RECAP: X-Men 97 Season 2, Episodes 1-3
It’s been more than two years since we’ve had a new episode of Disney+’s excellent “X-Men ‘97” animated series, the continuation of the influential and iconic “X-Men” animated series that aired on Fox in the 1990s. The wait was long, but based on the first three episodes of Season 2 that dropped this week, it was worth it. These three episodes featured not only the central cast in some thrilling action sequences and big emotional moments, it also worked in numerous secondary and tertiary X-folks from numerous generations. While not all three of these episodes were equally successful, on the whole they did a great job hooking the audience back in, and setting up this season’s big bad, Apocalypse.
Read on for my take on “X-Men ‘97” Season 2 Episodes 1-3, breaking down each episode’s arcs one by one. Warning: there WILL be spoilers! Read on at the end for speculation on where we may be going next, as well as some Easter Eggs based on someone who has been reading X-Men comics (and comics in general) since the mid-1980s.
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EPISODE 1: “Days of Past Future”
The action picked up a few months after the conclusion of Season 1, with the bulk of the X-Men missing after the conflict with Bastion on Asteroid M, with Bishop and Forge left to find them. This is a kind of a play on the early 90s storyline in Uncanny X-Men (circa 255-280) in which Forge and Banshee (currently dead on the show) traveled the world, and ultimately the universe, to track down and save the missing X-Men, who had been scattered to the wind after a series of major losses.
Forge opts to go roughly 2000 years into the future to find the X-Men members stranded in a post-apocalyptic landscape – literally post-apocalyptic, as the planet is an ecological wasteland conquered by Apocalypse. There Forge is fairly quickly reunited with Storm (his reason for going, after their love story last season), Morph, Wolverine (devoid of his adamantium following Magneto’s brutal attack, now using his natural bone claws), Cyclops, and Jean Grey. He is also introduced to the reason all of this happened: Mother Askani, and a teenaged Nathan Dayspring Summers, AKA the boy who will one day become Cable.
We last saw Nathan as an infant in Season 1, when Scott and Jean made the gut-wrenching decision to entrust their child to time traveler Bishop, who promised to take Nathan to the far future where there was a better shot at treatment for the deadly techno-organic virus with which the baby had been infected. If this is the future Bishop intended, someone should call CPS, because this is a mess. But it is exactly where Nathan was fated to be, as Mother Askani reveals that Nathan is destined to be the savior of man/mutantkind, and he will take down the immortal Apocalypse once and for all.
Mother Askani also reveals that she is the reason the X-Men were scattered into the timestream, but none of it was accidental. She sent some team members to the future to help save and train Nathan, and others to the distant past to hopefully prevent Apocalypse from emerging in the first place. (Read on in the Speculation section for more on Mother Askani, who has a lot of history, or rather future, with the X-Men.)
The crux of this episode is Scott and Jean trying to navigate how to tell Nathan that they are the parents who abandoned him, the family making peace with that impossible situation, and doing what they can in their brief time together to prepare this young man for the burdens of his destiny. They also wrestle with whether they can just take their son back with them, potentially destroying the future in the process. Meanwhile, Storm and Forge have a heart-to-heart about their fraught dynamic, Forge being a man of science, and Ororo being almost a godlike being. I love this pairing and I miss it in the comics. It’s been literally 30 years since they broke up, and I still miss it.
Apocalypse sends his Final Horsemen and lackey Ozymandias to take out the X-Men and to claim Nathan’s immense genetic potential as the new host for Apocalypse’s essence, as Apocalypse needs a new body to sustain himself indefinitely. Mother Askani concocts a plan that involves Storm summoning a solar storm to power the massive high-tech craft Ship (included in a memorable episode of the original “X-Men” cartoon, also a one-time X-team headquarters in the comics). After a brief but dynamic battle with the Horsemen, the X-Men storm Apocalypse’s throne room.
This is when things get a little weird. Apocalypse teleported out before being confronted, telling Ozymandias that he had to confront the X-Men where they were at their most vulnerable: the 1990s. Meanwhile, Nathan makes the decision to embrace his destiny by interacting with some kind of AI, which bonds itself to his techno-organic virus, giving us the bionic arm and time-travel capabilities we know Cable to have. An empowered Nathan then sends the X-Men back to the 1990s, where they find the X-mansion in ruins and abandoned, and unclear where the other time-tossed team members ended up.
If you liked this, check out these comics: This arc is a direct interpretation of the 1994 comic mini-series The Adventures of Cyclops & Phoenix, a great story in which Scott and Jean – who had just discovered they were Cable’s parents in the comics – are spirited to the future in very similar circumstances to what we see in this season. (The show also includes some design elements taken from Steve Skroce’s excellent run on the Cable solo book shortly thereafter.) It also includes some elements of the 2011 Uncanny X-Force run (the Final Horsemen – those characters were comics accurate), and Storm’s de facto power-up is in line with the more modern interpretations of the character, including her Martian warlord in the Krakoa-era X-Men Red book (highly recommended), and her recently concluded solo series in which they scaled up her abilities to cosmic proportions.
