X-Men: Pryde of The X-Men - Critical Response

Critical Response

The reaction from fans to the pilot is generally mixed. Although praised for its high quality animation (which was as previously mentioned, provided by Toei Animation, who also animated Dungeons & Dragons, G.I. Joe, Transformers, and Jem), fans simply felt that the pilot for the most part, came across as too campy for a comic (especially under the guidance of John Byrne and Chris Claremont) with often dark and adult oriented themes like X-Men. The on-screen action sequences had to be severely curtailed for a children's cartoon show, and the episode only superficially deals with sort of social issues often dealt with in the comics, such as isolation, intolerance, racism and bigotry.

Furthermore, purists were not fond of the way certain characters were portrayed in the pilot. For instance, Kitty Pryde was seen in their eyes as coming across as too much of a whiny damsel-in-distress (although this may have been intended to be the start of her character arc, eventually evolving into a stronger, more mature heroine). Fans also found it confusing to see the White Queen be portrayed as a member of the Brotherhood of Mutants. This Brotherhood was a mix of Magneto's group (with the inclusion of Toad) and Mystique's (with the inclusion of Pyro and the Blob) along with the previously unaffiliated Juggernaut and White Queen. Most importantly, fans were upset at the sound of the traditionally Canadian Wolverine, speaking with an Australian accent. This casting error seemed to stem from a brief run-through of the script in which, mockingly, Wolverine calls the traditionally Australian character Pyro, a dingo. In the final version, however, Wolverine calls Toad a "dingo" rather than Pyro.

According to Rick Holberg (as taken directly from the book X-Men: The Characters and Their Universe), storyboard artist and finalizer for Pryde of the X-Men and Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends:

I ended up being the voice director on the show, and I was forced to use the Australian version of Wolverine (which coincidentally, foreshadowed the casting of Australian actor Hugh Jackman in the live-action X-Men film), because all of this Australian stuff was popular at the time - the Mad Max films, Crocodile Dundee, and so on - it was going to turn out (in the comics) that Wolverine was an expatriated Australian. The direction of the character however never got beyond the plotting stages and Wolverine remained Canadian in the comics.