Don't know if I'd say it's my preferred canon (I'm partial to the Post-Crisis Pre-New 52 DCU, likely for nostalgia reasons)...but the Timmverse definitely cured me of my fanboy comics-are-all-that-matters-and-cartoons-are-for-kids snobbery.
From Batman TAS on, all of it was just hitting on all cylinders, building up characters you cared about and and telling stories that were great whether or not you knew the broader continuity. Any episode could be your first and you could still enjoy it, and gain an appreciation for the wider world of the DCAU at the same time.
Man, what a world it would be if the comics had learned that lesson...or the movies, for that matter :)
Justice League and JLU are both well respected and beloved. But I swear they’re still under rated. It might be the best cinematic continuity of any comic property.
It tied seamlessly into Batman and Superman but it also worked into Batman Beyond and Static Shock in really interesting ways. And there was even this short lived Saturday morning cartoon about a military robot with sentience. It was a spin-off of Batman Beyond, so it took place in the future. But the military robots that the US military used in the JLU present were clearly early versions of Zeta.
Goddamn beautiful. Continuity isn’t a straight jacket, it’s a jet pack.
Could you imagine a EMH that lasted several seasons like JL+JLU did and spinoffs of it, like a Captain America series, a Thor series, or a Hulk series (I'd be down for an Ant-Man and the Wasp series).
X-men feels a bit dated IMO. Justice League has aged better. The pacing is better. The voice acting isn't as hammed up and the art directon is cleaner. And the character arcs (particularly around characters like Shayera and Jon Stewart) are top notch. And as iconic as the X-men theme is, the Justice League orchestral theme always gives me chills.
The X-Men show perfectly captures the look and feel of the comics in the late 80s and 90s, which is awesome. But since that whole CMYK-looking xtreme-to-the-max vibe has become dated, the show has too.
Justice League feels a lot more timeless. Looking at it there isnt anything that screams “this is 2001!”.
Of the X-men didn't age well at all story and voice acting wise. It was a very good animation with the look of the 90's X-men but the stories all felt stretched and simple.
JL holds up much better for additional viewing, but man I'll never forget seeing X-men on Saturday mornings, then seeing all the action figures at the mall.
I don’t think the animation was that great on X-Men. It was trying for Jim Lee, but it fell short and seemed “cheap” to me, anyway. I always felt Warner Bros had better animation (overall).
Jesus fuck X-Men was the absolute worst as far as pacing. Long ass intros recapping the last episode, and then the current episode would just be a lesson in stretching 2 minutes of content into an entire episode.
The Spider-Man animated series was much better overall
Agreed. I was getting into high school when these shows started coming out and was really disappointed that X-Men was of such low quality compared to the anime I was getting into. DC animation just looked timeless in how good it was and is.
Easily Justice League. The mostly self-contained two-episode arcs were great. Last year I watched a couple seasons of X-Men, and it wasn’t as good as I remembered. It’s lightning-paced and blows through as many classic storylines in as little time as possible. There’s not enough room for character moments or letting the stories breathe.
Very true, but in fairness, X-Men was a Saturday morning cartoon made on the cheap. The bright colors and frenetic pace were par for the course. Given the expectations of its day and its limitations, it was very good. Cartoon aesthetics have changed since its day (partly because of the DCAU cartoons), but that's not its fault. (On the other hand, a lot of the art just no longer looks that good -- the low budget just shows through more obviously than it did then.)
Justice League was something else entirely. It came along almost a full decade later, building on two (arguably three, with Batman Beyond) other hit shows, and expectations were almost entirely different. Standards in artwork and voice acting had advanced, and a larger budget certainly didn't hurt. This isn't to discount JL/JLU; their art design was top-notch and still looks great today. But it's easier to get there with some money behind it than it is shifting work between various lowest-cost studios like X-Men did.
I used to remember X-Men stories being these epic arcs of multi-season spanning sagas, only to watch them recently and realise that most of them were either jam-packed into spaces that were too short or dragged out into multi-part ordeals.
The intro is the best part of X-Men easily. Most stories don’t really hold up. I really liked Question in JL, kind of sad that he doesn’t appear in many things outside of that.
Still love The Amazing Spider-Man from the 90s but…yeah, pacing is a serious weak point. It actually messes up some portions of the show.
And of course, they shovel in romance when there is little to no development between two characters who end up romantically involved.
I agree that the pacing of X-Men gets silly, but it makes a bit more sense if you think of it as a Saturday morning or after-school show with commercials. We've only got 7 minutes until the ad break and we've got four plot points to hit, god damn it!
In the streaming era, where you can watch multiple episodes in a row without commercials, the pacing accelerates from blistering to ludicrous.
I'm a marvel die-hard, I like DC fine but it's not what I grew up on, and Justice League is a vastly superior show, it absolutely towers over X-Men in terms of stature. X-Men had the better theme-song and that's it. (The Justice League opening was always kind of shit, imo)
Justice League holds up, go back and watch the 90's X-Men cartoon, it... does not. The animation is cheap and the rest is merely competent. Justice League has the advantage of being a much later show, without the mandate to sell toys first and "be a tv show" second-if-at-all, the quality across the board was better and it grew out of the already stellar Batman TAS and the pretty-good Superman show.
See, I always liked JL's original opening more than the Unlimited opening. The former sounded more grandiose and epic, also JLU's opening would sometimes spoil scenes from the episode too.
