By Steve Morris

If you choose to believe the words of everybody’s favourite paper-munching Marvel editor, then it looks as though Kieron Gillen’s Journey Into Mystery isn’t going to be cancelled as a consequence of Marvel NOW!!

Tom Brevoort’s Formspring account is something worth keeping an eye on, not least because it suggests that Jean Grey and Black Panther are the two most popular characters to ever exist in the medium. But also because he also mixes repeating the company line on certain stories with the occasional step into secret announcements. And in this case, a plucky fan appears to have asked the simple question “will JiM be cancelled?” and receive the simple answer “nope”. In essence, this fan seems to have basically won a confirmation that the series will not be cancelled once writer Kieron Gillen leaves.

Gillen’s series has been one of the rare titles which gets by on the literary style of the writer, rather then the central character or ‘importance’ of the storyline. There are few other books on the market, as far as the Big Two are concerned, where the voice of the writer is one of the core appeals of the book. Which, that means it’s going to be very hard for whoever comes on to the series next. The book has rather low sales, but the teaser images released a few weeks ago seemed to suggest that Kid Loki, protagonist of the title and inspirer of Tumblrs worldwide, may be joining a team of some kind.

Whether this would be the new direction for Journey Into Mystery – which would, really, not benefit from the next writer attempting to imitate Gillen – or a suggestion of a new book designed to boost Loki’s profile… who knows.

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