Marvel is in full-on sell mode with their upcoming big Summer event that pits Marvel’s two most popular superhero teams — the Avengers and the X-Men — against each other.

The event is being led by some of Marvel’s best creative types including Brian Michael Bendis, Jason Aaron, Matt Fraction, Jonathan Hickman, Ed Brubaker, John Romita Jr., Adam Kubert and Olivier Copiel. The cover art for issue #1 of Avengers vs. X-Men comes to us from Jim Cheung. Check out the cover art here below.

Marvel is killing two birds with one stone: they’re offering a deal to celebrate the holidays and getting readers ready for next year’s big Avengers vs. X-Men mega event. From now through December 30, 2011 at 11:59pm EST, Marvel is offering a selection of digital titles featuring the stars of the upcoming event for $.99 cents each. They’ve titled the sale AVENGERS VS X-MEN: MAJOR PLAYERS.

In March, Marvel Comics will be releasing Avengers vs. X-Men #0 from the creative team of Brian Michael Bendis, Jason Aaron, and Frank Cho. This prelude issue is meant to set up the coming war of heroes and for better or for worse appears to be focused on Wanda Maximoff aka The Scarlet Witch and Hope Summers. The Scarlet Witch is one of those great classic Marvel characters that has been totally destroyed in the last ten years and ends up being a writing crutch for Marvel creators. It would be cool if this storyline is what rescues the character and makes her cool again. I wouldn’t count on it though.

At any rate, here’s the cover for issue #0 of what will hopefully be an entertaining 12-issue war of heroes.

Earlier today, we reported on the next big thing coming to Marvel Comics — Avengers VS. X-Men.

While you’ll have to wait until April 2012 for Avengers VS. X-Men #1 to simultaneously hit store shelves and the Marvel Comics App, you can participate in the official launch of the new event with Marvel Comics during their Live Stream event, which kicks off today at 3pm EST.

Pretty much every year, comic book publishers unleash a monthly event comic to boost excitement and sales in their comics. And this week Marvel Comics announced that event as The Avengers vs. The X-Men.

Now, I’m not quite sure how, but more on that later. Avengers Vs. X-Men will be a bi-weekly, six-month comic coming in at a total of 12 issues and features some of the biggest names in comics. Brian Michael Bendis, Jason Aaron, Jonathan Hickman, and Matt Fraction will all be on writing duties, while John Romita Jr., Olivier Coipel, and Adam Kubert will be working on art.