X-Men '97 Found A Hidden Way To Incorporate The Original Series' DNA

X-Men ‘97 has received almost universal praise that has even come from the notoriously hard to please 90s kids that exalted the original show, and a recent interview with the originators of that series reveals one major reason why this is the case.

X-Men ‘97 is a continuation of the highly well-regarded X-Men: The Animated Series from the 1990s which stopped airing in 1997, giving the new series its name. There was a lot of speculation and anxiety about whether this was a true-to-the-bone revival or an MCU project that would more closely align with the rest of Marvel’s Disney+ fare, with believers on both sides doubting it would live up to the now. However, the show’s debut was a massive success, with the instant and sustained good reception given to X-Men ‘97 raising questions about other animated shows deserving of revival.

While the show’s directors have highlighted the influence of anime on X-Men ‘97, the show’s biggest inspiration is definitely still X-Men: The Animated Series, and not just as a spiritual predecessor. In a recent feature from Variety concerning everything from the start of the revival process to the Morph backlash, the original series director Larry Houston commented on howthe revival series had not only managed to capture the spirit of the show from the 90s but also how the new team managed to take what was already established and improve it. “When we did our show, we did the best we could with the money we had. But this current show, they’ve got Disney money,” Houston noted to the publication. “Disney money makes stuff really good.” Executive producer on the revival and Marvel Studios’ head of streaming, television, and animation Brad Winderbaum also offered a great look into how the revival kept things faithful by using the villain Mister Sinister as an example.

Part of the design of the show was to reconstruct people’s memory of it. When we designed Mister Sinister for the new series, we tried to emulate the designs, textures, and