Marvel Denies Rigging X-Men Fan Vote Over Controversial New Member

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The recent X-Men: Hellfire Gala #1 saw a new X-Men team being formed from democratically elected Krakoan mutants, but one surprise was the winner of Marvel's Fan Vote, which saw the Avengers-focused Firestar chosen as a new member of the X-Men. Dedicated X-Men fans have been skeptical of whether or not the fan vote had been rigged, but in a new interview with Chris Hassan at AIPT the X-Men Senior Editor Jordan White assured fans that the vote was 100% genuine.

While the fan vote options for this year's X-Men election featured little known mutants like Micromax or Avalanche, the addition of Firestar into the vote was still a surprise for many since she is often considered to be explicitly not a member of the X-Community. Angelica Jones very deliberately has not joined the mutant nation of Krakoa, so even though her addition to the team may come as a surprise, it will also lead to a ton of interesting drama and intrigue.

Related: Cyclops Is Going to Kill Professor Xavier Again: Theory Explained

Firestar was first introduced as a character on the beloved 1980s Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends alongside other mutant Iceman, but quickly became a fan favorite character and was introduced into Marvel comics canon soon after. A major plot of Angelica Jones introduction into Marvel involved the then evil Emma Frost manipulating her into joining her Massachusetts Academy, a rival of the Xavier School, while secretly training her to become an assassin without her knowledge. To do this she used a hypnotizing bracelet to give Angelica horrific nightmares of all the X-Men attacking her and also murdered her horse Butter Rum to convince her she couldn't control her powers, and although she eventually figured out Frost's deception the