The Uncanny Experience Celebrates 25 Years Of ‘X-Men: Evolution’
by Austin Gorton
In honor of the 25th anniversary of the animated X-Men: Evolution, the Uncanny Experience X-Men fan convention hosted a celebratory panel at its third annual event on July 12th. In the “lecture hall” of the historic Minneapolis Club (standing in for the X-Mansion), designer Steven E. Gordon along with actresses Meghan Black (Rogue) and Maggie Blue O’Hara (Kitty Pryde) reunited in front of a packed crowd (which included at least five people cosplaying as X-Men: Evolution Rogue) to discuss the series and its legacy and offer up plenty of behind-the-scenes tidbits.
Black and O’Hara started off discussing getting involved with the show and recording their lines. Both auditioned for the show. Unlike most animated series today — in which each member of the cast records their lines in isolation — the X-Men: Evolution cast recorded their lines together in the studio. As a result, they felt the end result was much more dynamic. O’Hara mentioned that the audio recording sessions were often recorded on video; she was told this was to help inspire the animators in their depictions of each actor’s character, leading her to deliver her lines while recording with much more physical expression than normal. In a humorous moment, Gordon sheepishly corrected her, saying the video recordings were just used for DVD extras.
Given that the series’ launched in the same year as the first X-Men live-action movie, one attendee in the audience asked if their was a desire on anyone’s part to create synergy between the series and that film. According to Gordon, any such synergy which is present is largely coincidental. Similarly, when someone asked about the romance between Kitty and Avalanche — a romantic pairing original to the series — both O’Hara and Gordon said it was something that developed on accident, and wasn’t intended from the start.
Gordon said that throughout the run of the series, Marvel was largely hands off — they handed down a few broad edicts at the start, such as specifying color associations for each character (like green for Jean Grey, red for Cyclops, etc.). That said, the creators were careful to keep the Mystique and Destiny relationship — who, in the series, were presented, as in the comics, as Rogue’s foster parents — low key to avoid attracting attention from Marvel, and while the animators originally put a Star of David necklace on Kitty, Marvel asked them to remove it.
Marvel also asked the series to introduce a new young mutant, which led writer Craig Kyle — then the liaison between the series and Marvel — to create X-23/Laura Kinney, whom Kyle based on his niece. Asked whether Spike — another young mutant original to the series — was inspired by Marrow (who, like Marrow, has bone-based powers), Gordon said that any resemblance was accidental, as Marrow, who was created in 1995 and joined the X-Men in late 1997, wasn’t known to the creators.
According to Gordon, a 5th season of the show was in the works when it was cancelled — something which was news to both Black and O’Hara. He said that the bankruptcy of KB Toys — which had an exclusive distributor deal with Marvel’s corporate owner, Toy Biz, to distribute the X-Men: Evolution action figures — scuttled that season and led to the end of the show. Unable to sell the toys anywhere else, Marvel wanted to end the series even earlier, while Kids WB (which aired it) was happy with the ratings and wanted to keep it going. Eventually, a deal was made to end the series with its fourth season (that said, while I confirmed Gordon’s recounting of events with him at his table after the panel and I wouldn’t be at all surprised by Toy Biz only caring about the show in terms of its action figure sales, I can’t find any evidence that the X-Men: Evolution action figures were exclusive to KB Toys at any time),
Asked about any future stories set in the X-Men: Evolution universe, O’Hara said that at the previous evening’s Omega Gala event, she suggested a series focused on Kitty’s kids, but nothing official is in the works. Gordon concluded the panel by telling the crowd to reach out to companies — Disney, Funko, etc. — to express their desire for more X-Men: Evolution stories and merch.
