Comics creator Rob Liefeld, who has spent quite a bit of his career working on X-Men characters at Marvel, has shed light on how Disney’s near-finalized reacquisition of the film rights from Fox will affect the comics moving forward.
“Here’s the deal. Since the X-Men movies came out and Disney didn’t have them, I don’t know if you’ve ever paid attention, but Marvel kind of turned the volume down on the X-Men for almost 20 years,” Liefeld reportedly said at a panel at Wizard World Comic Con in Austin, according to MovieWeb. “Now that they have them more, what was told to me was, ‘Oh yeah. Our budgets on the X-Men books are back up to what they used to be because now we own them all.’”
RELATED: Rob Liefeld Working on ‘Huge X-Men Crossover’ for 2019
For years, fans speculated that Fox releasing X-Men movies resulted in Marvel cutting back on how much it promoted its mutant characters. Liefeld’s statement here seems to confirm that there’s some merit to that speculation and that, going forward, Marvel will start putting more resources into its X-Men books.
After months of negotiations, Disney approved a $71.3 billion deal acquiring most of Fox’s properties including the cinematic licensing for the X-Men and Fantastic Four. The complete acquisition is expected to be finalized by summer 2019. Disney purchased Marvel in 2009.
KEEP READING: Marvel’s Kevin Feige Confirmed to Oversee Disney’s X-Men Films