The Film:

It isn’t hard to argue that Superman and Batman are two of the greatest superheros ever created. Usually, when comic editors decide to pair up two big name heroes together, the results can be mixed at best. To tell a story that utilizes both of those heroes powers, attributes, and giving them a reason to be together, is a tough proposition. Now, with Batman and Superman, they’ve seemed like a natural fit from day one. Teaming in World’s Finest in the spring of 1941, a few short years after being introduced to us, they’ve continued a long, rocky, but healthy friendship throughout the years, mediums, and fans.

I think the success of teaming Batman and Superman together, relies on the strengths and weaknesses of the two heroes, and how they compliment each other. Superman is nearly perfect. There’s nothing he cannot do. He has morals and ideals, based on what he lost on Krypton and what he learned from the Clarks in rural Kansas. If anything, Superman is ideally what America is all about. For Batman, he too has learned a strict code of morals and ideals, but they’re jaded from pain and his hunger for revenge. He seeks justice and is our silent guardian of Gotham, but he goes about it in a way, that might be criminal. Placing these two characters together, you have one coin, with two relating, but interesting sides of that coin. I think that’s why they work so well together.

In Superman/Batman: Public Enemies, America is faced with a unique proposition: while in a recession, and looking for answers, we turned to someone who could quickly fix it all, restoring that healthy lifestyle we Americans are accustomed too. His name wasn’t Barack Obama, but Lex Luthor. We elected him President, and he delivered on his promises. Superman is unconvinced that Luthor has changed for the better, but due to the American philosophy he believes in, there’s nothing he can do. Unfortunately, for Lex, he must turn to Superman, as well as the other heroes to form a team needed to protect us from this gigantic on-coming meteor that could wipe us all away. As Superman refuses, Lex sets him up as a terrorist to American, placing a bounty on his head. Every super villain is now coming after him.

It’s a great set up, as the script written by Stan Berkowitz is full of action, rarely slowing down. Most of the DC animated films, have the look and feel of what Bruce Timm has done with the Batman: Animated Series and Justice League, but for a change, we get a different looking animation style, and it’s refreshing. I love Timm’s efforts, but after seeing this I think a change of style was needed. The look goes back to the McGuinness/Loeb original comic story, that this film draws inspiration from. The biggest flaw to the film, is that it’s barely over an hour long. So that means we get little character development, and while we do not need any for Superman or Batman, there are secondary characters that needed some. The climax is also rushed. Despite this though, this is a really fun DC animated film. The banter between Superman and Batman are great, and sometimes lines of dialogue refer back to previous DC animated films, like Superman: Doomsday. The constant barrage of villains are fun to see, especially if you’re a DC fanatic.

These types of what-if stories need to be done more in animation, as the solo adventures, in my opinion are starting to bore. Again, this might sound like a broken record, but I cannot wait to see what Timm, DC, and WB bring us in future animated fare.

The Blu-ray:

Audio/Video: These animated films are just gorgeous on high def. Showing casing the vibrant colors and thick black lines of the animator’s pen, the transfer is stunning. Detail is as high as the animators allowed in the production of the film. The audio isn’t as impressive, sadly. For such an action oriented film, it lacks clarity, often sounding mumbled. Now, the dialogue is crystal clear, but the bass is unrefined and and the rear speakers don’t get much to do. After a stellar sounding Green Lantern: First Flight (here), this track disappoints.

All extras are in standard definition.

A Test of Minds: This features interviews with DC writers and psychologists, as they analyze the two characters. Some information is well known, and any long time fan of these characters will know much of this already, but I enjoyed the interviews with the psychologists a lot, as they put science behind the actions and emotions of Batman and Superman.

Dinner with DCU and Kevin Conroy: This is a splendid hour long round table discussion with Bruce Timm, his creative team, and the voice of Batman, as they chat about everything. This is probably one of the best extras on a DC animated film’s disc, so fans of animation and DC need to watch this.

