Through cases beyond their totality, other people expand their ordinary powers into a world that begins to worry them. But with the help of a rich and mysterious benefactor, those “mutants” use their gifts to save others from persecution while shady government organizations fight to hunt them down. down and them.
That’s the premise of Marvel’s X-Men, and it’s also the premise of Marvel’s Mutant X scam series, a commonly forgotten TV show (unrelated to the comic book of the same name) that ended twenty years ago today on an abrupt cliffhanger.
The similarities don’t end there, either. Iconic X-Men storylines revolving around mutant cures, discrimination, and even the astral plane have been heavily proportioned throughout the 3 seasons of Mutant X. Hell, those kids even had their own personal Blackbird-esque sigil. jet and a holographic educational facility such as the Danger Room. But there were also some differences.
In this world, mutants who go the right way, pass, because they weren’t born that way. Instead, they were genetically modified in a lab by Adam Kane, a former biogeneticist who once worked for a dubious government-sponsored corporation called Genomex. He learned that this society was evil and planned to exploit mutants for their own gain. Adam faked his own death and set up a safe haven for the team of mutants who would eventually become Mutant X.
The members included Jesse Kilmartin, a “molecular” mutant who can simply replace the composition of his frame with something intangible like Kitty Pryde or physically dense like Emma Frost in her diamond form. On screen, this translates into blurry special effects that now look old-fashioned. or tacky depending on his nostalgia for the low-budget sci-fi of the early 2000s.
The only other member to appear in all 66 episodes was Shalimar Fox, a mutant tracker whose feline agility was based on a mixture of wobbly wires and public disbelief. A medium-sized redhead named Emma DeLaurno joined the organization early on, but when she passed away at the beginning of Season 3, she remained dead, which isn’t how such things happen for middling redheads. Emma was then replaced by Lexa Pierce, a Dazzler analogue who can gently bend to his will, while a brilliant elemental mutant named Brennan Mulwray rounded out the team with the visual dinner we needed and deserved.
But it’s not like each and every X-Men scam also wants its own Magneto, and that’s where Mason Eckhart comes in. Adam’s old friend and former head of security at Genomex created his own organization in the first episode called the Genetic Security Agency (GSA), which was supposedly created to protect the public, but actually captured mutants for additional testing. In this regard, Mason looked more like Mr. Sinister, if Mr. Sinister wore bulky gloves and a reasonable white wig. However, all that (sexual?) tension between Charles and Magnus continued here in the same dynamic that was ingrained in so many X-Men videos from that era.
However, manufacturer Avi Arad’s Mutant X was never on the same level, although it shared a similar love for soft black Matrix-style leather. Comparing the films to this series would be like comparing X-Men 2 to Dark Phoenix, however, the 20th Century Fox studio still questioned the blatant plagiarism, even though technically there is no connection between Mutant X and the X-Men.
But if Mutant X is a Marvel series, why is it a problem?To avoid bankruptcy, Marvel had sold its rights to the X-Men – as well as many other characters – to 20th Century Fox a few years earlier, in 1994. So when it came time to try their hand at television, they partnered with Tribune Entertainment and Fireworks Entertainment to fund Mutant X.
Even before the series arrived in October 2001, Fox challenged this new organization of satisfied mutants and sued Marvel, who erased some of the biggest similarities so that a trial could give them the green light to continue. Marvel then countersued Fox, who, in turn, continued their action against Tribune and Fireworks, prompting Tribune to sue Marvel for misleading them about what can and cannot be used in the series.
More complicated than a Genoshana funeral home (and just as painful), the drama surrounding Mutant X is arguably far more engaging than the exhibit itself, but that didn’t stop enthusiasts from connecting with it anyway.
Sure, we were pretty hungry for clever superhero content at the time, and yes, key episodes (often named just to sound “cool”) were even filmed out of order. Still, Mutant X has won a few industry awards, not Emmy awards yet, that’s for sure, and when the series ended after 3 seasons on that cliffhanger, several fan campaigns fought to get it back after the sci-fi channel recently had to save its sister series, Andromeda.
Attempts to resurrect Mutant X failed because the challenge was financial, not because the exhibit itself was unpopular. In fact, the writers were so sure of themselves in renewing a fourth season that they ended the third season with an innovative twist that it still pursues. Today’s hearing, twenty years later. Our comfort prize was the so-called “fourth season” which simply combined some reruns of the first 3 seasons into the “Best Of” of a Deficient Man.
Talk of a TV movie designed to shut things down came and went, and for a while, it looked like Mutant X wouldn’t even make it to DVD. But Tribune, regardless, made enthusiasts smart and broadcast the series in physical format. middle. So now you can go back and enjoy all 3 seasons through Ebay or your local charity store without paying an exorbitant amount for streaming rental.
Echoes of Mutant X can also be felt in later presentations that officially had ties to the X-Men, even if they weren’t exactly prominent either. Just as Mutant X is a huge improvement over Generation X: a TV movie from the ’90s that dared to ask the question “what if Emma Frost, but bland?”- The Gifted also enhanced Mutant X with its own unexpected parallels.
16 years after Mutant X first aired, The Gifted also explored a kind of global exchange where mutants were on the run from an evil government agency, and the series even killed off its resident red-haired medium, Dreamer, just one season later. As an example, The Gifted canceled even before Mutant X, having lasted only two seasons in total.
But what does the long-term future hold for Mutant X beyond this forgotten legacy it left behind?Is there even one? When Marvel runs out of superheroes from the 2000s to bring back to the screen, at least some of which will likely appear in Deadpool
And if we want to be even cheesier about it, Mutant X is canonically based on an exchange fact that’s officially part of the Marvel multiverse, set on Earth-704509, so who said that portal in the latest Deadpool trailer couldn’t?End up in the team’s dojo? Check out your copy of the official Marvel Universe A-Z Vol 5 Handbook.
For now, though, as X-Men ’97 is rightfully proud of its position after this incredible Season 1 finale, take a brief moment not to forget Mutant X, the only X-Men-adjacent series that dared to believe in a world where mutants are treated as supporting roles. Class citizens, not because they are different, but because they look too much like the mutants that enthusiasts already know and love.
Mutant X is now available to stream on Freevee.
Stay up-to-date with all the TV screens that will be available soon with our advisor on exciting new TV screens to keep an eye on.
With ten years of experience in online journalism, David has written about television, film, and music for a wide diversity of publications, including Indiewire, Paste, Empire, Digital Spy, Radio Times, Teen Vogue, and many more. on LGBTQ panels to talk about queer representation and in 2020 created Digital Spy’s Rainbow Crew interview series, which celebrates queer ability on both sides of the camera through video content and extensive readings. His passions come with animation, horror, comics, and LGBTQ storytelling, which is why David aspires to see a Buffy-themed Rusical in RuPaul’s Drag Race.
The Boys Author Needs to Complete His “Supernatural Pokémon” Game in Season 5 by Adding Jared Padalecki
The Boys Reveals Its First Look At The Seven In Season 4, But There’s One Main Problem
Baldur’s Gate 3 had less of a meltdown than Larian’s previous RPGs, but its director says you’ll “get a little bit” of extra time.
GamesRadar is from Future plc, a leading foreign media organization and virtual publisher. Visit our corporate website.