Proteus hunts his father while the X-Men hunt him.
Last time on X-Men: The Animated
Series, we met Proteus. Son of Moira MacTaggert and her ex-husband Joe,
Kevin aka Proteus was born with immense power. He can manipulate reality in a
fixed area around himself, functionally warping space and time around him,
though things reset when he moves too far away. His powers are unstable,
though, causing him to exist in a monstrous energy form. He is obsessed with
seeing his father, believing Moira is keeping them apart so she can run these
experiments on him. He escapes containment and Moira reluctantly calls Charles
for help. We learn that Joe was the man that Moira left Charles for, though the
two divorced very shortly after the birth of their son. She keeps her
connection to Kevin a secret at first, telling Charles he’s just a patient. They
track Proteus across the Scottish countryside as he makes his way to the
capital, knowing his father is a politician in Edinburgh. He runs from most of
their fights, though this is clearly more from impatience than fear of fighting
them. They finally face off just outside the city where he singlehandedly
defeats the X-Men and Moira finally admits that he’s her son. Enough recapping.
Let’s get to it, shall we?
We pick up the story again right
after Kevin MacTaggert kicked the X-Men’s asses. Wolverine seems really shaken
up from being swallowed by the ground itself and having his claws turned into
snakes but is trying to play it tough because that’s what Logan does. Moira is
terrified her son is going to do something that he can’t undo, but Charles
assures her that they’ll stop him before that happens. Beast suggests tracking
down Joseph MacTaggert, as he’s Kevin’s target. Charles is obviously disgusted
by this, as Joe was not only the man that Moira left him for, but now he knows
Joe left her AND their son. He suggests that they could even offer him some
protection if needs be. Moira says that he won’t accept their help, but Charles
thinks that Joe is the least of their worries.
Proteus arrives in Edinburgh and
sees photos of Joe MacTaggert running for Secretary of State. He’s infuriated
to see Joe with a wife and other children. He finds and possesses a man named
Thomas that just struck out with a woman he’d been pursuing, Maeve. The street
over the X-Men arrive, Beast saying that Joe’s campaign headquarters is just a
block over. Wolverine senses Proteus, not with his nose but his whole body
shuttering at his presence. As the street is deserted, Kevin is easy to spot
even in a new skin suit. They chase him to a nearby castle and confront him.
Kevin drops Thomas and tells them to leave him alone. Moira begs him to come
home, saying Joe can’t help him. Like a lot of children who’ve grown up with an
absentee parent, he refuses to accept Joe doesn’t care about him and clings to
this idea that Moira kept them apart. The X-Men try to talk him down, but
Proteus causes an Earthquake and tries to bury everyone. The X-Men stop him
from hurting some civilians, demolishing the castle around him. Though it once
again completely resets the moment he leaves. Moira is heartbroken her son is
causing so much damage and that he won’t listen. And she’s terrified what he’ll
do when he realizes Joe is a deadbeat dad, he divorced Moira after learning
their son was a Mutant. She’s worried there will be nothing they could do to
stop him other than kill him. Charles promises they’ll find another way.
The next day, Proteus grabs a
constable figuring he’ll know where Joe is. The X-Men arrived at Joe’s office,
who promptly show’s Mr. Family Man is a hypocrite as he say Kevin isn’t his
problem. He asks if they want him to put Kevin on TV. Charles, clearly barely
holding in rage, says that he just needs to talk to the boy. Joe says he can’t
as the election is tomorrow and he doesn’t want folks remembering he’s
divorced, let alone learn that he is the father of a Mutant. Moira begs him to
talk to Kevin as he needs his father. Joe says to just tell him Charles is
Kevin’s father, as that’s the way she always wanted it. DICK! Charles calls him
an idiot and says that Kevin is coming for him whether he likes it or not. Joe
tells them to get out as he has his own protection… in the form of two goons.
Two goons… instead of Four X-Men… Okay, whatever.
