Jonathan Dobres

Season 5 is the show’s last and shortest, with just ten episodes produced for it. Courtesy of Fox’s episode shuffling, the season was lengthened with a few episodes originally produced for earlier seasons, bringing the aired total to fourteen. The four I’ve already covered are: “A Deal with the Devil”, “No Mutant Is an Island”, “Longshot”, and “Bloodlines”. The only one of those that’s any good is “Bloodlines”, which is very good indeed.

Given all of that, I wasn’t very optimistic going into “The Phalanx Covenant”, but it turned out to be one of the show’s strongest stories. It feels almost as epic as “Beyond Good and Evil” in half the run time. Well plotted, lots of fun, and chock full of the little details that take an episode of X-Men from good to great. Unlike most of the show’s two-parters, both halves are solid Saturday morning entertainment. Squint, and it almost looks like an MCU movie in miniature.

However, there’s one detail in these episodes that is going to drive me insane. The title cards for this story call the first part, “Phalanx Covenant: Part One”, while the second part is titled, “The Phalanx Covenant: Part II”. What, did they decide on the use of definite articles and Roman numerals with a dartboard?

Phalanx Covenant: Part One

Season 5, Episode 1. Air date: September 7, 1996.

This episode opens with Beast and Jubilee on a quick mission to corral a rampaging Sabretooth. While I question the wisdom of bringing Jubilee along for something like this, it’s clear that Beast has no intention of putting her in harm’s way. He just gasses Sabretooth and a crowd of bystanders from the safety of the Blackbird, and they bring Sabretooth back to the X-Mansion. Beast and Xavier decide to conceal Sabretooth’s presence from Wolverine for obvious reasons. Jubilee, of course, immediately blabs about this to Storm, at which point Wolverine goes nuts and demands to see Xavier. “The Professor’s in the gym!” Jubilee cries, as Wolverine stomps off.

We’ve got to talk about what’s going on in this gym. Charles Xavier is shown on the parallel bars, where he executes a few swings, a turn, a sort-of planche, and a dismount so unique that it’s probably just called “the Xavier”. I asked a physical therapist friend of mine whether there was any way in hell a paraplegic could perform these moves. He said it was “highly unlikely”, and would require both an extremely specific spinal cord injury and an assist from psionic powers. But whatever Xavier’s doing, it’s clearly working. He’s the most cut 60 year-old I’ve ever seen. Meanwhile, Rogue is shown lifting weight on a special apparatus that reads 65 tons. It’s not clear what exercise she’s doing exactly, since she’s only briefly shown in the background, but her arms are moving up and down in a way that vaguely suggests something like a preacher curl.¹

From there, the episode rapidly becomes a horror movie. Something emanates from Sabretooth and takes over the mansion’s computers. Xavier gets a desperate video call from, of all people, Mister Sinister, who warns him that, “The creature consumes matter! It can take on any form. You cannot wait!”. But it’s already too late, as a black and yellow tentacle grabs Xavier from behind. Beast briefly becomes the episode’s final girl, barely outrunning the creature, only to find the rest of the X-Men trapped in cocoons. He even sidesteps a suspicious hazmat team, quickly revealed to be more shapeshifting creatures (the stakes, they are rising). Serious props to the animators on this episode. Throughout this sequence the effects are dynamic and clever (the creature chasing Beast through the building’s wiring, for example), a very noticeable change from the show’s usual stiff style.

Beast manages to get away by “borrowing” Wolverine’s Jeep (a nice continuity detail), where he finds a stowaway: Warlock, heir apparent to the Phalanx Covenant. Warlock is another Chris Claremont creation, debuting back in 1984. His character history is tangled up in the relationship between the Technarchy (which debuted the same year) and the Phalanx, which debuted in 1993. Both the Technarchy and the Phalanx are galactic alien powers bent on consuming the universe one way or another. Whether the Technarchy created the Phalanx or vice versa depends on what year of comics you’re reading. The show wisely streamlines things to just the Phalanx, and gives them the Borg-like motivation of wanting to assimilate all worthwhile life. As for Warlock, he’s considered a mutant among his people, the mutation being pacifism. He and his “Life Mate”² fled the Phalanx and crash landed on Earth, which has inadvertently summoned the rest of the Phalanx and endangered the planet.

Saving the exposition dump for halfway through the episode gave the Phalanx some time to feel like a real mystery, and they’re all the scarier for it. Beast and Warlock make their way to Beast’s lab at Grace Eye Clinic (another nice bit of continuity), where Beast is able to determine that the Phalanx are electromagnetic in nature. Thus they can move incredibly quickly over any wire or metal, though they seem to struggle to assimilate mutants. Science Corner is punctuated by a call to President Robert Jefferson Kelly, who invites Beast and Warlock to share their findings in person. Warlock realizes that President Kelly shouldn’t be aware of him, which—dun dun dun—means that he’s already been assimilated (the stakes, they are rising!).

Beast instead contacts Forge, who agrees to meet him at a diner. The alien power that is rapidly conquering the planet gives Beast just enough time to catch up Forge and Quicksilver on the goings-on, before a violent mob of assimilated Phalanx surround the diner. The good guys are able to make an escape thanks to an assist from the rather conspicuous Mister Sinister, but not before losing Quicksilver to the Phalanx (the stakes, they continue to rise!). Beast casually tosses a live grenade back into the diner as they exit, for good measure. We’ll later learn that assimilation can be reversed, which means Beast probably just killed a few innocent people. Look, it’s been a busy day for the guy. He hasn’t even had time to sleep since gassing that crowd yesterday.

Beast, Forge, Warlock, and Sinister take a moment to collect themselves in Sinister’s jet. Beast reasons that given how fast the Phalanx have spread, they’ll take over most of the planet within four days. Forge argues—be still my scientist heart—that Beast may be using the wrong assumptions in his model, since the Phalanx are intelligent, and could potentially work even faster than that. It’s a real low point for the heroes, as they confront the overwhelming odds against them. Meanwhile, over at the assimilated Empire State Building (now “The Spire”), a malevolent tower of faces schemes to take over the world.