First Look at Justice League-A Crisis on Two Earths: Here’s the preview for next DC animated film. At first, I was thinking it might not be that good, but by the end of this preview, as they show us animatics, voice work, and the crew talking about it, it just might be one amazing film.

Blackest Night: This appeared on the Green Lantern: First Flgiht disc, as it examines Geoff John’s latest arc for the character.

Justice League and Superman Bonus Episodes: Bruce Timm once again picks related episodes for us to enjoy. The episodes selected serve as a prequel as sorts to this feature. Fans will be happy to have these all together, since only Justice League Season One is out on Blu-ray.

Digital Copy and bonus Previews round out the extras.

Conclusion: Not as good as previous DC animated films, but it’s still really fun. The Blu-ray is pretty good too, although no commentary hurts the overall decent extras. Fans will dig it, all other rent.

The Film: Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

The Blu-ray: Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

Previously on Remembering the X-Men: Animated Series…we talked to Lenore Zann, the voice of Rogue, as she gave us her look at the show from an actor’s perspective. We have been also talking to Sidney Iwanter, the Fox network executive at the time, on all things about the behind-the-scenes and the casting of this great animated series. From the three previous articles (here, here and here), you should have a good idea on the production of the show, now it’s time to continue talking to the cast.

Finally, for the first time on DVD, X-Men: The Animated Series comes roaring to the format in all of its glory in season sets (dubbed volumes). You can almost hear Shuki Levy’s score now, the pulsating theme tune that is so memorable a decade after the last episode aired. To mark this special event, Killer Film takes a look back at the ground-breaking series, through the words of it’s creators, writers, and voice talent in Remembering the X-Men: The Animated Series. This is the final part as told by Jubilee herself, Alyson Court.

Why are they doing this to me? I didn’t ask to be a mutant.

The character of Jubilee was created by the great X-Men writer Chris Claremont and artist Marc Silvestri for Uncanny X-Men issue # 244 (May, 1989). Wolverine and Jubilee developed a father-daughter like relationship, that becomes a mainstay in the X-Men universe, this is seen throughout X-Men: The Animated Series, as well as in the Bryan Singer X-Men films, except Jubilee is replaced by Rogue for those films. Her character in the beginning was a minor one, and it wasn’t until the 1992 pilot episode that Jubilee a popular character.

While her character is seen very briefly in the X-Men films, notably in X2 during the Storm and Nightcrawler’s rescue of some teen mutants in Stryker’s holding cell, and a one off shot of her in X-Men: The Last Stand.  In further X-Men animated ‘toons,  her character is homage because of the popular status she received in the 1992-1997 animated series. In Wolverine and the X-Men, whenever her character is seen outside of her X-Men uniform, she is always seen wearing the yellow trench coat as she is memorably known for, thanks to this series we’re talking about now.

A spunky mall rat, and a mutant with the ability to shoot fireworks from her fingers, her character was the audiences introduction into the X-universe in the first two episodes Night of the Sentinels. Through her we see the hatred from ignorance as she is targeted throughout the show by Sentinels and mutant-hating humans. Her naivety is well expressed through the great voice work by actress Alyson Court.

The Mall Rat Talks

Alyson Court remembers how she was cast as Jubilee: “I was a replacement, actually. I had just finished voicing Lydia Deetz for the Beetlejuice series (also carried on Fox), during which I worked with a man named Sidney Iwanter. He was an executive at Fox Kids and had grown so sick of hearing my voice as Lydia that when it came time to cast Jubilee, his instructions were: “I don’t care who plays Jubilee, as long as it isn’t Alyson Court!”

“Dan Hennessey on the other hand, was very much in favor of casting me in the role,” she says. “Another actress was initially cast, but I guess they felt it wasn’t working so I was brought in on day three or thereabouts. It was crazy! So many people were there for the recording session. Sidney from Fox, Joe Calamari from Marvel, Winston from Saban, a few other execs, it was like we were doing a feature film! There was so much pressure to get this show exactly right, everyone wanted to have a say. Everyone had their own vision of each character, how they should sound, what the level of intensity and seriousness should be- it was unlike any other animated series that had come before.”