Kevin arrives that the MacTaggert
Estate and lets himself in, using his powers to melt the gate and then the door
to the house. He finds a lavishly set up mansion, with many photos of Joe’s
second wife and two children. Kevin hears laughing and hides, seeing his half
siblings running around the house playing a game of tag. He manipulates the
ground, turning it into a sort of puddy and using that to lift himself to the
second floor. He enters his father’s office and sees the campaign poster saying
Joe will be at Union Hall that night. He leaves, his stepmother just barely
catching a cop seeming to melt her walls and floor as he leaves.
Later that night, Joe meets with
his head of security, telling him to make sure Kevin is kept out of sight until
after the election if they catch him. The guy asks if Kevin is dangerous, and
Joe admits he’s got no idea as he hasn’t seen Kevin since he could crawl.
Rogue, watching from a vent and wonders if they couldn’t just like Proteus have
this one. The guard is confident they can contain Proteus, because he has no
idea what he’s up against, but Joe warns him to not get careless. The guard
goes to check on the team. Rogue exits the vent and radios the team, saying
that they need to do a guard change as she needs a shower after being around
Joe this long.
We shift to the rally at Union
Hall. Joe is shaking hands and being a smarmy politician, fully expecting to
win the vote. Rogue is extremely disgusted to be here, shock of shocks, she’s
not big on folks that abandon their kids. Beast quotes some lines from James
Harvey Robinson about how Politics is inherently a nasty endeavor. Charles
tells them to report the least sign of any disturbance over the radio. Logan is
guarding the basement, and is extremely jumpy. A rat scurrying around makes him
almost lunge at it. Charles asks if he’s okay and Logan deflects by saying he
should be worried about what he’ll do if he catches Kevin. Joe goes to make his
big speech, confident in his coming victory and saying that he’s working for
Scotland and their children. Outside, Proteus hops into one of the security
guards. Rogue muses that he likes kids when they’re not his and how she’s seen
that before. We flashback to when she was a teenage and her father disowned her
for being a Mutant, despite her begging her daddy to not leave her. Beast
radios Charles and wonders if Proteus might not be avoiding the rally for how
crowded it is. Charles starts to sense Proteus and tries to warn everyone. Joe
brags about how important his children are, perfectly setting up Proteus to
arrive and reveal himself. Rogue and Beast try to stop him, telling Proteus
that Joe might not recognize him in this form. He screams at them to leave him
alone as a panic breaks out. Charles tells Logan to meet up with them, but
Logan remembers how Proteus warped him and flees in a panic.
Proteus mucks around with reality,
disabling Beast and Rogue as his father runs away like a coward. Charles tries
to talk Proteus down, begging him to just talk and Charles will listen. Proteus
wants to know where his father is, and when Charles tells him the truth that
Proteus frightened him away, Proteus freaks out again and rips reality asunder.
Charles and Beast are nearly dropped into a flaming pit but are saved by Rogue
and Logan, who unlike Joe faced his fears. Charles reached out to Kevin
telepathically and calms him for a moment. He offers to help Kevin, but Kevin
is fixated on his father, believing somehow that Joe wants him. He melts the
hall and escapes out the door, everything resetting once he’s gone. Beast is
fascinated by this power, realizing that Kevin is only limited by his
imagination, and Rogue adding that his temper is a factor too. Charles admits
that Kevin is too powerful for them to stop, all they can do is keep trying to
reason with. Moira tells him that they’ve tried, she’s the only one who can
stop him. The group leave the hall, trying to figure out what to do. Wolverine
suggests they may need to take Proteus down, causing Rogue to yell at him for
thinking of hurting a child and demanding to know where HE was during the
fighting. Logan tries to threaten her… but like Rogue’s one of a handful of
people that he can’t do that to. Beast says that Logan couldn’t help how he
reacted to Proteus. Logan demands to know what he means by that, and Beast
simply states that no emotion is more difficult to control than paralyzing
fear. Logan accuses Beast of calling him a coward, but Charles buts in, saying
that they don’t have time for this. He’s worried that Moira will try to do
something drastic to stop Kevin.
