First Things First…
Season 2 is off to a good start. Now we have the second episode of this two-parter, and I’d like to see Mister Sinister come out of the shadows and take the spotlight.
4 Things I Like
4. Recycling Genosha’s Slavery Paraphernalia
My first reaction when Mister Sinister’s goons capture Cyclops and Jean and stick the mutant power suppression collars on them was annoyance. I don’t want this to become a lazy, go-to plot device any time they need to depower an X-Man. But I changed my tune right away when Gorgeous, the one doing the collaring, says…
“These are out of fashion now on Genosha, but on you it looks good!”
I’m a sucker for continuity, so I love acknowledging that these are the same collars that were used on Genosha to enslave mutants.
3. Avalanche!
I wasn’t expecting a “To Be Continued…” at the end of this episode, and I was surprised to find Magneto in Antarctica. Last episode, when Morph posed as Magneto to lure Professor X there, I assumed it was just to get him out of the way. But when he arrives, Magneto really is there, and it sounds like Morph may have played the same trick on him.
I don’t know what Magneto has to do with any of this, or why Morph or Mister Sinister would be working against him, too. Maybe Sinister is aware Magneto fought alongside the X-Men at the end of last season?
Regardless, there’s never a bad reason to include Magneto. And now it looks like he and his old friend Charles will team up again to escape the trap they walked into.
2. Unmasking Morph
Wolverine literally sniffs out Morph’s presence while Morph is disguised as Professor X. But Gambit is the one who notices him talking more violently than the Professor ever talks, and who then tricks him into standing up and, thus, revealing himself.
After Gambit got suckered in by Morph last episode and humiliated himself by trying to steal a kiss from Rogue, it was nice to see him follow Wolverine’s lead and reveal the traitor before things got worse.
1. Saved from the Friends of Humanity
“If you knew how much bubblegum I had to sniff to find you…”
Wolverine
As this episode takes us further into Mister Sinister’s plans, we move away from the Friends of Humanity a little bit, except for one awesome scene early on.
Creed and his followers have Jubilee, who walked right into their clutches last episode thanks to Morph. It’s actually harrowing—by kids cartoon standards, at least—when Creed is leading their rally, and they bring Jubilee on stage to decide what to do with her. A lot of the FoH want to kill her, even if they’re using different words.
Luckily, Wolverine arrives in time. He provides the best visual of the episode when he crashes through a skylight and slices through the middle of their Friends of Humanity banner on his way down.
1 Thing I’m Mixed On
1. A Sinister Plan
“Your whole lives I’ve watched you, tracked you, studied you. You are the prototypes, the chosen ones. And from your offspring, I will control the future of all human creatures on Earth!”
Mister Sinister
I don’t know much about Mister Sinister’s background, but he appears to be a scientist. He’s all about conducting experiments. And I like this aspect of him.
I’m just not sure I fully understand his plan. First of all, how and why has he been tracking Scott and Jean since they were kids? How old is he?
And he wants to use their genetic material to create an unbeatable race of mutants he can enslave? Between the Leader on Genosha, Apocalypse, and now Mister Sinister, that’s a lot of bad guys who want slaves to do their bidding. (And between the Morlocks’ leader and now Sinister, I’m a little disturbed by people wanting Cyclops’ offspring.)
Also, why is Sinsiter so intent on destroying the X-Men? They didn’t even know of his existence, so it’s not like they’ve been in his way.
2 Things I Don’t Like
2. Rogue’s Outburst
Morph’s mischief has fooled all the X-Men. So it’s understandable that Rogue is pissed at Beast. As far as she can tell, Beast knew that Rogue and Storm were going out to help the fight in the last episode, but he never joined them. So she blames him, at least in part, for Storm being hospitalized. She doesn’t realize the real Beast was actually fighting for his life in the Danger Room, also because of Morph.
But Rogue and Beast are perfectly friendly when they go to the hospital together to see Storm. Rogue even thanks and compliments Beast for helping them sneak in through the window. It’s only when they’re inside that she turns her anger on him.
If she believed all along that Beast had failed them, wouldn’t her anger have shown up right away? Or wouldn’t she at least have given him the cold shoulder until seeing Storm unconscious in a hospital bed, at which point her anger would rear its head? Her 0-to-60, from friendly to hostile, plays out very silly.
1. Cyclops Muscles Free
Speaking of silly…
Not only are Cyclops and Jean wearing the suppression collars, so they can’t use their powers, but Mister Sinister has them shackled to the wall at the wrists, biceps, and ankles.
They spend half the episode like this, unable to break free. Then, suddenly, with no rhyme or reason, Cyclops just powers out of the wrist shackles, frees himself, and rips off his collar.
It’s so dumb. Cyclops doesn’t have super strength, and even if he did, it would’ve been suppressed at that moment. This is just lazy writing. They needed Cyclops to fight Sinister but didn’t even bother to come up with something or someone to free him.
Tim Matassa