Stray observations:

• Warlock shapeshifts to become Forge’s missing (due to assimilation) prosthetic leg, which I’m sure is a fetish for a non-zero number of people.

• Beast, reacting to Warlock telescoping his eyes: “Please don’t do that.”

• On the toilet: no one per se, but Gambit, Cyclops, and Jean (of course) are only briefly visible inside the Phalanx’s cocoons.

The Phalanx Covenant: Part II

Season 5, Episode 2. Air date: September 7, 1996.

Part 2 continues the suspenseful action and rising stakes of Part 1, as more and more of the planet is taken over by the Phalanx. At the same time, the enemy gets some identifiable faces. The nameless creature that’s been chasing the good guys is Warlock’s Life Mate, albeit under some kind of Phalanx mind control. The rest of the Phalanx gets an antagonistic face in the form of Cameron Hodge. In the comics, Hodge is a longtime adversary who did at one point steal the powers of the Phalanx via Warlock. On the show, Hodge appeared as a Genoshan government functionary waaaaay back in season 1’s “Slave Island”, making his presence here an extremely deep cut that I’m pretty sure no one watching in 1996 would have gotten.

Part 2 is also where our heroes will be figuring things out and saving the day, of course, though the path to victory is anything but easy. Forge confirms that the Phalanx can’t seem to assimilate the x-gene, which will buy them some time. This also explains why Sinister’s lab and the X-Mansion, the two greatest resources for mutant genetics on Earth, were the Phalanx’s earliest targets. This episode does a great job blending the required expository beats with ever-rising stakes. Our heroes first stop over at Muir Island to try to develop a virus that will reverse assimilation.³ The Phalanx consumes all of Muir Island but the good guys add Amelia Voght⁴ to the party. Then they jet over to the Arctic Circle to pick up a very depressed Magneto, whose electromagnetic powers will be needed to isolate a sample of the Phalanx from the rest of the collective.

I really like the little details here. Amelia stops Sinister from blowing up the doors to Magneto’s fortress and just turns everyone into mist for an easy entrance (which will come in handy later). Showing mutants using their powers on the show about mutants is something that season 4 often struggled with (just look at how often “Beyond Good and Evil” fell back on guns). Sinister and Magneto also despise each other (they parted on very poor terms, you’ll recall), though Magneto sets that aside in the name of helping Quicksilver. Then it’s off to Newfoundland to get a sample of the Phalanx. Why Newfoundland? I mean, why not?

The very quick trip to northeastern Canada is kept interesting via a clever use of Warlock’s powers to disguise Magneto. It’s maybe a little over-engineered for all the good it does, but the point is, it’s fun. The wee bit of Phalanx goo that Magneto collects transforms into the disembodied head of Cameron Hodge. He monologues about how assimilation will, at last, be the “final solution” (yikes) to the scourge of mutants. Before Hodge’s head can wax poetic about any thousand year Reichs, the virus works, and he reverts to a brick. Meanwhile, over at The Spire, the Phalanx has worked out how to assimilate mutants, though it’s still going to be a slow process.

By this point, everything is in place for the final act. Our band of six heroes divides in two (been a while since we’ve seen that), with Sinister, Forge, and Amelia misting into The Spire to raise some hell. My favorite part of this sequence is when Sinister frees Cyclops, who regains consciousness and immediately tries to laser Sinister’s head off. Even Jean gets pulled out of a cocoon to actually do something! Shortly thereafter, Magneto, Beast, and Warlock bust in to deliver the viral attack. Back on Muir Island, Warlock had decided that if destroying the Phalanx was going to kill Life Mate, he might as well die with her. I wish the episode had the courage to follow through. Because Warlock is “immature”, he’s not fully part of the Phalanx collective, and so survives (somehow). He then happens upon a pile of goo that used to be Life Mate and resurrects her. It’s the only part of this story I’d change, honestly.

With the Phalanx’s local powers destroyed, everyone and everything reverts to normal, as is the way with cartoons. The best part of the epilogue is a quick shot of Mister Sinister scampering off in the background, just running as fast as his evil little legs will carry him. Cyclops sees him escaping and turns to follow, but Jean stops him, which makes absolutely no sense. Jean, honey, this man abducted you. On your honeymoon. TWICE. He’s an unrepentant monster who recently joined forces with a man who was trying to destroy the entire universe and all of history. Let your hot husband go kill him, please.

Stray observations:

• Before Hodge reverts to a brick, he and Beast have a chance to trade perspectives about “the perfection of the hive” versus the wonder of diversity. This is exactly the kind of thing I wish “Love in Vain” had made room for.

• Magneto and Quicksilver share a loving embrace in the end. I guess they patched things up between this story and the the last time they saw each other.

• On the toilet: no one! Everyone at least appears on camera briefly, even if, like Jubilee, they’re just in a single shot. It’s refreshing to see Wolverine in a reduced role, for once.

Season 4 is X-Men: The Animated Series’s largest, weighing in at twenty-one episodes across fifteen stories. While a lot of the season falls short, especially the season finale, there are still standouts to enjoy.

By this point in the show’s run, the writers could no longer count on episodes airing in their intended order, so continuity is light. That said, I couldn’t help but notice a few recurring themes. We learn more about Charles Xavier in this season than anywhere else. There are episodes about his childhood, his college years, his ex-girlfriend, his ex-fiancé, and even his founding of the X-Men (sort of). The season is also a bit preoccupied with family drama, whether Magneto’s, Nightcrawler’s, or even Moira MacTaggert’s.

There are a lot of conspicuous absences in season 4. Cyclops, the supposed leader of the X-Men, misses more stories than he appears in, as do Gambit and Jubilee. Trust me, I counted. But nobody gets it worse than Jean this season. She has practically vanished from the show, appearing in just five stories. Only in three of them does she do more than wave hello, and that’s only if I count her brief contributions in “Weapon X, Lies, and Video Tape” and “Have Yourself a Morlock Little X-Mas”. She spends all of “Beyond Good and Evil” trapped in a glass tube and has a total of maybe four lines across 88 minutes. The only episode where she does anything meaningful is “Xavier Remembers”.

