X-MEN ‘97 RECAP: Everything to Know Before SEASON 2!

[00:00] If you could travel back in time and

[00:01] kill Baby Apocalypse, would you? I'm

[00:02] Gina, and I did your homework for X-Men

[00:05] 97. Everything you need to know going

[00:06] into season 2, I'll be talking about it,

[00:08] breaking it down in chronological order.

[00:10] I'll recap season 1 and tell you the

[00:12] stuff I think will be most important to

[00:13] know from the original animated series

[00:15] that might pop back up in season 2. That

[00:17] original series ran for five seasons and

[00:19] 76 episodes total. It ended with an

[00:21] episode titled Graduation Day. In that

[00:23] episode, rabbit anti-mutant dickbag and

[00:25] co-creator of the Sentinel program,

[00:27] Henry Guyrick, shoots Charles Xavier

[00:29] with an energy disruptor device that

[00:30] causes his psychic abilities to spiral

[00:32] out of control, overwhelming him. He

[00:34] slips into a coma. Mutants on Janosha

[00:36] want to go to war over the assassination

[00:38] attempt, and they want Magneto to lead

[00:39] them in the uprisings. Unable to help

[00:41] Charles using Earth science, the X-Men

[00:43] and Moira McTager decide that their best

[00:45] hope is to contact Landra, Empress of

[00:47] the Alien Shi empire, and someone who

[00:49] shares a deep connection with Charles.

[00:51] In the 11th hour, Magneto turns away

[00:53] from his rebellion and helps the X-Men

[00:54] contact Landre, who takes Charles away

[00:56] with her to the sher. No one knows if

[00:58] Charles will ever be able to return to

[00:59] Earth. So, he says goodbye to his X-Men.

[01:01] X-Men 97 season 1, episode 1, To My

[01:04] X-Men, opens with Charles still gone,

[01:06] and the world thinking that he's dead,

[01:08] killed by Guyrich in that assassination

[01:10] attempt. Because of this, there's more

[01:11] sympathy for mutants. It's only been a

[01:13] few months since the events of the

[01:14] original finale. Roberto Dcasta,

[01:16] Sunspot, is kidnapped by the Friends of

[01:18] Humanity, who use a power dampening

[01:20] collar that we saw a bunch in the

[01:21] original series. The X-Men rescue him

[01:23] and bring him back to the X-Mansion. The

[01:25] X-Men interrogate Guy in prison and

[01:27] learn that Bolivar Tras, the designer of

[01:28] the Sentinels, is outfitting the Friends

[01:30] of Humanity with Sentinel Tech. During

[01:32] this interrogation, a very pregnant

[01:33] woman, who everyone thinks is Gan Gray,

[01:35] probes Gyrich's mind and has a

[01:37] terrifying vision of doom and

[01:38] destruction to come. The X-Men locate

[01:40] Tras and take out the Sentinels. Tras is

[01:42] taken away by government officials,

[01:43] headed up by Dr. Val Cooper, UN liaison

[01:46] to the X-Men. Back at the X-mansion,

[01:47] Magneto shows up and reveals that

[01:49] Charles left everything to him in his

[01:51] will, including the school. In episode

[01:53] 2, mutant liberation begins. The UN puts

[01:55] Magneto on trial. The trial is attacked

[01:57] by the Friends of Humanity and the

[01:58] Executioner, a human outfitted by

[02:00] Sentinel Tech and Advanced Weapons. He

[02:02] fires a blast at Magneto, which is

[02:04] intercepted by Storm. She loses her

[02:06] powers and leaves the X-Mansion. Magneto

[02:08] saves the lives of the UN tribunal, who

[02:10] pardon him. They also say they'll start

[02:11] taking steps to admit Janosha into the

[02:13] UN. The woman everyone thinks is Gan

[02:15] gives birth to baby Nathan, but back at

[02:17] the exion, a woman who also claims to be

[02:19] Gene shows up. Episode three, Fire Made

[02:21] Flesh. It turns out the pregnant Gene is

[02:24] actually a Gene clone created by Mr.

[02:25] Sinister, who'd kidnap the real Gene.

