Summary

• Peach Momoko's Ultimate X-Men offers a fresh and exciting vision of Marvel's mutants with beautiful watercolor art and interpretations of lesser-known heroes.
• Momoko's transition from cover work to sequential interior work has allowed her to showcase her storytelling abilities and prove her talent beyond just covers.
• Ultimate X-Men explores real-world social issues faced by modern-day kids, showcasing the impacts of things like social media, both good and bad.

Screen Rant was honored to get the opportunity to discuss the Ultimate X-Men series with the acclaimed comics creator Peach Momoko alongside her husband and manager, Yo Mutsu. Peach is an Eisner Award-winning comics artist, the architect of Marvel’s Momoko-verse – a Japanese folktale reimagining of the Marvel Universe – as well as the writer, artist, and creator of the highly anticipated relaunch of Ultimate X-Men.

Part of Marvel's new Ultimate Universe, alongside other new titles like Ultimate Spider-Man and Ultimate Black Panther, Momoko's Ultimate X-Men offers a brand-new vision of Marvel's mutants, with gorgeous water-color art and excitingly fresh interpretations of beloved heroes.

Editors Note: Peach Momoko’s answers were translated from Japanese with the help of her husband and manager, Yo Mutsu, and have been lightly edited with permission for clarity and perspective.

Screen Rant: So, before we dive into talking about Ultimate X-Men, which everyone was so excited about when the news first broke, I was hoping you could tell us a little about how your artistic process has changed from doing cover work to now doing more sequential interior work?

Peach Momoko: So, when I was doing just covers, I understood there was more storytelling involved in interiors, compared to covers. I am sure there are cover artists that tell stories in their covers too, but my covers don’t show the story or what’s going on [in the interior] usually. I had pressure, good pressure, to prove to the people that doubted my interior work – because everyone thought I was just a cover artist – so I wanted to show my interior storytelling as well as action movements, so I was in a good way, pressured.

SR: Was creating comics something you were always interested in, or was this something that interested you after you started doing comic cover work?

PM: I have never intended to do interior work, I actually never thought about doing comic covers as well. We basically started [going to] Comic Cons - I used to be more of a Gallery artist, like fine art - and then I was being published in a magazine, and the Chief Editor invited me to LA Comic Con and that is where I really found out about comics. The rest is that I started doing more and more shows at Comic Cons, without expecting to be published for covers, but just more connections were made and meeting people. Things just kept going and the next thing we knew, I was doing covers and the next thing we knew, Marvel offered me to do interiors, so nothing was really planned or expected to be a comics' artist at all.

SR: It must have been really exciting to see all these new doorways opening up after going to that first Comic Con! Is gallery work, outside of comics, something you are continuing to do?

PM: I am still really optimistic and really looking forward to doing gallery work and fine art in that field too, but I know I need to concentrate on the projects in front of me, mostly Marvel, like Ultimate X-Men. I am still 90% focused on comics stuff, but on the side, I am continuing to do my own original stuff, like fine art style, just so when the time is ready I have enough materials to put out to the galleries.

SR: Focusing in on Ultimate X-Men, I am wondering how the opportunity to write Ultimate X-Men as part of the Ultimate Universe came about?

PM: It was very, very random. We were at Disney Paris doing a mentorship - I was a teacher - at Disney's Hotel New York called “Marvel Art Atelier” for two days, so we were at Disney Paris teaching and then C.B. Cebulski just kind of called us, and we stepped out of the studio. C.B. sat me [Yo] and Peach down and just suddenly was… at that time we were finishing Demon Wars, so C.B. suddenly asked “Do you want to take a break from the Demon series?”

We were like, "Whatever is fine, we will take a break." We thought it was a break from interiors, but then he said “Well then, would you like to do Ultimate X-Men?” So it was just very random. That was how I got introduced to Ultimate X-Men, at Disney Paris, in a very random situation. We said Okay, and we didn’t know what Ultimate X-Men was at that time, but we knew it was a big project, and C.B. told us about Jonathan Hickman and all the other big projects both in the past and current, and we were both like, it sounded interesting and Peach likes the X-Men, so we said Okay.