On the other end of the spectrum we have Wolverine, who misses just two episodes: the first half of “Sanctuary” and Cyclops’s solo episode (so while he misses two episodes, he only misses one story). And Wolverine is never just present. If he’s showing up, he’s doing something. I wish the writers had that attitude with more characters.

Worst Episode

“Xavier Remembers”, which is boring, nonsensical, and badly animated. How did Xavier defeat the Shadow King all those years ago? How, exactly, did that inspire him to found the X-Men? The episode does no work to show us, but insists on telling us that it’s so.

Dishonorable mentions: “A Deal with the Devil”, an episode which features four X-Men but somehow only uses the powers of one of them, briefly. “One Man’s Worth” should also be on the dishonored list, since it’s a story about how Charles Xavier’s premature death completely reshapes the timeline, yet forgets to show us what makes Xavier so special. We should also ding “Lotus and the Steel” for its bad mashup of Eat, Pray, Love and Seven Samurai. I was tempted to put “Beyond Good and Evil” here, too, but Parts 1 and 2 are fun enough to recommend watching. Just stop after that.

Finally, “Have Yourself a Morlock Little X-Mas” is terrible, but it gets a special exemption because it’s a network-mandated Christmas special.

Best Episode

Definitely “Nightcrawler”. The writers put a ton of care into this story, and it shows. It’s a great episode and Adrian Hough gives what is probably the best guest performance in the entire series.

Honorable mentions: The writers liked Nightcrawler so much that they gave him a second episode, “Bloodlines”, which is X-Men as it should be: cool powers, fun antics, high emotion. “Courage” also stands out for how well it closes up Morph’s tormented time on the show, and the first half of “Sanctuary” is magnificent, peak Magneto.

Worst Hero

Cable, by a mile. He’s an obnoxious, humorless, hypermasculine edgelord who does nothing but screw up for an hour and a half straight, then acts like the X-Men owe him something. 3999 A.D. is all explosions and gunfire, a completely different show that I simply cannot bring myself to care about.

Best Hero

Nightcrawler, by a mile. Like I said, the show’s portrayal of the character is great. You can’t help but love the guy. The writers obviously loved him, too. Nightcrawler gets two main episodes, plus a little cameo in “Lotus and the Steel” and a silent (but pretty cool) action scene during the alt-1995 battle royale of “One Man’s Worth”. All totaled, I think Nightcrawler might actually get more screen time this season than Jean.

Worst Villain

Trevor Fitzroy, the worst guy in your office. He’s got an annoying sycophant for a sidekick (Bantam), doesn’t follow basic instructions from his tyrannical boss (Master Mold), and only begrudgingly agrees to solve a problem that he himself caused when it personally affects him.

Dishonorable mention: the Silver Samurai, or at least this version of him, which is badly miscalculated in every way.

Best Villain

Magneto, who isn’t quite an antihero by the end of season 4. Let’s get the ugly part out of the way first. Erik Magnus Lehnsherr agreed to work for the overtly evil Apocalypse. It doesn’t matter that he has a change of heart in the end. I think Magneto, of all people, would understand that the sentence, “I was just following orders,” does not exempt one from the ethical consequences of one’s actions.

His scheme in “Sanctuary”—abducting mutants to build his commune and stealing 200 nuclear weapons to arm it—is clearly villainous. That said, it’s a justifiable kind of villainy, the kind that makes you want to buy “Magneto Was Right” merch. And his stoic acknowledgement of the pain he’s caused his family is the best part of “Family Ties”.

Most Improved

A tough call in a universe without strong continuity, but I think it’s old Professor X. Charles Xavier is intellectual to the point of iciness on this show. Abandoning Gambit in “Sanctuary” and ignoring Wolverine’s immediate suffering so that he can chat with Magneto in “Family Ties” come to mind. But the sheer amount of time the show spends with Xavier this season reveals new sides to his personality. I’m thinking specifically of his vulnerability in “The Juggernaut Returns” and his paternal pride in “Beyond Good and Evil”.

I also have to give a nod to Jubilee. She only has a few appearances, but she’s funny every time, so at least she’s growing into a reliable comic relief role.

“Beyond Good and Evil” was supposed to be X-Men: The Animated Series’s grand finale, not just for the season, but for the whole show. It was to be a supersized story that culminated in permanent changes to the team roster. Regulars like Cyclops and Storm would depart, while new faces like Bishop, Archangel, and Psylocke would take up the cause of mutant-human peace. Then Fox decided to order an abbreviated fifth season, making such changes untenable. Per Eric Lewald, this story had to be completely reworked in about two days. It shows.

Should we grade this one on a curve? There are things to enjoy in these four episodes, particularly in Parts 1 and 2. But things rapidly fall apart after that, with tons of loose ends that never get properly resolved. Characters just sort of drop out of the story as it goes on. The core X-Men wind up strangely absent from their own finale, leaving the dumbest man in the franchise, Cable, to close things out with little more than a big gun.

Part 1: The End of Time

Season 4, Episode 18. Air date: November 4, 1995.

I have made my feelings about Cable abundantly clear throughout these reviews, so obviously I’m not thrilled to see we’re starting in 3999. Cable and—heavy sigh—Clan Chosen infiltrate Apocalypse’s pyramid. The animation is terrible. Just look at this screenshot of Cable’s son, Tyler, assuming you can make him out under his shoulder pads. The last time we saw Tyler he was a little kid, so either “3999 A.D.” is shorthand for an entire era, or they grow up very fast in the far future. The action is practically nonexistent. Cable unlocks Apocalypse’s defenses by waving his hand around and then asking his computer for the answer to a puzzle. He then attempts to kill Apocalypse with a gun. If this is your idea of a good time, you’re going to love the way this story ends.

