2026 is the Year of the Cyclops (Cyclopes?)

Trust me when I say that we are so back. I’ll try to be brief, as I know I could go on endlessly about the X-Men if given the opportunity, but it truly is a great year to be a fan of Scott Summers (I am!).
Let’s run through the timeline.

• February – Cyclops #1, from Alex Paknadel and Roge Antonio, his first solo comic book in over a decade, released to positive reviews.
• May – Alongside the Fantastic Four’s Thing, Cyclops was released as a playable character in Marvel Cosmic Invasion via paid downloadable content.
• June (NOW!) – For the second half of the current Marvel Rivals season and following the addition of Devil Dinosaur, Cyclops will be added to the game.
• July – The hotly-anticipated second season of X-Men ‘97 releases on July 1st, as the third consecutive month where Ray Charles plays the character (so it’s a pretty great year for him too).
• December – James Marsden will return to the role for the first time since 2014’s X-Men: Days of Future Past, when Avengers: Doomsday hits cinemas – maybe in this one he’ll get to do something! 

On another note (that makes the title of this article make sense), July will also be a big year for another famous cyclops in fiction- when Christopher Nolan’s take on Homer’s Odyssey releases in cinemas on the 16th.
It’s already made millions of dollars in pre-sale tickets in the United States alone, meaning it will surely be one of the biggest features this year. Bill Irwin, who played the robot TARS in Interstellar, is tackling the task of puppeteering Polyphemus to bring him to life.

Overall, if you’re a fan of characters who are metaphorically or literally one-eyed, there’s something for you this year. Hooray for that!

Written by: Harry Gerreyn