This week on “X-Males ’97,” Apocalypse beats up an elephant. Below most circumstances, we may assume that one of the crucial murder-crazed international threats ever encountered by Xavier’s Faculty for Gifted Children is the unsympathetic aggressor, whereas the elephant — whose species associates him with beloved youngsters’s characters similar to Babar and Dumbo — is an harmless sufferer. Nevertheless, this extra-large elephant fights on behalf of nefarious despot Rama-Tut (John de Lancie), whereas Apocalypse — who goes by En Sabah Nur (Adetokumboh M’Cormack) at this level within the timeline, 3000 B.C.E. — battles to finish slavery throughout Historical Egypt.
Season 2 of the acclaimed Disney+ collection fleshes out Apocalypse’s origin story, lifting some key parts from the 1996 comics miniseries “Rise of Apocalypse” by Terry Kavanagh and Adam Pollina. When cartoon followers first meet the immortal butcher in “X-Males: The Animated Sequence” Season 1, Episode 9, “The Remedy” (1993), Apocalypse preaches hyper-violent Darwinism and brainwashes of us into servitude. In keeping with “X-Males ’97,” he did not begin out that manner. With out the malign affect of Baal (Michael Dorn) — and, okay, tremendous, possibly additionally with out the well-intended meddling of a time-displaced Magneto (Matthew Waterson) — Apocalypse would possibly’ve been a chill dude.
“I can do extra than simply conquer the world,” says Nur, having an optimistic second in Season 2, Episode 3, “Rise of Apocalypse: Half I.” “I can reserve it.”
Is Apocalypse extra fascinating as a villain or as a hero?
Created by Louise Simonson and artist Jackson Guice within the mid-’80s, Apocalypse has been making life troublesome for Marvel heroes ever since. However regardless of his repeated assaults on existence itself, he does not all the time resonate as an omega-level menace.
The model of Apocalypse from “X-Males: TAS” — arguably the definitive tackle the character — lacks the distinctive inside conflicts related to cape-clad Stan Lee and Jack Kirby creations like Dr. Doom and Magneto. Apocalypse isn’t an avatar of elemental darkness allegedly lurking inside all residing beings like William Stryker, Darkish Phoenix, and different existential antagonists from Chris Claremont and John Byrne’s immeasurably influential “Uncanny X-Males” run. Aside from Apocalypse’s dogmatic insistence that the fittest should survive, not a ton differentiates him from the quite a few Darkseid knock-offs scattered throughout the Marvel and DC universes.
Nevertheless, as “X-Males ’97” Season 2 suggests, possibly Apocalypse has extra to supply. On the onset of the Krakoan Age — an period of “X-Males” comics launched in 2019 initially overseen by author Jonathan Hickman — Apocalypse turns into a grim, enigmatic hero with the immortal gravitas of an Anne Rice vampire. Within the spin-off e book “Excalibur” (2019) by Tini Howard and artist Marcus To, En Sabah Nur operates because the workforce wizard on an X-squad alongside Rogue, Gambit, and Jubilee. In Rick Remender and Jerome Opeña’s near-universally beloved “Uncanny X-Pressure” (2010) — which additionally supplies the model of Apocalypse’s Horsemen Cyclops and Jean Gray encounter in “Days of Previous Future” — a clone of Apocalypse grows up into the good-natured however awkward teenager Evan Sabahnur.
Are X-Males baddies predisposed to goodness?
If Apocalypse does, the truth is, make a extra compelling hero than a villain, he is in good firm. The record of onetime X-Males adversaries who turn into comrades in service of Xavier’s dream contains Magneto, Scarlet Witch, Quicksilver, Emma Frost, Rogue, Mystique, Juggernaut, Sabretooth, Pyro, Toad, Child Omega, Greycrow, and Frenzy. Villains realizing the error of their methods is not distinctive to “X-Males” lore, however evil mutants (and evil-mutant-adjacent people) do appear to seek out their option to righteousness with extra frequency than, say, the tremendous criminals of Gotham Metropolis.
Then once more, the face turns do not all the time stick — Apocalypse resumes evil actions in “X-Males” comics following the conclusion of the Krakoan Period; likewise, the benevolent En Sabah Nur we meet in “Rise of Apocalypse: Half I” is chopping heads off by the top of the episode. But when “X-Males ’97” can totally rehabilitate Magneto, maybe it is not too late for Apocalypse to appreciate that peaceable coexistence with humanity is the one viable path towards mutant survival.