The whole sequence is really just there to lay down the exposition. Apocalypse’s one actual weakness is that once every hundred years, he must return to his Lazarus Chamber to regenerate and sustain his near-immortality. Cable is predictably unsuccessful in trying to shoot Apocalypse, who snatches his time traveling computer in the midst of some delicious monologuing (“Evil? I am not malevolent. I simply am.”). Apocalypse muses that despite his obvious superiority, he’s been locked in a pointless struggle against lesser beings for millennia. Before Cable can grunt a reply, Apocalypse vanishes into the time stream.

Also appearing in the time stream: Bishop, who unluckily crosses paths with Apocalypse while trying to make the return trip from “One Man’s Worth” (points to the show for some ambitious continuity). Apocalypse’s intrusion into the time stream literally knocks Bishop out of the universe, landing him at the End of Time, a surreal space with a single inhabitant hanging out on a rainbow bridge (possibly the Bifrost). This weirdo, Bender, strongly evokes Robin Williams at the height of his cocaine era. Even at fourteen, I probably found Bender’s torrent of Looney Tunes gags and goofy non sequiturs grating. Bishop does his best to brush off Bender and begins walking toward the End of Time’s only point of interest: an Escher-inspired building that we’ll later learn is the Temporal Control Center. Bishop is going to be walking towards it for the entirety of this four-parter, if you can believe it.

Now fully halfway through the episode, we return to the present and finally see some X-Men. Cyclops and Jean are getting married, again, presumably having verified that their new priest is not a mentally traumatized shapeshifter. It’s a pretty lovely scene, actually. Beast quotes poetry, Xavier waxes philosophical about his first X-Men growing up, Rogue catches the bouquet (to her chagrin), and Wolverine looks utterly miserable. Hey, at least he bothered attending this time. I will also note that he’s wearing the same peach bowtie as everyone else, which implies that he’s in the wedding party. These are the kinds of details that escaped me in childhood but catch my eye in middle age.

Everything’s going great until Storm says as much out loud, practically summoning the Nasty Boys (Nasty Boys), plus the only cool Mutate, Vertigo. The Nasty Boys manage to knock Cyclops and Jean unconscious (one of her two natural states, along with Possessed by Cosmic Entity), and quickly toss her into a portal. While the X-Men are out searching for her, none other than Mister Sinister (last glimpsed in “Sanctuary”) appears at the X-Mansion to vamp. His goal is to abduct Xavier, and he nearly succeeds, but with Cyclops back in the fight by this point and a surprise appearance from Shard (chasing Bishop’s temporal anomaly), it’s all Sinister can do to flee through a portal as Rogue snatches Xavier. There’s practically an entire episode’s worth of character beats and fun action packed into these final ten minutes, and I have to give the show credit for some nimble storytelling here.

Sinister’s former henchmen are working for someone other than him. It’s all pretty fun, if nothing else. Seeing arch-nemesis Mister Sinister casually stride into the familiar home of the X-Mansion, especially after the coziness of a wedding, is pretty thrilling. The episode closes with Jean arriving at the End of Time, imprisoned in a glass tube, where Apocalypse is revealed as the mastermind of the whole scheme. This is played as a shock reveal, but given how the episode started, it doesn’t feel that way. The episode would probably have been better if it gave the entire run time to the wedding and melee with the Nasty Boys (feat. Vertigo), allowed the entrance of Apocalypse at the end be a genuine twist, and saved his motivations for a later flashback.

Stray observations:

• Cable tells his son that “500 centuries” of research have led them to strike Apocalypse at this moment. He surely meant 50 centuries (5,000 years). Or maybe Cable is just really dumb, as the rest of this four-parter strongly indicates.

• Apocalypse: “You DEFILE my saaaacred CHAAAAAMBER!???”

• Rogue, catching the bouquet: “Whole lotta good it’s gonna do me.” Gambit is right there, Rogue!

• As all hell breaks loose at the X-Mansion, Xavier tasks Jubilee with getting rid of the normie wedding guests. The next time we see her, she has done so. I really wish we’d seen how.

• The Nasty Boys (Naaasty Boooooys) still aren’t the most interesting villain crew, but seeing them at odds with Arch-Delegator Mister Sinister was a fun twist. Unfortunately, they’ll skip most of the rest of the story, making only the most minor contributions to the fights in Part 4.

Part 2: Promise of Apocalypse

Season 4, Episode 19. Air date: November 11, 1995.

Part 2 is this story’s finest half hour, absolutely packed with ambitious action and a ton of guest characters. Even keeping my summary to the bare essentials, it’s a lot, so apologies in advance.

This twenty minutes has a little something for everyone, even the freaks who like the Shi’ar. Empress Lilandra’s troublesome sister, Deathbird, is attempting a violent coup. She gets worrisomely close to offing Lilandra, before Gladiator bursts through the floor to stop her. It’s at this point that Deathbird’s ace in the hole, Apocalypse, emerges from a portal and abducts not Lilandra, but her court psychic, Oracle. John Colicos makes a meal out of double-crossing Deathbird before departing. Having Apocalypse visit the Shi’ar was a smart way to raise the stakes, but just as with the Nasty Boys, we won’t be seeing them again.

Back at the End of Time, Jean coaxes a little more exposition out of Apocalypse. We learn that since time doesn’t pass here, he’s been able to spend the equivalent of a thousand years studying the Temporal Control Center. Sinister and Deathbird (and later, Magneto, Mystique, and Sabretooth) are all working for Apocalypse because he’s promised them whatever they most want, though how he plans to deliver, if at all, remains a mystery.

Back on Earth and with the benefit of a tip from Lilandra, Xavier reasons that whatever Apocalypse’s goal is, he’s abducting psychics to accomplish it. For those of us in the audience who like it when characters have thoughts and opinions, the episode makes time for a sharp little debate about what to do next. Cyclops wants to surveil other psychic mutants in case the bad guys show up. Storm is firmly against the idea of using people as bait (“You cannot endanger innocent people just to save Jean.”), and Gambit, as usual, has a more chaotic take. “If they be psychic, they already know, right?” Xavier gets the final word, agreeing with Cyclops and setting the episode’s wild second half in motion.

