X-Men ‘97

Hey everyone and welcome today we will be talking about the show X-Men ’97. Fun Fact, the show's title gets its ’97 due to the original series ending in 1997. This season came out in 2024 and stars George Buza, Cal Dodd, and Holly Chou and was created by Beau DeMayo. So without further ado let’s get right into it.

X-Men 97 takes place following the death of Professor Xavier. The team is surprised to see that the professor has left his school to his former friend and arch-nemesis Magneto. The team must put aside their issues with their new leader to confront some old villains and some new ones as well that will really test them as a team.

X-Men ’97 is an action superhero show. It has similar vibes to X-Men: The Animated Series, X-Men: Evolution, or Young Justice.

X-men ’97 is structured interestingly to me, there is an overarching story but we also have a lot of character side stories that help you understand the characters more. The interesting part to me is at first I didn’t think the episodes were connecting at all but then as the season was finishing I was able to draw the connections. The way it was structured really helped me to care about more of the characters and understand them better.

X-Men: The Animated Series and X-Men: Evolution is part of the reason why I love superhero media today and so I was excited when this show was announced and knew I was going to watch. While I did enjoy the original, I rewatched part of it before this and the dialogue in that show is so cringe I’m so happy that in this show they made sure the dialogue is much more digestible. I thought they would keep the animation style but they changed it obviously because it’s like almost 30 years later but the animation was so colorful and they did a really good job showing the emotions of the characters. Some scenes even looked like a video game and then the line delivery was just very reminiscent of an arcade game like Street Fighter from the 90’s. I have mixed feelings about reboots but I think that this show rebooted a show and somehow improved on its predecessor which is a feat not many can say that they did.

I first have to talk about the theme song in the intro because no matter what you think about the show, that theme song is epic and I feel like it gets you excited to watch the episode and is a great way to remind you of the characters. I like how as the roster changed so did the intro but they kept the end part of Magneto and Professor X going head-to-head with their respective teams. If you pay attention you’ll also hear the theme song in some of the episodes but it’s arranged differently to fit the tone of the scene that it is in which I thought was cool. They also kept the theme in the end credits but it is a more mellow tone as you are taking in what happened in the episode.

Omega-level mutant is something I’ve been hearing about more lately and one that stands out for me is the one and only Storm because she’s one of my favorites. I feel like we never really got to see what an Omega-level mutant would look like on screen but in this show, they give it to us in the first episode. Cyclops drops this dope line, “give them the forecast”, which had me excited, and then we see the sentinels say Omega-level threat detected and I knew something was about to go down and I was losing my mind. Storm uses her powers to summon lighting to heat up the sand so that it becomes glass and then makes a glass tornado which was such an inventive way to show not only how powerful she is but also smart. Later on, we also see Magneto, another Omega-level mutant who shows how much he can do with his magnetic powers.

I was so sad that Storm lost her powers in episode 2 partly because I love that character but also because I hate when powerful characters in shows have powers and then temporarily lose them for a season. Thankfully this show didn’t follow suit and make us wait an entire season, just a couple of episodes. In the episode where she gets her powers back, she is attempting to save Forge while being hunted by a demon and she is at her lowest point when this demon called the adversary also confines her in a small space bringing out her claustrophobia but instead of submitting she fights back and not only escapes but gets her powers back in an epic moment. I love how after this episode she rejoins the team and helps save Jubilee and reminds us of how powerful she is.

Rogue is a character I feel bad for because she can’t touch the ones she loves without hurting them. We start off the season with her and Gambit, who I loved as a couple, but she struggled not touching him, and with Magneto she was able to because of his powers which made her have to choose between the two and she chooses Magneto for a minute and realized that wasn’t right but she was too late to rectify her relationship with Gambit because a sentinel attacked. While trying to save Genosha she is incapacitated by Gambit because she almost gets shot down and at the end of the day, he loves her and doesn’t want her to get hurt but this leads to his death which is so sad because the episode ends with her saying I can’t feel you which is something that’s also said by Wanda in the WandaVision show in a sad scene as well with her and vision. Her character shows grief beautifully and shows how sometimes it makes you change your perspective on things and for Rogue that eventually leads her to align with Magneto because she has seen what the worst of humans can do and how much they can take away. The other characters do not understand her reasoning but she reminds them that they weren’t at Genosha which I think is an important point, they witnessed it from afar and it was sad but Rogue is the only one of the X-men who was actually there and made it out alive which I’m sure also brings on this sense of guilt.

