TV Review: X-men Evolution Season 2

The Lowdown: A re-imagining of the popular comic and film franchise, X-men, where the title characters are de-aged into teenagers in a high-school setting.

The Review: Here I am back at it again with more X-men Evolution. Since the first season kiddied up the X-men concept and castrated the complexity of the X-men world and it's characters, it left me wary on how the show would progress. Would it continue in it's cutesy direction that only a pre-teen could love or would it grow a pair of balls and satisfy the child, the teen, and the adult audience?

Well, in short, X-men: Evolution season 2 is a huge, gigantic step in the right direction. Unfortunately, it takes most of the season to make that step. It's understandable, and was a good decision to slow burn the dark tonal shift. This shift plays into one of the major themes of the season, HIDDEN IDENTITIES. In the Evolution world, mutants are largely hidden and most of the X-men can hide amongst the regulars. There's quite a few episodes that play into the non-exposure of mutants and it's one of Beast's struggles during this season. By the time the season comes to it's excellent conclusion (the last three episodes), you can see all the little nuances tying together.

But before I get ahead of myself, heck I almost jumped into my hopes and impressions for season 3, let me jump back to the beginning of the second season. The whole season takes on a fresh slate feel. Although the Brotherhood and X-men fight (again!) in the early episodes, it doesn't seem as stale. Why, you may ask? Because this time around it's not just about recruitment, and heck they only fight once (motivated by the main theme mentioned earlier) in the early part of the season, most of the rest is just petty arguments. It makes sense, because of the age group of these mutants, they're less likely to be involved in constant super hero team clashes. It didn't mesh well in the season before, and the season before made it occur in almost every single episode.

Also, from the very beginning, Xavier's school has a larger population of mutant students, making it seem like an actual school instead of a superhero bootcamp. There are a ton new mutants that often take supporting roles in many of the characters. Some are takes on the classic New Mutant series (Cannonball, Magma), one is a classic X-character (Iceman) and my favorites are takes on the X-factor team (Rahne/Wolfsbane and Madrox/Multiple Man). There's others that make constant cameos and this is one thing that really livens up and freshens up the series from the get-go.

Another reason why this season is better is simply the writing is crisper, this time around the high-school concept is only a backdrop instead of consuming the series every episode. The stakes are often larger, although small-scale enough for teenager mutants to deal with, and the adults take more important roles throughout but are less dictating and more subdued in their manipulation (speaking specifically of Mystique and Magneto). The children also engage in very high-school things, they act like teenage kids, they have crushes, they often engage in pranks, and they are underdeveloped in their ability to handle emotion. The romantic subplots become another huge theme and also are better parts of the series, they really add little nuances, and slowly develop like real relationships. The chemistry between the character is much more spot on and the fight sequences have improved as well. (As an aside: For animate, Nothing has been able to top the amazing fight choreography of the Spectacular Spider-man series, WOOO!)

Of course the season is fantastic, it's still got kiddified plots, but they're handled much better than before. Outside of a few dud episodes, the season is solidly above average, sometimes good, but not anywhere near great or fantastic. Some plots are still rather boring, and the series is rather tied to the high-school concept limiting the depth and complexity that the plots can have. But when the series hits its stride near the end of the season it really hits its stride. Those last 3 episodes (Hex Factor, Day of Reckoning Part 1-2) are the best three episodes of the season (along with On Angel's Wings). And frankly the ending of the season makes you glad you stuck around because the tone of the show completely changes to a more mature, dark feel.

OVERALL: It's a solid season that's a rather fun adaptation, but still can be rather dull at points. Lots of bonus points for the pre-finale episode and finale two-parter. It's a barnburner that makes you excited for things to come.

** 3/4 out of *****

TV Review: X-men: Evolution Season 1

The Lowdown: A re-imagining of the popular comic and film franchise, X-men, where the title characters are de-aged into teenagers in a high-school setting.

