In the history of the X-Men’s rogues’ gallery, Magneto’s always been #1 with a bullet, but Apocalypse is consistently a strong second in the rankings. Ever since his starring role in the Age of Apocalypse story arc back in the ’90s, En Sabah Nur has been one of the most dangerous threats in the Marvel Universe, even and maybe especially when he’s ostensibly on the X-Men’s side.
With his current featured role in X-Men ’97 season 2, Apocalypse is enjoying another moment in the spotlight. Speculation is running high about what might happen next after the events of the latest episodes. Since X-Men ’97 to date has been directly adapting/remixing some of the greatest storylines in X-Men history, from the fall of Genosha to “Lifedeath,” it’s safe to assume that whatever happens next will take heavy cues from the comics.
The surprise is that Apocalypse doesn’t actually have that much material to draw from. The comics have used him somewhat sparingly, all the better to make him a genuine threat when he does appear. As such, if the next step for Apocalypse is another direct adaptation, here are some of our best guesses as to what could be adapted, taken in order from entirely possible to highly unlikely.
Major spoilers follow for season 2 of X-Men ’97.
1
The Twelve
This is one of the rarest things in X-Men history: a long-running storyline that eventually reached a payoff. There’s a deep graveyard of abandoned X-Men plot arcs, due to changes in the creative team, editorial interference, and/or simple human error, but The Twelve actually got an ending. It might not have been the original intended ending, but it still counts.
The Twelve were first mentioned in passing in X-Factor #14 (1986), as a group of mutants that were supposedly future leaders of the species, and were specifically targeted by particularly advanced Sentinels. Some of the identified members of the Twelve included Apocalypse, Cyclops, Storm, Jean Grey, Danielle Moonstar, and Franklin Richards.
As originally written, this was presumably meant as part of a low-profile, slow-burn storyline in the ’80s X-books where multiple characters were preparing for some kind of imminent war between superhumans. This seems to have been conclusively abandoned around 1991 when long-time writer Chris Claremont left the books for a while.
Later writers (and Claremont eventually) revisited the concept of the Twelve for a storyline in the late ‘90s. It was revealed that the Sentinels had been given the names of the Twelve in the first place by a time-traveler and member of Clan Askani named Sanctity. She had gone back and uploaded the information to the Sentinels’ database as an attempt to prevent a particularly dark future.
In the story as written, the Twelve were actually a specific group of mutants whose powers Apocalypse could steal and use to elevate himself to godhood. The list included some obvious names, such as Cyclops, Phoenix, Iceman, Storm, and Magneto, alongside some unexpected characters like Sunfire, Polaris, Bishop, Colossus’s crazy brother Mikhail, and the obscure villain the Living Monolith.
The comics’ resolution to the Twelve storyline is a particularly messy story in a messy era. It’s from the period of time in Marvel history where absolutely everything was an overcomplicated crossover, and The Twelve doubled down with a couple of faked deaths, some time travel, a bunch of renegade Skrulls, and the death of Cyclops. (It didn’t take. If you’ve ever wondered why Scott is so messed up at certain points in Grant Morrison’s X-Men run, however, it’s mostly due to lingering effects from The Twelve.)
That being said, this is exactly the kind of plot arc that X-Men ’97 has seemingly specialized in. Abducting a bunch of seemingly random characters to power-drain them and become a god sounds like the sort of thing that the cartoon’s version of Apocalypse would be interested in. Then again, if this season of X-Men ’97 is setting up a scenario based on The Twelve, it’s running out of time to reveal who those 12 mutants might be.
2
The Further Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix
In the ’90s, Marvel released a couple of different miniseries about a time-traveling Scott and Jean. The first one has already influenced X-Men ’97, which suggests the possibility that we might see an animated adaptation of the second.
Peter Milligan and the late John Paul Leon’s The Further Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix is set in 1859, and serves as an origin story for Mr. Sinister. Back in Victorian London, he was just Nathaniel Essex, a scientist who wasn’t yet mad but was absolutely getting there.
