Logan's going on a sojourn.
Last time on X-Men: The Animated
Series, Nightcrawler learned about his mother. She was kidnapped by the
Friends of Humanity and he was told to surrender himself to them or she dies. The
monk sought out his friends Logan and Rogue to help him, and they brought
Jubilee too. They reach the location, a dam, and break in. Inside they learn
that Kurt’s mother is in fact Mystique, the shapeshifter. As it turns out, she
is also the biological mother of Graydon Creed, who lured his mother and half
brother here to kill then and prune his family tree. A fight breaks out, but
there’s enough time to learn why Kurt was abandoned. Mystique was living as the
wife of a baron, a life that was ruined upon birthing a blue demon. She had to
flee with the baby, Mystique ultimately deciding to Moses Kurt down the river
because taking care of him would have been too difficult on the run. Kurt
forgives his mother, which seems to break something in her. Everyone escapes
the dam right before Graydon destroys it. Killing his family had been a requirement
that the FoH new council had given Graydon in order to stay as part of the
group. They decided to “give” him one more chance to clean up the part of the
family tree he didn’t want to touch. He is dropped out in front of the rural
home of Graydon Creed Sr, and the last we see of Jr is him screaming in fear as
his father lifts him by the throat. Enough recapping. Let’s get to it, shall
we?
We open with Charles giving Logan a
therapy session. He seems to be dealing with some deep-seated feelings of fear
and dread that he can’t quite shake. Charles asks if this might have something to
do with what happened when they fought Proteus, or upon learning of his past in
the Weapon X program (The episodes are out of order, we’ll see what he’s
talking about here next time), but Logan doesn’t think it’s either of those.
Charles then asks if it’s about Jean, but he admits that he loves her enough that
her happiness is what counts above anything else. Charles explains to us that
when Logan first came to the mansion, he had a lot of anger issues and in many
ways was more of a wild animal than a man. He says that Logan learned to hone
his rage and use it as a weapon, the scene we’re shown includes Jean and Charles
giving him some sort of telepathic therapy to help him focus. Logan says that
the others helped to aim him, give him purpose, but he’s losing that again. He
says what really brought this on was a road rage incident where he almost
gutted a kid for cutting him off in traffic. He literally ripped the door of
the kid’s car and drew his claws, but Jubilee pulled him off. Logan claimed
that throwing Jubilee off didn’t bother him much and that scares him. He says
that he needs to find his focus again, and to do that he’ll need to leave the
X-Men. He says he’s heading for Japan.
We see Logan packing for his trip.
He sees a vision of Kurt in a mirror, the blue priest asking him why he can’t
just try to see the world with different eyes, but Logan says it’s beyond him. The
vision switches to Sabretooth who taunts him before Logan slashes the mirror. Jubilee
comes in and says his taxi has arrived. She begs him not to go but Logan is set
on this one. He flies to Japan and heads to the countryside. He arrives at a temple
and is greeted by his former sensei, Oku. Logan says that he feels like he’s
been rushing around since he left and is wondering if he could get back to his training.
Oku agrees and Logan gets to helping the younger monks make repairs to the
temple. We see a quick montage of Logan helping with construction, meditating
and just living life more slowly. He’s invited to a feast the locals are
throwing for the monks. They head into town, and Logan notices the villagers
are tense around him. Oku insists they’re just nervous because Logan is
different. Which, ya know, makes sense, how many short hairy white guys do
these people see? He’s introduced to the mayor Yoshida and his daughter Kisara,
and son Soichi. Soichi pulls up on a motorcycle and has a fight with his
father, as Soichi is shirking his responsibilities to train to fight someone. Logan
starts to step in and tells Soichi to show respect to his dad, but realizes he’s
being hostile, so he backs off. Soichi calls him a coward, but Oku rightly
notes sometimes the braver man is the one that walks away from a fight.
We cut back to the mansion, Jubilee
steals a minijet and flies off to find Logan. She left a note to the Professor
saying that she has to try to help Logan and knows he’ll understand.
Oku tells Logan that they need more
lumber for the construction, so he heads out to cut some down. He’s interrupted
by Kenuichio Harada aka the Silver Samurai, who teleports in and demands to know
who he is. Logan introduces himself and tries to be polite. Silver Samurai warns
Logan to stay out of matters that don’t concern him and teleports away. Logan
mutters to himself that he doesn’t think he’s local. We jump back to the
village where a biker gang rides in to remind the villagers they have a tribute
to pay to Silver Samurai in three days. Yoshida asks for an extension as it’s
been a rough year, but the bikers won’t have it. Soichi then comes in and tries
to fight the bikers to get them to back off but gets knocked around. One of the
bikers nearly kills him but Silver Samurai teleports in and says they don’t
need a martyr. He says they’ll be back in two days for the tribute, and that
the village will be paying double. He then orders his men to leave a reminder.
Logan is just coming back to town
with some lumber when he sees smoke coming from the temple. He rushes over to
help. The temple is on fire and Kisara tells him Oku is trapped inside. Logan
rushes in and saves Oku, dragging him from the temple. He demands to know what’s
going on. Kisara explains about how they need to pay protection money to Silver
Samurai each year, and that they’re screwed this time because they have been
having poor fishing hauls. She’s certain Silver Samurai’s gang will burn the
village down this time. Logan mutters “It never ends,” before walking off.