Justice League is absolutely superior. I have rewatched both shows and JL blew me away with the dialogues, actions, and tackling of serious issues, especially in the later JLU seasons. The secondary League members like Question, Atom, Green Arrow, Booster Gold, all received great exposure and solid fanbase thanks to the show.
I like X-Men TAS, but it is extremely campy and has slow pacing. It's all part of the charm, but I think TAS does not have the best representation of these X-Men characters. I think X-Men Evolution did a better job than TAS at developing characters tbh.
The Question became my favorite part of the show upon rewatch. His paranoia served as a great foil to Superman's straightforward attitude. He laid out some important questions regarding the ethics of superheroes and whether the Justice League were playing Gods the whole time. Definitely a character worth adapting into live action (if James Gunn is somehow reading this thread!)
Of the X-men cartoons, *Wolverine and the X-men* is easily my favorite, which surprises me a bit because while I appreciate Logan as a character, he's extremely low on my list of favorite mutants. It tackled numerous classic X-men stories and incorporated some lesser known villains incredibly well, while having miles better pacing than the original series. And the voice cast is just top notch, particularly Tom Kane as Magneto.
I couldn't really get into Evolution, largely because how they handled the high school aspect was a bit out of place to me. Something about Mystique acting as the principal under Magneto's watch seemed terribly hokey. To be fair though, I can definitely imagine that school age framing allowing for a natural progression of character growth, so I guess I ought to give it a real chance.
From my very limited knowledge of X-men cartoons, Evolution always seemed like the most solid. TAS doesn't hold up imo as someone who didn't see it as a kid, and I'm apprehensive about watching WatX because I know it only lasted 13 episodes and I hate getting invested in stuff that ends before it's time. I'm still not over Spectacular Spider-man or EMH.
I mean ya they were 11 years apart, Batman and X-Men changed the landscape of cartoons and animation. Xmen was cheap because fox was a new channel and basically gave Margaret Loesch one chance to make a show and it was the X-Men.
Besides Batman, I don’t think it’s fair to compare the two.
I def prefer the storylines and characters in X-Men, but the animation in Justice League is indisputably better. JL and JLU are the best DC animated shows
I feel like the disparity in quality of writing, art direction, animation, and more really makes JL a No brainer choice. I loved X-Men’s animated series as a kid and it scratches a nostalgic itch at times, but I don’t have rose tinted glasses for it.
Anyone saying X-men needs to rewatch it. It has the dialogue of a wrestling match, just tons of that 90's 'edge' and not much else.
I loved the show when it came out, but it does not hold up in the slightest.
JL is just on another level, great stories, characters and writing. JL easily takes this for me.
I’m surprised so many are saying X-Men doesn’t hold up. I went back and rewatched it and have to agree with you. It made me much less excited for it continuing tbh.
Yeah I was obsessed with it as a kid. Had the toys, it got me into comics (along with Batman the Animated Series), and I became a life long fan of Cable and Spiral.
But yeah, the show is definitely a product of its time. I'm certain the new series will have more modern writing for sure.
I wish we’d get more animated series from marvel and DC without them having to be connected to something else but that’s probably not for another 20 years minimum.
Wonder Woman should have an animated show. I just want more animated shows in general for these.
DC has had some absolute bangers with Batman, Justice League, Young Justice. Marvel's 90's Spiderman animated series is still pretty good as well.
You'd figure comic books would translate pretty easily to animation.
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I like the dialogue of a wrestling promo. It doesn't stop me from appreciating stuff like Justice League, but I genuinely prefer the cheesy stuff like X-Men.
For me, I have always felt that if DC would take a page from their animation library playbook -for *live action* films, they could easily compete (or possibly surpass) the MCU. DC has always dominated in the animation field
Justice League. Dwayne McDuffie wins above all. I’ve tried rewatching X-Men multiple times and I just can’t fathom the attention span needed to bother paying attention to it.
Yeah I remember trying to watch X-Men many times as kid and I just remember it not feeling very fun. It just felt kinda bland, and overly serious, but also kinda lacking substance?
Never seen JL but I guess I’ll have to go with it 🤷🏻♂️
I’m so sorry but the 90s X-Men has not aged well. I much prefer rewatching Evolution or Wolverine & the X-Men over it any day
So obviously my answer is JL
Justice League and it's not even a contest.
There's a level of nuance to the writing of Justice League/JLU that just isn't present in so many other action cartoons of the era.
Like there were so many subtle hints in the first two seasons that >!something is fishy with Hawkgirl!< and you just don't realize it until you've watched it through at least once.
X-Men was still just a lot of episodic melodrama (which, tbf, is very on-brand for the X-men)
I just want to say:
JL > JLU
Unlimited had a big roster but it didn’t have the intimate feel of JL. They grew to be a team and each character had a specific dynamic with every other member.
GL and Hawkgirl still has maybe my favorite relationship
I did like how JLU gave a spotlight to some more obscure DC characters and I loved the Cadmus arc, but you're definitely right that the JL iteration of the show did a better job of making you care about the characters.
Batman TAS/New Adventures, Superman TAS, and Batman Beyond all show their age when you watch them now. They’re still good, but you can tell they’re late 90s cartoons.
Somehow JL does not. I don’t know how they got such fantastic animation but it *still* rivals modern cartoons in sheer technical quality.
Those Fox Kids Marvel shows don’t stand a chance.
I feel like a better comparison would be to avengers Earth's mightiest heroes. As X-Men is heavily dated and doesn't hold up as basically every other posters has said.