I was going to tee up this part with some background on Psylocke, but good lord, look at her Marvel Fandom entry. More twists and turns in that character history than the Temporal Control Center. Suffice to say that Elizabeth “Betsy” Braddock started out in the pages of Captain Britain, Marvel’s 1970s attempt to break into the UK market. By 1995, she had become Psylocke, a hot telepathic ninja who wields stylish purple “psi-daggers”. Now That’s What I Call ’90s!

Psylocke is an elite thief, and we get our first glimpse of her as she’s sneaking into Worthington Castle. Archangel, who’s looking a lot more sane than the last time we saw him, wastes little time confronting her. The quick fight culminates with Psylocke nonsensically jumping off a cliff, or so it seemed. It’s one of the last clever things we’ll see anyone do in this entire story. Archangel, who is clearly into Psylocke, rescues her, only for her to literally stab him in the back and knock him unconscious. He wakes up just as Psylocke is driving away with his stuff, so he decides to tail her back to her London warehouse.

Wolverine and Shard, following Xavier’s plan, have been on a stakeout near the warehouse just in case Psylocke showed up. Psylocke and Archangel start going at it (fighting! I mean fighting!), with Psylocke accusing Archangel of being a wealthy assimilationist and Archangel accusing her of being a common thief. Before they can finish the argument, Sabretooth rips through the warehouse doors, followed by Mystique, who is followed by Wolverine, Shard, and—surprise!—Magneto. So there are seven powerful mutants duking it out over the course of a few minutes. The whole sequence is maybe a little too cute and quippy, but Jennifer Dale’s sardonic performance as Mystique stands out as especially fun.

Magneto brings the fight to a decisive end. He pins Wolverine to a conveniently placed battleship (the warehouse is next to a harbor). He then drops the entire ship, Wolverine still attached, on Psylocke’s warehouse, just to make a point, before carrying her into a portal. Back in “Family Ties”, when the High Evolutionary said that Magneto’s genes were the key to overwhelming mutant power, he knew what he was talking about.

Storm and Gambit rush over from their own stakeout to do cleanup, which as we’ll see in the final scene, allowed Sinister to abduct another unnamed (and apparently not very important) telepath. Lastly (and leastly) we revisit 3999 A.D., where Cable and Tyler are manfully climbing a cliff, as Cable explains that he’s going to steal the government’s last remaining time machine.

Oh, and we also get a quick shot of Bishop walking toward the Temporal Control Center. That’s all for him this episode.

Stray observations:

• Apocalypse had, by his own reckoning, a millennium to hatch this scheme. Wouldn’t it be much harder to interfere with his plan if he abducted psychics from across the centuries, instead of sticking to 1995? Cartoons!

• Archangel, regaining consciousness: “That’s the last time I save a falling ninja.”

• Shard notes that Archangel is “destined to join the X-Men,” an obvious leftover from the version of this story that was going to permanently shuffle the team.

• When I say this episode is a little too quippy for its own good, I mean lines like Gambit’s, “All tied up and nowhere to go?” as he frees Wolverine from the side of the ship.

• On the toilet: technically, all of the core X-Men appear, but Rogue and Jubilee are inexplicably relegated to blink-and-you’ll-miss-them background appearances, essentially dropping out of the story after Part 1.

Part 3: The Lazarus Chamber

Season 4, Episode 20. Air date: November 18, 1995.

Part 3 is where “Beyond Good and Evil” falls apart. We pick up with Cable and Tyler in 3999 A.D., unfortunately. To stop Apocalypse, Cable wants to destroy his Lazarus Chamber at its origin point in 1200 B.C. To do that, he has to gain access to the world’s last remaining time machine, and to do that, he needs to infiltrate a heavily guarded facility. Whose facility? Cable’s comments in the last episode suggest it belongs to the government, but if that’s true, what’s the deal with Apocalypse ruling 3999? It’s all terribly vague and impossible to care about. Cable grunts his way through a series of explosions, interchangeable robot soldiers, and lots—and I mean lots—of gunfire. More guns than this show has ever seen in a single episode, I think. A really upsetting amount of guns. Even this sequence’s best attempt to gin up the stakes, by putting Tyler in harm’s away (again, from a random robot, for no clear reason) involves Tyler just trading gunfire with the thing for what feels like forty-five minutes. This feels like a completely different show, and a bad one at that.

Anyway, Cable takes control of the hybrid time machine / spaceship known as Graymalkin, and nearly runs Bishop over while passing through the Axis of Time (Bishop spends this episode continuing to walk forward, FYI). Apocalypse, from his vantage point in the Temporal Control Center, cackles malevolently and forces Cable to detour to 1995. I’ll give the episode this much: that’s a nice bit of foreshadowing that Apocalypse has things well in hand and Cable’s plan isn’t going to work.

Cable lands at the X-Mansion right around the time that Wolverine beats the crap out of Sabretooth to try to learn more about Apocalypse’s scheme. Wolverine comes away with almost no new information, so Xavier decides to violate his own code of ethics and read Sabretooth’s mind against his will. Looking like heroes here, guys. All Xavier learns is that Apocalypse wants to use his abducted psychics to “master time”, somehow.

The X-Men decide that their best shot is to follow Cable’s lead and travel with him to 1200 B.C. to destroy the Lazarus Chamber. Not that Cable would be willing to do anything else, of course. He repeatedly tells the X-Men that their problems are boring and don’t matter to him, never mind that the X-Men’s current cosmic-level problem is a direct consequence of Apocalypse stealing a time machine from Cable. And let’s remember, dear reader, that the currently imprisoned Jean Grey is Cable’s mother, without whom he cannot exist. So anyway, welcome to Apocalypse’s insane looking pyramid, architectural design by Dr. Wily.

Cable’s aggressive stupidity is so obvious by now that I think even the writers had to start commenting on it. Cyclops asks Xavier why Apocalypse might be abducting psychics:

Cable: Who cares? He’s pure evil and that’s why he’s GOTTA GO.