EPISODE 2: “A Force to Be Reckoned With”
This may have been my favorite episode of this series ever, both the “97” reboot and the original series. I nearly climaxed watching the custom opening credits for “X-Force ‘97.” Everything about this episode was perfection, and if Disney+ is not considering a spinoff show focusing on these characters, they should be.
Episode 2 was the only one of the three new ones set primarily in the present, with Cable knowing that Apocalypse was up to something, and tracking down whatever leads he could – specifically War, one of Apocalypse’s Horsemen, running around Brazil, dressed incredibly poorly (but accurately to his 80s appearance). To do that, he assembled a team: X-Force, a mutant black-ops squad made up of leftover X-Men Jubilee and Sunspot, as well as Psylocke and Archangel, who had both been introduced in the original series, but rather poorly used.
Not here! Archangel isn’t given a ton do this episode, except to provide context/exposition for Apocalypse, as Archangel was a former Horseman himself (also shown in the original animated series). But Psylocke is amazing this episode, kicking serious ass, using her telepathic powers and fighting skills to great effect. I suspect she’ll be a fan favorite after this, and I hope she sticks around. She was a core X-Man for almost the entire 90s, and a good chunk of the 80s, too.
That said, the star of this episode was Jubilee. She gave us a great emotional arc over a mere 30ish minutes, starting out feeling hopeless with the X-Men missing, joining X-Force and providing a moral compass for a basically immoral team, and then having without question THE best fight sequence in Jubilee’s entire history, in any medium, as she fought off well-armed federal agents and leading a teen-mutant jailbreak. I loved every second of that fight, and I geeked out over the fact that Jubilee was wearing rollerblades and her Generation X costume during it. Incredible!
The episode also featured returns from a few other characters previously seen on the show, but never fully realized…until now. Emma Frost was briefly shown in Season 1 of “X-Men ‘97,” surviving the Genoshan holocaust due to her diamond skin secondary mutation. Here we get a thoroughly capitalist and man-eating Emma Frost, playing both sides to her own benefit – THIS is the Emma Frost that became a standout character in the comics. We also got a return for the government-sponsored X-Factor squad, seen in the original series episode that introduced Iceman and established that X-Factor member Polaris was previously a member of the X-Men.
That element of her character was relevant here, as Jubilee used her connection to the team and Xavier to convince Polaris that she was on the wrong side of history by tracking down and imprisoning young mutants on behalf of the government. Polaris helped Jubilee to escape, and Jubilee used the opportunity to free dozens of other imprisoned and de-powered mutants (read the Speculation Section for a rundown of who I saw – pretty much every one of those characters come from the comics). X-Factor heads Val Cooper and Havok seemed to know or at least suspect that Polaris betrayed them, so this may not be over.
X-Force saves Jubliee and the rescued teens, leaving Cable with a mix of deadly assassins, moody teenagers, and terrified former inmates. How will that help or hurt his quest for Apocalypse? We’ll see.
Further reading: There is no one comic arc this episode adapts, though it is inspired by numerous X-Force and X-Factor runs. Cable founded X-Force as his edgy and aggressive mutant attack squad, and prepping to fight Apocalypse was eventually part of that scope. Psylocke and Archangel have both been members of several iterations of X-Force (Psylocke has led at least one), while Sunspot was a longtime member of Cable’s first X-Force, and even its predecessor team, the New Mutants (you might remember the polarizing live-action movie from the COVID days). The X-Factor squad seen here – Havok, Polaris, Wolfsbane, Multiple Man, Strong Guy – is comics accurate, and includes elements of two X-Factor iterations. This team was the government-sponsored squad led by Val Cooper, and the mutant-hunting aspect is a kind of nod to the original X-Factor team, the original five X-Men (Cyclops, Angel, Beast, Iceman, Jean Grey) reunited and initially operating as fake mutant hunters who were secretly rescuing and training endangered young mutants. I am loving these C-list spinoff teams getting the spotlight in this series.
EPISODE 3: “Rise of Apocalypse, Part 1”
This was my least favorite of the three episodes. I don’t know if that’s because of the characters used, or the slow, repetitive scenes, but it lacked the pull of the first two episodes.
The team stuck thousands of years in the past – Magneto, Xavier, Rogue, Nightcrawler, Beast – attempted to stay undetected by the ancient Egyptians, even as Magneto tried to engage and ingratiate himself to En Sabah Nur, the local revolutionary, allegedly the world’s first mutant, and the man who the X-Men know will one day become Apocalypse. Nur and his band of warriors are attempting to stand up to the pharaoh, who is using some pretty wild technology for 3000 B.C. – we’re talking robots, energy whips, etc.