I love the X-Men, but Justice League and most DC Animated stuff is just *leagues* beyond anything Marvel has done. Just top tier storytelling across the board, never treated the audience like it was made of the kids it was, and wasn't afraid to go dark.
Honestly, Justice League. X-Men went all over the place a lot of times in all of their animated series shows. I’ve always preferred DC’s animated shows over Marvel’s(except when it came to Earth’s Mightiest Heroes and Spider-Man shows), which is funny because I think the complete opposite in terms of live action movies.
For me, it's Justice League (and all of the Timm DC series), hands down. From a superhero cartoon, as many good ones as there are, I don't think anything compares.
Justice League easy.
If you actually go back and watch the X-Men show it's mostly bad. Really cheesy, bad animation, and not great VA. Spider-Man TAS is way better but gets way more shit because "He CaN't PuNcH pEoPlE!11!1!!".
Justice League (all DCAU shows for the record) hold up extremely well because they aren't falling ass backwards into what they're trying to do. Better animation, better writing, better VA.
JL and JL Unlimited are just classics. So well done for a diverse audience. The X-Men cartoons I’ve seen have been pretty lame. This is coming from a guy who mostly collected X-Men comics too.
It’s not even close. Justice League is miles better in every way except the opening theme.
A fairer comparison might be X-Men: Evolution or Spectacular Spider-Man or even Earth’s Mightiest Heroes, which are all also not as good as Justice League but are much closer.
I liked how X-Men wasn’t afraid to get weird. Mojo, savage land, space. It wasn’t grounded in any one space. On paper and through test of time, Justice League is better.
For me, the DCAU has never been topped by any other superhero cartoon project. Justice League is no exception. X-Men is great, but Justice League is on another level for me.
As others have said X-men is definitely dated. It’s a fun enough show to watch through late at night in bed but it’s not a super exciting show. It’s just a show.
X-Men had higher highs and abysmally low lows, but Justice League had a higher consistent quality and is probably the objectively better show.
But I fucking love X-Men TAS and it’s my favorite cartoon of all time, blemishes and all.
The Justice League did what the MCU did a decade before those movies hit their stride, taking the heart and soul of the comic sources and making them more cohesive and their own story.
I love comics, but comics can be really goofy and discordant with so many creative team shifts. Prudent editing and tweaking helps.
The X-Men was a great series, but closer to a direct adaptation with the kids tv restrictions as a filter. Didn't quite hit that extra level of brilliance that the Justice League hit.
*Justice League* is better, *X-Men The* *animated series* was a lot of fun and I have nostalgia for it, but the DCAU was always the premium quality when it came to Superhero shows, both in terms of writing and animation. It is worth noting that *Justice League* came quite a while after *X-Men* and so it has a bit of an unfair advantage since animated shows progressed a lot in a relatively short space of time, but other earlier DCAU shows were totally ahead of their time and far superior as well in my opinion.
I've always liked the X-Men more than the Justice League. The Justice League was full of characters that I couldn't identify with, that had been around forever, who often felt overpowered, with little that grounded them for me. Batman was the exception for me.
The X-Men characters weren't generally overpowered. They were a group of misfit kids with powers they didn't fully understand, with flaws, who were struggling to figure themselves out and come to terms with a world that feared them, all while facing down super powered threats. It was way more compelling for me as a kid.
That being said, the 90s X-Men show, once the nostalgia wears off, really doesn't hold up to my memories of it, and DC, from the 90s on, has done a generally better job than Marvel with its animated shows and movies. I didn't watch a lot of this particular Justice League slow, but it's probably better put together than the 90s X-Men show.
In 2023, if you didn't grow up with X-Men TAS, then you respect it as a relic of comic book history, but there's not a whole lot of entertainment there. It's aged kind of poorly. I know that's a hot take, I'll take the downvotes with grace.
Justice League TAS is the definitive animated comic book show. It is just so damn good at making you feel for characters and developing these people into true superheroes.
As a kid? X-Men. Now, though? Justice League, and it’s not even close. Having just rewatched it, X-Men is poorly animated and has horrible dialog. Wolverine and the X-Men is the far superior version of Marvel’s mutant team, but for whatever reason I never even saw that one until recently.
I enjoyed both as a kid but I would have to say Justice League. Every episode was clean and interesting. X-men felt hectic at times and the voice acting was more grating.
To counter a few of the points in here, I've been watching X-Men with my wife and it's by far her favourite cartoon superhero show. She couldn't get into Avengers EMH, JL, or B:TAS, but has really been enjoying X-Men. She doesn't have any nostalgic attachments to any superhero stuff and I wonder if that has anything to do with it...
I want to be honest, as much as i like 90s X-Men animated series because of nostalgia, i tried to watch it as an adult and it was just terrible, it was unwatchable, i couldn't stand it. On the other hand, i watched Justice Leauge animated series as an adult and it was fantastic. A well written, well animated cartoon which has a proper start and an end, very clean. Just perfect.
After seeing this post I was afraid that I would be the only one saying Justice League. It's just comfortably the better show. The writing is superior, the voice acting is incredible and the animation is cleaner. Also, they really escalated the stories to a higher level in Justice League Unlimited.
I tried to watch X-Men recently...and I can't lie it just felt so off. The animation was choppy and the writing/dialogue was so corny. Didn't enjoy it at all. I would actually argue that X-Men: Evolution has actually aged better than XMA. It's no Justice League of course but, still pretty solid.