[02:27] The Gene clone under Sinister's control

[02:29] turns into the Goblin Queen and fights

[02:31] the X-Men using her psychic powers to

[02:33] force each of them to experience some of

[02:35] their deepest fears. The real Gene

[02:36] battles clone Gene on the astral plane

[02:38] and helps break her free of Sinister's

[02:40] control. Unfortunately, he's already

[02:41] taken baby Nathan and dipped him in

[02:43] green goo, exposing him to a

[02:44] technoorganic virus. The only way for it

[02:46] to be possibly cured or contained is to

[02:48] send Nathan into the future with Bishop

[02:50] to find future forge. Before they send

[02:52] him off, clone Gene leaves baby Nathan a

[02:54] psychic message to help him remember

[02:55] that he's loved. Bishop takes Nathan,

[02:57] presumably back to the future, which is

[02:59] Bishop's present time. Clone Gene leaves

[03:01] the ex-mansion, giving herself the name

[03:03] Meline Prior before she goes. In a bar,

[03:05] Storm is approached by a young forge who

[03:07] offers to help her. Episode 4,

[03:09] Motendo/Life Death Part One. In the

[03:11] first half, Motendo, it's Jubile's 18th

[03:13] birthday, and she just wants to play

[03:15] video games. She and Sunspot get sucked

[03:16] into a Motendo by Mojo, an

[03:18] interdimensional producer. They have to

[03:20] play their way through, and if they die

[03:21] in the game, they die in real life. A

[03:23] digital replica of Jubilee named Absa is

[03:25] already in the game. Jubilee and Sunspot

[03:27] work with Absa to defeat Mojo and escape

[03:29] the game. In the second half of the

[03:30] episode, Life Death Part One, Storm and

[03:33] Forge work on a solution to her lack of

[03:34] powers, and things are getting a little

[03:36] romantic. That is until he reveals that

[03:38] he was the one who helped build the

[03:39] early designs for the power dampening

[03:41] collars that were then used to make the

[03:43] gun that led to Storm's powers going

[03:45] away. Forge's mutant power is that he

[03:46] can basically invent anything he can

[03:48] picture in his mind. After Storm gets

[03:50] rightfully pissed at Forge, the

[03:51] adversary shows up in the form of a

[03:53] giant terrifying demon owl with Storm's

[03:55] own voice and bites Forge, poisoning him

[03:57] and feeding on Storm's misery. Episode

[03:59] 5, Remember It, is the most brutal and

[04:01] heartbreaking episode of the season. The

[04:03] UN formerly admits Janosha, which has

[04:05] been renovated and upgraded into a kind

[04:06] of paradise vacation spot for mutants. A

[04:09] lot of familiar mutants are here now,

[04:10] including the Morlocks, and some are on

[04:12] the Janosian interim council, like

[04:13] Nightcrawler, Emma Frost, and Maline

[04:15] Prior. The council wants Magneto to rule

[04:17] Janosha, and he agrees, but only if

[04:19] Rogue agrees to be his queen and serve

[04:21] with him. There's a lot of messy

[04:22] romantic entanglements in this episode.

[04:24] Gene discovers that Scott has been

[04:25] having a kind of mental affair with

[04:27] Meline. He claims to love both of them.

[04:28] Rogue tells Gambit about her

[04:30] relationship with Magneto, which started

[04:31] when they realized that his

[04:32] electromagnetic powers protect him from

[04:34] her touch-based draining powers. Rogue

[04:36] seemingly chooses Magneto, telling

[04:38] Gambit that since they can't touch each

[04:39] other, they'd never work out. But after

[04:41] doing a sexy flying dance with Magneto,

[04:43] she also rejects him, which sadly Gambit

[04:45] never finds out because in the midst of

[04:46] a huge celebration party, all hell

[04:48] breaks loose. Cable comes back and tries

[04:50] to stop the upcoming massacre, but he's

[04:52] pulled away. We find out in a later

[04:53] episode that it's because it's a fixed

[04:55] point in time. There's an explosion and

[04:57] then a giant bug-like sentinel attacks

[04:58] and kills a whole bunch of mutants.

[05:01] Gamut dies performing a heroic act.

