Marvel Animation’s X-Men ‘97 Discussion Thread.

Correct. Annie Richardson.

https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/Annie_Richardson_(Earth-616)

 

Yeah, I did notice that the whole Madelyn Pryor name did seem to just kind of come out of nowhere.

 

"Call me Madelyne Pryor."
"Okay, but why?"
"I don't know. I just picked it at random."
"Huh. Fair enough."

Maybe Jean was almost going to be named Madelyne before her parents settled on Jean. So she was Madelyne, prior.
Oof, that's awful.

 

I heard "Maddie". So The Madelyne Pryor name made sense to me. Guess i heard wrong too.

 

So I just watched the first 3 eps and was not expecting the Madelyne Pryor stuff, but they really retconned it to save Scott's character. There's a reason why comics readers really felt disgust with the way it was handled and how he just abandoned a NORMAL WOMAN who he got with just because she looked like Jean and then fathered a child with her, but as soon as Jean is resurrected it's back to jean and "Madelyne who? What kid?" Tell Nathan I went to go buy some milk"

I think the comics attempted to spin it a little more this way (after the fact and the damage was done), so this is a more nuanced take. Jean was cloned and replaced, nobody knows when except it happened at least 8/9 months in the past.

BTW, watching the first episode. I'm not a hardcore comics reader. Growing up didn't really get an 'allowance' and read comics. So most of my knowledge came from THIS SHOW... Has Cyclops used his optic blasts that way before like in episode 1? Using them to quickly propel himself in a direction or to then deaden his descent from a freefall?

 

In the comics, yes, certainly. They're kinetic force blasts, not heat rays, so really they should be knocking him backward all the time by Newton's Third Law, though there's a handwave about how his mutant nervous system dissipates the recoil through the ground yada mumble. I had him use the optic blasts for a bit of aerial maneuvering in my X-Men novel Watchers on the Walls, on the principle that the recoil couldn't dissipate into the ground when he was in midair. I don't recall whether the episode had him jumping up first before he fired and got pushed back, but it might have.

 

Bob Layton was given control of Cyclops for five issues, and tainted the character forever. It was clear and obvious that he did not know how to write the character at all. Pretty much the entirety of Louise Simonson's run on X-Factor was damage control from Layton's five issues.

 

The show has reminded me of how much I hate the thunderous* stage actor voice for Storm.

*Irony?

 

While I am very familiar with the story in the comics, I didn't think about how well the changes in the X-Men '97 version really help Cyclops character until reading this thread. Now he's not the asshole who left his pregnant wife because his old flame was revealed to be alive, and we get more of a tragic thing with him, jean and Madelyn, changes that honestly really help the story. I love how this show is sticking to adapting some of the classic X-Men stories, but also modifying them to fix some old flaws and to fit their world better, this is a great way to adapt the source material.

 

What did he do that tainted the character?

 

The beginning of X-Factor, which bluntly reformed the original X-Men team after twenty-three years of storylines. It's the storyline that was adapted (more or less) by the last X97 episode, except in that version, Jean Grey was dead, Scott had met Madelyne Pryor, they'd gradually developed a relationship, he'd convinced himself that despite their uncanny (heh) physical resemblence, Madelyne and Jean were two different people, they got married, had a baby, and then Jean Grey was found to have not been dead and just hidden, so Scott dumped Madelyne and their son and got back together with Jean without a second thought.

 

The name definitely came from Mr. Sinister in the comics, so he does indeed have that awful sense of humor. I think we have a No-Prize winner!

 

Definitely a nod to the arcade game. I bet this will drum up interest for a retro remake of the arcade game like the NES TMNT game

 

Fairly mediocre episode this week (I never liked the Mojo stuff), but it's interesting that it did a "lead story and backup" format like an old comic book. I thought it was "Motendo: Lifedeath Part 1," but it's "Motendo/Lifedeath Part 1," two completely separate stories in one half-hour.

Jubilee's older digital clone, Abscissa, was voiced by her original voice actress Alyson Court. It's weird that they designed her as taller than Jubilee, since this was set on Jubilee's 18th birthday, so shouldn't she be at her full height by then?

 

As someone who played tons of old '90s era 16bit games, I loved all the video game stuff, and it was also a nice way to address Jubilee's issues with getting older.
The stuff with Storm was pretty good too. Her and Forge seem to have a pretty nice relationship. Forge being the one who designed the power canceling tech was a surprise. Was that Shadow King at the end?

 

I found it interesting that they specifically used the name/phrase "Big Mac". Did I miss a McDonald's tie-in or promotion for this series?

I guess with Marvel being part of the Disney conglomerate along with Star Wars, I shouldn't be surprised that Boba Fett appeared in video game Genosha.

 

No, a different character known as The Adversary. A destructive, trickster demon/god that has a past with Forge's people.

Not super dissimilar from the Shadow King in practice. Lots of illusions. The best comparison that comes to mind for me is Doctor Who's Celestial Toymaker. A player of games, master of illusions.

 

Oh OK, I've never heard of them before, I don't really know much about Forge beyond the basics.