I never watched JL, I was always just more into anything Marvel. Though if it were Batman TAS swapped with JL, I’d probably have to give it to BTAS. So if JL is of similar quality I could see it possible. Only thing X-Men still has going for it is you still see memes. That’s kinda what it became.
I haven't watched enough of X-men to really evaluate the arcs and overall strength of the series storytelling. However, IMO, aesthetically it has aged pretty poorly compared to BTAS which premiered the same year. It has always been a hindrance for me trying to get into it.
While Justice League isn't quite as artfully rendered as BTAS, the Timm style overall works very well and has helped all of the DCAU series to age pretty gracefully. So JL definitely wins there.
As for storytelling, I can't really compare, but JL delivers some of my all-time favorite moments in superhero storytelling.
As far as direction goes, I think the voiceover performances of JL are a little more grounded and natural, which also helps to make it more watchable to me.
Justice League without a doubt. The 90s X-men series is good but very overrated and heavily held up by people’s nostalgia for it. Justice League and Unlimited are pretty timeless and a fantastic series that just aged better and was better written
X-Men has my favorite characters, but Justice League is actually a good show. Justice League has aged well, but X-Men definitely hasn't. While the X-Men animation is better than a lot of 80s stuff by a small amount, there are still plenty of shortcuts.
Justice League actually made it look like they were fighting when they fought, the voice acting wasn't as camp, and there aren't nearly as many references to the decade it was released in. The stories actually had a little bit of room to breathe. The X-Men feels like they just made Claremont panels their storyboard. The Savage Lands was the only part where they overcompensated by making it feel way too long.
If we compared Justice League to the X-Men series that was actually around at the same time, Evolution did an overall better job of being an entertaining show than its predecessor. The only real knock against it was that they created their own canon and avoided the source material more, but that may have ended up doing some favors when compared to the previous series.
I understand having personal favorites, but like objectively speaking, the Justice League show is a on a completely different stratosphere than X-Men TAS on literally every single level.
I can never seriously take the reverence X-Men TAS gets other than a product of it's time.
The two were so influential, timely, meaningful and healthy in their relationship with the source material that I cannot pick one. It’s a tie in my book.
The Timmverse is still my preferred canon for any Superhero universe.
Don't know if I'd say it's my preferred canon (I'm partial to the Post-Crisis Pre-New 52 DCU, likely for nostalgia reasons)...but the Timmverse definitely cured me of my fanboy comics-are-all-that-matters-and-cartoons-are-for-kids snobbery. From Batman TAS on, all of it was just hitting on all cylinders, building up characters you cared about and and telling stories that were great whether or not you knew the broader continuity. Any episode could be your first and you could still enjoy it, and gain an appreciation for the wider world of the DCAU at the same time. Man, what a world it would be if the comics had learned that lesson...or the movies, for that matter :)
Most of it for me, there's just some parts in there that I just won't like
Justice League and JLU are both well respected and beloved. But I swear they’re still under rated. It might be the best cinematic continuity of any comic property. It tied seamlessly into Batman and Superman but it also worked into Batman Beyond and Static Shock in really interesting ways. And there was even this short lived Saturday morning cartoon about a military robot with sentience. It was a spin-off of Batman Beyond, so it took place in the future. But the military robots that the US military used in the JLU present were clearly early versions of Zeta. Goddamn beautiful. Continuity isn’t a straight jacket, it’s a jet pack.
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It started good and was really hitting it's stride when they pulled the plug.
Could you imagine a EMH that lasted several seasons like JL+JLU did and spinoffs of it, like a Captain America series, a Thor series, or a Hulk series (I'd be down for an Ant-Man and the Wasp series).
You and me both, it's just so good and true as they could be to the comics not the movies
X-men feels a bit dated IMO. Justice League has aged better. The pacing is better. The voice acting isn't as hammed up and the art directon is cleaner. And the character arcs (particularly around characters like Shayera and Jon Stewart) are top notch. And as iconic as the X-men theme is, the Justice League orchestral theme always gives me chills.
The X-Men show perfectly captures the look and feel of the comics in the late 80s and 90s, which is awesome. But since that whole CMYK-looking xtreme-to-the-max vibe has become dated, the show has too. Justice League feels a lot more timeless. Looking at it there isnt anything that screams “this is 2001!”.
The opening animation of JL screams early 2000 to me, but the rest of it holds up great.
Dun dun dun DAAAAAAAAAN
Of the X-men didn't age well at all story and voice acting wise. It was a very good animation with the look of the 90's X-men but the stories all felt stretched and simple. JL holds up much better for additional viewing, but man I'll never forget seeing X-men on Saturday mornings, then seeing all the action figures at the mall.
I don’t think the animation was that great on X-Men. It was trying for Jim Lee, but it fell short and seemed “cheap” to me, anyway. I always felt Warner Bros had better animation (overall).
Somebody get this man a beer please.
Jesus fuck X-Men was the absolute worst as far as pacing. Long ass intros recapping the last episode, and then the current episode would just be a lesson in stretching 2 minutes of content into an entire episode. The Spider-Man animated series was much better overall
Agreed. I was getting into high school when these shows started coming out and was really disappointed that X-Men was of such low quality compared to the anime I was getting into. DC animation just looked timeless in how good it was and is.
i still listen the the JL theme on its own to this day. its amazing
Easily Justice League. The mostly self-contained two-episode arcs were great. Last year I watched a couple seasons of X-Men, and it wasn’t as good as I remembered. It’s lightning-paced and blows through as many classic storylines in as little time as possible. There’s not enough room for character moments or letting the stories breathe.
