Going underground.
Last time on X-Men: The Animated
Series, old friends and old enemies faced off. Magneto lured Charles
Xavier, Cyclops, Storm, and Rogue to a chemical plant to fight. He quickly dispatched
the other X-Men, leaving him and Charles to do their favorite thing, debate.
The two try to sway each other’s way of thinking but get no traction. Magneto decides
to finish Charles off now, flipping his hoverchair and attempting to crush him.
Charles fires a mental blast at Magneto, making him relive the night his
parents died in that vague war that was definitely WW2. Meanwhile, Sabretooth
was held at the X-Mansion with Jubilee guarding him. He tricks her into freeing
his hands and he escapes. He reveals he’d been working with Magneto and had
been sent to wreck the place when he saw an opportunity. Wolverine had been waiting
around for this exact situation and the two brawl. Wolverine holds Sabretooth
off long enough for the other X-Men to arrive but gets rocked when he’s
distracted by Xavier scolding him. He saw Wolverine over an unconscious body
and made some assumptions. Sabretooth goes to finish him off but Jubilee blasts
him through a wall and drives him off. Charles apologizes for assuming the worst
of Wolverine and Magneto vows to gather a Mutant army to destroy the humans and
the X-Men.
We open with Storm, Rogue, Gambit,
Jubilee and Jean in a Danger Room training room. Charles and Cyclops are
watching from the control room, Charles explaining how important training is to
their mission and their own safety. Storm takes command and orders the others
around the dangers, right up until Charles hits a button and locks them in a
shrinking room. She has the others push the walls back and she tries to hold up
the ceiling, but as things get tighter her claustrophobia kicks into high gear and
she panics. She summons a huge whirlwind and batters the others about as she remembers
being buried alive as a child. Charles turns off the simulation and mentally
projects himself by Storm. She says she doesn’t wish to lead right now, as her
claustrophobia puts the others at risk, but Charles points out that when the
time comes it might not matter what she wants.
Wolverine, meanwhile, is doing some
martial arts training. It should be noted that while he has his healing factor,
The Animated Series takes place in an era where he heals faster than
normal but not ‘bones reset after being broke in a few minutes’ fast. It allows
for Logan to get badly hurt and recover within an episode but slow enough to
add drama. Jean comes in and says that he should be resting, but Logan ignores
her and keeps working. He buckles with pain, Jean helping him right himself and
they have a tense moment. Jean says that Cyclops is waiting for her, and Wolverine
says that he is too. Smooth, hairy man.
Jean and Scott leave their date, a showing
of Phantom of the Opera, with Jean noticing that Scott is kind of out of it tonight.
Scott reveals that he’s feeling stressed out by trying to live up to the
professors example, particularly with Mutant hate on the rise. A little
background detail they show is a Magneto wanted poster at the local newsstand.
Jean says he won’t do anyone good like this, so he promises to focus on her
tonight. Behind them, a green skinned boy uses his powers to steal some fruit,
causing a small mob to start chasing the Mutant. Scott and Jean chase after all
of them to try to help. They enter a subway and meet more Mutants with obvious
physical abnormalities. These are the Morlocks, a group of Mutants that can’t
blend into society as easily as other Mutants so live under the streets of New
York. The Morlocks throws some people into the way of the subway, but Jean
pulls them out of the way at the last second. Cyclops optic blasts the Morlock’s strongman,
mentioning he can’t do that again as he can’t control the blasts without his
visor. An old woman, Annalee, comes out and uses her powers to put every non-Morlock
to sleep. Another Morlock joins them and orders the strong man, Sunder, to take
them below.
Back at the Mansion, Logan is in
his full costume for some reason while laying on his bed. He’s caressing the
Jean half of a picture of Jean and Scott in a fairly creepy manner, when he
hears Rogue and Gambit walking by. Rogue mentions the ‘lovebirds’ have been out
all night but Gambit tells her not to worry too much about it. Logan gets
pisses and cuts Scott’s picture.
Back in the tunnels, Cyclops wakes
up and discovers he’s without his glasses… but he’s not blasting anything.
Weird. Also, he’s locked to a bed. The green boy from earlier thanks him for
helping earlier. Scott asks what happened to his power, the boy, Leech, says
that Scott helped him so he’s helping Scott. Leech can, as his name implies,
drain powers. So, in his presence Scott is just a normal dude. Sunder comes in
and grabs Scott by the shirt, drags him to and throws him in front of his boss,
Callisto. She explains the Morlocks deal, they are obvious Mutants that can’t hide
amongst the humans. She says that ever since she saw his leadership and combat
skills, she knew it was his destiny to rule the Morlocks beside her. Weird
tactic, hitting on someone in front of all your subjects, but whatever. She
reveals she sent Leech topside to draw him in. Scott says he’s not interested
and wants to know where Jean is. Callisto says that wasn’t a question he can
say no to. Scott points out that he’s solar powered, literally. He needs to
absorb sunlight to fuel his optic blasts. Callisto says she’s not interested in
a protector, but a companion that can provide her with an heir. Again, super weird
to be hitting on Scott like this in front of her subjects. Jean’s revealed to
be suspended from the ceiling. Callisto orders Jean killed for Scott refusing
her. Jean, once she knew where Scott was, frees herself and starts blasting.
