“It’s guys and girls slaving over hand drawn work”: After X-Men ’97, Kevin Feige’s MCU Course-Correction Can Make Marvel Animation Even More Legendary Than DCAU

Marvel has always had a fascination with stretching the limits of what is known and what is possible. One of the first proofs of that concept was the 1990s production of the X-Men animated series. Now, evolving into X-Men ’97, the show not only serves as an extension of the past but also re-examines what made the 1992 series so successful in the first place.

With an inherent interest in the progress of the modern-day MCU, fans and studio execs, sponsors and competitors, partners and collaborators – all wait patiently on the sidelines, waiting for the comic book studio juggernaut to either slip up or create a masterpiece. However, with recent accomplishments of X-Men ’97 under the belt, Kevin Feige may not call it quits just yet.

X-Men ’97 Revives Hope for the Marvel Universe

For the longest time, Marvel Animation has suffered drastically while DC has only grown more qualified by the day. One of the primary reasons for that is the division of Marvel’s original properties, which currently lay scattered all over the industry, even though Fox’s recent annexation has brought back 2 of the strongest IPs home.

DC, on the other hand, has enjoyed full access to its properties even though the Dark Knight has singlehandedly kept the industry afloat for most of the time. Starting from Kevin Conroy‘s Batman: The Animated Series to The Killing Joke, the Arkham video games to The LEGO Batman Movie, there has been no shortage of the Caped Crusader – be it in animation, video games, or live-action.

With Beau DeMayo‘s ingenious revival of X-Men ’97, Marvel can finally have a leg-up on the animation sector that has been falling far behind on DCAU’s astounding evolution from the 90s.

Kevin Feige Course Corrects With X-Men ’97

Marvel doesn’t have much to show for itself when it comes to animation – apart from a bright spot in the 90s that saw the era of X-Men: The Animated Series. The recently cobbled-together division, titled, Marvel Studios Animation was set up in 2021 to develop projects like What If…?, Marvel Zombies, I Am Groot, Spider-Man: Freshman Year, and X-Men ’97.

Being merely 3 years old, the studio division doesn’t have a lot of expertise to fall back on despite using the best CGI and VFX artists to conjure up the magic to make all these storylines come true. Surprisingly, however, it was X-Men ’97 that managed to strike a chord with the fans – not only for its subject matter but the nostalgic feel and aesthetic of the series and the hand-drawn visuals that give it the same gravity that was thought lost in the mists of time.

In the same vein, Craig Kyle, a former Senior Vice President of Creative Development Animation for Marvel Studios, revealed in a 2007 interview with iF Magazine:

What I love about Marvel and our characters — everything springs forth from comic books. It’s guys and girls slaving over hand drawn work and the written page and it all lives and breaths on the paper.

That faith in the hand-drawn animation capable of telling stories that move us to our core was what supplied Beau DeMayo with the idea not to sell X-Men ’97 short of what it was worth. In an interview with Inverse, he shared:

This is still a 2D hand-drawn show. Even though in this day and age we do take advantage of CG for layout, or overly complicated vehicles or ships. But then you still have to go in and hand draw all of that because if you don’t, it doesn’t feel like it looks the way it should.

We wanted this to still feel like it was a show that came out 30 years ago. For me, it came down to looking at what was happening between ‘96 and ‘98; what was being done in anime, what were cinematic elements at that time, and how did television look… We still had to make it relevant and make sure it still slaps for today.

If Kevin Feige can follow the model that made X-Men ’97 a groundbreaking success, Marvel Animation surely has better days ahead – a thought that almost makes one hopeful of being able to see the studio standing on par with DCAU one day.

X-Men ’97 is available to stream on Disney+