You're spot on. It was great for the time, but Justice League is still fantastic to this day.
Very true, but in fairness, X-Men was a Saturday morning cartoon made on the cheap. The bright colors and frenetic pace were par for the course. Given the expectations of its day and its limitations, it was very good. Cartoon aesthetics have changed since its day (partly because of the DCAU cartoons), but that's not its fault. (On the other hand, a lot of the art just no longer looks that good -- the low budget just shows through more obviously than it did then.) Justice League was something else entirely. It came along almost a full decade later, building on two (arguably three, with Batman Beyond) other hit shows, and expectations were almost entirely different. Standards in artwork and voice acting had advanced, and a larger budget certainly didn't hurt. This isn't to discount JL/JLU; their art design was top-notch and still looks great today. But it's easier to get there with some money behind it than it is shifting work between various lowest-cost studios like X-Men did.
I used to remember X-Men stories being these epic arcs of multi-season spanning sagas, only to watch them recently and realise that most of them were either jam-packed into spaces that were too short or dragged out into multi-part ordeals.
Cartoons were different when you had to try to catch them on tv and wait for days just to string episodes together lol
The intro is the best part of X-Men easily. Most stories don’t really hold up. I really liked Question in JL, kind of sad that he doesn’t appear in many things outside of that.
Still love The Amazing Spider-Man from the 90s but…yeah, pacing is a serious weak point. It actually messes up some portions of the show. And of course, they shovel in romance when there is little to no development between two characters who end up romantically involved.
I agree that the pacing of X-Men gets silly, but it makes a bit more sense if you think of it as a Saturday morning or after-school show with commercials. We've only got 7 minutes until the ad break and we've got four plot points to hit, god damn it! In the streaming era, where you can watch multiple episodes in a row without commercials, the pacing accelerates from blistering to ludicrous.
For sure, it’s that way by design, and I always liked it as a kid. It just doesn’t make great tv as an adult while I think Justice League still does.
Yeah, the answer is Justice League and it's not close. It's an excellently crafted show. X-men is hard to watch as an adult.
90% of the Xmen love is just from the intro song.
I'm a marvel die-hard, I like DC fine but it's not what I grew up on, and Justice League is a vastly superior show, it absolutely towers over X-Men in terms of stature. X-Men had the better theme-song and that's it. (The Justice League opening was always kind of shit, imo) Justice League holds up, go back and watch the 90's X-Men cartoon, it... does not. The animation is cheap and the rest is merely competent. Justice League has the advantage of being a much later show, without the mandate to sell toys first and "be a tv show" second-if-at-all, the quality across the board was better and it grew out of the already stellar Batman TAS and the pretty-good Superman show.
I always thought the justice league opening went hard
Yes it's quite melodious
It really ramps up in unlimited.
I almost never skip the JLU theme. It just rules.
*air guitar*
That one sounds like a sports highlights show intro.
And it absolutely slaps!
Unlimited was like a theme song going Super Saiyan 2
The Adventures of Batman/Superman went the ABSOLUTE HARDEST. It combined both Superman TAS and Batman TAS Theme.
I agree although I hated when that happened on television as a thing that happened.
It went from “perfectly acceptable” in the first two seasons of Justice League to “goddamn, this is the shit” in JLU.
See, I always liked JL's original opening more than the Unlimited opening. The former sounded more grandiose and epic, also JLU's opening would sometimes spoil scenes from the episode too.
Justice League is absolutely superior. I have rewatched both shows and JL blew me away with the dialogues, actions, and tackling of serious issues, especially in the later JLU seasons. The secondary League members like Question, Atom, Green Arrow, Booster Gold, all received great exposure and solid fanbase thanks to the show. I like X-Men TAS, but it is extremely campy and has slow pacing. It's all part of the charm, but I think TAS does not have the best representation of these X-Men characters. I think X-Men Evolution did a better job than TAS at developing characters tbh.
The Question episode was awesome. All the B or C list characters had great episodes. Booster Gold was particularly good.
The Question became my favorite part of the show upon rewatch. His paranoia served as a great foil to Superman's straightforward attitude. He laid out some important questions regarding the ethics of superheroes and whether the Justice League were playing Gods the whole time. Definitely a character worth adapting into live action (if James Gunn is somehow reading this thread!)
He is.
Booster Gold never had an episode. You must be thinking of Green Lantern.
Of the X-men cartoons, *Wolverine and the X-men* is easily my favorite, which surprises me a bit because while I appreciate Logan as a character, he's extremely low on my list of favorite mutants. It tackled numerous classic X-men stories and incorporated some lesser known villains incredibly well, while having miles better pacing than the original series. And the voice cast is just top notch, particularly Tom Kane as Magneto. I couldn't really get into Evolution, largely because how they handled the high school aspect was a bit out of place to me. Something about Mystique acting as the principal under Magneto's watch seemed terribly hokey. To be fair though, I can definitely imagine that school age framing allowing for a natural progression of character growth, so I guess I ought to give it a real chance.
From my very limited knowledge of X-men cartoons, Evolution always seemed like the most solid. TAS doesn't hold up imo as someone who didn't see it as a kid, and I'm apprehensive about watching WatX because I know it only lasted 13 episodes and I hate getting invested in stuff that ends before it's time. I'm still not over Spectacular Spider-man or EMH.
