“Ladies and gentlemen, the world tonight is in the grip of a terrible crisis.”
(s1 ep11) “Down with mutants!” (s1 ep11)
“-No more mutants!
No more mutants!” (s2 ep1) “But we must not forget that mutants are
human beings.”
(s2 ep1) “How can it be?
A world condemned to darkness.”
(s1 ep11) “There is one hope, the X-Men.”
(s3 ep7) “The legendary X-Men.”
(s1 ep11) “Who are these so-called X-Men?”
(s1 ep2) “But I wonder when the time comes, will
the X-Men be ready?”
(s1 ep4) “X-Men, right on time.”
(s5 ep14) “The X-Men face hopeless odds” (s3 ep14)
“X-Men don't cut and run.”
(s1 ep2) “Don't mess with the X-Men.”
(s1 ep2) In 1963, Stan Lee wanted to create a group
of superheroes but didn’t want to explain how they got their powers.
He had said, "I couldn't have everybody bitten by a radioactive spider or exposed to a gamma-ray
explosion.
And I took the cowardly way out.
I said to myself, 'Why don't I just say they're mutants?
They were born that way.”
It seemed like such a small premise, but with the power of Stan Lee & Jack Kirby, Marvel
had created one of the most powerful and influential groups of fictional characters that the world
has ever seen.
The X-Men franchise is such a significant contributor to the many fandoms in the world,
and it makes sense, they were everywhere at a time.
We had the Marvel Vs. Capcom franchise, the X-Men movies in the 2000s, the X-Men animated
series, the massive amounts of comics released, and the impact of these story arcs, which
helped change the game of comics everywhere.
They were an absolute powerhouse, with the potential to bring it all back now.
With how good they have done, they are still the 7th highest-grossing movie franchise.
While I would like to say something in the movie area of the X-Men, that is something
already in the works.
The topic for this video is something that I believe we do not see a potential push for
in the future because we are making what we had work.
That being the X-Men animated series.
With times before and even now, the X-Men animated series had always had a place in
our world.
Covering hard topics like identity, discrimination, and oppression.
Adding on, you have a multitude of allegories that go over the topics that we've seen in
history.
And with the world being a lot more open the idea of self-discovery and being who you are,
the show would be fantastic for those that want to connect to a show on a deeper level.
I feel like with shows like Gumball, Bojack Horseman, Gravity Falls, and Rick and Morty,
there's this call for shows that provide this form of awareness and connection to the audience,
and the X-Men animated series is something that'd also be able to help contribute to
that.
With its full cast, the vast amount of storylines, investment, and development in characters,
there's a lot to be given to the world once again.
They've been able to do it before, but with the resources we have now, I believe we can
take it on into the next level.
Consider how good the show was, with having all that I've mentioned, added on with a phenomenal
score.
That beautiful 90s animation we know it for.
With the right care, the X-Men can come back into the limelight and hold that connection
with the people that had initially.
To provide an example of the strength of the show, let’s go about this from the absolute
beginning.
Episode 1, Season 1, Night of the Sentinels: Part I.
We open with some news that is believed to be a mutant destroying the downtown area.
The specific line used to focus on is, “The fact that the perpetrator is believed to be
a mutant has fueled current anti-mutant hysteria now growing nationwide.”
The audience is introduced to how the world views this group of people and the media bias
towards helping spin this narrative against them.
This transitions into two people talking about a mutant they both know.
These are the adoptive parents of our character Jubilee.
It's implied they've both found out that she's a mutant.
Still, the father has taken a means of registering her into what he believes to be an outreach
program for mutants.
“She's one of them, Martha.
She needs help.
“But how could you register her with that Mutant Control Agency as if she were some
sort of criminal?”
The mother here isn't open to the idea of sending her daughter one of these types of
groups.
I'd say most likely because of the name of the agency is a strong reason as to why the
idea sounds bad.
Still, it's most likely the notion of sending your kid to be control and or fixed by other
people, which is the problem for her.
The father doesn't see it like that because he already thinks that mutants are a problem,
and if his daughter is a mutant, it's a visible problem.
Maybe not to them directly, but it's the fact that he knows the negative connotation around
mutants.
We've confirmed this thought with this follow up line.
“Let's just hope the neighbors never find out our beautiful Jubilee's a mutant.
They'd never understand.”
Though these aren't terrible parents.
How we're shown these two, it's more so that they're most likely scared and uninformed.
The information further gives the fact that these two are foster parents.
They're new.
New to being a parent is one thing, but you're able to help your child through guidance and
wisdom from your experiences and knowledge.
But what do you do when your kid is so different from you?