Nur is intrinsically interesting, and the action sequences centered on him were compelling (my dude threw a massive element - watch out, Stampy!). I just felt this episode never achieved liftoff. Xavier and Magneto having long, drawn-out arguments about whether it’s right or smart to try to use Nur as a way to change history and establish mutant rights centuries in advance should have worked, but it fell flat to me – an old gay married couple endlessly bickering. Beast trying and failing to build a time machine in ancient Egypt should have been interesting, and yet there were no stakes, because we knew Bishop was coming to rescue them. Rogue was given virtually nothing to do, while Nightcrawler at least gave us his trademark ethical socratic monologues.
The most intriguing elements of this episode were the pharaoh, his technology, and the mysterious prize he was seeking in the desert. Check the Speculation section for more details on who this is, and what he is likely trying to do here – if you’ve watched every MCU movie, the energy signature of his tech should look familiar to you. But the ending felt super rushed as the pharaoh was alerted to En Sabah Nur’s location, along with the X-Men’s, and let loose a massive energy blast in an effort to kill them. Cliffhanger!
Further reading: This episode is a loose adaptation of another 90s X-Men mini-series, Rise of Apocalypse. I’ll be honest, it’s been literally 30 years since I read that book, and the most memorable part of it was the artwork by Adam Pollina (the design for En Sabah Nur is a direct reference to Pollina’s exceptional work), but I don’t recall much else. I believe Pharaoh Rama-Tut is the antagonist in that book as well, and I suspect most of the beats are similar. But I can’t say that with any certainty.
SPECULATION SECTION
LOTS of spoilers, including for things that have not/may not happen in the future.
-Mother Askani is very likely Rachel Summers, the alternate-timeline daughter of Cyclops and Jean Grey. That makes her the alternate-reality sibling to Cable, and explains why she’s so invested in Cable’s destiny. In the comics, Rachel herself was an X-Man for a chunk of the 1980s, before moving on to the UK-based spinoff Excalibur. You may have noticed the Phoenix emblem in Mother Askani’s eye during her info dump to Storm. Rachel was the avatar for the Phoenix Force for more than a decade in the books, during the period Jean was dead (well, “dead”), and when Jean came back but wasn’t Phoenix-empowered. I’m surprised they didn’t do the Rachel reveal in these episodes, but I suspect we will get there at some point.
-I think the ending of Episode 1 felt a bit anticlimactic on purpose, as it too will be revisited due to timey-wimey shenanigans. The fact that there was no confrontation between Nathan and Apocalypse, and Apocalypse going back to the 90s to stop Cable from coming into being, will likely result in another important figure from the 90s comics getting introduced at some point this season. I just can’t imagine they’re doing a 90s Apocalypse arc without bringing in a certain silver-clad, red-caped baddy. I’ll say more if/when he shows up.
-Wolverine is dealing with his adamantium being stripped out remarkably well, given that when that happened in the comics, the character literally devolved overnight. As in, he became a feral beast with thorny bone claws and, for reasons I don’t think have ever been adequately explained, no nose. Literally, it was just gone. The look he was sporting in the future in Episode 1 was highly reminiscent of that feral version (Scott and Jean’s future looks also referenced their best X-Factor costumes, and Storm and Forge are wearing their early-90s X-Men uniform looks), and he’s definitely using bone claws now. But it’s interesting that the show seems to be entirely skipping his personality shift post-adamantium, which was a significant plot point in the comics. Personally, I’m glad. I hated that version of Wolverine. I also wonder, however, if the character we see in Episode 1 is in fact Logan. Bone claws would be easy enough for a shape-shifter to emulate, and there’s a notorious story arc in the comics that could be intersecting here in which Wolverine is secretly replaced by a doppelganger. We’ll have to see.
-Episode 2 was chock full of cameo appearances by teen mutants from various X-generations. We got Artie from the X-Factor days. We got most of Generation X, with Penance/M, Chamber, Synch, and I’m pretty sure I saw Mondo; the only ones I didn’t clock were Husk and Skin. We got a bunch of Morrison-era characters like Glob Herman, Quentin Quire, the Stepford Cuckoos, and Dust. And I believe we got some students from the Jean Grey Academy in Eye Boy and Nature Girl. Most of those characters didn’t do much this episode, but it was fun getting to see them.
-Rama-Tut, as seen in Episode 3, is an aspect of Kang the Conqueror – as in, he is Kang, from a specific point in Kang’s timeline. The technology Rama-Tut is using in Ancient Egypt sure looks like the design language used in Marvel’s Eternals movie. That makes sense, given that Ship (shown in Episode 1) is a Celestial creation, and part of Apocalypse’s canonical origin is that he encounters and is empowered by the Celestials. I find this fascinating, because when this season was being developed, Marvel had yet to pivot away from its initial MCU Phase 5 and Phase 6 plans, which initially had Kang as the central villain (he appeared in both “Loki” Season 2 and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania) and likely would have had an Eternals sequel pick up on the Celestial plotlines. Marvel eventually decided to punt on all of that and instead refocus around Doctor Doom for the upcoming Doomsday, but I suspect this particular “X-Men ‘97” arc would have been significantly more relevant to the overarching MCU when they initially envisioned it.
What do you think of “X-Men ‘97”? Are you happy with Season 2 so far? Drop your thoughts in the comments.