Beast: If Apocalypse is indeed the personification of evil, it may be impossible to destroy him.

Cable: WHY???

Beast: The conflict between good and evil is part of the fabric of existence. Perhaps the world cannot exist without evil. If Apocalypse is destroyed, evil may only take another form.

Cable: I’ll worry about that later.

It’s like watching Voltaire attempt to educate a clenched fist. My heart breaks for Hank McCoy. And later, when Cable and the others have gotten inside the pyramid:

Cable insists that he already knows every trap in the pyramid, then nearly falls into a spiked pit.

Cable: Thanks, I don’t know how I missed that one before.

Beast: Apparently Apocalypse will make a few alterations in the next five thousand years.

I’ll take this opportunity to point out that if Cable had been allowed to do what he’d originally wanted—travel to 1200 B.C. alone to destroy the pyramid—he’d have fallen into that trap and died right there. God, what a moron.

Anyway, by this point the good guys are fighting their way toward the Lazarus Chamber, having been met by Apocalypse’s Egyptian-era Four Horsemen. They look cooler than their modern day counterparts, I’ll give them that much. Other than that, the action is pretty basic. Cable does actually manage to do one smart thing, using his knowledge of the pyramid’s booby traps to take out one of the Horsemen. Another one of them lands on Cable with an entire horse, and while this doesn’t do permanent damage, it ensures that he won’t be able to proceed into the Lazarus Chamber with the rest of the team.

The good guys finally arrive at the Lazarus Chamber, only to realize too late that they’ve fallen into a trap. “Apocalypse” is revealed as a disguised Mystique, and the real Apocalypse electrifies the entire chamber from the comfort of the Temporal Control Center (somehow). Apocalypse claims his ultimate prize, Charles Xavier, while Cable stumbles into the Chamber to find everyone else unconscious.

Stray observations:

• Cable says “nail” a lot. I realize it’s an S&P approved substitute for “kill”, but like everything with Cable, it just feels so edgelordy and lame.

• On the toilet: Rogue and Jubilee, once again.

Part 4: End of the Beginning

Season 4, Episode 21. Air date: November 25, 1995.

In The Matrix, Morpheus explains that the entire human race is being held prisoner in a virtual reality simulation so that their machine overlords can use their bioelectricity and body heat as fuel. “Combined with a form of fusion, the machines had found all the energy they would ever need,” he says. An entire generation of nerds have pushed up their glasses to point out that this makes no sense, that a human body would make for a terribly inefficient power source. But these nerds are missing something. The phrase combined with a form of fusion is all the explanation the Wachowskis needed. It’s a perfect verbal sleight of hand that makes the premise feel plausible. It puts enough science in this fiction to keep our disbelief suspended. That, I think, is what differentiates sci-fi from fantasy. Sci-fi is rooted in the knowable (or at least feels that way), while fantasy is rooted in mystery, where power is ineffable and things Just Are. Neo can break the laws of physics and come back from the dead because he has learned to perceive the code underneath the Matrix. Gandalf can break the laws of physics and come back from the dead because he is Gandalf.¹

I say all this because Apocalypse’s master plan doesn’t read as sci-fi to me. Sure, the wider Marvel universe has its fair share of magic. In the comics, more than one X-Man has been to Hell, which is a real place. But the show has steered clear of the magical side of Marvel, remaining firmly in sci-fi. Apocalypse’s plan doesn’t feel as if it’s grounded in the same world as mutants and time traveling cyborgs. Instead, it feels like a magic ritual. There’s even an orb.

Apocalypse’s version of “combined with a form of fusion” is this: “Time is motion, and motion and thought are a unity. Two aspects of a single power that is beyond comprehension to all but myself. That is why certain psychics can see into the future. The mind can transcend time.” By gathering together all these psychics at the Axis and then sacrificing them, Apocalypse will destroy time itself and remake the universe in his own image.

I like the idea that psychics derive their powers from a special relationship with time. The mind can transcend time even has a grain of truth to it. After all, memory is the mind traveling to the past, and planning is the mind traveling to the future, so to speak. But the show hasn’t really done anything with the idea other than say it out loud, making “therefore Apocalypse can use psychics to destroy the universe” a hard pill to swallow.

But alright, this is a make-believe cartoon for little kids. Maybe I’m asking too much, even though we’ve seen the show do much better. Even giving the story’s premise the benefit of the doubt, what Part 4 does with the core cast is just unforgivable. In the immediate aftermath of Part 3, Cable blows up Apocalypse’s pyramid in 1200 B.C. and we see five X-Men (Cyclops, Gambit, Storm, Beast, and Archangel) board the Graymalkin with him. Yet when Cable eventually arrives at the End of Time, somehow it’s just him. Everyone else vanishes from the story until the epilogue. Wolverine is also there, because it’s very important that Wolverine be present for all big stories.²

Part 4’s action revolves around two things, the first of which is the collapse of Apocalypse’s tenuous alliance with his fellow villains. Upon learning the true intent of Apocalypse’s plan, Magneto is disgusted to be in league with someone who “would destroy the innocent along with the guilty.” It’s a nice character note and it kicks off the betrayals and counter-betrayals that will fill the back half of this episode. Magneto and Mystique do their best to fight off Apocalypse and the Horsemen. While Magneto and Mystique have famously great chemistry in the movies and comics, they’ve never even been in the same room on this show, and yet it still feels really cool to see them fight together. What’s less cool is the mounting obviousness of the second thing that powers this story: guns. Mystique somehow holds off the Four Horsemen with nothing but a laser pistol while Magneto frees Wolverine.

Meanwhile, Bishop ambles ever closer to the Temporal Control Center, once again enduring Bender. I wish Bender’s incessant craziness had a point, that maybe his constant stream of nonsense would turn out to be clues that Bishop eventually uses to gain the upper hand and save the day. But no, Bishop doesn’t learn anything useful from these interactions. He just notices the newly added ring of hovering psychics around the Temporal Control Center and decides to shoot one out of the sky. It happens to be Psylocke, and she tells him to shoot down as many as he can, so he does.

