There's 54 years of X-Men comics by now, so there are a lot of characters to explore.

The thematic core of X-Men is tolerance. It's that for those of us who are different in any way - in a big way - whether it's you're a minority, you're a woman, you're a Muslim, you are suppressed or marginalized; it can go the whole spectrum, but even if you are shy or you feel like an outsider, and X-Men are outsiders.

What we always want to say [in X-men] is, "It's OK to be yourself, and actually it's a gift to be yourself. Whatever it is that you have, that may be your gift." I think that's what we always want to say, and spread it out, so have tolerance for other people who are different also.

The thrill of doing television versus features is in television you get to focus more on the characters.

We just don't want to repeat anything that we've done in the movies [X-man] or that we're going to do in the movies. There's so many stories to tell, we just want to stay out of each other's way.

I've never produced a series, so for me [X-men] was a wonderful challenge.

I think the time has changed. Because of 9/11, because of the economy, it is more and more now. There is a darker awareness, although it would seem to reason that because life is so much tougher now people would seek entertainment to just totally escape.