http://news.toonzone.net/articles/3...views-greg-johnson-on-wolverine-and-the-x-men
Major thanks for Greg for speaking with me. And really all the Marvel animation voice actors, writers, and producers are incredibly awesome people. My one regret is not interviewing Jamie Simone (voice over director). I was talking to him at the Marvel booth and I think he would've made a great interview.
I also have to thank Dread because I feel his amazing, thought out and well written arguments about the show inspired I feel the direction of my questions and topics for my Convention interviews. Even though while I don't agree with many of Dread's points, I wanted to see how the creators felt about the ideas and arguments fans such as Dread has brought up before. And not to single Dread out either because other fans have expressed similar views about the show as well.
Thanks for the acknowledgments. While I naturally don't always have an opinion that is completely unique from someone else, I do usually spend a lot of time explaining, trying to explain, or over-explaining my position or perspective. I did notice a lot of my talking points in your questions, although they are points others raise too, and it was nice to have some of the crew respond. Johnson did go into many of them in some detail.
Despite my criticisms of WOLVERINE AND THE X-MEN's first season, it's not a bad show and even at worst, saying it is "only above average" still means it is better than most cartoon shows on TV and especially on NickToons. I am glad it is getting a second season to address things and continue onwards. Whether 13 episodes or 26 a season, it isn't uncommon for even the best shows to not be at their prime from Season One. Even SPECTACULAR SPIDER-MAN, a show I champion, was not the best it could be in Season One (Season Two has been better, as good as that show started off). Neither was the 2k3 TMNT (that show's prime was Seasons 3-4 probably). There are plenty of characters that were handled well and a good serious tone for much of it. And a very serialized story.
Johnson did say some good things about Colossus. I was typing a Colossus Animation Retrospective on another site last year and noted that while in X-MEN EVOLUTION he had the most episode appearances of any X-Men cartoon so far (8-9 episodes), he didn't accomplish as much in them as he did in two episodes of the 90's show (across it's first two seasons). The question came up of whether for a B or C list character, is it better to show up often but do little of consequence, or only to show up once or twice but for it to be a grand thing every time? Ideally, a mix of both is the goal, but usually the latter it usually better. As much as I missed Colossus in Season One of W&TXM and thought he had a place, I do understand that having him around but, say, do less than Forge or Iceman did would have been a drag. It does sound that they have a, "we'll bring him in when we can do him right" philosophy which at least is a step up from EVOLUTION's usage of him. Again, he hasn't been the star of an episode, really, since 1994's "Red Dawn" episode.
It doesn't surprise me that the pitch for the show started as a WOLVERINE solo series. I can understand why it shifted, though. To a network and a corporate company, the entire X-Men even as background to Wolverine are more appealing than Logan alone. Johnson at least has a point when he mentions many episodes that did not star Logan. Ironically, many of those were actually better, as if there was more creative freedom or some sort of exhale of narrative talent. Perhaps they envision this show as a more serious BATMAN: BRAVE AND THE BOLD. Much as that show uses Batman as the A-List bait to introduce an audience to many lessor known DC characters (and Batman easily is just as overexposed across comics and media as Wolverine is, perhaps more so since he had a good 20+ year head start), maybe they envision Wolverine doing the same here with X-characters. The results have varied. But it isn't a completely illogical approach. The execution of it, though, for Season One sometimes waxed and waned.
I do think there was a little less internal team tension with Logan as leader as some of the writers intended, and I wonder if that was something that occurred in the frantic "editing for time" that exists in TV animation, where you barely have 19-20 whole minutes an episode to do what may be an intense plot. And I admit that I probably would have preferred "the pissing contest" between he and Wolverine than what he got, but of course that's my opinion and taste. I think that would have accomplished the show's pitch themes better than the overplaying of the sad sack card. I do still think Logan is a little bit of a hypocrite unless in Season 2 he doesn't chew Colossus out for a personal quest mission since he is almost as "indestructable" as Logan is, perhaps in some ways more so. Logan can heal, true, but he can't as easily get up from a grenade to the chest like Piotr can. The dilemma with what they were trying to portray with Cyclops was that in order for some of us to swallow the "fallen hero in turmoil" angle, there had to be a sense that he was once a hero, that he was once a pro. I didn't get that impression from Season One. All it would have taken, in episode 20, was a still panel flashback picture and Frost saying two lines, like, "and with Jean settling your turmoil, you did live up to Xavier's dreams and ideals for the team, at least until...", throw in a few nice notes of music, and done. Anime does that all the time. Again, maybe it was a time limit thing, I don't know. But it wasn't there, and the only picture we got of Cyke in Season 1 was negative. While "we all know" he may be a hero, but every show has to work on it's own terms, and I don't think Season 1 executed that angle as well as it could have.
Unless of course being a hero is occasionally being guilted or obligated to show up for a mission, and blasting Avalanche into a wall.
But, we do have another season, at least, to address these problems. One could perhaps claim that because Cyclops' esteem was effected, he only showed Frost his worst moments, rather than his successes, which he dismissed.
I do hope Season Two addresses the faults. With writing up another level this could be an epic. It was great of Johnson to be so candid, though. It was insightful.
