1. X-Men 97 (Disney+: 2024)
The title of Best Marvel TV Show was firmly in the mystical grip of Wanda Maximoff and Wandavision for years, until the mutants came. Go looking for awe-inspiring moments from Disney’s sequel to X-Men: The Animated Series and you’ll find one that justifies it taking the top spot quicker than a Sentinel can sniff out a mutant. Cyclops (Ray Chase) jumping out of The Blackbird with the rest of the X-Men and using his laser vision to help him land before proclaiming, “To me, my X-Men”? Magneto (Matthew Waterson) ripping the adamantium out of Wolverine’s (Cal Dodd) body after the clawed crusader stabs him while Professor Charles Xavier (Ross Marquand) pleads for it all to stop? Gambit (A.J. LoCascio) letting a Prime Sentinel impale him just so he can blow himself up and take the gigantic mutant hunter with him? Those are just a handful of the moments that helped make X-Men ‘97 the crème de la crème of Marvel TV shows.
Beyond the animated theatrics and lore-expanding additions, X-Men 97 is centered around storylines that would be enthralling whether the characters were hand-drawn or in the flesh. Watching Magneto lead the X-Men to fulfill the dying wish of Professor Charles Xavier and struggling to reconcile his genocidal mistrust of humankind with the X-Men’s pledge for inclusivity is the kind of drama that prestige TV was made for, especially when he gets back on his nefarious bullshit and shuts the Earth’s power off. If the 2025 Critics Choice Award for Best Animated Series is any indication, X-Men ‘97 is the new benchmark for all Marvel TV shows moving forward. [Keith Nelson Jr]