I know Rogue stole powers from Captain Marvel in the OG series but I forgot just how powerful she is. When she’s looking for Trask she goes to a government building where General Ross says the building is made to keep the Hulk out and then she proceeds to get in. Her emotions probably played a part but I was like wow Rogue is pretty strong. I love how she directed that strength in the last episode at Bastion and gave him the best hooks to his face while saying “his name was Gambit, remember it” which also had me on the edge of my seat cheering for her and she didn’t let up, she was punching and headbutting and I felt like they did her justice. One subtle thing when she’s fighting Bastion is how she also sheds a tear because the emotions are still raw and this is the person who killed the one she loved the most.

Speaking of Gambit, I love how in such a short time on this show he made such a big impact on the story and the characters’ lives. Even though Rogue has her own issues with not touching people I feel like Gambit tried really hard to help accomodate so that she felt loved and not left out. I was sad when he saw Rogue leave Magneto’s room and then they danced and kissed in Genosha but I feel like he knew that she still loved him as much as he loved her. He had a very awesome way to go out which is him going straight for the sentinel to prevent it from hurting others and the sentinel stabbing him which could have been the end but he uses his last bit of energy to supercharge the sentinel and says a very Gambit line “The names Gambit, remember it” which was such a dope line and it was said at the perfect moment right before he made that sentinel go boom and its also the title of the episode. I was shook after that episode but even though he was dead you could still feel his influence throughout the season.

Cyclops is a character that I have never liked and I think for the first time this show changed that. From the first episode, I loved how he used his powers in such a creative way. When saving Roberto he used his powers to push them away from the villains and when the sentinels shot their aircraft out of the sky he let all the flyers save the non-flyers and he used his beams to land and he really stood out as a leader. This show also made me get clarification of his powers which are red but aren’t heat-based powers but instead a heatless concussive force so it’s like getting hit by something, hard. I hate seeing the love triangle with him, Jean, and Wolverine, and while this show doesn’t have that it did have a love triangle with him, Madelyne, and Jean for a minute which was complicated, to say the least.

Scott and Madelyne had a baby named Nathan better known as Cable who was experimented on by Mr. Sinister. It was sad that he had to send him away as a baby for a chance of survival and how he was trying so hard not to become like his father and abandon his child without saying goodbye. He loses Madelyne in the Genosha disaster which is clearly hard for him. He eventually reunited with his son and I loved seeing them and Jean team up to take on the Prime Sentinels and prove that the Summers family is one you want on your side. To add to him not being there for Nathan’s life he also had to separate from him during the last battle in which Jean telepathically links them so they can say goodbye and shows Cable/Nathan how he has his dad’s eyes. After he says goodbye he is trying to save Earth from asteroid m and we see him take off his visor to supercharge something and he’s crying which is sad.

Jean Grey or Madelyne Pryor or Goblin Queen, you never know which one you might get. I was kind of surprised to see them add the Madelyne storyline because clones can get confusing but they handled it well. Looking back it was cool to see how it was hinted in the first episode when Madelyne used Cerebro and felt the connection to Jean but didn’t understand it. It was sad that they didn’t know when they were switched and this led to some drama and confusion with Scott. One thing that was kind of funny was Jean catching Scott and Madelyne having a telepathic date and she said girl your time is up. I love how even though Cable isn’t technically her son, she stepped up to be the mother he didn’t have and helped Scott deal with his grief.

When rewatching the OG show I just felt like Jean was always so dramatic crying and her powers were so weak and I was so happy in this show they fixed that. Like we see her lift half of a building and launch it into the sea and I was like oh yeah this show is showing the Jean I know and love. In the end, she was going toe to toe with Sinister and she was holding her own, launching whatever she could and giving that man a run for his money until he decided to use Cable against her, and to be honest she could’ve taken him but I think she lost on purpose because she didn’t want Cyclops to have to choose. But surprise surprise she was not dead because the Phoenix woke up proving she still had some left in her and got Bastian under control and then unraveled Sinister’s DNA that he stole turning him into nothing which is a great payback for what he did to her and Morph. Jean Grey has always been one of my favorite characters in the X-Men and this show just reminded me why I fell in love with this character. Also, the Phoenix rising from the bottom of a lake seems a bit reminiscent of the live-action X-Men films but better written.

