Read our review of X-Men ’97 #1 from Marvel Comics, written by Steve Foxe with art by Salva Espín, the official prequel to the TV series.
We reviewed the book on the Stack podcast. But in the interest of highlighting more about the title, here’s a summary of the conversation with our thoughts. And if you prefer the longer audio version, that’s below as well!
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X-Men ’97 #1 Review:
In this first issue, we’re bridging the gap between the end of X-Men: The Animated Series and the beginning of X-Men ’97, as the team grapples with the “death” of Xavier, Jean discovers she’s pregnant, and Bishop goes to a Dazzler concert.
“This flavor is nice,” host Justin Tyler said, of getting more of the classic X-Men adventures in this book.
“Everything that we liked about the first two episodes of X-Men ’97, it feels like the same tone, it feels classic, there’s people quipping and making jokes while they’re fighting,” said host Alex Zalben. “A million things happen to this issue. So it channels all of that.”
That said, Zalben did express some reservations about taking the comics, adapting them to screen, and then back to comics removing some of that magic of seeing them come to life. Tyler, however, disagreed.
“I would also argue this is a flavor that the X-Men comics aren’t giving us right now,” Tyler said, “And are not planning on giving us based on what we’ve read, and haven’t given to us in a long time. So I don’t mind it. I actually like it in comic book form because this feels like they’ve boiled down a lot of the characters to continuity-free, core personality, and honestly, I’ve been missing that in my main X-Men stuff, because it’s so continuity heavy.”
X-Men ’97 #1 Official Synopsis:
THE OFFICIAL PRELUDE TO THE HOTLY ANTICIPATED DISNEY+ SHOW! The X-Men are back – and the ’90s have never looked better! In this official prelude to the upcoming X-Men ’97, created in collaboration with the showrunners, discover what Storm, Jubilee, Wolverine and the rest of the beloved ’90s X-Men cast have been up to in the time before their return! Startling revelations here lead directly into the hotly anticipated new series – don’t miss out!
