Future Shock: Explore The Past and Present of the X-Men 2099

[CBR News]

Following their surprise appearance in "X-Men '92," learn more about the rise, fall and return of the once prominent mutant team.


Full article here.

[Nevets]

Man, I absolutely loved 2099, especially the X-Men. Greatly underrated and missed.

[bkart1978]

X-Men 2099 was my favorite series for two solid years when it came out. Teenage me was never as happy as the day #25 was released, with its embossed card-stock cover, when all of the characters converged for the obligatory full page team shot. It was a huge moment after 24 issues of build-up, with most of the team off on their own mini-missions for the bulk of the series. That kind of patience just doesn't exist in many books these days. Of course, the Ron Lim art was never hard on the eyes either.

I've always been disappointed that the X-Men disappeared so completely. Even Doom 2099 and Punisher 2099 have gotten a cameo, or at least a pin-up in the background of a cover. They seemed to be pushing Cerebra into the forefront quite a bit toward the end of the X-Men run (2 of the 3 stories in the X-Men 2099 Special were about her, and she was the main character of the beautiful Hildebrandt painted X-Men 2099: Oasis) but she didn't even make the cut as a character in the at-least-it-was-something Bendis/Sorrentino version of the team (and if I remember correctly she was just a giant brain in that lackluster Timestorm version that I haven't read since it came out).

As someone longing for years to see the original versions rendered in a Marvel comic, I'm extremely happy about their appearance in X-Men '92, even though it's out of continuity. But I really hope it's not another 20 years before we see them again.

(Side-note, wouldn't be upset if one or two X-Nation 2099 kids popped up someday too; the first couple issues before the staff changes were super promising, including the first art I ever saw from Humberto Ramos who I interestingly loved at the time, but can't stand now).

[MarvelMaster616]

I admit I never got into X-men 2099 back in the day. I can appreciate the concept. Unlike some of the other 2099 titles, this one tried to build up a team from scratch. It worked to some degree, but not as much as others. I think that's why it isn't as remembered as fondly as Spider-man or Doom. As such, I think it's perfect that Bowers and Sims are revisiting this series with X-men 92. They've already explored so much of what made the X-men so great in the 90s. If they can bring some fresh attention to X-men 2099, I'm all for it.

[Kolimar]

As someone longing for years to see the original versions rendered in a Marvel comic, I'm extremely happy about their appearance in X-Men '92, even though it's out of continuity. But I really hope it's not another 20 years before we see them again.

What he said.

[Kolimar]

Meanstreak, a speedster and hacker -- and arguably the heart of the team. [/I]

Heh... ....

[Sam Robards, Comic Fan]

Never read X-Men 2099 back in the day, but I remember thinking some of the character designs and powersets were cool. Maybe I'll try and track some down on the cheap: with Ron Lim art, it can't be that bad.

As for X-Men '92, the series just didn't grab me: it feels like it's leaning too hard toward parody and less toward genuine affection. That's their prerogative, of course, it just didn't strike a chord with me.

[cray_ws]

I never could figure out why Marvel couldn't sustain the 2099 line. I thought it was far more creative and original than the Ultimate line, yet the latter lasted far longer than it should. Probably because it consistently produced by the biggest names in Marvel's stable and the abundance of promotion by Joe Quesada and Bill Jemas.

If only 2099 received that kind of love and promotion, Marvel would've finally injected some real freshness to their stable.

[NewMutant]

I think it is fun to see the X-Men 2099 show up in X-Men 92' but I could careless about the characters in general. I have a decent amount of issues form the 25 cent sales but it never hooked me.

[electr1cgoblin]

Man, I absolutely loved 2099, especially the X-Men. Greatly underrated and missed.

Same here. X-Men, Spiderman and Doom were my favorites, though I also remember buying FF and Hulk from that line.

I really wonder whatever happened to John Francis Moore. He did great work on X-Men (and I believe Doom), then he seemed to just disappear.

[Malachi]

X-men 2099 where great. It created characters that still stand the test. You can focus on the obvious cliche things liek the clothes and names but beneath that some good characters and powers rested. Tim got interesting after La Luna messed with him, his powers added another dimension to him. Meanstreak was a great character with interesting relastionships with the others. Xi'an was ever mysterious and fascinating. Cerebra was the best though, a strong willed character.

It probably was a bit before it's time, or maybe we are regressing so much these days that we forget how it was back then. I think X-men 2099 had 8-9 characters. Without Serp it's 8 and of them 2-3 where white male(3 if bloodhawk was white). The rest where of different nationalities. If such a team where introduced today then people would attack it.

[Iluvitloud1976]

I fondly remember the 2099 stuff when it was coming out. It definitely spun up plenty of interest at the time. Loved & still love the original run's of Spider-Man 2099 & X-Men 2099. Great 90's comics.

[Mr.Majestic]

Yeah really liked X-Men 2099, also followed Doom 2099, a terrific title, and Ghost Rider 2099 a beautiful title.

[Knightmare10880]

I never could figure out why Marvel couldn't sustain the 2099 line. I thought it was far more creative and original than the Ultimate line, yet the latter lasted far longer than it should. Probably because it consistently produced by the biggest names in Marvel's stable and the abundance of promotion by Joe Quesada and Bill Jemas.

If only 2099 received that kind of love and promotion, Marvel would've finally injected some real freshness to their stable.

It wasn't so much that they couldn't "sustain" the 2099 line it was more like Marvel could barely sustain themselves, the early 90's lead to a huge collectors boom do to the insane sells of Spider-Man #1 and X-Men # 1, along with the first appearances of Batman and Superman going for incredibly huge amounts of money lead to everyone both fans and non-fans thinking that in the future comics of "modern times"(ie published in the 90's) would one day be worth as much as those early Batman and Superman comics did, this lead to a lot of growth in the industry at they time but not all of it was good, there were so many books being published at the time by Marvel, DC and all the various independents that it eventually lead to the bubble bursting to where Marvel almost went out of business for good.

As for comparing it to the Ultimate line, yes it's true that it was Quesada's baby and while it did have many top creators of it's time so did the 2099 line, the industry was just at a different state when the Ultimate line launched compared to where it was when the 2099 line both launched and was canceled and in all honesty looking at how things went with the Ultimate line, I'd say that the 2099 line had a better run and ended slightly better than the Ultimate one did.

I'm personally a huge fan of the 2099 line of titles and slowly been collecting all of the various titles in the line, I've completed X-Men 2099 and Fantastic Four 2099, am about 75% completed with Doom 2099, have all but one issue of 2099 Unlimited and am at various states of completion with the other 2099 titles.

[Huntsman Spider]

And it didn't help, either, that Joey Cavalieri, the supervising editor for Marvel 2099, was fired by Marvel as a cost-cutting measure, which prompted a lot of the writers working on the 2099 titles to walk off in protest, which forced Marvel to put up fill-in writers that weren't nearly as good and pretty much tanked 2099.