Back at the Temporal Control Center, Wolverine and Mister Sinister engage in a minor tussle that shatters Apocalypse’s magic orb, reversing his attempt to destroy time (cue footage of the Shi’ar, random New Yorkers, and a few leftover X-Men fading out of or into existence). Sinister decides to cut his losses, and he and the Nasty Boys (Nasty Boys) head for the nearest portal. A few seconds later, Cable shoots Apocalypse with a big rifle, which somehow causes the Temporal Control Center to shatter into little floating pieces. There’s some slightly fun back and forth as Wolverine and Magneto save each others’ lives, only for Apocalypse to make one last literal power grab via another magic orb. By this point, Bishop has finally made his way to the center of the action and—say it with me—shoots the orb. Apocalypse brags that he is immortal and can never truly be stopped. That’s when Professor Xavier, leading the newly freed psychics, declares that their combined power is enough to pull Apocalypse out of the Axis and put him back in normal time, where he’ll cease to exist (Cable destroyed his regeneration chamber, remember?).

Apocalypse had a thousand years to plan this. Bishop and Cable foiled it with a couple of rifles. Everyone departs for the regular universe, and Bender turns to the camera to reveal that he’s actually Immortus, longtime Marvel villain and Kang the Conquerer variant. It’s a twist out of nowhere and it will never be revisited. Maybe this was all Immortus’s convoluted way of removing one of the only true threats to his own power? Who can say? Certainly not the writers.

In the epilogue scene, noted paraplegic Charles Xavier is depicted standing next to Magneto. This isn’t a blink-and-you’ll-miss it animation error, either. He even gets a few lines while fully upright!

Beast asks Cable if, having destroyed what he considers the incarnation of evil, he thinks the world has been changed. He replies, “I really don’t care. I just wanna go home.” I’m sure this sounded cool to an exhausted writers’ room. Archangel says to Psylocke, “I wish I’d been there to help,” and you know, me too, buddy. Why weren’t you? Why wasn’t anyone?

A story this big with an ending this bad triggers in me an overwhelming urge to suggest some rewrites. As this review is already way too long, I’ll keep it to three items:

1. For the love of God, get rid of Bender. He’s annoying and completely pointless. Everything Bishop learns during his slow, slow walk to the Temporal Control Center comes from various hanging time portals, not this Yakko Warner ripoff.

2. Psychics having a special relationship with time is a cool idea, but the story doesn’t do anything with it. What if instead, characters occasionally received mysterious messages from out of nowhere, cryptic hints that help push the story along or pay off in weird ways. Imagine Wolverine seeing an apparition of Jean before he interrogates Sabretooth, or Archangel dreaming of Psylocke before they meet, or Xavier getting a strange message from himself, with the final reveal that it’s all been coming from the trapped psychics at the End of Time. The psychics get to do more than just lay around, and Apocalypse’s monologue about their true power gets some weight behind it.

3. Cable is the son of Jean Grey and a powerful telepath in his own right. The TV show has never once shown him using his mutant powers. It’s all guns all day, forever. It would make for a fun twist if the crown jewel of Apocalypse’s collection of psychics wasn’t Xavier, but Cable. Over the course of the story, Cable would move from protagonist to damsel to, perhaps, a more interesting hero in the final minutes. It might also present an opportunity for Jean to do anything in the finale.

Stray observations:

• The animation is all over the place in this episode. Bishop’s rifle doubles or halves in size depending on the scene.

• Archangel, theatrically berating Cable in the aftermath of Part 3: “He knew! Apocalypse knew your stupid plan before we made our first move!” I think Archangel is this story’s MVP, honestly.

• Apocalypse: “You have traveled over 50 centuries of time to stop me. When will you learn it cannot be done?” See? Somebody knows how to do math.

• On the toilet: technically no one. Everyone appears at least briefly in this story, even if they’re just wordlessly vanishing in and out of existence. But they might as well be in the bathroom.

Season 4, Episode 17. Air date: December 23, 1995.

Just about every kids’ show does a holiday episode at some point, and a few of them even become modern classics. Just not this one. Sure as hell not this one. “Have Yourself a Morlock Little X-Mas” exists because the network wanted a Christmas episode. That’s per head writer Eric Lewald in Previously On X-Men…, where he summarized this episode with the words, “It seemed like a good idea at the time.” This isn’t Letterboxd and I’m never going to review an episode in two sentences or less, but boy, this one tempted me. The episode’s plot is Christmas Special and its key themes are Christmas Special. The soundtrack is Christmas Special and most of the character beats are Christmas Special.

If you’ve been keeping up with my review series, then you probably want a more earnest synopsis of the goings-on. I’ll give it this much, it’s got a big helping of the slice of life scenes that I tend to like. The X-Men are in the midst of some lighthearted holiday antics. Jean and Gambit threaten to kill each other for control of the kitchen, Beast nearly blows up the mansion in an attempt to make cranberry sauce, and everyone hits the mall for some last minute shopping. That’s when the Morlocks bust into Rockefeller Center in a stolen ambulance. They say that Leech is gravely ill, and they implore Storm, whom you might recall is technically their leader, for help. The only viable treatment, given the Morlock’s lack of resources and inability to seek treatment at a hospital (points to the show for highlighting that), is a blood transfusion from Wolverine. Because why should any other character be important in an X-Men story?

Wolverine reveals yet another detail of his infinitely tragic backstory (a similar transfusion attempt failed with some kids, never referenced before or since), but after a bunch of Sad Times Back and Forth, he agrees to try it with Leech. It works, and Beast—the team’s actual medical expert—arrives just in time to do nothing other than give Leech a quick checkup. Also, there is an incredibly cloying, incredibly off-model mutant named Mariana for Jubilee to be sad with. Jubilee decides to give the Morlocks all the presents she’s bought, half of which are food (honestly a nice touch). Storm also formally reinstalls Callisto as the leader of the Morlocks. I’d point out that becoming their leader has previously required trial by combat, but hey, Christmas Special.