Alyson Court was no stranger to doing voice work for animated shows, but this one was tough at first. “The recording sessions were brutal. We re-recorded those first few episodes three or four times. And during all of this, every time I opened my mouth Sidney would shout “No! Sounds like Lydia (her character from Beetlejuice), do it again!” He drove me nuts, but I have to say he was right. It was like voice acting boot camp, and Sidney forced me to really explore my voice and character to find the right performance for Jubilee. Funnily enough, Sid is now my best friend from that show!”

The show brought Jubilee to the forefront, and Alyson speaks of how she developed the character outside of Eric Lewald’s team of excellent writers. “Figuring out Jubilee and making her more than how she had appeared thus far in the comics, was hugely important since the entire series premiere (Night of the Sentinels) focused on her. We really worked hard to bring a sense of drama and depth to the character. She had to have sass, but she was also still just a kid, so her fear, confusion, and naivety had to come through. Yes, she was still very much a brat, but often that was just to hide her vulnerability. Part of why I ended up in the role was because they needed someone who sounded young but could push the seriousness of the performance, and put her on a level that could keep up with Logan (Cal Dodd). Remember: This wasn’t your typical Saturday morning cartoon where someone pitches a fairly simple straight forward idea for a kids show.”

“X-Men was totally different,” she continued. “Everyone involved with the show (all of the guys I mentioned earlier) were extremely passionate about this property. EVERYONE CARED. At times it seemed like people cared too much, because they spent so much time arguing, nothing was getting recorded. At any rate, I had plenty of source material in those guys to help me develop the character, plus all of my artist friends were huge fans, so they never stopped giving me advice either!”

“They were walking a fine line-making a Saturday morning cartoon that would appeal to that younger viewer ship but keep the property’s integrity and adult dramatic essence,” she explains of the effort everyone was doing for the show. “We worked very hard to make sure those initial episodes which featured Jubilee demonstrated to everyone what this show was going to be. I really appreciate the effort the show creators put forth to make Jubilee a legitimate, interesting and appealing part of the X-Men: The Animated Series cast.”

Jubilee and Wolverine had a unique relationship in the series, and Alyson remembers fondly working with Cal Dodd, who voiced Wolverine, and working with him in the recording booth throughout the years. “Cal is great! And in a way, he and I had a very similar relationship away from the mic. We had been neighbors for years, he’d known me since I was a little kid. On the show, Cal was one of, if not the most experienced performers, and I was the youngest cast member. He always had a big brother protective vibe towards me. At cast parties, we would inevitably end up moving away from all the craziness happening at the party, and just talk for a while. In the studio, he would really get into character, and it was a hoot! He didn’t say much, but every now and then he would growl out some dry sinister but sarcastic remark that would send the room reeling in laughter. He is a very smart and funny man.”

While Alyson Court is remembered for Jubilee, she is also the only actress to have voiced Claire Redfield from the Resident Evil video game franchise, as well as the character’s recent role in Resident Evil: Degeneration. There is a well of voice acting talent out there that gets easily brushed aside for celebrities, when a casting director casts for a feature film. Alyson offers her opinion on the industry: “Using celebrity voices is a tricky thing. It really depends on the role and the actor involved. I think Pixar usually does a very good job with their casting. Ellen DeGeneres was perfect for Dory (from Finding Nemo). Can you imagine anyone else in that role? She brought so much to Dory, they probably let her ad lib much of her own dialogue. Hank Azaria (The Simpsons), John Ratzenberger (Cheers, Toy Story), Mark Hamill (Batman: The Animated Series), these are incredibly talented actors who deserve to be cast as voice actors, not because they are famous, but because they are really, really good! Then there are other celebrities- big Hollywood blockbuster types- that don’t really bring a lot to the table when it comes to voicing a character. Their on screen presence is incredible, but all of that charisma gets lost when the image is taken away. In this kind of situation usually the movie studio is depending on the “big names” to sell their movie. Probably because the movie itself isn’t very good.”

