ANOLE [Victor Borkowski]
BLING! [Roxanne ‘Roxy’ Washington]
CULLEN BLOODSTONE
DAKEN AKIHIRO
HULKLING [Theodore ‘Teddy’ Altman]
KARMA [Xi’an Coy Mahn]
KAROLINA DEAN
LOKI LAUFEYSON, God of Mischief
MOONDRAGON [Heather Douglas]
MYSTIQUE [Raven Darkholme]
NORTHSTAR [Jean-Paul Beaubier]
PRODIGY [David Alleyne]
RICTOR [Julio Esteban Ricter]
SHATTERSTAR [Gaveedra-7]
WICCAN [William ‘Billy’ Kaplan], the Demiurge
Since Rachel and Karma are both currently unavailable (Kitty and Karma were implied to have been involved at one point), Illyana does make the most sense if they are wanting to have Kate dating another established X-Woman. As you said, not every close friendship needs to get turned into a romance, but some subtext is already there between Kate and Illyana so its not like it would be out of the blue.
And what other same sex crossover couple could happen between the two books? Emma and Kwannon? Quentin and Bronze? MagiKat is the one that makes the most sense.
I will never be down with Kitty dating Magik. Kitty banged her brother and broke his heart by leaving him at the alter in front of all their friends. But I'm sure that won't stop Marvel, considering Rachel is dating the lady who tried to cuck her mom, kissed her dad, kissed her uncle, and banged multiple clones of her brother.
Well...seems like we're getting even LESS Pride month content this year than initially expected with a stupid move from Marvel: Celebrating "straight allies" instead of LGBTQ+ characters...
Is there anything actually saying that there won't be LGBTQ+ characters on those covers as well? I would guess that they will likely be showing the 'ally' character with their queer friends, teammates, etc.
Its probably in reference to various LGBTQ+ characters connected to Spider-Man. Black Cat would be the most prominent, but there is also a link to Iceman that has been carried over into the comics thanks to the AMAZING FRIENDS cartoon of the 80s. Web-Weaver is a gay Spider-Man from an alternate universe, and he had Peter have teamed up in Spider-Verse adventures. Max Modell worked with Peter Parker and has helped Spider-Man on occasion, and Peter was a guest at Max and Hector's wedding. Spidey and Deadpool have also been close allies--they co-starred in a team-up book that lasted for 50 issues, and was full of homoerotic subtext (and just plain text) about their friendship.
For that matter Spidey's friendship with Johnny Storm has also been noted for its homoerotic moments, although Johnny has not been officially outed.