X-Men: The Animated Series Review – “Cold Vengeance”
Previously on X-Men: We were introduced to the Morlocks, who I always enjoy seeing but I’m weird; there was lots of horrible Nineties “romantic” tension between Wolverine and Jean Grey; and Storm won the throne of the Morlocks after beating Callisto in a lightsaber battle.
As a side-note, my typing is slightly better. No more stitches in my hand, but I still have to wear the splint for the majority of the day. Next week’s review will be back to normal, I swear.
Not-So-Short Summary: We start pretty much where we left off with Jean Grey and Cyclops standing in the mess that was Wolverine’s room. Cyclops overreacts, basically writes off Wolverine as a traitor, and storms off without letting Jean get a word in edgewise. Because she knows Wolverine left because of her.
Star-wipe to Wolverine skiing through the icy Canadian wilderness. Apparently Sabretooth is tracking him, knew exactly where Wolverine would be skiing, and set up some awesome explosions that would go off underneath Wolverine so they can battle again.
Fighting ensues after a lot of banter. Somehow they end up at the edge of a crevasse and Wolverine tumbles into cold water while Sabretooth hangs out up top and screams things about the X-Men. “Not even your mutant healing powers can keep you alive on a chunk of ice in the middle of the Arctic!” he shouts. He should learn a thing or two about Wolverine’s powers, then.
Wolverine washes ashore of some Eskimos, who want to trade him into the government to get money for a snowmobile (please calm your laughter), but their leader says no dice–they help strangers. Naturally, Sabretooth sees him in their company and will follow.
Eskimos don’t know what mutants are, so Wolverine can blend with them without fear of discrimination. He starts showing up one of the other eskimos, who immediately hates Wolverine and runs away only to find a snow demon/Sabretooth. He sides with Sabretooth in order to get back at Wolverine, which is the smartest thing to do, right?
The idiot returns and challenges Wolverine to do battle against an “old enemy” and Wolverine stupidly accepts. He needs to learn how to back down from a fight; literally, he’s Marty McFly. They’re out in a canoe when Wolverine realizes it’s a trap and something explodes back at camp. Sabretooth is messing up everyone’s business.
He and the Eskimo banter about whose fault it is when Wolverine decides to go out and face Sabretooth to make up for everything. It turns out Sabretooth has the people of the village tied up to an ice bridge that will explode in one minute.
Cue another fight between Wolverine and Sabretooth. And much like the Joker and Batman at the end of The Dark Knight, I think these two are destined to do this forever. Sabretooth falls into a dark crevasse and Wolverine saves the day.
Back at the Professor’s mansion, Cyclops is hashing it out with Gambit and the rest of the X-Men. Gambit wants to check out Genosha, an island that happily welcomes and invites mutants and promises no persecution. Cyclops selects Storm, Gambit, and Jubilee to go and “vacation.”
When they go to check in at Genosha, the concierge scans their eyes and finds lots of footage of their mutant powers. While everything seems to be in order to the three X-Men, Storm knows there’s more that meets the eye.
And then they get gassed in their hotel room and sentinels show up.
Badass Moment of the Week: Let’s go with Sabretooth tying a bunch of Eskimos to an ice bridge that he’s going to explode with dynamite. He always has dynamite on him or something. It’s not really a badass thing; I just like that he has dynamite on him.
Best One-Liner: “Why would Wolverine take off?” “Well, he must have had a good reason.” “I don’t buy that, Jean.” Of course you don’t, Cyclops, because you’re a dick.
Storm, Jubilee, and Gambit are supposed to look like tourists in Genosha, yet Gambit is wearing his super-Eighties getup. Way to blend in, dude.
Look, I know I shouldn’t care about consistency or a competent storyline, but how is there all of this video footage of the X-Men like they’re constantly front-page news? And in a society that has the Internet in its infancy stages, how do they get a hold of this kind of stuff on-demand?
Also, it looks as though the Eskimo who hated Wolverine has the old English D on his hat. So apparently he’s a Detroit Tigers fan. That’s cool.
Come back next week when we find out what happens to mutants on Genosha. I’m sure Trask is behind it, and I’m not just saying that because I’ve seen the episode before.