And you don't have advice to give because you don't know anything about their life.
The mother wants to be there for the Jubilee, and she doesn't know what to do.
But you know that she'll be there for her anyway.
The father sees what the world is, and along with being uninformed, it gives him this idea
that being a mutant is going to require help that he believes he simply does not have.
So, he takes the means of having other people do it.
Now, this is a huge scene and one big allegory, but we haven't got on to who this is about
and how they feel.
Jubilee.
When we're panned over to Jubilee, you can see that she's been eavesdropping, and she's
not taking this news well at all.
“Why is this happening to me?
I used to be a normal kid.
It's not my fault!”
Being a mutant isn't something that she accepts as being her.
In this moment of her life, it's more so an inconvenience even when it was something had
her whole life.
It isn't her fault, but there isn't anything at fault here, to begin with.
But this is her new character before she learns to learn the ins and outs of being a mutant
and, in the end, process, accepting, and having confidence in herself for who she is.
You see this self-doubt and how much being a mutant is affecting her.
We also have the following scenes where you can see how she feels about the situation
and how she views her parent’s stance on it and what they’re doing about.
“They’re ashamed of me.
I thought they loved me.”
And you can see her trying to escape in video games, but also projecting her feelings through
the video game.
Viewing the aliens in the video game as this whole situation entirely and how it "invaded
her world."
“Come on, I’ll teach you to invade my universe.”
It also doesn’t help that there’s a painful irony type of moment when she tries to support
the idea of her being a mutant.
“What’s so wrong about being a mutant anyways. *machine breaks*."
Along with that, she also faces discrimination for being a mutant.
“Hey you’re one of them, aren’t you?”
“We don’t want you lousy mutants around here.”
And this just goes about us talking about Jubilee in specific is facing.
A bunch is going on in this episode alone.
It's such a great first episode that gives us so much information as to what you'd see
this show be about, and the connections to real-world things help convey an idea so well.
The Sentinels.
“I am here to serve and protect.”
The mutants and the similar situations they’ve gone through.
“It like to kill my daddy when he found out I was a mutant.”
“We all had to face that problem.”
Or even what to do when the pressure of the world is on them.
“All right, already!
But then why do people hate us?”
“People fear what they do not understand.”
If they're able to convey a point that well, all in one episode (which all the clips I
just used were in).
Think about if we were to have an entire show once again.
Imagine being able to tweak so much because of the resources we have now.
The animation being stylized to hold substantial similarity to the style of comics while still
defining itself.
The theme song recreated to match the quality of the time.
The storylines can create by pulling from the comics we've received in that large timespan.
The characters, their pain, their growth, their fights, and I just love the X-Men so
much…
I'm sorry.
I don't know how well I'm going about conveying my point as to why I believe it should come
back, but I do hope that I got some of it across.
Editorial notes: So, all of this is happening in the first episode.
That’s great in terms of clips, but while I’m explaining, you can most likely still
go about editing around it still.
Like say you use a still image of whatever scene is going on, on the screen something
else is making the point connect more.
Not exactly sure what I’m looking for, but I’m sure you probably got since all I imaged
was just clips from the episode originally, and more than that is better altogether.
The world needs the X-men.
They've done so much to garner so many great communities, and it's insane that the push
for them to return isn't a consistent talking point.
Though the only reason why I'd want to talk that much is because of the whole idea of
supply and demand.
So, it would help give them the initiative to make more X-Men related things, but I'm
not an industry guy.
I'm just an observer who wants to see one of his favorite franchises come back.
And I'm sure that I'm not the only one.
Now, before closing this out, I want to give a final note.
Accessibility is a huge thing to me when talking about the series returning.
If it was to return and be exclusive to streaming sites and or cabled channels, I feel like
that would defeat the purpose a bit.
One of the reasons I know people were able to watch the X-Men animated series was because
you could watch it on Fox Kids.
I don't know how it works in other states, but in mine, Fox Kids would be accessible
even if you didn't have cable.
I don't know what sort of impasse that tv channels have to go through to make this possible,
but it would be great.
People forget that even in 2020, there's still a bunch of people that go without internet
or cable, so there are limitations on what can be watched.
I feel like X-Men was a show for everyone and should still continue to be that.
But that's all.
Thank you all for watching and listening to me talk about this franchise.
It means a lot.
And if you do want to help support the cause, please share the video and tweet out the hashtag
with stuff like your favorite moments or your personal reasons why you want the X-Men back.
And this can be in anything, it doesn't have to be limited to the animated series if you
wish.
Thanks again, and hopefully I'll see you all in the next one.
Until then, peace out and godspeed.