Entertainment
All The Comics You Need To Read Before X-Men ‘97 Season 2
By Chris Snellgrove
| Published
It seems that Disney has finally figured out the secret to getting fans to care about Marvel again: throw in the X-Men, baby! Hype for Avengers: Doomsday didn’t reach its zenith until the trailer, which brought back Cyclops, Magneto, and Professor X from the 20th Century Fox films. Before that, a third Deadpool movie seemed pretty “meh” until the reveal that he’d be fighting alongside Wolverine, everyone’s favorite canucklehead. Meanwhile, fans who couldn’t remember the last time they watched anything on Disney+ flocked to the streamer to watch X-Men ‘97, arguably the best thing this franchise has given us in at least a decade.
Now, the trailer for X-Men ‘97 Season 2 show just dropped, and you don’t need Cerebro to detect fan excitement all around the world. One reason to be excited is that the second season, like the first, is going to incorporate some of the most important storylines from the X-Men comics. By reading (or re-reading) those comics, you can get a solid idea of what will be happening in Season 2, which premieres on July 1, and be better able to appreciate every little Easter egg. Based on the trailer, which comics should you thumb through before the new season hits? Keep reading, true believer, and I’ll tell you!
Adventures Of Cyclops And Phoenix
In the ‘90s X-Men comics, Cyclops and Jean Grey finally got married. The miniseries Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix revealed that, not too long after they got hitched, these newlyweds were transported to an Apocalypse-ruled far future by Rachel Summers, their daughter from a different alternate future (it’s complicated). There, they are reunited with Nathan Summers, Cyclops’ son from a previous relationship, who grows up to be Cable, the time-traveling hero. Cyclops and Jean Grey spend 12 years raising Nathan and training him in his powers, but they are eventually brought back to their present day, where no time has actually passed.
Why should you re-read this comic before X-Men ‘97 Season 2? Cyclops and Jean Grey were transported into the future at the end of Season 1, and the new trailer shows them walking through a field of corpses in a world ruled by Apocalypse. It looks like the show will be doing its own homage to Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix, and it’s a pretty solid bet we’ll see young Nathan Summers in Season 2. That will also give us some important background information and character-building for Cable, who (thanks to his time-travel abilities) remains one of the show’s most important characters.
The Twelve
“The Twelve” (sometimes written as “Apocalypse: The Twelve”) was a crossover comic event in which a weakened Apocalypse hatched a crazy plan to achieve supreme power. He captured 12 very specific mutants with the intent of basically stealing their powers and becoming omnipotent. However, his battered body couldn’t withstand all this extra juice, so he had a backup plan: to give it all to Nate Gray (an alternate universe Cable) and then put his own mind in the young man’s body. Our heroes stop the villain, but he goes on to rewrite reality in a later arc, and he’s only stopped when the X-Men defeat him in both the past and the present.
Why read this crossover before X-Men ‘97 Season 2? The trailer shows an interesting cave etching where several X-Men are seemingly looking up at a mysterious floating figure. This implies we may be getting a version of “The Twelve” storyline where Apocalypse is hoping to steal some very specific powers, putting them into a new body along with his own mind. This is the story where Wolverine gets his adamantium back, which would build on the hero’s story from Season 1. Plus, the overarching plot of Season 2, where X-Men fight Apocalypse in the past and the present, is reminiscent of what happened in “Ages of Apocalypse,” a comic story that happened soon after “The Twelve.”
Bonus Reading
So, based on the trailer for X-Men ‘97 Season 2, those are the big comic storylines we can expect to be adapted for the show. With that said, there’s some bonus reading that you may want to do. For example, you should consider reading “Blood of Apocalypse,” a story in which the titular villain transforms Gambit into one of his Horsemen. The end of Season 1 highly implied that Apocalypse intended to bring the ragin’ Cajun back to life, and the Season 2 trailer further implies that there’s a resurrection in the cards for Gambit. By reading this comic, you may get a better idea of how the hero’s return will be handled in the show.
Additionally, you should consider reading Grant Morrison’s New X-Men run for several reasons, including the fact that it’s the best run in the entire history of the comics (I said what I said!). Additionally, the trailer gave us glimpses of Quentin Quire and maybe Xorn, two characters introduced to the franchise by Morrison. The trailer also briefly showed Emma Frost, who first joins the team in New X-Men. Finally, the show has already adapted one major storyline from Morrison’s run (namely, the brutal attack on Genosha), and it wouldn’t be surprising if we get other arcs. As a bonus, this comic also introduces Cassandra Nova, who was the Big Bad of Deadpool & Wolverine.
Bust Out Those Longboxes, Boys
Obviously, you don’t have to read these classic comics to enjoy the show. One of the best things about X-Men ‘97 is that it is remarkably accessible to new fans of the franchise. However, Season 1 was filled with amazing homages and Easter eggs from the comics, and noticing them is a great way to enhance your appreciation for the best show Marvel ever made. Now, you have a chance to brush up on some classic comic reading and maybe get a better idea of what to expect from Season 2.
Of course, the show never does a straight adaptation of comic events, and it’s also rewarding to see how the writers have modified classic storylines and woven them into something new. If nothing else, the imminent arrival of X-Men ‘97 Season 2 gives you a chance to read New X-Men, the most important comic in the history of the franchise. In the immortal words of Bob Belcher, “I don’t want to oversell it. But if changes you forever.”