Essex might’ve died unknown, or more likely been beaten to death by an angry mob, if not for the sudden arrival of Apocalypse. Masquerading as a human, Apocalypse introduced Essex to the cocktail of bad decisions, alien technology, and Darwinian ethics that would eventually transform him into Mr. Sinister. Jean and Scott are then stolen from their proper timeline and unceremoniously dropped into 1859 by Sanctity (see above), with a mission to stop Apocalypse from conquering England and only 48 hours to figure out how.
This is the kind of story that animation is ideal for, where you turn the X-Men into a strange combination of superhero action and Oliver Twist for an episode or two. Call this one a strong possibility.
3
Apocalypse vs. the Brood
Fun facts to know and tell about the comics’ En Sabah Nur: He was born 5,000 years ago in Egypt, where his grey skin and strange blue skin markings made him an outcast. He later stumbled upon alien artifacts that allowed him to enhance his powers to the point where he’s been able to survive to the modern day. That puts Nur in a long list of immortals and time-travelers who’ve secretly been active throughout all of Marvel history.
At one point in 2620 BC, in a story that’s been mentioned but never told in its entirety, Nur teamed up with the pharaoh Imhotep and that era’s Moon Knight to defend Egypt from an invasion by the alien Brood. Their brief alliance would later give rise to the Brotherhood of the Shield, a secret organization that went on to inspire the creation of modern S.H.I.E.L.D.
It’s not an entirely likely scene for X-Men ’97, but watching Apocalypse and Moon Knight bash Temu Xenomorphs together would make for one hell of an episode.
4
Apocalypse vs. Dracula
Speaking of Moon Knight: this obscure miniseries from 2006 dealt with a previously unknown blood feud between Nur and (Marvel’s version of) Dracula, which began with a mortal Vlad Tepes barely surviving a run-in with Nur in 1400s Romania.
Centuries later, Dracula stumbles across a secret network of Apocalypse’s descendants in 1897 London. Shortly afterward, those descendants start showing up in various states of exsanguination, which spurs the survivors to wake Nur to deal with the problem. Soon, Apocalypse has teamed up with vampire hunter Abraham Van Helsing to fight Dracula and his minions.
Dracula has his own peculiar history with the X-Men, most of which comes from a famous ’80s story where he almost turned Storm into a vampire. (That, in turn, led to an infamous ’90s issue of What If where Wolverine usurped Dracula’s position as king of Marvel’s vampires.) Given X-Men ’97‘s established love of making two major comic storylines do the fusion dance, some kind of Apocalypse vs. the X-Men vs. Dracula brawl could make for a fun episode.
5
Age of Apocalypse (1995)
30 years later, this is still the Apocalypse storyline. It’s also the least likely of the available options. This section is here to sink hopes, not genuinely speculate.
The AoA event began when David “Legion” Haller, Charles Xavier’s estranged son and a powerful mutant in his own right, decided to “fix” his life by going back in time and killing Magneto. Instead, David accidentally murdered Xavier.
Due to David’s ability to manifest whatever super-power he feels like having, he was able to bypass both the grandfather paradox and the Marvel Universe’s previously established rules about time travel. Instead of spinning off a new timeline, David changed the world. Now Apocalypse’s forces had conquered North America, and the only real forces left to oppose him were a handful of freedom fighters, a dramatically outgunned European blockade, and a few splintered groups of Magneto’s X-Men. In the Age of Apocalypse, some heroes were villains, some heroes were villains, and the Avengers had never been formed at all.
An entire generation of ‘90s kids has wanted to see an animated adaptation of Age of Apocalypse for over 30 years, and at first glance, all the ingredients were present in season 2 of X-Men ’97. Then episode 4 hit.
It’s not impossible for a future arc or season of ’97 to go in an Age of Apocalyptic direction, but its chances looked better a few episodes ago. In fact, one could go so far as to say that one of the boldest creative decisions X-Men ’97 has made is not immediately zipping towards an Age of Apocalypse storyline as soon as humanly (mutantly?) possible.
