of new character who have debuted over the years that are dubbed as the "next generation of X-Men!" However, the first generations of X-Men never left to make room for their replacements resulting in the X-Men's infamous amount of countless obscure background characters.

The first groups of new mutants debuted in 1984 in "Marvel Graphic Novel #4," and were a team of teenagers recruited by Professor Xavier who believed his original team of X-Men had perished on a space mission. Of course, the X-Men were alive and well and the New Mutants team continued to train and eventually went on to become X-Force. However, these new mutants never achieved the popularity that the first two X-Men generations achieved and still hold today.

Marvel has not given up on the idea of promoting new generations of X-Men characters and have tried numerous attempts to sell a book of teenage X-Men students in recent years, with varied success. Meanwhile, the original "New Mutants" star in their own current series, under the name... "New Mutants." "The fact that they're still called the "New Mutants" thirty years after they were introduced is just silly," said James Wepy, a Hofstra University student and long time X-Men fan. "They're still treated like kids and I don't understand why more writers don't shine the spotlight on them and let them join one of the main X-Men teams." However, most writers seem to have a soft spot for them and their current series has held up remarkably well despite fan's frequent worries about its cancellation. Starting with issue #33, the New Mutants will have a new artist, David Lopez, whose new team designs have left many readers unenthusiastic. "Why must the whole team be wearing the same boring costumes?," Mr. Wepy added. "They're not students in training anymore." Below is a picture of Lopez's designs.