Last week for
Disney+ Day we got the word that the
X-Men from the 90's would be returning for a new animated series coming in 2023 to the streaming service. This will be a direct continuation of the fan-loved Fox
X-Men Animated series that originally ran from
1992-1997 and featured
Professor X's primary team of
Cyclops, Storm, Wolverine, Jean Grey, Rogue, Gambit, Beast and
Jubilee.
While some might credit the Fox movies for making
X-Men a household name, many of us who grew up in the early 90's probably would say it was this series that actually did that, often taking storylines straight out of the comics and putting them on the small screen.
While not a lot is yet known about the new series, we can tell you that it will be written by
Executive Producer Beau DeMayo (
Netflix The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf animated series). The Supervising director is
Jake Castorena and supervising producer is
Charley Feldman. We can also tell you that
Amelia Vidal has been brought on as the lead character designer for the show. Vidal's most recent work includes the Marvel
What If...? series also on Disney+ which will also be getting a second season.
While not specifically done for the new show, Vidal has been known to dabble in X-Men characters for fun, some of which you can check out below. Again these images were done a while ago and not specifically for this new show. It does likely give us an idea however of what we might expect for the look and feel of X-Men '97.
For the voice cast we can expect
Cal Dodd, Lenore Zann, George Buza, Alison Sealy-Smith, Chris Potter, Catherine Disher, Adrian Hough, and
Christopher Britton from the original series to return, though some might not be voicing the same characters they did in the original show.
New additions for the show will include
Jennifer Hale, Anniwaa Buachie, Ray Chase, Matthew Waterson, JP Karliak, Holly Chou, Jeff Bennett, and
AJ LoCascio.
Finally we can tell you the showrunners of the original series
Eric and
Julia Lewald along with original series director
Larry Houstonhave have been brought on as consultants for the new series.
The X-Men have changed a lot over years in the pages of the comics since those classic 90's X-Men stories, so it's hard to say if the new show will solely stick to that era for it's stories or just use that as a launching point to bring us into the present with these characters. Never-the-less, if this new show is even half-as-good as the original, then I think it will be worth checking out. If you have never seen the original
X-Men cartoon then I highly recommend you check it out, which if you have
Disney+ already is easy to do being all the episodes are available there for your viewing pleasure.