The X-Men have returned! Well, kind of – in X-Men ’97. During the Disney Plus Day showcase of the latest to come from Disney, it was revealed that we’ll be getting a new X-Men animated series based on the beloved 90’s cartoon. The series premiered on the Fox Network back in 1992 and continued until 1997 – and has been getting a lot of nostalgia love over the years. Thanks to the show finally reaching Disney Plus, that love was only amplified, and Disney decided to strike while the iron is still hot.
X-Men: The Animated Series featured many from the X-Men universe which included Jean Grey, Cyclops, Rogue, Beast, Gambit, NIghtcrawer, Jubilee, and everyone’s favorite berserker, Wolverine. Little is known what that entails – but I would hope the animation gets better because that last season of the X-Men was kind of bad.
What we do know is that Beau DeMayo will serve as a showrunner. If that name sounds familiar, he’s the person that penned the script for The Witcher anime, Nightmare of the Wolf, that is currently streaming on Netflix.
It looks like several cast members from X-Men: The Animated Series will be returning as we’re getting reports of Cal Dodd (Wolverine), Lenore Zann (Rogue), George Buza (Beast), Catherine Disher (Jean Grey), Chris Potter (Gambit), Alison Sealy-Smith (Ororo Munroe), Adrian Hough (Nightcrawler), Christopher Britton (Mr. Sinister), and Alyson Court (Jubilee) reprising their roles.
Disney is already making the right moves by bringing back these well-known and iconic voice actors – because let’s admit something – it would be totally weird not hearing Cal Dodd’s voice come out of Wolverine during this series.
Brad Winderbaum, head of Streaming, Television, and Animation at Marvel Studios had this to say about the X-Men ’97 announcement:
“This is the first X-Men title produced by Marvel Studios. What an amazing first step to reintroducing audiences to the X-Men with a look at one of the most pinnacle eras of the X-Men comics, which was the ’90s. That iconic style that has its roots in Chris Claremont, and is celebrated in Jim Lee, and then again in The Animated Series.”
X-Men ’97 is currently set to premiere on Disney Plus in 2023.