Nightcrawler becomes a mainstay after the Genosha destruction episode and I was glad we got to see more of him. Nightcrawler is a German mutant who is very religious, which makes him perfect to give the eulogy for Gambit but don’t be mistaken, he will fight to protect the ones he loves. He is very smart in how he uses his teleporting skills and he has a tail that just seems like another limb for him. There’s a scene where he teleports with Wolverine and it was cool to experience what someone traveling with him would experience. He’s very protective of Rogue and when the sentinels come and Wolverine says something about 6 reasons for resisting and then Nightcrawler comes in with swords and says actually 9 I knew crap was about to hit the fan and it did because he was using those teleporting skills and his hand to hand combat to slice and dice them. I just felt like he was brought in at the right time as a support system for Rogue.

I think my favorite part about Wolverine in this show is that he was barely there. He’s still his grumpy self when he is on screen, except maybe when he’s with Morph. He has been the star child of X-Men media and I feel that after the live-action movies, I got tired of the character because in my opinion there were more interesting characters to focus on. He was the only one who I could see actually fighting Magneto and going for blood but I did not expect to see Magneto rip out his adamantium skeleton from his body and leave him clinging to life. This show gave me the perfect amount of Wolverine and made sure the show focused on the team as a whole.

Morph gave us a look at so many superheroes and I loved when in battle I would see one and be like oh my god I know them. A small thing I noticed is that Morph uses they/them pronouns which is something that really fits their character. Morph and Wolverine’s relationship is hinted at being much more than friends throughout the season and in the finale Morph confesses their feelings for him as his future is unsure. They also added some comedic relief throughout the season and one of my favorites is when he shows Sinister what he looks like after the Phoenix strips his DNA.

Jubilee isn’t as big in this season in terms of being on the front lines with the sentinels but I think her role is still very important. She is helping Roberto come to terms with his mutant abilities and realize that he is being discriminated against. I think that yes the big battles are important but through her character, we saw that sometimes the path in front of you is helping others realize who they are and accept it and show them that they may be different but that doesn’t make them any less than and that they should embrace their uniqueness which is what she helps Roberto do. She gets sucked into one of Mojo’s games and we see an older version of her and I wonder if that character will come back into play. Her powers have been described as fireworks even though it is more than that and she has been shown as kind of weak but in the finale they finally let her have a moment to show that she is not weak when she is able to hold her own against Bastion and launched him into some machinery and had his face all discombobulated and leaking. Hopefully, with some of the team missing we see her step into a bigger role in the future.

Also to say I was pissed when Roberto attacked her when the Professor’s team was going against Magneto’s is an understatement. Like she was nothing but nice to you and this is how you treat her? He kinda redeemed himself in the next episode by saving her from falling out of the asteroid but he better not do it again.

Bastion was a cool villain who was playing Puppetmaster all season and finally stepped out of the shadows when he was ready to set his plan in motion. His human sentinels were crazy strong and I was worried when the X-Men couldn’t take out one and then saw he had an army. His powers were cool even though he used them for bad things.

I just have to say I think Professor X and Magneto are both wrong and the solution is probably a mix of their ideas. Xavier wants mutants and humans to coexist but seems to ignore the fact that humans hate what they don’t understand or can’t control and have no interest in being second on the food chain and will do whatever to get on top. Magneto is right about how humans will attack mutants but he is also feeding their hate by constantly instilling fear into them by you know having a giant meteor floating over them and using his powers to shut off power for the entire world, basically ruining infrastructure. These two fight about this constantly but the way they are going about this isn’t the best.

Professor X is always talked about because his ability is so strong but often times I feel like he uses Cerebro to find something and then sends his students to deal with it and we don’t really get to see the extent of his powers. In this season we see how when he’s with the Shi’ar empire and everyone is arguing he is able to pull everyone into a classroom in someone’s mind and talk through the situation to find a nonviolent course of action. In the finale, we see how he’s so powerful that once Magneto’s helmet is off he is able to control him and use his power to reverse what he did, and following that he is able to restore Magneto’s psyche that he just destroyed. I was shocked he was alive and happy that Cyclops didn’t hold back his irritation for how the Professor handled stuff when he supposedly died.

While the Professor is with the Shi’ar we meet Deathbird who delivers a funny line when she is talking about her disdain for intermingling with humans because she thinks they are inferior and she doesn’t want to be in alliance with them. She says that Xavier would see his Milky Way ghetto become our new throne world and I just could not stop laughing because of the disrespect.

Magneto is a character who is trying so hard to change which is shown to be pretty hard. He has a monologue in episode 2 about it when he takes the world leaders up into space and explains that mutants deserve to live in a world and not be hunted down. I love it when he says Do not make me let you Down which is a nice way to threaten somebody and let them know that if some crazy stuff happens it’s your fault. Suprise to no one they let him down with what happens in Genosha and he is captured and once he is freed he ends up turning off power to the world, keeping his promise. This shows how much he has held back because he has had the power to make them extinct and decided not to. It was perfect timing that Xavier came back which coincided with him returning to his evil side and donning his iconic outfit.