[05:03] Magneto also seemingly dies, although we

[05:05] find out in a later episode that he's

[05:06] still alive. Episode 6, Life Death Part

[05:09] Two, takes place at the same time as the

[05:11] previous episode. Charles is still with

[05:12] the Shar in Space. Empress Alandre

[05:14] announces that she and Charles are going

[05:15] to be married, but Charles has a vision

[05:17] of what's going on on Janosha, and he

[05:18] can't go through with it. Meanwhile, the

[05:20] adversary taunts Storm as its poison

[05:21] makes its way through Forge's system.

[05:23] Storm finds a cactus plant to cure him

[05:24] and defeats the adversary, which gets

[05:26] rid of the mental block that was keeping

[05:28] her powers suppressed. Storm turns on

[05:29] the TV and learns of the Janosha attack.

[05:31] This is also the episode where we learn

[05:32] that Tras is in league with Sinister.

[05:34] Episode 7, Bright Eyes. Instead of going

[05:36] to Gamut's funeral, Rogue goes on a

[05:38] tear, breaking into a military facility

[05:40] and demanding to know where Guyrick and

[05:41] Tras are. Captain America tells her

[05:43] about the existence of an organization

[05:44] called OZT, which we find out in the

[05:46] next episode stands for Operation Zero

[05:48] Tolerance. Bastion, the big bad of the

[05:50] season, kills Guyrich. The X-Men find

[05:52] Tras and Rogue drops him off a roof, but

[05:54] instead of dying, he transforms into a

[05:56] human sentinel hybrid called a Prime

[05:58] Sentinel. He's very hard to fight, but

[06:00] Cable shows up and tosses an

[06:01] electromagnetic cluster grenade at him,

[06:03] taking him out for the time being. Scott

[06:04] realizes that Cable is actually Nathan

[06:06] all grown up. Sinister has been working

[06:08] for Bastion, who has Magneto held

[06:09] prisoner in some very skimpy clothes.

[06:11] While all this is going down, Roberto

[06:13] tells his mom that he's a mutant. She

[06:14] apparently already knew this, but she

[06:16] says they need to keep it a secret

[06:17] because her shareholders are squirmy

[06:18] about anything involving mutants.

[06:20] Episode 8. Tolerance is extinction part

[06:22] one. Cable explains that in his

[06:24] timeline, Bastion used the fallout from

[06:25] Janosha to get backing for his prime

[06:27] sentinel project. Then he upgraded

[06:29] humans to the human sentinel hybrids and

[06:31] used mutants as slave labor to provide a

[06:33] utopia for the humans. The Prime

[06:35] Sentinels were created using Sinister's

[06:37] technoorganic virus, the one he infected

[06:39] baby Nathan with. A whole bunch of

[06:40] people signed up to be turned into these

[06:42] things, and they don't even have a

[06:43] memory of having had the procedure done

[06:44] until they're activated. Gene and Scott

[06:46] go to Bastion's childhood home. They

[06:48] discover that his father was infected by

[06:50] Sentinel tech from the future. And when

[06:51] his mother had Bastion, he had the

[06:53] ability to communicate with the

[06:54] machines, including Master Mold. He's

[06:56] basically the descendant of every

[06:58] Sentinel. He orchestrated Janosha,

[06:59] knowing that that much tragedy would

[07:01] overwhelm humans, and they'd eventually

[07:03] feel apathy about it all. A bunch of

[07:05] Prime Sentinels get activated and start

[07:07] attacking the X-Men, including Bastion's

[07:08] mom, Sunspot's Butler, and reporter

[07:10] Trish Tilby, who spent a few episodes

[07:12] flirting with Beast. Dr. Cooper, who it

[07:14] turns out was a member of the OZT group,

[07:16] sets Magneto free and he uses his power

[07:18] to basically EMP the whole Earth,

[07:20] shutting down the Prime Sentinels.

