Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk about this week’s episode of X-Men 97 instead. Again, this episode works. Why?
Because unlike MCU, X-Men 97 do not try to relate to
RL issues. Yes, mutants can easily stand for any RL minorities, and their
struggles can be perceived as struggles of RL minorities, but that is optional.
In the season’s 2-part starter, for example, this happened; this week’s
episode, ‘Fire made flesh’, conversely, it did not. If in the previous two episodes,
the titular characters fought against not just against their regular foes – the
Sentinel robots and the F.O.H. goons – but also against newer faces, Carl
Denti/X-cutioner and Dr. Valerie Cooper, here it is back to the tested and true
foe, Nathaniel Essex/Mr. Sinister and his proxy, Madeline Pryor, aka the evil
Jean Grey clone, aka the Goblin Queen.
…For me, anything or anyone associated with goblins
should belong in the Spider-Man corner of the franchise, and, moreover, the
moniker ‘Goblin Queen’ belongs, or belonged, to several different Marvel
characters, not just Ms. MP, so no Spider-Man crossover here and now, no.
Conversely, another new character introduced in this episode is Nathan Summers,
Scott and not-Jean’s son, better known as mutant named Cable.
Now, Cable is a time-traveller himself, not unlike
Bishop, and so his timeline is confusing on a basic level. (In addition, that
is before we even try to figure his less canon appearances, such as the second
live-action ‘Deadpool’ film, into the mix). Nor does he show any powers
reminiscent of either Cyclops or Jean Grey, so usually he isn’t associated with
them either. Ok, he is, but not on a family level – more like a general ally or
a frenemy. (All mutant relationships are confusing). To have his backstory
appear on the show in such a manner is certainly unexpected.
Finally, we got Forge. For me, Forge is mostly
associated with the X-Men Evolution show, (also known as Earth-11052, apparently).
There, he is depicted somewhat differently from his more canon appearances,
with a different backstory; he is an ally of the X-Men of that universe, while
here his relationship with them is more ambiguous. Therefore, to have him
interact with Storm here the way that he did is also interesting – but that is
what any X-Men franchise does: it stirs up interest in its’ audience, in a soap
opera way.
No, seriously, at the end of the day, a part of any
Marvel (or DC, etc.) franchise’s DNA is soap opera, and for X-Men, a franchise
with a large default cast, this is doubly so. When your core team amounts to
half-a-dozen characters at least, (and usually eight or more instead), then you
don’t often need outsiders to stir up the pot – but the X-Men usually face
other teams; in fact, my introduction to Mr. Sinister in this universe had him
trap the X-men in Savage Land with their powers blocked, while his minions did
their best to capture them. Wolverine, (with the help of Ka-Zur, I believe),
saved the day regardless. Go team Wolverine, then. In this week’s episode,
however, he isn’t as big a presence; however, since we see him haunting Morph
in the episodes’ intro it means that the Goblin Queen setback probably won’t
set him back too much. Moreover, since only Cyclops can truly hurt him with his
optic blasts (so far), it means that he’ll probably be back with a new plan, so
that’ll be interesting to see. (Mr. Sinister’s MO is about evolution, but he is
a different villain from the High Evolutionary, BTW). Anything else?
Yes, the reference to Dante’s ‘Inferno’. People,
Dante wrote an entire ‘Divine Comedy’, an entire trilogy devoted to the
Christian afterlife. The Riordan-verse novel, ‘Sun and Star’, also draws upon
the ‘Inferno’ third of it, but, again, Dante’s work is not just about Hell, but
about the Purgatory and Heaven too. People should not ignore those works so much; I really should talk about those works
too, but for now – this is it.
See you all soon, instead!
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