Later we see that Joe has spun the
meeting with Proteus as some kind of attack on his person by his opponent, Bill
Wallace. Not sure how you cold make that pitch without evidence, but what are
ya gonna do. We see a storm cloud come in that Proteus is riding in. Joe begins
a speech to the Scottish Parliament, once again claiming that he’s the big
family man that loves his children above all else. Rogue says he’s as greasy as
hog fat. Charles is clearly frustrated by all this, as the only solution to
their problem is Joe, but the man chose his career over Kevin years ago.
Proteus arrives, telling Joe that everyone keeps telling him Joe doesn’t want
to see him. He refuses to believe that’s true and comes down to see him. Logan
immediately flees, his fear of Proteus that strong. Proteus confront his
father, Joe saying that he’s not real, he’s here to ruin Joe’s life. The X-Men
try to get in the way, but Charles tells them to stop and let them talk. Proteus
is able to reduce his energy form down enough that Joe can see his human form
inside it. He begs his father to just talk to him, but Joe refuses, calling for
someone to protect him and runs away. Charles tries to help Kevin process this
but he’s in a fury and starts destroying the building in earnest. Logan is able
to suck it up and try to talk to Kevin via his usual bravado and threats but
Kevin sweeps him away in a gust on wind. Of all the missions to not bring
Storm. Moira and Sean Cassidy arrive with the machine she’d used to repress
Proteus’s powers. She says that it weakened him at low power but might be able
to stop him on a higher setting. Charles begs for one last chance. He reaches
out to Kevin telepathically and offers his body to Kevin, saying that if they merge,
he can show Kevin that he truly understands his pain and can help him through
it. Kevin accepts and the two unite. In the mindscape, Charles tells Kevin that
he’ll be able to control his powers one day, but he’ll need to learn to control
his anger and to trust both those that love him, both his father and mother.
Kevin leaves Charles’ body and fully reverts to human form. He and Moira hug.
Joe, now fully seeing Kevin, speaks with him and hugs his son, saying that he
has no right to the name ‘father’ to Kevin but he wants to earn it. They head
out with Joe carrying Kevin, which clearly hurts Charles a little.
Later we see Sean helping Kevin
train with his powers, using them to shape and manipulate blocks of energy. They
compliment his progress, though he’s clearly struggling slightly to keep his
focus. Moira is just happy that he’s working through his anger. Outside, Logan
tells Rogue he’s impressed by Charles, as the professor never loses his cool
despite the fear. Rogue tells him that everyone gets shaken up sometimes, but
Logan angrily says that he doesn’t before the credits roll.
As far as two-parter stories go,
this one isn’t my favorite. It feels like it was a lot of repeating things.
Kevin arrives somewhere, the X-Men catch him, “Arrgh, leave me alone!” Kevin
bends reality and does weird stuff, Kevin flees, the X-Men recover, rinse and
repeat. They honestly could have covered the whole story in one episode if they
wanted to in my opinion. They’d just have to drop a few encounters, and the
subplot about Logan being afraid. Don’t get me wrong, after what he experienced,
fear is a natural response, but it feels tacked on here to just increase the
run time. Especially when Logan just kind of gets over it when the plot needs
him to not be scared anymore. And I think the story kind of wimps out at the
end by Joe actually talking to and accepting Kevin. Like… seeing the real him
undoubtedly helped… but the man cut his son out of his life as an infant, was a
massive hypocrite about family values, and even tries to deflect his son’s
rampage onto his political opponent. He shouldn’t get to apologize to
Kevin, Kevin should have told him to screw off. But that’s just me. The power
on display was impressive, I liked the message that says Charles can fix even
the most angry and broken people with a dialogue and effort, and Proteus is
just such a fun concept for a villain of the week. So ya, not my favorite
episode but there aren’t really bad X-Men: The Animated Series episodes.
Next time, we catch up with Magneto. See you then.
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Bluesky: @basicssuperhero.bsky.social
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