Marvel editor-in-chief Axel Alonso responded to the sudden attention to two variant cover shifts which brought sudden media attention (see "Marvel Pulls Manara Variants"), clarifying in a statement to CBR that the move was due to overbooking of artist Milo Manara.

"Clearly, unequivocally, I want to state that this is only a scheduling problem," Alonso said.  "The Manara covers were recast due to his schedule.  He will be doing more covers for us, in fact, he's working on one right now that will be announced sometime soon.  This is purely an issue of his schedule not permitting him to do the two covers, Axis #1 and Thor #2.  We overbooked him, and the timing didn't work out."
 
That may be true, but if Manara or Marvel were looking for a way to let the brouhaha die down for a while, this would be a way to do it.