Toad's name has been changed from Mortimer Toynbee (as he is known in the comics) to Todd Tolensky
One of the new comics that was out on the stands, at this time, was 'Children of the Atom' so it really wasn't that big a leap to do this show with the characters as teens. The original working title for this show was Children of the Atom.
The first opening title featured both a mixture of originally animation and clips from the show. The reel also highlighted each member of The X-Men and showed a brief clip of their powers. The only one missing was Professor Xavier who was removed by the network for being too old for they target audience. A new opening premiered with season three, presumably to include the glutton of new characters introduced. A remixed version of the original theme is also used.
The first season was very restrictive. The network felt that action shows like Batman: The Animated Series, etc, had gotten too dark and mature for the kid audience they were trying to reach, so they really kept a tight lid on this show. Once the first season aired, and proved to be a big success, they loosened the reigns a little more with each succeeding season. The good side of this, according to Producer/Writer/Director Boyd Kirkland, is that he had always wanted the show to be more character driven than big action-story driven, so the restrictions actually helped play into that. The high-stakes epochs they did later really became more meaningful and poignant because of how much time we had given the audience to get to know and empathize with the characters.
Blob is watching a loosely disguised version of The Powerpuff Girls on TV (episode 3.11 "Dark Horizon Part 1")
The WB network felt the cons outweighed the pros for serial style storytelling, so they didn't allow it except for the season finales. By Season 3, they loosened the reigns on us a bit, so the writers pushed more into stories with continuity.
Toad's theme (which we've seen in episode 1.01 "Strategy X", 1.06 "Middleverse" and 3.04 "The Stuff of Villains") now has lyrics. You can hear them during Toad's first fight with Nightcrawler, and at the end when Toad heads back to Wanda (episode 3.07 "The Toad, the Witch and the Wardrobe").
When initially developing the series, the first X-Men movie was still being shot, so no one working in this show could really refer to it. Only Avi Arad knew what it was going to be, and he didn't share much of that with the rest of the crew (everything was top-secret). He did guide them a little in such things as the style of Wolverine's hair, the look of Sabertooth and the design of Xavier's chair. Beyond that, they were pretty much on their own. By the second season, the movie had been released, and influenced a few things such as the addition of new recruits.
According to Producer/Writer/Director Boyd Kirkland, many stories remained to be told, however, when the series was canceled
When the X-Men and Acolytes are separated in the beginning, there was a reason why the writers had Nightcrawler, Colossus, and Shadowcat as a group. In Marvel Comics, they were members of a Europe-based team called Excalibur (episode 3.12 "Dark Horizon Part 2").
According to Producer/Writer/Director Boyd Kirkland, the Acolytes provided new, bigger challenges for the heroes to face. The theme of the series was growth, beginning with these guys first discovering their powers, and then learning how to use them while still trying to get along with the "normal" world. According to Kirkland, by season 3, they knew they had to up the stakes. The Brotherhood hadn't really developed into the kind of team Magneto wanted, so he recruited Gambit, Colossus and Pyro. The first two were very popular X-Men characters in the comics, and Kirkland and co. wanted them in their series. But we already had many more heroes than villains, so the writers and producers thought it would be fun and more surprising to break with convention and introduce Gambit and Colossus as bad guys. However, these two would be conflicted about what they were doing, and would eventually join the X-Men. According to Kirkland this is one of the stories that never got to be told.
One of the episodes featured the original 5 X-Men from the Stan Lee/Jack Kirby days (Cyclops, Jean Grey, Beast, Angel, and Iceman) working together. Boyd Kirkland, Producer/Writer/Director, had been a fan of the Kirby era X-Men, and thought it would be cool to pay tribute to that. Having Iceman among the new recruits, and having already introduced Angel to the series gave them that opportunity. are not only the original five X-Men from the comic book series. These five characters are also the original five members of another mutant team in the comics called X-Factor. The character of Apocalypse, whom this team of X-Men is trying to stop from being unleashed, first appeared in the X-Factor comic series.
Boom Boom leaves the Brotherhood. (episode 2.15 "The HeX Factor")
DEBUT and only appearance of: Captain America (episode 2.14 "Operation: Rebirth")
Captain America is the only Marvel Superhero to cross over with Evolution, and is the second superhero referenced during the course of the series. The first being a small Iron Man in-joke from the episode 2.09 "On Angels Wings".
When designing Angel's costume, they went for a look similar to a comic version.
Whilst the shows production took place in the United States, the voice cast was from Canada. For the first season, the producers flew to the voice recording sessions in Vancouver every week. Eventually, we hooked up a direct digital line between Film Roman and their studio so I could "sit in" on the sessions without having to be there.
This show's romantic storylines are one of those areas where the network really boxed the writers in because of Batman Beyond. The writers thought this kind of character development was crucial and consistent with the fact that these X-Men were teenagers in high school, but the WB network felt that 6-10 year old boys (their intended audience) would find such fair just "icky." Often, the crew had to slip stuff like that in visually without writing it into the script, or it wouldn't have made it into the show. They kept pushing it, and the WB network kept saying no, even though they knew that it was popular with their "tween" audience
One story that Producer/Writer/Director Boyd Kirkland always wanted to tell but couldn't interest the network in, was how Professor X lost the use of his legs, and how he came to know Magneto - to kind of give the back-story of these two characters. Kirkland thought the comics version of Xavier's story wasn't that great, and he thought we could come up with something better.
The Cytorrak gem Magneto uses in his enhancing chamber were the same ones that turned Cain Marko into the Juggernaut in the comic books (episode 1.13 "The Cauldron Part 2").
When they were making the design for Beast, they tried to make him more grey than blue.
When designing Wolverine's costume, they tried to use colors closer to his brown-ish uniform that he had used in the comics.
The New Recruits were intended as a homage to Jack Kirby's original "Jumpsuit" look.
First time we hear Gambit speak (episode 3.04 "The Stuff of Villains")
Powr8 is a copy of the real drink Powerade (episode 3.06 "X-Treme Measures")
Kurt arrives wearing a brown robe. In the comics, Kurt Wagner was briefly a priest, though he never wore a brown robe (episode 1.01 "Strategy X").
DEBUT: Shadowcat, Avalanche and Sabretooth. Technically, Sabretooth appeared in the first episode. However, he has a bigger role in this episode (episode 1.02 "The X-Impulse").
The US version got a new opener from this episode onwards (episode 3.10 "X23").
In the third season, a new original character, X23 debuted. X23 was the brainchild of Craig Kyle, Marvel's producer over the show. One day he told the producers and writers about his idea, and asked them to work her into the series.
According to Producer/Writer/Director Boyd Kirkland, their hands were always tied with Wolverine because of the violent aspect of his power and nature, and because he was an adult (the network wanted all of the stories to focus mainly on the kids).
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