SR: A lot of your Marvel work so far has been more independent, like cover work or the Momoko-verse which is its own universe now, but Ultimate X-Men is part of a multi-series shared universe. I am wondering how it has been working with a larger team of creators on a collaborative shared project?

PM: It is a bigger, shared universe with other creatives, but I feel like I am still kind of independent. Jonathan and C.B. kind of just let me do whatever, they just gave me... “What If? X-Men… but in Japan?” but with a whole new roster of X-Men, not Wolverine, not Cyclops, not the popular ones, that’s why its Hisako (Armor) and more centrally Japanese. Although it is shared, but because there is not too much that overlaps between Hickman’s story and my story, I kind of believe that Jonathan Hickman chose me to just go wild with how I wanted to tell the story.

But also, I have always enjoyed - even though Demon Days and Demon Wars is completely Momoko-verse - but there are those rules that it has to be like “Marvel wants Psylocke in Momoko-verse” or “Marvel wants Wolverine in Momoko-verse,” even though it is Wolverine as an actual wolf in Demon Days. There are still those small rules that I still have to go through so it still represents Marvel.

So Ultimate X-Men, there are some characters that they [Marvel] doesn’t want us to use, because they're used in Ultimate Black Panther or Ultimate Spider-Man, so there are some characters that are off limits. I enjoy those small rules so I can explore differently, because if it is completely open-ended it just becomes not Marvel, but I am having a blast working with these creative teams but without too much being in a box.

SR: My next question is about choosing Hisako, or Armor for Ultimate X-Men. Hisako is such an amazing character in the X-Men universe and there are so many fans who absolutely love her, and she hasn’t been featured as heavily in recent X-Men comics. What inspired you to choose Armor as the central figure, for at least the start of your Ultimate X-Men series?

PM: I decided to use Hisako because I was researching X-Men characters, particularly Japanese [ones], and I found Hisako had the power of “Armor.” But when I read it I felt that the armor is actually protecting Hisako, and the armor is almost a symbolic meaning to “a girl in her own shell.” She just can’t fit into the world, so she is always kind of protecting her own bubble. With that concept, I felt very interested in this concept, and I enjoy touching on adolescence, these teenager kids going through live and how to live life, in school, [with] adults. I just felt that Hisako was a perfect character for a theme I really like to touch on.

The Ultimate X-Men issue #1, the main cover, Hisako is kind of balled up, she's curled up, with the armor is like protecting her, and there are all these talismans and amulets around on the cover. That was my first initial concept art, so I read about Hisako, and then with that image I painted that imagery, the cover, and that started everything for me. I saw Hisako as kind of sad, having all kinds of things going on, dealing with life, which we think all teenagers go through life like that, kind of.

SR: Amazing, sounds like Ultimate X-Men is going to be a very emotional, character-driven story. One of the questions I was going to ask was that I would love to hear how themes in other works of yours like adolescence and metamorphosis have influenced your work in Ultimate X-Men?

PM: I feel that adolescence, what kids go through, is something that for me comes naturally to me, it is easy to tell a story. I feel that all X-Men characters seem to go through this quite a bit. So the adolescence, the metamorphosis, they are all natural and are stories that I always want to tell.

SR: One thing that people got super excited about was seeing Maystorm in the preview for Ultimate X-Men #1. Maystorm is the first New Champions cover character to become an official canon Marvel hero. I’m wondering if that was asked of you Peach, or if you decided to bring Maystorm into Ultimate X-Men?

PM: It was almost simultaneous! I was drafting out Ultimate X-Men and when I created the Maystorm character for the Champions Variant I actually had all her characteristics – almost a character design sheet – this is before we were approached with Ultimate X-Men. I did the character design as if the character Maystorm would be coming out, without Marvel asking for that.

When I was drafting [Ultimate X-Men], I wanted to see if I could introduce Maystorm, even as a subcharacter, into the story, but before we asked that to Marvel, Marvel came to us and was like, “If you wanted to create a new character, it doesn’t have to be an existing Marvel character, a brand-new character, let’s say Maystorm, you can introduce that [character]!” So it was a very natural thing. When we got that email I was thrilled that Marvel offered me to add a new character and I already had Maystorm in mind, so I made the story between Armor and Maystorm very naturally that way.