Logan stands on a beach and stares
at the sunset. Kisara runs in and begs him for help, as Soichi is trying to get
the villagers to band together and fight the bandits. Logan says that he can’t
and that they should follow Oku’s advice that protecting stuff isn’t worth
risking lives. Kisara counters by saying Oku also believes inner peace is found
by embracing one’s true nature, not from running from it. Logan draws his claws
and wonders what his nature is.
Back at the village, Jubilee has
arrived and is asking for Wolverine. The monks pretend to not understand.
We cut to Silver Samurai rallying
his men. One asks why they’re even bothering doing this for one small village.
Silver Samurai gives the classic ‘everyone needs to fear us or they’ll all start
fighting back line, and that they’ll burn the village to the ground to set the
example.
Back at the village, Soichi has
rallied a lackluster mob. Yoshiro says that they all will die if they do
this, but Soichi says better to die than keep taking this crap. Logan walks in
and actually agrees with Soichi, saying they need to fight back or kiss Silver Samurai’s
ass forever. Yoshiro asks if this is really how Logan will pay back the village
for their kindness, getting them all killed.
Logan helps the villagers set up
traps to prepare for the next day. That night, Logan is standing alone when Oku
comes to join him. Logan admits that he’s conflicted, that he just wants to live
a life of peace like Oku. Oku reminds him that peace needs a purpose, and that
maybe Logan knows his purpose but looks upon it less kindly than he should.
Logan insists gutting people isn’t a purpose, but Oku counters by saying
protecting people is. Logan turns to argue some more but Oku disappeared.
Later, Logan’s dreaming about all the misery in his life, the adamantium being
bonded to his skeleton, saying goodbye to Yuriko before she became Lady
Deathstrike, fighting her as Deathstrike, fighting Sabretooth, and watching two
of his friends get attacked by Omega Red. He hears Kurt’s advice to see himself
through other’s eyes, has a vision of him BEING Sabretooth, and then Kisara arrives
and tells him that he is only himself, no one else.
The next day, the bikers arrive and
are met with the Villagers and their various traps. Logan arrives as Oku stops
some of the bikers from attacking children. Logan throws them around and scares
them off. Logan asks why he’s here and Oku says everyone fights in their own
way, and notes Logan has rediscovered his. The bikers are lured to the beach by
some balloons that drop logs on them, and to a damn the villagers set up.
Soichi breaks the damn, unleashing water and washing them down a river. The
bikers pull guns on them, but Jubilee arrives and blasts them, she asks Kisara
if Logan’s here and she agrees to lead Jubilee to him.
The villagers beat the last of the
bikers, but then Silver Samurai arrives. Logan faces off against him. Silver
Samurai is a Mutant. His power is to coat any object he holds in a tachyon
field that makes it able to slice through just about anything. So that sword is
a real problem. Plus, he’s got a ring that lets him teleport. He teleports
behind Logan and slashes, Logan dodges and tries to think strategically. He figures
out Silver Samurai’s preferred method of attack is to slash at him from behind
so waits for Silver Samurai to teleport and then quickly jumps away to get
behind the samurai. He disarms and captures Silver Samurai, cutting the raising
sun logo on his chest. Soichi tells him to finish Silver Samurai, but Logan
refuses, saying that he’s done. Silver Samurai walks off, defeated. Jubilee
runs in and greets Logan warmly. She says she was worried that Logan had left
because of her but he reassured her that this was just something he had to do.
Later, Oku assures Logan that the temple
will be built without him. Logan agrees that temple building isn’t his purpose.
He says goodbye to the villagers, everyone thanking each other for their help.
He kisses Kisara goodbye and leaves with Jubilee.
I’ll just start by saying if there’s
no plot beat that I truly hate, it’s Logan developing one-off love interests. I
get it, he’s a mysterious tortured soul, someone always thinks that’s hot, but
it gives the vibe that he only helped these people out because he wants to bang
one of them. And like… he literally had 4 conversations with this woman that we
see. And one of them was in a dream. I really don’t see how that warrants a
kiss goodbye. Other than that unnecessary plot point, I like this story. Logan’s
anger is something that he’s constantly struggling with, and I understand his
need to go away and try to decompress for a while to recenter. He probably
could have gotten this same lesson by signing up for Habitat For Humanity back
in New York and saving himself the airfare but that’s just me. But Japan is extremely
pretty so I can give him a pass on this one. The story feels a little rushed but
that’s just what happens with the twenty-minute timeframe. Many episodes feel rushed,
and I’d prefer that over overly stretching episodes out into multi-parters like
Proteus. We probably could have cut some of the villager stuff just a little
and gotten a longer fight with Silver Samurai. Two cuts and two teleports
before being beaten is an extremely short fight, we could have at least
stretched out Logan figuring out his attack pattern at least a little bit. But
that’s a nitpick. Next time, we learn about the origins of Wolverine that would
really help inform this episode. No, I don’t know why they ordered them this
way. See you later.
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/posts/135109918/
Bluesky: @basicssuperhero.bsky.social
No comments:
Post a Comment