[07:22] Charles crashes back down to Earth in a

[07:23] sheer ship. Episode 9, Tolerance is

[07:25] extinction part two. Charles is back in

[07:27] the mansion and Magneto is back in his

[07:29] original outfit, which you know can't

[07:30] mean anything good. If the Earth's

[07:32] magnetic field isn't turned back on by

[07:33] Magneto within 24 hours, it and

[07:36] everything on it will die. Magneto

[07:37] offers the X-Men a home on asteroid M,

[07:39] planning to take off and leave Earth to

[07:41] its fate. and Rogue and Sunspot actually

[07:43] join him. Half of the remaining X-Men go

[07:45] to fight Magneto and try to convince him

[07:47] to save Earth. So Magneto, Rogue, and

[07:49] Sunspot end up fighting Charles,

[07:51] Wolverine Cyclops Nightcrawler and

[07:53] Jubilee. Wolverine stabs Magneto, who

[07:55] then rips the adamantium from Wolverine

[07:57] skeleton. The other half of the X-Men,

[07:59] Storm, Gene, Morph, Beast, and Forge, go

[08:02] and try to neutralize Bastion. Sinister

[08:04] shows up and controls Cable to make him

[08:06] fight Gene. Episode 10, Tolerance's

[08:08] Extinction Part Three, the season 1

[08:09] finale. The X-Men, with the help of the

[08:11] Phoenix Force, still inside Gene, manage

[08:13] to defeat Sinister and Bastion. But the

[08:15] president targets Asteroid M with

[08:16] missiles. And now it's going to crash

[08:18] down into the Earth. The X-Men stay

[08:19] behind and work together to destroy it,

[08:21] which will save humanity, but likely

[08:22] kill all of them. At the last second,

[08:24] they're pulled out of time by some force

[08:26] and sent to two different timelines. 6

[08:28] months later, people don't know what

[08:29] happened to the X-Men or where they are.

[08:31] Bishop shows up to tell Forge that they

[08:33] were pulled through time and that they

[08:34] need to be rescued. In the post-redit

[08:36] scenes, we see rogue nightcrawler beast

[08:37] Charles and Magneto in 3000 BC as they

[08:40] meet and Sabanor, the first mutant who

[08:42] will become Apocalypse. Meanwhile, Scott

[08:44] and Gene meet Mother Escani and young

[08:46] Nathan in 3960 AD. In the present day on

[08:49] Janosha, Apocalypse picks up a Queen of

[08:51] Hearts playing card, Gambit's Queen of

[08:53] Hearts playing card, and says this,

[08:55] >> "So much pain, my children, so much

[09:00] death." hinting at the fact that he may

[09:02] in fact be resurrecting Gambit as his

[09:04] horsemen death. So season 2 is going to

[09:06] open with the X-Men split up between

[09:08] three timelines. Rogue, Nightcrawler,

[09:10] Beast, Charles, and Magneto in the past,

[09:11] Forge, Bishop, Jubilee, and Sunspot in

[09:14] the present. Although Bishop is

[09:15] presumably about to travel through time

[09:17] to join the past group. Then there's

[09:19] Jean, Scott, and according to the

[09:20] trailer, Storm, Wolverine, and Morph in

[09:22] the future with young Nathan. It's

[09:24] pretty clear that season 2 is going to

[09:25] focus on the X-Men dealing with

[09:26] Apocalypse at different points in time.

[09:28] So, I'm going to go through his

[09:29] storylines from the original series very

[09:31] briefly. Apocalypse was first introduced

[09:33] in the animated series in season 1,

[09:35] episode 9, The Cure. In this and the

[09:37] following episode, episode 10, come the

[09:39] Apocalypse. Apocalypse's machine turns

[09:41] Warren Worthington III's angel into his

[09:43] horseman death, Archangel. When mutants

[09:45] become horsemen, they're under

[09:46] Apocalypse's control, but Rogue uses her

[09:48] powers to drain Archangel just enough

[09:50] that it snaps him out of it.

[09:51] Apocalypse's whole thing is that he

[09:53] hates and is disgusted by society and

[09:55] wants to rebuild the world in his own

[09:56] image. With only the strongest humans

[09:58] and mutants left, he turns mutants into

[10:00] his horsemen slaves and uses them to

[10:02] help him try and wipe out humanity.

