X-Men ’97 rips on 2000 era’s ‘black leather’ costumes, which Ian McKellen rightfully defended
There is no end to the X-Men ’97’s nostalgia streak: If simply reviving a Saturday morning favorite from the 1990s wasn’t enough, the creative team behind the Disney Plus series has littered each episode with even more in-jokes, from retro side-scroller references to connections to other Marvel animated properties. This week’s episode, “Tolerance Is Extinction — Part 2” contains a whopper for those around in 2000 for the release of the first-ever X-Men movie – a perfect dig that also works as a pithy callback.
Halfway through the episode, as the X-Men prepare for a split mission to Asteroid M and Muir Island, Scott Summers gives an old-fashioned dad pep talk to his Large Adult Son, Cable. After reminding him that Jean Grey and her clone Madelyne (Cable’s real mom) are two of the strongest women he’s ever met — nothing weird about any of this, by the way — he throws Cable a classic blue-and-gold X-Men suit.
“Am I going to war or a circus?” Cable quips.
To which Scott replies, “What did you expect, black leather?”
This is an act of sweet revenge episode from X-Men ’97 writer Anthony Sellitti, who has clearly been online long enough to understand the infamy of the 2000 X-Men movie costume choices. Not only does Sellitti knock the monochrome too-cool-for-comics design choices from Bryan Singer’s film, but he does so with an inversion of a wink-wink line from the movie. In X-Men, Scott (James Marsden) prepares Logan (Hugh Jackman) for their big faceoff with Magneto (Ian McKellen) by gifting him his own team uniform. But while riding the X-Jet to the Statue of Liberty, Wolverine is feeling a bit… stiff. Or as the screenplay puts it, “Logan seems very uncomfortable in the too-small uniform” — a perfect opportunity for him to be a rebel and make room for his bulging muscles by ripping the sleeves. Logan ends his tailor job with a joke.
“You guys really go out in these things?” Wolverine quips.
To which Scott replies, “What would you prefer, yellow spandex?”
According to X
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