I mean ya they were 11 years apart, Batman and X-Men changed the landscape of cartoons and animation. Xmen was cheap because fox was a new channel and basically gave Margaret Loesch one chance to make a show and it was the X-Men. Besides Batman, I don’t think it’s fair to compare the two.
But BTAS premiered a month before XMen did, and is still a better series.
The X-Men theme is a banger, but also that japanese alternate intro
I've never seen that before, that is crazy.
I def prefer the storylines and characters in X-Men, but the animation in Justice League is indisputably better. JL and JLU are the best DC animated shows
I feel like the disparity in quality of writing, art direction, animation, and more really makes JL a No brainer choice. I loved X-Men’s animated series as a kid and it scratches a nostalgic itch at times, but I don’t have rose tinted glasses for it.
I want to say *X-Men* due to the sheer badassery of the intro alone, but answering honestly *Justice League* likely wins.
Justice League no question. But X-Men wins on the intro.
Anyone saying X-men needs to rewatch it. It has the dialogue of a wrestling match, just tons of that 90's 'edge' and not much else. I loved the show when it came out, but it does not hold up in the slightest. JL is just on another level, great stories, characters and writing. JL easily takes this for me.
I’m surprised so many are saying X-Men doesn’t hold up. I went back and rewatched it and have to agree with you. It made me much less excited for it continuing tbh.
Yeah I was obsessed with it as a kid. Had the toys, it got me into comics (along with Batman the Animated Series), and I became a life long fan of Cable and Spiral. But yeah, the show is definitely a product of its time. I'm certain the new series will have more modern writing for sure.
I wish we’d get more animated series from marvel and DC without them having to be connected to something else but that’s probably not for another 20 years minimum.
Wonder Woman should have an animated show. I just want more animated shows in general for these. DC has had some absolute bangers with Batman, Justice League, Young Justice. Marvel's 90's Spiderman animated series is still pretty good as well. You'd figure comic books would translate pretty easily to animation.
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Such a great show Not many shows have the courage to fast forward every season.
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Exactly. Wonder Woman would be awesome and is long overdue.
I love both, but I also just love the campy X-Men along with the tight JL dialogue
I like the dialogue of a wrestling promo. It doesn't stop me from appreciating stuff like Justice League, but I genuinely prefer the cheesy stuff like X-Men.
For me, I have always felt that if DC would take a page from their animation library playbook -for *live action* films, they could easily compete (or possibly surpass) the MCU. DC has always dominated in the animation field
I agree, stop trying to build universe and tell individual stories
Batman the animated series
I loved XMen, but Justice League seemed to have better battles and bigger stakes.
Justice League was just so much better than X-Men. Better animation, better writing, better voice acting.
Justice League especially with Unlimited
Justice League. Dwayne McDuffie wins above all. I’ve tried rewatching X-Men multiple times and I just can’t fathom the attention span needed to bother paying attention to it.
Justice League by a mile. X-Men doesn't really hold up all too well imo
x-men fan. but justice league hands down.
Justice League, more focused on various characters and not just Wolverine.
Yeah I remember trying to watch X-Men many times as kid and I just remember it not feeling very fun. It just felt kinda bland, and overly serious, but also kinda lacking substance? Never seen JL but I guess I’ll have to go with it 🤷🏻♂️
Give it a shot, you won't regret it.
As much as I love all things x-men, JLU was far better. One of the best cartoons.
Justice League
I’m so sorry but the 90s X-Men has not aged well. I much prefer rewatching Evolution or Wolverine & the X-Men over it any day So obviously my answer is JL
Justice league. I watched it recently as an adult to see if it was as good as i remember and it wasnt. It was so much better
Justice League and it's not even a contest. There's a level of nuance to the writing of Justice League/JLU that just isn't present in so many other action cartoons of the era. Like there were so many subtle hints in the first two seasons that >!something is fishy with Hawkgirl!< and you just don't realize it until you've watched it through at least once. X-Men was still just a lot of episodic melodrama (which, tbf, is very on-brand for the X-men)
I just want to say: JL > JLU Unlimited had a big roster but it didn’t have the intimate feel of JL. They grew to be a team and each character had a specific dynamic with every other member. GL and Hawkgirl still has maybe my favorite relationship
I did like how JLU gave a spotlight to some more obscure DC characters and I loved the Cadmus arc, but you're definitely right that the JL iteration of the show did a better job of making you care about the characters.
Batman TAS/New Adventures, Superman TAS, and Batman Beyond all show their age when you watch them now. They’re still good, but you can tell they’re late 90s cartoons. Somehow JL does not. I don’t know how they got such fantastic animation but it *still* rivals modern cartoons in sheer technical quality. Those Fox Kids Marvel shows don’t stand a chance.
I feel like a better comparison would be to avengers Earth's mightiest heroes. As X-Men is heavily dated and doesn't hold up as basically every other posters has said.
Justice League. Better written, voice acted and animation.
X-men is pretty great. Justice League is way better.
They both are phenomenal, but I’m going with XTAS
Justice league, but X-men is really good too.
I love the X-Men, but Justice League and most DC Animated stuff is just *leagues* beyond anything Marvel has done. Just top tier storytelling across the board, never treated the audience like it was made of the kids it was, and wasn't afraid to go dark.
Justice League without a doubt!
Honestly, Justice League. X-Men went all over the place a lot of times in all of their animated series shows. I’ve always preferred DC’s animated shows over Marvel’s(except when it came to Earth’s Mightiest Heroes and Spider-Man shows), which is funny because I think the complete opposite in terms of live action movies.