She puts out a mental SOS to Charles, who gets it, but she’s knocked out before
she can give him many details.
In the War Room, Charles tells the
others what he knows and the general area he was able to track Jean to. Storm,
Wolverine, Gambit, and Rogue head out. Storm is obviously not jazzed going
underground but she muscles through it for the good of the team. A flat Morlock
woman that can camouflage herself begins to follow them. Wolverine leads them
with his nose. They get jumped, Rogue gets grabbed by Sunder, and Wolverine and
Gambit get stuck to a wall. They quickly free themselves, though and drive off
the Morlocks. As they go deeper, Storm’s panic grows more obvious. Gambit tells
Wolverine to do something, but Wolverine says that he should let her ask
before he does anything. They find Jean with Annalee; she’s got Jean hypnotized
into thinking she’s Annalee’s daughter. Wolverine goes to confront her; Annalee
hypnotizes him into thinking he’s covered in scorpions. He freaks out for a
second, but then powers through and nearly stabs her in the face with his
claws, scaring her off. Jean, once freed, asks where’s Scott, and Callisto
comes out to say he’s dead, showing his body at her feet.
Jean mourns over Scott’s body,
Callisto saying that the Morlocks will lead them to safety in honor of their
fallen leader. Wolverine, being Wolverine, draws his claws and says maybe they’ll
bring the ‘great warrior’ home in pieces, driving his claws into the concrete
on either side of Scott’s head. This causes the Morlock shapeshifter to revert
to his normal form and run off. Wolverine says that he has his problems, but Cyke
don’t smell like a Morlock. The X-men and Morlocks fight. Wolverine chases
after Calisto when she runs. They drive most of the Morlock’s off, but Gambit
gets touched by an old woman with an infectious touch. He starts passing out
from fever so Storm orders Rogue to take him back to the mansion. She and Jean
hold off the remaining Morlocks. Wolverine, meanwhile, sniffs out Cyclops. He mentions
to himself that he could make a couple women real sad right now if he wanted
to, but that he hates seeing Jean cry so he won’t. Callisto, Annalee and the
flat lady heard this remark and Callisto tells them they know what to do.
Wolverine rejoins the others, but
Annalee uses her hypnosis on them. She makes Storm start to think she’s trapped
in a confined space and drive’s Wolverine into a jealous rage to attack Scott. Jean
blasts him to keep him back, but then blasts Annalee when she realizes what’s
going on. Callisto says that the Morlocks will execute the X-Men one at a time
until Cyclops agrees, Storm, though, challenges her to a duel. Winner gets to
be Queen of the Morlocks. Callisto agrees, on the proviso they can’t use
powers. They start dueling with glowing staffs. Callisto is a strong fighter,
but Storm knocks her to the ground and claims victory. She tells the Morlocks
that they can join them at the Mansion. The Morlocks don’t want to go, though,
as they can’t live normal lives on the surface. They’ll go to the surface when
Mutants have equality. So they’re going to be down there a while. Storm says that
she’ll come for them when that day comes and until that time Callisto will rule
in her place. Jean and Scott have a moment and Wolverine looks on, looking
pissed.
The X-Men return to the mansion.
Gambit is unconscious but recovering nicely. Scott jokes that he and Jean will
need a vacation after that date. Charles congradulates Storm on her leadership,
Storm says that the team nearly perished because of her, but Charles says they
didn’t because of her. Jean and Scott go to talk to Wolverine to thank him for
his help, but he’s apparently run off, the last shot we see is that picture of
Scott and Jean sliced in half. Damn dude.
This was an okay episode, not as
good as the previous four, but it hard for the Morlocks to compare to Sentinels
and Magneto. The Morlocks as a group are fairly sad, a collection of social
outcasts that can’t blend into the normal world, forced to live in the tunnels
and sewers to avoid persecution, it’s just depressing. Callisto comes across as
completely psychotic with her insistence that Cyclops be her… consort? I guess.
Like, imagining telling a someone they’ve got to bang you in front of everyone
you know. That’s just odd. This was the first episode to put the
Jean-Scott-Logan love triangle front and center. The other episodes hinted at Logan
having feelings for Jean and for her feeling something towards him too, but
this is the first one to like to linger on it. Their love-triangle is a pretty well-established
trope by now, Jean having to choose between her childhood best friend and lifelong
companion, and the mysterious loner that seems to hold a soft spot in his heart
for her. These three kick that Twilight’s triangles ass, and I’m not
just saying that because Scott, Jean, and Logan have apparently tried being a
Trouple in recent stories. I do give Logan credit for always doing what makes Jean
happy even if it makes him sad. Like, does he get a bit creepy with his
affection? Yes, but her happiness matters a lot to him. I liked the focus on
Storm’s claustrophobia. The literal storm goddess being left paralyzed by the
thought of confined spaces is fairly obvious, but it’s always satisfying to see
her finally power through her fear and get that W. So yeah, Morlocks met, and
Wolverine ran off. We’ll see where next time. Have a good night.
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Twitter: @BasicsSuperhero
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