“It doesn’t bother me, though,” says Court about the casting of celebrities over voice actors like her, “actors should be allowed to take any role they like. It’s up to the producer to make a good decision in casting. At the end of the day, if your property is for kids, then using a celebrity for namesake alone really isn’t necessary, since kids don’t care!”

Finally, Alyson says she’s still having a blast working in the industry, as she wants to thank fans of the Resident Evil franchise for their loyalty and support. “Fans whose dedication and loyalty are what made the property so successful in the first place, is something I think should be respected.”

“I hope everyone enjoys the X-Men series on DVD,” says Alyson excitedly. “I know I can’t wait to show it to my son as he’s never seen it before. Lastly, I want to thank Sidney Iwanter who, although he didn’t initially want me in the show, is responsible for making the series the ground breaking success that it was!”

And so that completes Killer Film’s mammoth look back at the X-Men: Animated Series. I hope you all enjoyed it as much as we did, and if you missed any part of this four part series, go back and give them a read, as well as check out Killer Film’s DVD reviews of the two volumes recently released. None of this could have been done without the X-Men themselves, Lenore Zann (Rogue) and Alyson Court (Jubilee), and the amazing team of Eric Lewald (Lead Writer), Scott Thomas (Supervising Producer), and Sidney Iwanter (Fox network executive).

Feel free to contact me at jon@killerfilm.com for any questions or leave a comment!

Previously on Remembering the X-Men: Animated Series…we talked to Sidney Iwanter, the Fox network executive who oversaw the production, and the Series Supervising Producer Scott Thomas, both of which offered some detailed background information on the shows conception from idea to production. That was part one.

Finally, for the first time on DVD, X-Men: The Animated Series comes roaring to the format in all of its glory in season sets (dubbed volumes). You can almost hear Shuki Levy’s score now, the pulsating theme tune that is so memorable a decade after the last episode aired. To mark this special event, Killer Film takes a look back at the ground-breaking series, through the words of it’s creators, writers, and voice talent in Remembering the X-Men: The Animated Series. This is part two as told by the Story Editor/Writer Eric Lewald, with the Fox network executive Sidney Iwanter and Supervising Producer of the show, Scott Thomas.

The Write Way

“If it wasn’t for the writing this show would be as forgettable as anything in the 80s,” states Sidney Iwanter, the Fox network executive at the time. “We were lucky; there was a lot of great people working on this show, from storyboard people, to writers, to editors, it all worked. It worked because we all had the same vision of pushing this show further than anything before. We wouldn’t be having this conversation if it didn’t work.”

Like Sidney Iwanter said, it was the writing of the show that made this stand out over the many other superhero-themed cartoons. One of the key reasons was Eric Lewald and his team of writers.

Eric Lewald, the head writer/story editor explains the developmental process of an X-Men episode: “I and my writers came up with “premises” – story ideas about a page long. We would submit these to Fox (Sidney Iwanter) and Marvel (Joe Calamari). They would accept, reject, or ask to see-again-with-changes. Once they all signed off, a writer was assigned.”

“Basically it started out in New York, looking over the comics, talking with Joe (Calamari) about what Marvel would want to see and what would work for the series,” chimes Scott Thomas, Supervising Producer, on the development of an episode. “Other times, we would sit down, with Eric (Lewald) and assign scripts and they would show up. We moved on from there; storyboards then overseas animation.”

Eric Lewald continues with the writing structure they followed: “Usually if a writer came up with the premise, he or she wrote the outline and the script. The first season (the only one we were guaranteed at first) of 13 episodes was written in an arc, to play back-to-back, so we figured these 13 out pretty much together. The two writers who did the most to create the initial arc were brothers Mark and Michael Edens, friends of mine from college. After that, we were asked to make the episodes more “stand-alone”, since that made them easier to repeat out of order if necessary. We got around this two ways – multi-part episodes (like the Phoenix Saga), and an experiment during season two where we had a connected ongoing one-minute tidbit at the end with Charles Xavier and Magneto stuck in the Savage Land (and thus not part of the main stories).”