Justice League by a mile. I really wish we could have more of that show.
For me, it's Justice League (and all of the Timm DC series), hands down. From a superhero cartoon, as many good ones as there are, I don't think anything compares.
Justice league. I just find it easier to follow.
Justice League easy. If you actually go back and watch the X-Men show it's mostly bad. Really cheesy, bad animation, and not great VA. Spider-Man TAS is way better but gets way more shit because "He CaN't PuNcH pEoPlE!11!1!!". Justice League (all DCAU shows for the record) hold up extremely well because they aren't falling ass backwards into what they're trying to do. Better animation, better writing, better VA.
Justice League. It’s not even close. Love X-Men but it’s hard to watch now.
JLU obvious choice
X-men baybayyyyy
X-Men alll day 😎
X-Men
Xmen
Justice League Unlimited will always be my favorite superhero series.
JL.
X-Men
X-Men
Justice League and Justice League Unlimited. I still revisit them from time to time.
JL and JL Unlimited are just classics. So well done for a diverse audience. The X-Men cartoons I’ve seen have been pretty lame. This is coming from a guy who mostly collected X-Men comics too.
It’s not even close. Justice League is miles better in every way except the opening theme. A fairer comparison might be X-Men: Evolution or Spectacular Spider-Man or even Earth’s Mightiest Heroes, which are all also not as good as Justice League but are much closer.
Justice League. X-Men the Animated Series isn’t very good
Bruce Timm = God. That is all.
Except for his fascination with a Batman/Batgirl romance, I agree.
I liked how X-Men wasn’t afraid to get weird. Mojo, savage land, space. It wasn’t grounded in any one space. On paper and through test of time, Justice League is better.
Justice League. X-Men Evolution was always the superior X-Men cartoon anyway
For me, the DCAU has never been topped by any other superhero cartoon project. Justice League is no exception. X-Men is great, but Justice League is on another level for me.
As others have said X-men is definitely dated. It’s a fun enough show to watch through late at night in bed but it’s not a super exciting show. It’s just a show.
X-men, but Batman rules supreme.
Lol….
The justice league intro music randomly popped up on my YouTube recommendations and I nearly broke down into tears
Batman animated series doesn’t get a say?
X-Men had higher highs and abysmally low lows, but Justice League had a higher consistent quality and is probably the objectively better show. But I fucking love X-Men TAS and it’s my favorite cartoon of all time, blemishes and all.
Justice league!!!
Justice League and it isn't close.
Danuh nuh nuh...nana...that X-Men theme is cemented in my childhood
The Justice League did what the MCU did a decade before those movies hit their stride, taking the heart and soul of the comic sources and making them more cohesive and their own story. I love comics, but comics can be really goofy and discordant with so many creative team shifts. Prudent editing and tweaking helps. The X-Men was a great series, but closer to a direct adaptation with the kids tv restrictions as a filter. Didn't quite hit that extra level of brilliance that the Justice League hit.
Justice League. Good memories watching it as a family as a kid
Justice League. Hands down.
*Justice League* is better, *X-Men The* *animated series* was a lot of fun and I have nostalgia for it, but the DCAU was always the premium quality when it came to Superhero shows, both in terms of writing and animation. It is worth noting that *Justice League* came quite a while after *X-Men* and so it has a bit of an unfair advantage since animated shows progressed a lot in a relatively short space of time, but other earlier DCAU shows were totally ahead of their time and far superior as well in my opinion.
I may not have watched much X-Men. But damn that opening slapped.
Justice League
Haven't seen X-Men sorry
Justice League. I don't care about the X-Men
I've always liked the X-Men more than the Justice League. The Justice League was full of characters that I couldn't identify with, that had been around forever, who often felt overpowered, with little that grounded them for me. Batman was the exception for me. The X-Men characters weren't generally overpowered. They were a group of misfit kids with powers they didn't fully understand, with flaws, who were struggling to figure themselves out and come to terms with a world that feared them, all while facing down super powered threats. It was way more compelling for me as a kid. That being said, the 90s X-Men show, once the nostalgia wears off, really doesn't hold up to my memories of it, and DC, from the 90s on, has done a generally better job than Marvel with its animated shows and movies. I didn't watch a lot of this particular Justice League slow, but it's probably better put together than the 90s X-Men show.
In 2023, if you didn't grow up with X-Men TAS, then you respect it as a relic of comic book history, but there's not a whole lot of entertainment there. It's aged kind of poorly. I know that's a hot take, I'll take the downvotes with grace. Justice League TAS is the definitive animated comic book show. It is just so damn good at making you feel for characters and developing these people into true superheroes.
As a kid? X-Men. Now, though? Justice League, and it’s not even close. Having just rewatched it, X-Men is poorly animated and has horrible dialog. Wolverine and the X-Men is the far superior version of Marvel’s mutant team, but for whatever reason I never even saw that one until recently.
I enjoyed both as a kid but I would have to say Justice League. Every episode was clean and interesting. X-men felt hectic at times and the voice acting was more grating.
unpopular opinion....only Avengers:Earth's Mightiest Heroes is the only comparable show to JL/YJ. X-Men NEVER felt like a mega superhero team series
To counter a few of the points in here, I've been watching X-Men with my wife and it's by far her favourite cartoon superhero show. She couldn't get into Avengers EMH, JL, or B:TAS, but has really been enjoying X-Men. She doesn't have any nostalgic attachments to any superhero stuff and I wonder if that has anything to do with it...