The Review: To begin, I'm a huge fan of the X-men's 90's Animated Series, I grew up watching it as a little grade-schooler, and have rewatched episodes throughout my high-school and college years. I just finished a 5-month rewatch of the entire series from beginning to end about a month ago. It hit me that I never really watched the Evolution series. Also with a third series, Wolverine and the X-men, making waves, I decided to contiue my trek through the animated X-verse.

Evolution season one is an odd ball. First of all, most animated films and tv series tend to have children in mind, but the creators also understand that many parents and family members will be watching the series, so they attempt to make it fun for those adult family members as well. Well season one, is kid's fluff. It's themes rarely hint at something deeper than high-school drama and much of the first season is mired in dull repetition, and the desire to get as many introductions out of the way as possible. Speaking of the introductions, the first 5 or 6 episodes have the same formula of introduce two new characters, have them come into conflict over something ridiculous, have one join the good team (The X-men, YAY!) and have one join the bad team (The Brotherhood, BOOO!), rinse, wash, and repeat. The single time they throw a twist into this is with the Rogue character, and not surprising, it is one of the better arcs and storylines of the season, providing some of the better episodes, but still decidedly not great episodes, of the season (for example, Rogue Recruit and Turn of the Rogue).

Ok, so the first half is formulaic, what about the second half? Does it get better? Yes the second half is better, but not by much. Although the formula of introducing characters is no longer there, the repetition of the same baddies vs. the same goodies every episode is still there. Also the plot lines aren't good at all, and a couple are downright boring and uninteresting (Spykecam, Survival of the Fittest). Of course there are a couple of bright spots in the second half as well, the episode dealing with Nightcrawler's lineage is rather good, and the episode dealing with Wolverine is the only real gem in a downright boring season.

Speaking of character driven episodes, it's a very different team than the 90's animated series, Cyclops, Jean Grey are still around, with new characters Nightcrawler, Kitty Pryde, and a character created for this series, Spyke joining the pack as young teenagers. There are few adult characters in this team including, Charles Xavier (of course!), Storm, and everyone's favorite, Wolverine. Thank goodness, they didn't go the incredibly idiotic route of making Wolverine a teenager.










DOH! STUPID MANGA!







Anyways, the characters is really where the evolution series excels over the original 90's Animated Characters, the characters don't feel like caricatures of the comic book series, they feel like true organic characters. This really helped by the better animation, the 90's animated series always had a static animation style, while it was retro and kind of cool because it looked like a moving comic book, it really wasn't that great in terms of animation.

Speaking of the characters, the teenage characters take center stage here, dealing with pretty typical teenage problems along with their powers. Rogue gets a huge update in terms of look as she becomes more of a goth, or rocker chick. It really does work for the character they try to portray in this series though. Kitty becomes a valley girl, who talks, like, you know, like, she chills at the beach all time, you know, like, suntan. Believe me it grates early on, but the voice actress does pull back a bit after the series goes on making Kitty a better character, instead of just a stereotype, you know. Anyways, Jean and Scott get a huge boost in terms of character, again, they're both more real and feel like real characters. Jean is still boring, but at least her nice-girl nature comes out more (in the pretty good episode Mutan Crush). Cyclops, Cyke (Scott) is also more fluid showing both the terse leader and a little more loose. The biggest problem with the cast is that Nightcrawler has essentially become comedic relief for the series. Sure Nightcrawler was goofy at times, but this was over the top, and actually far better suited for a character like Bobby Drake, Iceman. So far, I loathe this version of Nightcrawler and Spyke...well...Spyke can stick it. You see what I did there. I like that the characters are more fluid and emotional and can be developed, I just don't like how immature some of them are and how the writers never took advantage of the character development that could be made. Ultimately, the characters were plainly split up into good guys and bad guys, even Magneto whose whole motivation in the comics is to be in a way right, just using the wrong methods, was really seen as just a baddy who is a master manipulator.

Overall: The first season is pretty dreadful to get through, but it certainly isn't all bad. The creators struggle to find their footing in creating a proper balance between loyalty to the heart of the X-men comics plots and being creative and taking risks in their reimagining. I've heard it does get better, so I'll be sticking with it. Hopefully you stick along with me.

** out of *****