New X-Men ‘97 Season 2 Footage Teases Gambit’s Return & Reveals Apocalypse War

June 24, 2026, 1:21pm

When the first season of X-Men ’97 premiered in the spring of 2024, it delivered the biggest hit for Marvel Studios in ages, with near-universal acclaim and reigniting the passion for Marvel’s mutants. The wait has been long for the second batch of episodes for the series, but it’s now almost over. With just one week to go before the return of X-Men ’97, Marvel Studios has rolled out a new trailer for Season 2 that touts the high praise that the new season has already earned thanks to advance reviews, but there’s even more as well.

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Central to the new X-Men ’97 trailer is the series, making it crystal clear that Apocalypse is the main antagonist for the new season. The trailer does this by not only having the big bad of the franchise be the first to speak, but also showing off his sheer power and how he’s managed to take over the world across multiple eras. With the arrival of Apocalypse, though, comes, who else, but his four horsemen. There are plenty of other surprises to be found, but the one that fans will almost certainly be excited to see is the tease about Gambit’s return to the show.

X-Men ’97 Season 2 Reveals New Footage, Including a Gambit Tease

One of the biggest surprises that the first season of X-Men ’97 delivered was the shocking death of Gambit. Though the iconic ’90s X-Men character sacrificed himself to save his teammates, it still marked a major gut punch in the narrative, and one that no fan could have predicted because of how beloved Gambit is in the larger X-Men mythology.

The new footage for X-Men ’97 Season 2 shows Rogue being handed a playing card, setting the stage for Gambit’s return, but as we can surmise from the teases at the end of the season, it’s almost a guarantee that Gambit will become one of the horsemen of Apocalypse, a role he has previously filled in the comics, acting as Death for a brief time.

Another element that gets teased in the X-Men ’97 Season 2 footage is the arrival of new characters. Hidden in the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moments of the trailer are new looks at characters like Polaris, seen standing with Bishop and later exploding a building; Quintin Quire aka Kid Omega, seen in a prison cell; Havok, walking down a hallway with Jubilee; plus Psylocke, seen at the very end.

The final bit of footage in the trailer is also one of the best moments as it features a slew of X-Men characters from across different eras all appearing together for a big action scene. For this X-Men fan, it’s exciting because it’s bringing the iconic X-Men costumes from Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely to life, with Cyclops, Jean, and Beast all seen wearing the yellow and black suits with the giant “X” on the front.

As of this writing, and with twenty total reviews, X-Men ’97 Season 2 has a 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, improving on the near-perfect 99% that the first season had. ComicBook’s own Simon Gallagher awarded it a four out of five, noting that it was “absolutely worth the wait.”