[10:04] There's death, famine, pestilence, and

[10:05] war. And in these two episodes, we see

[10:07] three other mutants transforming into

[10:09] the remaining horsemen. Apocalypse is

[10:10] known as the first mutant, so he's super

[10:12] old, and he maintains his immortality by

[10:14] visiting his Lazarus chamber and

[10:16] hibernating once every hundred years. In

[10:18] season 2, episodes seven and eight time

[10:20] fugitives parts one and two, Apocalypse

[10:22] creates a plague that's supposed to wipe

[10:23] out both humans and mutants. Time

[10:25] traveling Bishop tries to stop the

[10:27] plague, but time traveling Cable needs

[10:28] the plague to happen because his

[10:30] timeline is being rewritten due to the

[10:32] interference. At the last second, Cable

[10:34] has the idea to infect Wolverine with

[10:35] the plague to use the antibodies created

[10:37] by his rapid healing capabilities to

[10:39] develop an antidote. In season 3,

[10:40] episode 9, Obsession, Archangel is

[10:43] obsessed with finding Apocalypse and

[10:44] making him pay for turning him into one

[10:46] of his horsemen. The X-Men appeal to

[10:47] Apocalypse's future tech sentient ship

[10:49] for help, and she seals him in an escape

[10:51] pot and blasts him into space,

[10:53] neutralizing him for the time being. But

[10:55] Archangel is still completely focused on

[10:56] getting his revenge. At the very end of

[10:58] season 4, episode 4, Sanctuary Part Two,

[11:01] Apocalypse rescues villain Fabian

[11:03] Cortez, from an almost destroyed

[11:04] asteroid M, and says he has a use for

[11:06] him. In the season 4 finale arc, Beyond

[11:08] Good and Evil, parts one through four,

[11:10] the end of time, Cable infiltrates

[11:12] Apocalypse's Lazarus Chamber in the

[11:13] future, but Apocalypse steals Cable's

[11:15] time travel tech and goes on a time

[11:17] jaunt. This inadvertently bumps Bishop

[11:19] off course of his own time travel, and

[11:21] he gets stuck in the axis of time, which

[11:23] is looked after by Bender, who turns out

[11:25] to be a disguised immortice. Apocalypse

[11:27] kidnaps all the mutant psychics,

[11:28] including Gene, Charles, and Psylock.

[11:30] Cable tries to travel back in time to

[11:32] destroy Apocalypse's Lazarus chamber

[11:33] before it's even built, but he gets sent

[11:35] to the present instead. But then Cable

[11:37] and the X-Men travel back to Egypt in

[11:39] 1200 BC where they fight the original

[11:41] four horsemen. Cable blows up the

[11:42] chamber which Apocalypse claims he no

[11:44] longer needs as he's now sustained by

[11:46] the Nexus outside of time. His plan is

[11:48] to kill all the psychics at once,

[11:49] releasing a burst of psychic energy that

[11:51] ends all of existence. But Cable and the

[11:53] X-Men manage to stop him. The psychics

[11:55] combine their powers to expel

[11:56] Apocalypse, causing him to cease to

[11:58] exist. But then in season 5, episode 5,

[12:00] the fifth horsemen, Apocalypse, now

[12:02] formless and in a void, uses Fabian

[12:04] Cortez as his vessel to bring himself

[12:06] back into existence. And that was where

[12:08] Apocalypse's story in the original

[12:09] series ended. So in season 2 of X-Men

[12:11] 97, I think we're going to see the X-Men

[12:13] in the past grappling with whether or

[12:15] not they should kill and saber before he

[12:17] becomes Apocalypse. Knowing that Charles

[12:18] and Magneto are both in the past, this

[12:20] should lead to some interesting ethical

[12:22] debates. And meanwhile, the X-Men of the

[12:24] future might have an interesting time if

[12:25] anything done in the past messes with

[12:27] their current existence. And I think

[12:29] it's all leading up to Gambit being

[12:30] resurrected by the end of the season by

[12:32] Apocalypse as the Horseman Death. So,

[12:34] that's everything you need to know

[12:35] before X-Men 97 season 2 comes out. Let

[12:37] me know in the comments where your hype

[12:38] level is for it. Go over to nerd

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