Jonathan Hickman is the award-winning writer/artist of critically acclaimed independent titles Pax Romana, Transhuman and The Nightly News. Teaming with writer Brian Michael Bendis, he launched Marvel's Secret Warriors, spinning out of Secret Invasion. He then wrote the Dark Reign: Fantastic Four limited series, which served as a warm-up for his revered runs on Fantastic Four and FF, as well as two S.H.I.E.L.D. series. Hickman penned numerous Ultimate Universe titles before bringing his intricate plotting to Avengers and New Avengers. Hickman's years of planning culminated with the Marvel Universe-shattering Secret Wars. His impressive list of credits includes a trio of lauded series for Image: East of West, Secret and the Eisner Award-nominated The Manhattan Projects. Hickman returned to Marvel to mastermind a transformative relaunch of its mutant titles, beginning with House of X and Powers of X, and continuing with X-Men.

A professional comic-book artist since 2003, Dustin Weaver's work on Dark Horse's Star Wars and King Kong led him to Marvel, where he's drawn X-Universe storylines in X-Men: Kingbreaker, X-Men: Legacy and the X-Necrosha one-shot. Weaver has collaborated with writer Jonathan Hickman on two S.H.I.E.L.D. series, as well as Avengers. He wrote the Rocksteady and Bebop issue of IDW's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Villains Micro-Series and produces the webcomic Amnia Cycle on his blog.