X-Men '97 Finally Brought Back One Of The Best Marvel Mutants

Spoilers for "X-Men '97" to follow.

The latest episode of "X-Men '97," "Remember It," took us to mutant haven Genosha (before it all went to Hell anyway). The island turned out to be a treasure trove of cameos; the Genoshan ruling council included Hellfire Club leaders Emma Frost and Sebastian Shaw, Morlock leader Callisto, the Irish mutant Banshee, Professor X's old flame Moira MacTaggert, and former Goblin Queen Madelyne Pryor. The streets of Genosha were filled with other mutants whom "X-Men" comics fans may recognize, from Pixie to Dazzler to Marrow to Exodus.

The best mutant cameo of all, though, is the blue-skinned Bavarian Kurt Wagner, aka Nightcrawler. His voice actor, Adrian Hough, joins the ranks of those who've reprised their roles from the 1992 "X-Men" cartoon. (Liam O'Brien was also a dang good Nightcrawler in "Wolverine and the X-Men," but I digress.)

Kurt shows up in the episode's title sequence doing some sword fighting with Gambit. In the episode itself, he escorts Rogue and Gambit down to the streets of Genosha, showing them what a vibrant mutant community the island has become. Once the Sentinel attacks, he saves Rogue and Magneto from one of its blasts.

Nightcrawler is one of my favorite X-Men, but he was seriously underserved in the original series. He never even joined the team, because one furry blue X-Man was enough (Nightcrawler doesn't have Beast's intellect, but he makes up for it with teleportation). I'm quite happy to have him back.

Nightcrawler is an integral part of the "X-Men" comics, introduced as part of the "Second Genesis" team alongside Wolverine, Storm, and Colossus in "Giant Size X-Men" #1 (by Len Wein and Dave Cockrum). Unlike many other mutants, Kurt can't pretend to be a normal human without holograms or serious make-up; he's introduced when Professor X saves him from a lynch mob.

However, despite looking like the devil, Nightcrawler is a good-hearted prankster and a devout Catholic (the "love thy neighbor" kind, not the dogmatic kind). As Kurt's teammate Kitty Pryde puts it in "X-Men: God Loves, Man Kills" while defending him from religious bigots, "[Nightcrawler] had every reason to be bitter, every excuse to become as much of a demon inside and out, but he decided he'd rather learn to laugh instead." This dichotomy has always made Kurt into one of the most compelling of the X-Men for me.

"X-Men" writer Chris Claremont, who's called Nightcrawler "the soul of the X-Men," used Kurt's backstory of growing up in a circus to explain his adventurous personality. "[Nightcrawler] wants to be Errol Flynn," Claremont once told Syfy, referring to the Old Hollywood action star most famous for "The Adventures of Robin Hood." Nightcrawler refuses to let his looks deter him from playing the part of a swashbuckling hero.

It took until season 4 for Nightcrawler to show up in the original "X-Men" cartoon. His first appearance came in the fittingly-titled "Nightcrawler," an outing in which Rogue, Gambit, and Wolverine go on vacation in the Alps and come across the monastery where Nightcrawler lives. The episode emphasized Nightcrawler as an outcast (the opening scene features villagers right out of a Universal "Frankenstein" picture attacking him, scored with an ominous organ). Hence, he felt more like a solemn preacher than the swashbuckler of the comics.

Still, Nightcrawler's faith convinces the surly Wolverine to give prayer a shot, an ending that touched this Catholic schoolboy's heart when I first saw it. (In the comics, Logan and Kurt are best friends, though, in the cartoon, Morph has supplanted the role of Wolverine's jokester pal.)

Nightcrawler's second appearance, "Bloodlines," focused more on his backstory: his mother is Mystique (which is where he gets his blue skin). She's also Rogue's adopted mother, so they're siblings (if not by blood or shared childhoods). It's not a coincidence that Nightcrawler was the mutant who greeted Rogue on Genosha; in "X-Men '97," he also seems to have developed his comic self's playfulness since we last saw him.

The 2000 cartoon "X-Men Evolution" (where both Nightcrawler and Rogue were main characters) focused more on this sibling relationship. Hopefully, Nightcrawler will finally become more of a regular presence in his sis' life on "X-Men '97." After the genocide of Genosha, the X-Men are going to need someone who can keep the faith like Nightcrawler can on their side.

"X-Men '97" is streaming on Disney+, with new episodes releasing every Wednesday.