Marvel’s Most Acclaimed Writer Is STILL Criminally Underrated, & I’ll Tell You the 1 Reason Why

Marvel Comics has no shortage of great writers, but somehow its biggest name, Jonathan Hickman, still has tricks that astound me when I think about him. I can’t fully quantify how he keeps doing it, or getting away with it, but it’s a skill I’m massively jealous of, and one that deserves its flowers.

Hickman is one of Marvel’s biggest stars, and he’s more than earned his accolades. Between reinventing the X-Men for the Krakoa age and his work with the Avengers, he’s had his hands in some of the biggest corners of the Marvel Universe – and that’s to say nothing of Ultimate Spider-Man. But if there’s one part of his storytelling that’s somehow under-discussed and underrated, it’s his skill as a provocateur.

Hickman’s books demand to be talked about for their wild swings, and they ignite passionate arguments from fans time and time again. None of this is accidental. Hickman knows what will get readers riled up, but manipulating readers’ emotions is never the entire point. The books wouldn’t work if they weren’t great regardless.

Hickman’s X-Men Era Is Provocative in Overt and Subtle Ways

House of X and Powers of X Changed the Franchise Forever

The perfect case study for Hickman’s skill is the Krakoa Era of the X-Men, which began with 2019’s House of X / Powers of X by Hickman, Pepe Larraz, R. B. Silva, Marte Gracia, and Clayton Cowles. From House of X #1onward, readers felt uncomfortable. Mutants had achieved a paradise, but were being directly confrontational with humanity, with Xavier declaring the dream of integration a failure. Less charitable readers basically declared the X-Men villains, or worse, fascists. Five years later and I’m still blown away that Hickman made a comic where everyone who read it came away with a strong opinion on the politics of a fictional nation state.

The sometimes-cultish bent of Krakoan resurrection also contributes to this mood. The best example takes place in X-Men #7 by Hickman, Leinil Francis Yu, Sunny Gho, and Cowles, which establishes the Crucible, the arena where depowered mutants fight and die in order to be reborn with their powers. Every emotion the issue invokes sits wrong. I feel a mix of horror at seeing Melody Guthrie, the Crucible’s young combatant, brutally killed, undercut by the almost-religious reverence and joy with which she’s reborn afterward. Shouldn’t we feel happy? However, like Nightcrawler in the issue itself, we sit uncomfortably, and that’s exactly the point.

Hickman’s Marvel Characters Are Just as Conflicted as His Readers

Panels from New Avengers #6 by Jonathan Hickman, Steve Epting, Rick Magyar, Frank D’Armata, and Joe Caramagna

Another perfect example is Hickman’s New Avengers with artist Steve Epting. This series put Marvel’s Illuminati through variations on the classic trolley problem again and again and again. Would they kill an alternate earth to save ours? Even if they did, could they do it again? Forever? Hickman’s Marvel work constantly pushes his heroes to the edge of their moral event horizons, and their emotions mirror ours. Hickman’s heroes are conflicted and uncomfortable, and thus so are we. That’s not easy to pull off. The story’s emotions and stakes both have to feel real, and there are plenty of comics that fail at that.

However, Hickman doesn’t need to lean on making readers uncomfortable to be subtly provocative, as demonstrated by his latest Marvel project, Ultimate Spider-Man, with artist Marco Checchetto. This book instead uses Hickman’s powers in a different way. Ultimate Spider-Man is partially built on the tension between what readers expect from canon and what’s actually going to happen. Uncle Ben’s around, so he’ll die soon, right? Green Goblin’s a good guy, but surely, he’s turning bad, right? Hickman is incensing fan theories and discussion in a completely different way that’s just as skilled as when his heroes are making terrible decisions.

Hickman’s Creator-Owned Work Offers Something Slightly Different from His Marvel Fare

The Black Monday Murders #1 Cover by Tomm Coker

In some ways, Hickman has more similarities to writers like Mark Millar, another provocateur whose weapon of choice is ultraviolence and all-around edginess. Hickman isn’t immune from edginess himself, often toeing the line of good taste in ways that resemble the excess of 2000s comics like Millar’s. The difference is that, for the most part, Hickman has a level of restraint, and his edginess is never the entire point of a story. This line-walking is more obvious in Hickman’s creator-owned work, which often plays with alternate histories with a sense of grand irreverence.

For instance, one of the best urban fantasy comics from Image, The Black Monday Murders by Hickman, Tomm Coker, Michael Garland, and Rus Wooton, invents a conspiracy of magical bankers ruling the world’s finances, which notably includes the Rothschilds, an uber-rich dynasty targeted by real life antisemitic conspiracy theories about global domination. Hickman isn’t lending credence to these theories, but he doesn’t not want readers to draw the connection. Again, he’s teetering on the edge of bad taste. Maybe it’s too close for some, but it’s impossible to ignore, despite only being a tiny part of the comic as a whole.

How Does Hickman Remain on Top of the Marvel Bullpen?

What His Craft Says About Him

Part of Hickman’s success is that he’s so deliberate with his technical craft, and more often than not has some of the best creatives in the industry collaborating with him. At the end of the day, Hickman’s provocation only works because of the intentionalityof every decision, and that’s something that’s gone under the radar despite his massive Marvel Comics successes.

Hickman’s next Marvel single issue, Ultimate Spider-Man #11, is available November 20th, 2024 from Marvel Comics.