The episode titled Remember It was one of the most intense episodes I’ve watched in a while and just had me completely shocked that wasn’t a finale. It was cool to see all these side characters that X-Men fans would be familiar with and to see Genosha and how it’s a thriving haven for mutants and the mutants there look happy. We see Nightcrawler who is a ray of sunshine but things start going downhill. Gambit and Rogue start going through a rough patch and then there is an attack that kills so many and causes so much devastation. It was like we as the viewer were there with them trying to evacuate and find survivors while also running from this sentinel. We see Gambit die and we think we see Magneto die but it’s sad that a place that’s supposed to be a sanctuary ends up being a gravesite for so many. This episode had me feeling sad by the end but also let me know that the show wasn’t afraid to tackle difficult storylines.

Remember It further showed the discrimination that mutants face as a marginalized group which is evident throughout the season. In episode one we are introduced to it from the get-go with the X-Cutioner and the goons going after Roberto. In episode 2 he incites violence at a hearing for Magneto which is very reminiscent of January 6th so if you are siding with the X-Cutioner then maybe take some time to think through some things. I think with the discrimination you may think how would the xmen be a marginalized group because they have these powers but you have to think about how they are the exception because there are many mutants who don’t have powers like theirs that can be used to fight and also some mutations are physical and the X-men aren’t trying to make a way just for the X-men but for all mutants. They have limited influence and power to make a change in the world but are trying their best to change that by showing they are there to help.

Superhero powers have always been something that fascinates me and as I’ve gotten older it fascinates me more how they use them in inventive ways. This show had some cool ways that they used them like Cyclops using them to move quicker and help him land on the ground, Storm creating a glass tornado, Gambit charging Wolverines claws, Older Jubilee using them like rollerblades, and Magneto shutting off power to the entire world. The inventive use of powers helped make the fight scenes even better and had me invested in how they would defeat their enemy. I feel like these are ways to use powers that took more time to think about and also make the viewer think more about the limitations of their powers. The one thing that is pretty constant is that the characters seem to feel comfortable using their powers.

The costumes in animated shows sometimes seem to stay the same but it happens so much I don’t usually notice. This show let some of the characters explore different costumes, which were reflective of something they wore in the comic book and I loved that they were willing to have some X-men have more than one costume. I must point out though that Storm’s costume change was the best from the lead-up to the reveal and following closely behind is Madelyne turning into the Goblin Queen who had a Sailor Moon like transformation and went from housewife to villainess. I love how they even make fun of the black leather costumes from the X-Men movies which is something I think about a lot because I hated those.

Throughout the show, we see cameos from X-Men characters but also non X-men characters. The non X-Men characters showed how the mutant fight is one that the mutants seem to be doing alone while other heroes are more concerned with whatever they are doing. I thought it was cool to show that yes this is an X-Men show but this is still in the Marvel universe, there are others around doing their own superhero thing. We see Captain America early on who tries to stop Rogue but he pretty much is just acting like a cop and the government’s puppet and isn’t helpful at all and that’s why Rogue launches his shield so he can go play fetch. Later we see Silver Samurai, Peter Parker, Mary Jane, Flash Thompson, King T’chaka and the Dora, Daredevil, Shadow and Dagger, and I’m sure there’s more I missed. we get cameos from other mutants as well like Emma Frost who I hope to see more of and a small glimpse of Quicksilver, Wanda, and Lorna in Magneto’s head to name a few. It’s cool to see some familiar faces.

The end sees the team disappearing and we realize they are scattered across time and possibly universes. We see that some are in the past where they come across a young El-Sabah Nur before he was Apocalypse, some are in the future or alternate future with the Summer kids, some we don’t know where they are, and then the crazy reveal which is Apocalypse in Genosha and he picks up a playing card which is known as a Gambit thing hinting that he is up to something and will play a big part in season 2.

My favorite part of this season was Jean, Rogue, and Storm. If you made it this far you could probably understand my appreciation for these characters. There’s a moment in the final episodes where Jean says to Storm mind the weather and Storm responds and make them weather your mind and I knew stuff was going to get real. I just really like how the show dealt with the different storylines of these characters and showed how they are not to be messed with.

Xmen 97’ season one proves that reboots can be great and that animated superhero shows still seem to somehow come on top of their live-action counterparts. The voice acting was great and the stories they chose had me very invested and wanting a new season immediately.