“Once the premises were approved, the writer would “go to outline” – creating a ten-page, full version of the story with little dialogue or minute detail,” Lewald continues. “This was sent around. Fox and Marvel – and directors and producers – all weighed in with thoughts. Revisions were made, then the writer was sent to script – about 40-pages, and very visually detailed (far more than live-action scripts, since it is handed to artists to draw). Then another round of notes was given until everyone in production and supervision signed off on the script. Then the board artist got it and about six weeks later we’d see it “alive” on paper. This would be my final chance to weigh in before the episode was recorded and produced. Four months later we’d have an episode. Usually there would be about a dozen stories going at once – four or five in premise, same at outline, same at script, with one episode to be “finalled” every week or ten days.”

With over 30 years of material at that time of 1992, deciding which stories to use would be key. Eric Lewald explains how this was done and what made some stories accessible to adapt: “Deciding on stories was tough. No one wanted us to try to simply adapt the books. TV is a different medium, and, if you time out the dialogue/action in a comic book, it runs about four minutes. We needed twenty-two minutes. So, for reference we used the books we could find (no web sites in 1992) and the material available in early “Marvel Universe” summary books – even an X-Men game booklet. There were many threads to X-Men history (three or four series going at once), so it was agreed to keep the spirit of the books and characters, but to primarily create original, TV-focused stories. Once the series became a huge hit, and we were asked to do 39 more episodes, fast, we looked to specific major works (Phoenix, Dark Phoenix) to adapt. Even there, many decisions were needed about what to keep in and what to discard. (There were often three or four plots/subplots interweaving in these longer book series, so we had to simplify the focus. It’s easier to pause and go back in a book – TV just barrels on.) We used the marvelous creation of 31 years of stories as reference – how would Cyclops act in a new situation, knowing he had been an orphan, etc. – and some writers sneaked in favorite bits from the books.”

“But the mission was always: tell a good TV story, using book material or not, but respecting the characters and their world”, Eric Lewald affirmed.

Stan “The Man” Lee
Marvel can’t go on without some association to the great comic legend, Stan Lee. From cameos in recent live action films, to his name plastered on the credits of such a series as this, how involved was the man? If one remembers the failed pilot episode, Pryde of the X-Men, Stan provided narration for the introduction. Hyper and excited, this element was not used when Fox reworked the X-Men for this series.

Scott Thomas remembers: “Stan was initially was involved as day to day; he would be involved in the meetings at first.”

“Stan and Chris’ (Claremont) comics work has had an immense affect on all subsequent X-Men projects: the books, the movies, and television,” said Eric Lewald. “But when we were developing and producing this series, neither Stan nor Chris were creatively active at Marvel comics (that I was aware of). I never met or talked with Chris (though I must say his work stood out in our research). And while Stan showed great initial interest in our TV series, his contribution was limited to some producer’s notes on ten or eleven of the first season’s completed storyboards. He didn’t like giving notes before the full scripts were put to storyboard, and once we had shown him that we “got” the X-Men world, we stopped hearing from him. I have since had the pleasure of working with Stan on a couple of other development projects and will always remember him with affection and respect.”

Favorite Episodes

After working on five seasons worth of material, like fans Eric Lewald has his favorite episodes. “We always wished there was more money to make the shows slicker. We were working on a budget of about half of what they had for Batman: The Animated Series. But there were a few stories that stood out for me: One was Nightcrawler, written by Len Uhley.”

“Nightcrawler himself is a fascinating character – a devoutly religious man who looks like a demon, ” explains Eric Lewald on this episode. “Then there was the opportunity to explore religious faith in a Saturday morning cartoon (yes, we had to ask and be persuasive and persistent to be allowed to tackle it). Finally, there is the use of Wolverine (thank you, Len Wein, for coming up with him) as a deeply troubled, older man who has lost his faith, but who is touched somehow by meeting Nightcrawler and is made to reconsider.”

