In the first confirmed change being made to the fan-favorite incarnation of Marvel’s Merry Band of Mutants, X-Men ’97 showrunner Beau DeMayo has revealed that unlike the original series, the upcoming revival will portray the mutant shapeshifter Morph as a nonbinary individual.
This change was first confirmed by DeMayo during a series-centric interview given to Empire Magazine for their April 2024 issue.
Providing brief teases into the approach the series took in writing each of the series’ principal mutant cast mates, when it came to Morph, the showrunner confirmed to the Empire, as recapped by the outlet’s Helen O’hara, that “this is a lighter take on the character, who is nonbinary and has an interesting buddy relationship with Wolverine.”
Unsurprisingly, this presents a significant change to the character of Morph, both as originally portrayed in the original Marvel Comics and in the original X-Men: The Animated Series.
Born Kevin Sidney, the mutant known as Morph as his name implies, possessed the mutant gift of cellular-level shape-shifting.
Though depicted as a through-and-through villain in his comic book form, on the small screen, Morph was initially introduced as a proper member of the X-Men in the team’s pilot episode, Night of the Sentinels, before being killed in that same episode by a surprise attack carried out by a group of Sentinels.
But in typical comic book fashion, Morph’s death proves to be anything but as the mutant is later revealed to not only have been rescued from the attack by none other than Mr. Sinister, but also had an ‘evil personality’ planted within him by the villain.
Following a brief stint as a mind-controlled pawn of the leather-clad Englishman, Morph is eventually rescued by his former teammates and brought back into the X-fold, even going on to play a major role in the eventual destruction of the Sentinel-producing Master Mold.
And of course, throughout his adventures, both in print and animated, Morph has never been portrayed as considering himself ‘nonbinary’.
While his ability does allow him to shift into any form, including that of a woman, at the biological level, he always defaulted to a standard appearance as a relatively nondescript human male.
Alas, while this ham-fisted change is certainly disappointing, it cannot be said that it is wholly unexpected.
After all, as stated by DeMayo during a 2023 Marvel livestream event regarding the series, one of his goals with X-Men ’97 was “to just get this right and really drill down to what I think the X-Men’s always going to be about which is just, you know, we talk a lot about the dream is social acceptance and it’s social justice.”
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“I think that can sometimes make certain people feel alienated and for me it’s always going to come down to, I think, the X-Men and what we’re going to be trying to do with this series is talking about the power of empathy, and how it can kind of heal these wounds that turn people against each other,” he explained. “That things like racism and bigotry don’t ‘just exist’ – there’s a reason behind it that empathy can kind of help us connect and build those bridges where we can actually say, ‘Hey, we are all different, but we have these little things that can still connect us.'”
Ultimately, how much of a spotlight Marvel will put on Morph’s newfound gender identity remains to be seen when X-Men ’97 slashes its way onto Disney Plus on March 20th.
