MarvelHot off President Barack Obama's historic support of gay marriage, the creative team behind the X-Men comic-book series has announced that a major gay superhero will be marrying his partner in its pages next month, providing yet another rich storyline for the film's producers to draw on.
(Don't forget: The comic-book's classic Phoenix Saga provided the blueprint for the narrative for X-Men: The Last Stand.)
And if that didn't set your geek heart aflutter, how about this: The big-screen's original Professor X himself, Patrick Stewart, tells E! News exclusively that he'd be up to return to the hit movie franchise.
Catch your breath there? Good…
First up, those wedding bells: Marvel Comics spilled the beans that Canadian hero Northstar, who has the ability to move at superhuman speed, will be marrying his partner, Kyle Jinadu, in Astonishing X-Men No. 51, which hits shelves June 20.
The wedding comes 20 years after Northstar came out as a gay man—er, superman—in the pages of Alpha Flight, becoming one of the first mainstream comic-book heroes to be written as an openly gay character.
"The Marvel Universe has always reflected the world outside your window, so we strive to make sure our characters, relationships and stories are grounded in that reality," says Marvel Editor-in-Chief Axel Alonso, according to reports.
But that's not all that's churning in the X-Men universe.
Stewart, who originated the role of Professor X in the first three X-Men films, reveals exclusively to E! News that he'd love to reprise his role.
We caught up with knighted British thespian—yep, that's Sir Professor X for you now—at yesterday's Peabody Awards ceremony in New York City.
When we asked if he'd be interested in doing a cameo in either of the two big franchises that have helped boost his career—X-Men and Star Trek—he readily stepped up with an answer.
"Those shows played an important and delightful part in my career and life," he told us, "and I would always be happy to return to them."
X-Men, of course, was rebooted last year with a younger cast and a new director, Matthew Vaughn, in X-Men: First Class. Star Trek, meanwhile, is now being helmed by Super 8 super-fanboy-cum-auteur J.J. Abrams.
Both franchises currently have sequels in the works.