“There were many others, like One Man’s Worth that was a pleasure. I have always loved the idea of the affect that one person – or his absence — could have to the lives of those around him,” explains Eric Lewald. “Another favorite was Beauty and the Beast, written by Stephanie Mathison. But I must mention Deal with the Devil,” adds Eric. “It was the one episode that I wrote start-to-finish (crazily, over a weekend). My preference was always to come up with or polish story ideas and hand them off to others to do the bulk of the writing. This way I could focus on keeping the overall series going in the right direction. In this case, we had paid a writer for his script, but Marvel ultimately had me throw it out (the only time this happened – and not his fault). So, since there was no money for another writer, I got to do one “for free.” I wish I’d had more time to do more.”

Finally, Scott Thomas offers his favorite episode: “I really liked Mojovision; from recording to finished product it was a good one.”

Cue the Music

No show is complete without music, whether its theme or background use, it makes all the difference in the world for animated features. X-Men was no different. “We would approach the show like a live action series, you know, with adding footsteps for the characters. If a character walks by glass or down a hall, you’d hear them. I’m not sure if anybody did that at that time,” says Scott Thomas, Supervising Producer of the show. “Sidney and I would work with the composers on each episode, and say we want that in this scene, or that here in this scene, and they would come up with different types of music for each episode. Sometimes we would use stock, and other times the theme.”
Sindey Iwanter concludes the production and legacy of the show perfectly by saying “X-Men has 40 years of material were you can explore the crevasses of this stuff. It was a wonderful project. It’s a series that will maintain itself for years and years.”

To be continued….

Come back soon for part three of this multi-part look at Remembering the X-Men: Animated Series as Rogue herself, Lenore Zann, joins us, along with Sidney Iwanter again, as they give us a detailed look at the casting of the X-Men. Future parts will include the more voice talent and their fond memories, so don’t miss out on those! Feel free to contact me at jon@killerfilm.com for any questions or leave a comment!

Finally, for the first time on DVD, X-Men: The Animated Series comes roaring to the format in all of its glory in season sets (dubbed volumes). You can almost hear Shuki Levy’s score now, the pulsating theme tune that is so memorable even a decade after the last episode aired. To mark this special event, Killer Film takes a look back at the ground-breaking series, through the words of it’s creators, writers, and voice talent in, Remembering the X-Men: The Animated Series. This is part one as told by the Fox network executive Sidney Iwanter and Supervising Producer of the show, Scott Thomas.

Pryde of the X-Men

It late 1989, the X-Men started off as a one off pilot episode, trying to get the Fox network interested in the property, called Pryde of the X-Men. Focusing on Kitty Pryde, the episode was well animated, but a flop in every other regard. It felt like a collection of bits, edited together like a superhero introduction montage. Wolverine was vastly butchered as they cast him having an Australian accent. Sidney Iwanter, a Fox Kids network executive at the time recalls this pilot: “It was crap! I remember making a real smart ass remark about that, and that was a Marvel production in 1987, in one of my interviews. It was like every conceivable mistake that could be done to the X-Men series, was right there in that show. I’m not talking about the animation compared to ours, that’s a financial problem, but storytelling-how you developed the characters, like the slip-shot approach to who Wolverine was. I think they gave him an Australian accent! It was the worst kind of slopping storytelling. Why in the name of God would you do a show around Kitty Pryde?! I don’t understand that, I mean who the f**k is Kitty Pryde! She’s not one of the major X-Men! It was a simple show; it was a throwaway. They used it as a pilot to get the network interested. The network looked at it and said, what’s the point? We don’t get it, who cares.”

The majority of fans felt the same way, despite it airing a few times before being released on VHS.

“I’ve looked at that, and I was slack-jawed!” he confesses. “This was Marvel and what the hell were they trying to do? I knew what they were trying to do, they were being safe. They were trying to take Moby Dick, and turn it into the most generic fishing story! When I got hired and my boss said, ‘What would you do?’ Remember, I was never a comic book geek. I would read them every so often, but I was not somebody who knew what was going on, on panel 62, issue 312. I was a normal reader of comic books as a kid, then moved away to the graphic novel later on. But a fanatic I wasn’t. However, I was aware of the history of the X-Men, like many of the story lines, but I was also aware of how complex and sophisticated these characters had become. Remember, the X-Men started in 1961, and so as they grew, their world grew, and more characters came to developed within the universe, the stories became very sophisticated especially with the Claremont stuff. You can’t do X-Men properly until you really, really, do them as sophisticated as ever been seen on a Saturday morning.”

