It’s been a long wait for the arrival of X-Men ‘97, having been announced in November 2021. But luckily, fans won’t have to wait much longer! With only two weeks to go until its March 20 release date, Marvel Studios has revealed the full schedule of the series along with episode titles on their X/Twitter account, so let’s take a look and see what’s in store for us, and the meaning behind it all.
Two Months of Mutants
Kicking things off with a dual-episode premiere on Disney+, the schedule and titles are as follows:
March 20: ‘To Me, My X-Men’ (Ep 1)
March 20: ‘Mutant Liberation Begins’ (Ep 2)
March 27: ‘Fire Made Flesh’ (Ep 3)
April 30: ‘Motendo / Lifedeath – Pt 1’ (Ep 4)
April 10: ‘Remember It’ (Ep 5)
April 17: ‘Lifedeath – Pt 2’ (Ep 6)
April 24: ‘Bright Eyes’ (Ep 7)
May 1: ‘Tolerance is Extinction – Pt 1’ (Ep 8)
May 8: ‘Tolerance is Extinction – Pt 2’ (Ep 9)
May 15: ‘Tolerance is Extinction – Pt 3’ (Ep 10)
‘X-Men ‘97’ Title Meanings Explained
While we don’t know exactly what each title means and what the episodes will have in store for us, they’re a few intriguing bits of information we’ve picked up on.
Starting with Episode 1, “To me, my X-Men” is, of course, Charles Xavier’s famous sort of catchphrase, which is seen being commanded by Cyclops in the trailer for the series. There isn’t too much to glean from this on what it may mean for the episode unfortunately.
Episode 2, called ‘Mutant Liberation Begins’, could be referring to the Mutant Liberation Front, first introduced in ‘New Mutants’ #86, which has also been more recently revived by Captain Krakoa during the Fall of X event.
Episode 3’s title, ‘Fire Made Flesh’ appears to be referencing when Jean Gray became Dark Phoenix. Could we be seeing the Phoenix Force return?
Episode 4 appears to be quite a unique situation, having two titles, one of which is a Part 1. Does this mean the episode is double the length? Or is it normal length but split into two separate stories? We’re not quite sure. What we do know, however, is that ‘Motendo’ seems to refer to common X-Men villain Mojo, who rules over Mojoworld. The “tendo” part sounds as if it’s derived from Nintendo, lending credence to rumors of a video game-themed episode in the series. Now the ‘Lifedeath’ part? We’ll have more on that for you in a moment.
For Episode 5, we honestly have no clue what ‘Remember It’ could mean. Only time will tell!
The title ‘Lifedeath’ returns with a Part 2 for Episode 6. Just as with X-Men: The Animated Series, it looks like we’ll be getting two-parters for stories of greater narrative significance. This title is actually the easiest to know the meaning behind, because it’s pulled straight from the comics! ‘Lifedeath’ was a Storm-focused issue in ‘Uncanny X-Men’ #186, and similarly to its upcoming animated counterpart being two parts, it was actually a special double-length issue.
Episode 7 looks like where we may see Nathan Summers join the party, with the title ‘Bright Eyes’ seemingly referring to when Rogue previously said to Cable, “Remember me, bright eyes?”
Not only are two-parters back, but so are three-parters! Unfortunately, there isn’t much for us to work with for Episode 8-10’s title of ‘Tolerance is Extinction’, but it sounds like it’ll be one hell of a fight!
The first two episodes of X-Men ‘97 premiere on Disney+ on March 20. Check out the trailer below.
