If you never watched the ’90s X-Men: The Animated Series cartoons, don’t worry: Even though the new series X-Men ’97 is a continuation of that story, the trailer will tell you the important things you may have missed. Such as: Professor X died! And now, alas, Scott Summers is in charge. He even gets to say “To me, my X-Men,” so you know he’s trying really hard.
Also Magneto is trying to muck things up, as per usual.
But let’s be honest: You don’t actually have to remember or know anything about ye olde X-Men cartoons to enjoy this trailer, and not just because this theme song is one of the greatest theme songs of all time. You just need to get the gist: Mutants exist, people hate them, mutants have different ideas about how to live with or destroy puny humans. The usual drill, except now, in the 2020s, absolutely everyone knows who Wolverine is. (Hard as it may be to believe, this was not always the case, though the older animated series was pretty popular.)
Here’s the show’s very brief summary:
X-Men’97 revisits the iconic era of the 1990s as The X-Men, a band of mutants who use their uncanny gifts to protect a world that hates and fears them, are challenged like never before, forced to face a dangerous and unexpected new future.
The show’s voice cast includes a handful of actors returning from the ’90s carton: Alison Sealy-Smith (Storm), Cal Dodd (Wolverine), Lenore Zann (Rogue), and George Buza (Beast). New cast members include Ray Chase (Cyclops), Jennifer Hale (Jean Grey), JP Karliak (Morph), AJ LoCascio (Gambit), Holly Chou (Jubilee), Isaac Robinson-Smith (Bishop), Matthew Waterson (Magneto), and Adrian Hough (Nightcrawler).
Beau DeMayo is the series’ head writer, and directors include Jake Castorena, Chase Conley and Emi Yonemura.
X-Men ’97 starts streaming on March 20th.