Even though the property failed to excite the network, Sidney was well aware of how to get it right. Luckily, Marvel was listening.

We are talking about 76 of the best action/adventure shows for kid’s programming!

Sidney Iwanter had an idea of how to get this property the respect he knew it deserved, as well as the fans. “You have to ask yourself: what was it about these episodes that made you want to sit down in front of the TV on a Saturday morning? I’ve given a couple of interviews on this in the last couple of years, and I’ve been in this game for a long time, I just turned 60, and I’m one of these geeks. When you look at these shows from your age, you see the type of sophisticated writing- forget the animation, the animation was what it was, and that was due primarily to budget. They didn’t have the same resources as Warner Bros for Batman: The Animated Series, who spent $500,000-$600,000 per episode, that’s the reason they look as good as they do.”

Scott Thomas, the supervising producer for the series adds this about the animation quality control of the show: “You know, it was later with this studio, a good Korean studio, but I don’t think the problem was there with them. The cost of the episodes were getting more expensive, so they were experimenting with looking at a studio in China, the Philippines, and Vietnam. They would all do one minute tests. It’s amazing to see the differences in each studio. Some would have good animation, but the characters would be completely different. It just would be to much of a change so we stuck it out with the studio we had, but they were experimenting with different avenues.”

“I was the network executive for Fox for Batman, Beetlejuice, Spider-Man, Silver Surfer eventually, and X-Men,” says Sidney Iwanter, “all of the shows the kids watched in the 90s. I remember when I first got into this business, the Hanna Barbara from the 60s, and I knew the guys who did Scooby Doo, and I examined the scripts and they’re  okay, it’s Scooby Doo. But when they do action/adventure shows, they were very linear storytelling. It was like reading spark notes all the time.”

Recreating X-Men

“So I thought to myself: why do they have to be this simple?” remembered Sidney Iwanter. “Somebody once asked me who my influences were. My answer was this: it was not animators, when it came to this kind of world, mainly because I can’t draw. I liked cartoons and all of that, but I was always intrigued by story. Why do some shows work and others don’t, whether it be live-action or animation? It always boiled down, not to the visuals, it was story. Go back to Scooby Doo. It’s visuals weren’t anything to write home about; sure you got a cute dog, goofy characters, but there’s nothing really about those characters that are life affirming. The stories were very simple, but were always very show eccentric. You really couldn’t have any new format. Scooby always had to get scared, Shaggy and Scooby, there was a format that worked. In an action/adventure shows, that’s not that easy to do. You can’t really do formulaic writing because what happens is that you know exactly what happens. In comedies, that works. When Scooby opens a door and gets scared it works. Okay, fine, we laugh.”

Iwanter continues: “You can’t do that in action/adventure. You’re not going for humor, you’re going for drama, suspense, and mystery. In the 1980s, I spent a lot of my time watching prime time shows, even though I was in children’s programming. The shows that I saw that moved television way beyond anything prior to the 60s and 70s, were Hill Street Blues. I looked at Hill Street Blues and I saw “holy mother mackerel! This is sophisticated storytelling, multi-dimensional characters, didn’t end at end the of each episode, as they continued. It had the level of characterization that I had never seen before on prime time programming in this country. I thought: ‘I wonder if you could do the same thing in kids programming?’ You would have story and character arcs, sophisticated dialogue that didn’t sound generic or without meat behind it. Wonder if you could do characters with depth. If you remember the G.I. Joe, the Transformers, stuff like that, those were very, very, linear, straightforward stories. Did you know anything about these characters before hand or after? No, not really. Those G.I. Joe’s were G.I. Joe’s, you know, sometimes they would delve into something or another, but there wasn’t meat behind those characters.”

