281 | Lenore Zann (Rogue-X-Men ’97)

My Summer Lair Chapter #281: You’re Supposed To Know Everything, Beast. What Makes Us Like We Are Anyway?

It’s the x-cellent return of Saturday Morning Cartoons! Well, on Wednesdays on Disney+. (Still, feel free to yam sugary cereal as you watch X-Men ’97. I ate Froot Loops watching the first 3 episodes.)

Here’s your “Previously On X-Men” bit: Rogue is a mutant. She’s born with the ability to absorb the memories, powers, and physical traits of anyone she touches. Which means she can’t touch people. It creates a strange isolation and a love-hate relationship with her super powers and who she is. And who she is becoming.

Rogue is one of the many mutants featured on Marvel’s X-Men: The Animated Series which broadcast 76 episodes starting on October 31, 1992. (The classic cartoon featured a team line-up similar to that of the early 1990s X-Men comic books: Cyclops, Wolverine, Rogue, Storm, Beast, Gambit, Jubilee, Jean Grey and Professor X. (Cyclops’ Blue Team! How is that for an old school X-Men reference!))

Rogue was voiced by Lenore Zann and she’ll continue to voice Rogue in this X-Men revival. Yes, because it’s a cartoon X-Men ’97 picks up right where the original TV show finished on September 20, 1997. 

Lenore infused Rogue with a sorrowful loneliness while also being Southern and sassy. Oh you better believe my ears went all red when she called me Sugah.

In this conversation we trace her journey from Australia, coming to Canada, starring in Canadian classics like Happy Birthday To Me (so happy I got that in there!) to going to York University where she studied drama and political science…eventually employing those poli-sci courses when she became an MP as part of Justin Trudeau’s Canadian Parliament.

I know…we’re gonna talk about X-Men cartoons and being a Member of Parliament. That’s how this chapter of My Summer Lair is gonna go.

Behold…the X-Men ’97 trailer:

X-Men ’97 is currently streaming on Disney+ so you can #SetTheVCR for that.

Here we go, with my “gifted” conversation with Lenore talking about Rogue back in action in X-Men ’97. Get it…gifted? X-Men. Heh.

X-Men ’97 @ W • T • F

Host Sammy Younan

Recorded: Tuesday March 19, 2024 at 3:00 pm (EST)

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