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The Newton Brothers did not point to one technical overhaul of the X-Men theme. In April 2024 interviews, composer Taylor Newton Stewart described their approach as restraint: pay tribute to the original, avoid undermining it, and make small, deliberate updates where they help the music feel current.
What the composers said
Taylor Newton Stewart and John Andrew Grush work together as the Newton Brothers, the composing duo behind the music for X-Men ’97. In an April 4, 2024 interview with Nerdist, Stewart said the pair were fans of X-Men: The Animated Series, and he was asked whether they worried about changing such a familiar song. His answer:
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“Of course, I mean as you just said, you know, we wanted to pay tribute to it. And when you get something wrong, the fans will let you know. So we really wanted to do right by that. Also, speaking with the creatives at Marvel and the team, there was a very sort of specific direction they wanted to go on that.”
A few days later, in an April 9, 2024 interview with ComicBook.com, Stewart gave the clearest summary of the brief:
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“So I think it’s finding ways to subtly do things without ruining it. You know what I mean? Stay out of the way of the greatness. Add to moments where you can help elevate something, or change something in a way that feels more to today because I think also a lot of the sounds from that era bring you back to the nineties.”
The method: subtle adjustment, not reinvention
Read together, the two interviews describe a three-part working rule. Stewart’s own words map onto it closely:
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- Protect what works. The stated goal is to stay out of the way of the original’s strengths rather than rebuild the theme around new ideas.
- Add only where it lifts a moment. Changes are meant to elevate specific passages, not to be applied across the whole piece.
- Update what dates the sound. Stewart linked the need for change to the sonic character of the 1990s, which he said can work against a contemporary feel.
This is the composers’ explanation of intent. It describes what they aimed to do; it does not itemize what changed in the finished recording.
Why the theme had to stay close to the original
The Walt Disney Company’s official account, published March 20, 2024, adds context from the studio side. It says Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige told executive producer Brad Winderbaum that a continuation needed the original theme song and the original cast to secure a greenlight. Disney describes X-Men ’97 as a continuation that picks up after the final events of X-Men: The Animated Series, rather than a reboot or remake.
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That framing explains why the composers were working under constraints from the outset. The Disney account is a statement from the studio, not from Stewart or Grush, so it should be read as the production context for their choices. In the same piece, Winderbaum described the creative goal this way: “The plan was never going to be ‘Let’s make a new X-Men show that takes places in 2024 and we’re going to redesign them and make them cool for today.’”
Sources at a glance
| Source | Date | Speaker or author | What it establishes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nerdist interview | April 4, 2024 | Taylor Newton Stewart | The theme was treated as a tribute; Marvel’s creatives gave a specific direction. |
| ComicBook.com interview | April 9, 2024 | Taylor Newton Stewart | The brief was subtle updating that preserves the original and modernizes selectively. |
| The Walt Disney Company official account | March 20, 2024 | Studio account citing Kevin Feige and Brad Winderbaum | The original theme and cast were required for the continuation to be greenlit. |
Where the “biggest change” framing needs qualifying
The question behind this story assumes the composers named a single major change to the theme. The published interviews do not do that. Stewart did not identify one discrete technical alteration as the most important one, and neither the interviews nor the Disney account confirm a specific change to tempo, instrumentation, harmony, or arrangement as the headline difference.
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That gap matters for readers who want to know exactly what changed. Any claim about a particular chord, key, or instrument would be an inference from listening, not something the composers said. The reliable answer is the one they gave: the aim was careful, selective change that keeps the original recognizable.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.How to hear the update yourself
If you want to test the composers’ description against the music, this is a listening approach. These are suggestions for your own analysis, not findings from the composers or the studio:
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- Play the original theme from X-Men: The Animated Series and the X-Men ’97 version back to back, on the same playback system.
- Note which melodic material is clearly the same, and which passages sound different.
- Check whether the differences sit in specific moments, as Stewart’s “add to moments” description implies, or run through the whole arrangement.
- Listen for production choices, such as the mix and the balance of sounds, that could read as “of today” rather than “of the nineties.”
Comparing the two side by side will show you the scale of the update more clearly than any single quote.
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