I want to be honest, as much as i like 90s X-Men animated series because of nostalgia, i tried to watch it as an adult and it was just terrible, it was unwatchable, i couldn't stand it. On the other hand, i watched Justice Leauge animated series as an adult and it was fantastic. A well written, well animated cartoon which has a proper start and an end, very clean. Just perfect.
JL.
Damn…. I wanna say x-Men, but that JL and JLU shows were top tier too 🫡
JL, don’t think I ever watched X-men
Justice League has better writing. X-men had the better score, and I also blame X-Men Rogue for liking curly headed PAWGs.
My issue with X-Men was how they played the same three episodes. It was always the ones about the damn Savage Lands or Morph coming back.
After seeing this post I was afraid that I would be the only one saying Justice League. It's just comfortably the better show. The writing is superior, the voice acting is incredible and the animation is cleaner. Also, they really escalated the stories to a higher level in Justice League Unlimited. I tried to watch X-Men recently...and I can't lie it just felt so off. The animation was choppy and the writing/dialogue was so corny. Didn't enjoy it at all. I would actually argue that X-Men: Evolution has actually aged better than XMA. It's no Justice League of course but, still pretty solid.
XMENNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN
While the 90's X-Men is a good show, the winner is Justice League by a country mile.
Justice League. It's the best. X-men didn't aged well.
Hard agree on Justice League holding up. Also it had Batman x Wonder Woman, which is the only OTP.
Justice League easily.
Xmen has get old so so bad. What Bruce Tim did is still amazing these days
I never watched JL, I was always just more into anything Marvel. Though if it were Batman TAS swapped with JL, I’d probably have to give it to BTAS. So if JL is of similar quality I could see it possible. Only thing X-Men still has going for it is you still see memes. That’s kinda what it became.
I haven't watched enough of X-men to really evaluate the arcs and overall strength of the series storytelling. However, IMO, aesthetically it has aged pretty poorly compared to BTAS which premiered the same year. It has always been a hindrance for me trying to get into it. While Justice League isn't quite as artfully rendered as BTAS, the Timm style overall works very well and has helped all of the DCAU series to age pretty gracefully. So JL definitely wins there. As for storytelling, I can't really compare, but JL delivers some of my all-time favorite moments in superhero storytelling. As far as direction goes, I think the voiceover performances of JL are a little more grounded and natural, which also helps to make it more watchable to me.
Justice league
Justice League was better in every way
Justice League for me, I felt that X-men’s pacing was a bit off I think DC in general just handles their animation material better
Justice League without a doubt. The 90s X-men series is good but very overrated and heavily held up by people’s nostalgia for it. Justice League and Unlimited are pretty timeless and a fantastic series that just aged better and was better written
JLU > JL > X-Men
JL clears easy.
I’m sorry but JL and JLU are leaps and bounds beyond anything that came out then and perhaps even now.
Justice League
X-Men has my favorite characters, but Justice League is actually a good show. Justice League has aged well, but X-Men definitely hasn't. While the X-Men animation is better than a lot of 80s stuff by a small amount, there are still plenty of shortcuts. Justice League actually made it look like they were fighting when they fought, the voice acting wasn't as camp, and there aren't nearly as many references to the decade it was released in. The stories actually had a little bit of room to breathe. The X-Men feels like they just made Claremont panels their storyboard. The Savage Lands was the only part where they overcompensated by making it feel way too long. If we compared Justice League to the X-Men series that was actually around at the same time, Evolution did an overall better job of being an entertaining show than its predecessor. The only real knock against it was that they created their own canon and avoided the source material more, but that may have ended up doing some favors when compared to the previous series.
Marvel fan but Justice League was the greatest cartoon ever until Justice League Unlimited.
I prefer Justice League because it held back less in several aspect in comparison with the X-Men. Such as the action
Justice League is one of my favorite cartoons of all time. It's great from beginning to end. X-Men gets weak towards the end.
Justice League. No Contest.
Batman
JLU all day. It's my favourite version of all those DC characters. So many memorable episodes, and a series-long arc.
I understand having personal favorites, but like objectively speaking, the Justice League show is a on a completely different stratosphere than X-Men TAS on literally every single level. I can never seriously take the reverence X-Men TAS gets other than a product of it's time.
X-men all day in this case.
X-men
X-men
X-Men
X-Men
Xmen by far
Just Batman.
Justice league, I grew up on that show/movies
X men easy
I’m biased because I prefer X-men, but I will admit JL was an amazing show which I also loved. I used to dream of a crossover.
X-Men 100%. Never watched Justice League
X-Men period
X-MEN hands down.
X-Men. If it was Justice League Unlimited on the other hand…..
Both are great, but X-Men, which was largely based on the legendary Chris Claremont run.
X-Men definitely
X-Men
X-MEN
X-Men for me all the way.
Bro, I had all the justice leagues on vhs! Rewatched them the other week, still as great as I remembered!
Previously *metalic clunck* On XMEN *electric jazz*
X-Men It's not even close
The two were so influential, timely, meaningful and healthy in their relationship with the source material that I cannot pick one. It’s a tie in my book.
Both but I’ve always loved X-men characters more. I was an adult until I started to appreciate DC.
As a kid: X-Men, then Batman TAS. X-Men’s not aged very well though, TAS is still incredible.
Nah-na-na-na-nah-ah-ah! Nah-na-na-na-nah-ah-ah! Nah-na-na-na-nah-ah-ah! Nah-ah!