Marvel Entertainment has taken incremental steps to bring the X-Men back into the fold. The purchase of Marvel Entertainment by the Walt Disney Company was a financial boon. With the financial backing of the Walt Disney Company, we would see a rise in Marvel-related content. While the X-Men or anything about mutants has yet to enter the MCU, except for Professor X (who was once again portrayed by Sir Patrick Stewart) in Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness, Marvel Studios is working on X-Men '97 which will stream on Disney+ in early 2024.
X-Men '97 is a revival and continuation of X-Men: The Animated Series which aired on the Fox Kids programming block from 1992 until 1997 for five seasons. If you need to catch up on the original series, you can watch it on Disney+ as part of Marvel's “Legacy” collection.
X-Men: The Animated Series centers on the government-sanctioned Mutant Registration Act.
Jubilee is the show's viewpoint character and the newest addition to the titular superhero group. It is known that Jubilee was revealed as a mutant and that her adoptive parents put her in the registration with no clue of the danger it possesses. This causes Jubilee to run away from home and hang out at the local mall arcade where she accidentally blows up a random arcade cabinet with her powers.
A Sentinel, one of many tower robots used to enforce the Mutant Registration Act, smashes its way into the mall to capture Jubilee.
Unknown to either, there are several X-Men at the mall who are casually relaxing.
Gambit and Rogue attack the Sentinel which allows Jubilee to escape. In the mall's parking lot, Jubilee is rescued by Cyclops who easily destroys the Sentinel with his optic blasts. Jubilee is taken to the Xavier Mansion but escapes before the other X-Men can introduce themselves.
When Jubilee attempts to contact her foster parents, she's captured by the Sentinels and taken to a facility to be killed. The X-Men launch a covert rescue to bring back Jubilee which becomes a pyrrhic victory because the operation resulted in the death of Morph and the capture of Beast (who spends the rest of season one in prison).
Season one focuses on the persecution and discrimination mutants face regularly. There are added elements such as Magneto's attempt to start a war between mutants and humans, Senator Robert Kelly ramping up actions to capture more mutants, and the prevention of a dystopian future where most of the mutants are dead.
The second season is split into several plots where one focuses on newlyweds Cyclops & Jean Grey being captured by Mr. Sinister, a second plot focuses on the anti-mutant group “Friends of Humanity,” and a third plot where Magneto and Professor X must work together (without having access to their powers).
A couple of origin stories are thrown in the mix, too.
Season three focuses on the “Phoenix Saga” where the X-Men travel to space to deal with the titular Phoenix entity. There is also a small subplot, which plays an important role in season four, involving Archangel's quest to kill Apocalypse.
Season four focuses on the X-Men working with Bishop and Cable to stop Apocalypse from taking control of the axis of time. This story arc also reveals why Archangel failed every attempt to kill Apocalypse.
Season five focuses on the battle between Professor X and Magneto whose ideals are stronger. It ultimately ends in a temporary ceasefire between both parties as Professor X is critically wounded by Henry Peter Gyrich and needs to be treated off-planet because the Shi'ar Empire has superior medical technology.
When X-Men '97 begins streaming, the story will continue right after Professor X is taken to space or there's going to be some time skip to maintain story continuity.
X-Men '97 would not have been possible to create if the Walt Disney Company did not acquire 21st Century Fox.
Marvel Comics declared bankruptcy in 1996 and sold its character rights to different corporate entities such as Fox (who acquired the rights to characters and plot devices associated with the X-Men and the Fantastic Four). Sony had an opportunity to buy the rights to all of the characters in the Marvel universe for $25M when Marvel made an offer in 1998, it declined and paid $10M for the character rights to the Spider-Man franchise.
The Marvel Cinematic Universe gained traction in the late 2000s with Iron Man. Future MCU releases (The Incredible Hulk, Iron Man 2, Thor, and Captain America: The First Avenger) were preludes to The Avengers. It expanded beyond films with Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D which was originally geared to fill in the blanks between the films before going on a tangent.
With the MCU becoming powerful, we were left wondering when the X-Men would ever be introduced in a future film. It wasn't legally possible because 21st Century Fox retained the character rights to anything associated with the X-Men. Disney tried to purchase the rights back but 21st Century Fox declined and I wouldn't blame them because of its big-money stars (Sir Patrick Stewart, Sir Ian McKellen, Michael Fassbender, Ryan Reynolds, Hugh Jackman, and Jennifer Lawrence).
Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch were the loopholes, though, because they weren't solely associated with the X-Men. Scarlet Witch, who was originally written as one of Magneto's estranged daughters, is a long-serving member of the Avengers. Quicksilver, who was originally written as the estranged son of Magneto, married Crystal of the Avengers and had a daughter, Luna, with her.
That's why Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch were in The Avengers: Age of Ultron but were not called mutants or it would have been a violation of the original licensing agreement. This is also why Quicksilver, played by Evan Peters, appears in X-Men: Days of Future's Past. There is a nod to that in WandaVision.
Magneto's other daughter, Polaris, made her on-screen appearance in The Gifted which aired on Fox.
Marvel Entertainment tried and failed to get its fans to forget about the X-Men. The company made an unpopular move to kill off all of the mutants and get the Inhumans to fill in the gap of being the new persecuted group. That failed because the Inhumans didn't face persecution on a level that the mutants faced for decades.
We saw that it was creative laziness but we understood the intentions.
That adversely affected the MCU which I believe caused Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. to go on that tangent where Skye is revealed to be Daisy “Quake” Johnson. Quake wasn't revealed as an Inhuman in the comics until much later, which is about the time her on-screen counterpart became an Inhuman. When Marvel focuses on the Inhumans in the comics, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D's original plot changed to dealing with the rise of new Inhumans.
That also led to the debacle which was the live-action adaptation of The Inhumans that was originally going to be a full-length film and changed into a TV series.
Not being able to do anything related to the X-Men forced writers to change the storyline for Captain America: Civil War and Secret War.
Marvel issued a memo in 2014 that forbade the writers in the X Department to create new characters, too, because the original licensing agreement automatically gives Fox the on-screen rights to them.
With the acquisition of 21st Century Fox, the character rights to anything associated with the X-Men are back with Marvel.
X-Men '97 will be the first X-Men-related show to be created by Marvel Entertainment after acquiring 21st Century Fox.
You can read my original version here: https://canhoangtran.medium.com/what-you-need-to-know-about-x-men-97-1e4836e2c42f
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