SR: That sounds like it all came together so perfectly! You were also asked to design the look of Ultimate Storm for Ultimate Black Panther, what was the experience of getting to redesign such an iconic character like Storm?

PM: I was really happy and honored when Marvel approached me for Ultimate Storm, I have always loved Storm, and them asking for me to redesign Storm for Ultimate Black Panther was a dream come true. The [design] theme from Africa or Wakanda and, Storm is supposed to be from a "liberation army" [freedom fighter] for Ultimate Storm… I have always enjoyed the, you know, “fighting female character” and also the designs of any African or Japanese tribes, I have always been interested in.

I also really like to show movement, like outfits that you can actually see movement within the outfit. Something a bit more “real,” you can’t fight in a specific outfit, they would be too tight and wouldn't be natural, so I like to design things that make sense in the real world as well. I have always been interested in that kind of design concepts, like with motion and movement, but also showing strength and beauty at the same time. I feel like Marvel knew that this is the kind of stuff I like to do, so this is probably one of the reasons why they approached me to design the Ultimate Storm character, because of my interests.

SR: The preview pages for Ultimate X-Men #1 are beautiful and also a bit terrifying – particularly Hisako pulling on the ingrown hair on her forehead – and it seems inspired by the body horror genre. I am wondering if you could speak to this inspiration and if this type of body horror is something that will be seen throughout your Ultimate X-Men?

PM: The body horror is something I kind of grew up with, I was inspired heavily with Japanese manga, body horror, and horror in general. So, for Ultimate X-Men, or any books that I write, I always want to put in what I love and what I understand, so for Ultimate X-Men as well, maybe not full-blown body horror everywhere, but I want to make sure I put in spices here and there. Not overdo the same thing over and over again. Once in a while there’s some body horror here, once in a while there’s some body horror there, so it makes it more interesting because you don’t know when it is going to show up, so I am very consciously putting body horrors. So yes, you will be seeing spices of body horror throughout Ultimate X-Men.

SR: That is very exciting! Jonathan Hickman, when talking about the original Ultimate Universe, said it was so popular because it was, “A reflection of the world outside your window.” I’m wondering what real-world modern-day issues or experiences you hope to tackle or touch on with your Ultimate X-Men?

PM: I really put in the real-world problems, the social problems of kids, usually into the stories, a lot of times I believe that even 30 years ago or 40 years ago, kids problems they were facing in life are almost the same as what they are facing right now, its just the difference is how the information is getting out compared to 40 years ago to now. So the main core, you know like getting bullied, or getting all this information that the kids are kind of stressing about, they are the same or similar, but now with the current Ultimate and current generation, information is received and put out much more easily now, because of social media.

Social media numbers are really, really important for these kids nowadays, so in my Ultimate story I want to make sure that I put in that kind of social media stress, and numbers, that the kids are really going through. I’m really making sure those real-world social problems are faced in my story. Not necessarily that social media is a bad thing, that kids are just going through bad stuff, I am also putting in that because social media is so easy to get, information is so easy to receive, and kids can get inspired by [people].

Not only does social media have its bad sides, but also its good side will be seen in the story. So, in issue #3 you will see how Maystorm... what platform Maystorm is looking at where she got inspired by Storm, so you get to see that kind of usage of social media, using social media as a core of everything in their life - good, bad, everything.

With the X-Men's acclaimed Krakoan Era coming to an end, Peach Momoko's Ultimate X-Men will be an exciting and fresh take on the beloved mutants of Marvel. Featuring lesser-known heroes like Armor, and new characters like Maystorm - instead of focusing on mega-popular ones like Wolverine or Cyclops - Peach Momoko has been given the flexibility to "go wild." Exploring themes like adolescence and the impacts of social media, all while taking place in Japan, Ultimate X-Men will give readers a unique perspective on the mutant experience, filled with body horror, epic powers, and gorgeous art.

Ultimate X-Men #1 from Marvel Comics debuts March 6th, 2024.