“We did stuff here that had never, ever been done on a Saturday. Fox had just started in 1990, one of the first networks who got into the market since the 50s. I kept saying to people, how do we make this not to look like G.I. Joe? Let’s go back to the stuff I’d seen in Hill Street Blues. Everyone thought I was nuts, crazy. Multilayer story arcs, that remained open week to week, character development that dealt way beyond the superficial, you know?”

The kids aren’t stupid!

“From Saturday morning to Saturday morning, how are you going to keep kids interested? You’re going to have to remember what happened the week before. It was a totally different kind of world back then. Why don’t we do what they did on prime time, like the previously on? If I remember correctly, I don’t think anything on Saturday morning prior did that. I got a lot of blow-back on that idea. They said, you can’t do that, kids aren’t going to follow that, no matter how sophisticated the ‘previously ons’ are. I don’t believe kids are that stupid. I have never underestimated my audience,” remarks Sidney Iwanter.

“If its edited properly,” says Sidney, “then I’ll give you a one minute recap that will bring everyone up to speed. If adults can figures this out, then kids can figure it out. So that’s what we did. They hit the high points of the previous episodes, really edited well. Also, I wasn’t afraid to get melodramatic. There was a love gist between Wolverine, Cyclops, and Jean Grey. I had people question why I was getting involved with that. ‘Why would an 8 year old want to see that? They are going to turn this off!’ You don’t understand kids I said, this has nothing to do with girls having koodies, this is exactly what life is about. Kids see this all the time, whether its their parents or siblings liking each other. We’re hardwired for this stuff, hardwired from the womb. You can have this stuff as long as it’s between fight sequences. No matter how powerful the X-Men are, let’s face it: they’re f**ked!”

“People don’t like them although they’re saving the world, they go to jail, their social lives suck and with all that power they have, they somehow can’t settle anything in their own lives. That was the key. Seven or eight year old kids are powerless. No matter how much power the X-Men had, they too were powerless. Not to be feared, not to be alone. We were tapping into the basic nature of being a kid. That was the genius of the creation of the X-Men; when you developed you’re powers it was at puberty. The world gets more confusing. Society is forcing limitations, but you’re branching out socially and intellectually. Okay, that’s exactly what we did with these characters. No matter how much power Cyclops has, he still cannot get the girl of his dreams.

Wolverine is more than insubordinate. Here’s a guy who is really pissed off. His life didn’t go the way he thought. Even Beast would’ve loved to be a simple professor. Giving Beast a form of intellectualism when he spoke was a character trait. I said to Eric (Lewald, the story editor for the show) you put into his mouth stuff as if he lives by a Thesaurus. So in the middle of fights he would quote philosophers as if they were throwaway lines. It’s a personality quirk. I wanted to make sure none of these characters talked alike. Even thinking as logically as that, was break through,” confesses Sidney Iwanter.

“Sidney (Iwanter) was really involved with this series,” remembers Scott Thomas. “We’d have fights with the censors, sometimes our villains and characters were rather risqué, for Saturday morning, so we had to go back and change that, which was always funny to me. Each episode was different, and we would get a memo saying what was way too risqué, you know and changed it. Little things like you couldn’t have a devil’s tail on this character, you know all kinds of different things.”

“If it wasn’t for the writing this show would be as forgettable as anything in the 80s,” Sidney Iwanter proclaims. “It all boils down to how good the writing was on these characters. For what we were trying to do, and we couldn’t do this without Eric Lewald and his team of writers, the reason for the shows success was the writing.”

To be continued….

Come back soon for part two of this multi-part look at Remembering the X-Men: Animated Series as Eric Lewald joins us, along with Sidney Iwanter and Scott Thomas again, as they give us a detailed look at the writing of the shows episodes and the casting of the X-Men. Future parts will include the voice talent and their fond memories, so don’t miss out on those! Feel free to contact me at jon@killerfilm.com for any questions or leave a comment!