“To me, my X-Men.” With those words, Cyclops (Ray Chase) summoned the mutants of X-Men: The Animated Series out of the 1990s and into a new age: Wolverine (Cal Dodd), Storm (Alison Sealy-Smith), Rogue (Lenore Zann), Gambit (A.J. LoCascio), Beast (George Buza), Bishop (Isaac Robinson-Smith), and Morph (J.P. Karliak). Along with Jean Grey (Jennifer Hale), Jubilee (Holly Chou), Sunspot (Gui Agustini), and new leader Magneto (Matthew Waterson), the X-Men returned in the Emmy-nominated Marvel Animation series X-Men ’97.
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With a second and third season of the acclaimed animated show already in development, Marvel Studios is tiding fans over with behind-the-scenes intel from the 10-episode first season streaming on Disney+. After premiering a making-of documentary special, Marvel is going even deeper into the production of the series with the official X-Men ’97: The Art and Making of the Animated Series book.
The 224-page hardcover from Abrams Books is slated for release on April 29, 2025, and retails for $50. Pre-orders are live here on Amazon.
According to a description from Abrams Books, “The Art X-Men ’97 takes fans behind the scenes of Marvel Studios Animation’s spiritual sequel to X-Men: The Animated Series.Picking up where the original series left off when it aired its finalepisode in September 1997, this new series features returning castmembers and a revamped but familiar art style.”
Contained in its pages are “storyboards, charactersketches, vehicle designs, new costumes, stills, animatic frames, cels” and more, offering fans a peek into every step of the process from design, to animation, to production. The official behind-the-scenes art book is written by James Fields (The Art of The Batman) and features a foreward by executive producer Brad Winderbaum, Head of Streaming, Television, and Animation at Marvel Studios.
“This is the first X-Men title producedby Marvel Studios,” Winderbaum said of the series. “What an amazing first stepto reintroduce audiences to the X-Men with a look at one of the mostpinnacle eras of the X-Men comics, which was the ’90s. That iconic stylethat has its roots in Chris Claremont, and is celebrated in Jim Lee,and then again in The Animated Series.”
Giving an update on X-Men ’97 season 2, Winderbaum told the Official Marvel Podcast: “We’ve got big plans for the second season. I’ve already seen all the animatics, and we’re well on our way to creating something that hits the heights of the first season. I know the first season is an emotional ride; that ride continues in a very X-Men fashion in the second season.”
X-Men: The Animated Series and X-Men ’97 are available to stream now on Disney+.
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Image Courtesy of Marvel Studios