Nothing has ever demonstrated the difference between Christmas and Christianity for me quite like the contrast between this episode and “Nightcrawler”.

Stray observations:

• Jubilee’s characterization is way off in this story. She comes off like a little kid instead of the rebellious teen she’s supposed to be. However, when cajoling Wolverine to sing Christmas carols, she gets in a fun line: “You could sing the guys’ part on ‘Jingle Bells’. Cyclops is uhh…having his problems.” I’m going to work the phrase having his problems into as many situations as I can from now on.

• Beast: “I am unhurt. That is more than I can say for my cranberry glaze…Delightful! Though the chemical formula proved distressingly volatile, the harmony of flavors is impeccable!” Been there, Hank. If you know me (and if you’re reading this, you probably do), you know that I am a huge cranberry sauce fan.

• Wolverine, in the middle of all the holiday cheer: “Did I hear an attack alarm? Or would that be hopin’ for too much?”

• Storm has a dignified bearing and sense of self-worth that most people can only dream of. When Callisto insults her for finally showing up after her extended absence, she firmly replies, “I do not deserve that. We are here to help.”

• Storm uses her powers to lift the Morlocks’ stolen ambulance into the air, diverting it from some innocent bystanders. This would require hurricane force winds strong enough to tear the ambulance apart, but now I’m just being pedantic.

Season 4, Episode 16. Air date: June 11, 1995 (in season 3).

Stories should happen in the present tense, especially for Saturday morning cartoons. I’ve said it before, but X-Men: The Animated Series only gets about twenty minutes per episode, and the show struggles whenever it has to spend precious minutes cramming in new backstory just to get the ball rolling. You would think that this wouldn’t apply to the show’s most frequently featured character, Wolverine, that at this point we know enough about him that we can live in his present. And yet there is always more Wolverine Background to unravel.

So it is with “Weapon X, Lies, and Video Tape”.¹ This episode features a pared down version of Team X and their false memory storyline from Wolverine #48. I don’t know much about those comics, other than that they tried very hard to be an overcomplicated spy spectacular. The first issue is titled, “The Shiva Scenario Part 1: Dreams of Gore, Phase 1”, for God’s sake. The show’s version of events greatly simplifies things, trimming Team X to Wolverine, Sabretooth, and guest characters Maverick and Silver Fox. Maverick is a dude in clunky armor and Silver Fox will be serving as Wolverine’s love interest for this half hour. Guy gets around.

Wolverine has started hallucinating, going berserk and lashing out at everyone around him. The cause, as we’ll learn, is that he has a bunch of fake memories courtesy of the Weapon X program, and they’re breaking down. A mysterious photograph of Wolverine with his arm around Silver Fox (and some coordinates on the back, more on that in the stray observations) sends him back to Canada to get to the bottom of things. Beast follows him, because the episode needs someone in it who isn’t constantly having a mental breakdown.

Wolverine arrives at the strangely familiar facility (“I got my bones here.”) and encounters Sabretooth. They fight each other immediately, and surely would have done so without much pretext. On top of their general hatred for each other, Wolverine’s memories suggest that Sabretooth was abusing Silver Fox and/or trying to destroy her romance with Wolverine, though the details are understandably kept vague for a kids’ show. Don Francks does what he can, imparting Sabretooth with an especially poisonous line reading of, “What’s the matter, runt? Can’t take care of your woman?” Wolverine also remembers a mission in which Team X faced Omega Red, and Sabretooth callously left Maverick and Silver Fox to die.

This is a story about false memories, so naturally, Silver Fox promptly reveals herself as very much alive. She explains that the facility they’re standing in—a cross between a TV studio and a science lab—was designed to turn them into sleeper agents with false memories. Oh and Maverick is there, too. Silver Fox discovered the lab months ago, but there’s one door she can’t open without all four of them present. Beast points out that the door, which is designed to put all four members of Team X in one extremely secure location, is an obvious trap. But they want the truth no matter what.

What’s waiting for them on the other side of the door is a little more exposition and a fight with a robot called Talos. Among its many combat features are what can only be described as nipple cannons. I am including a picture so that you will understand that this is not something I just made up. This is something a team of professional writers made up, had animated, and put on broadcast television. An entire TV network, along with its Standards & Practices Department, had no problem with this. But God forbid that Amelia Voght walk out on Charles Xavier while holding suitcases.

The fight with Talos is reasonably well done, making good use of all its participants. Where it loses me is the resolution, or the lack thereof. The good guys manage to blow Talos up, only for the facility’s defense systems to trigger traumatic memories in Team X (somehow) that conveniently knock them out, while also loudly announcing that a second Talos will shortly be activated to kill everyone. Beast takes the opportunity to collect Team X’s unconscious bodies, load everyone onto a truck, drive off, and lock the door behind him.

Before everyone goes their separate ways, Wolverine and Silver Fox have an intense heart-to-heart. They both have memories of carving their initials into a tree, as cartoon lovebirds do. Yet the facility’s studio has no such initials in its tree, and the team has learned that all of the false memories are based on half-truths. So was their relationship real? Did they really love each other? Is it too late to find out? Silver Fox doesn’t want to risk it, though she does give Wolverine one last, long look before departing. It’s pretty effective for what the episode has to work with, but it makes me wish the script had done a little more with the ideas of half-truths and unreliable narrators.

I’ll never say no to Beast getting some screen time. George Buza, as always, does a lot with what he’s given here, and I think he pairs well with Wolverine. That said, Beast doesn’t do much in this story other than locate videotapes of exposition (which, again, is the story being told from the past). Wouldn’t this story have been more interesting if Jean, who found the photograph of Silver Fox and Wolverine, had followed him to Canada instead? For one, it would have made sense for a telepath to try to help people who are in mental anguish. For another, Wolverine’s relationship with Silver Fox—yet another person he isn’t allowed to love due to forces beyond his control—would have hit that much harder with Jean nearby. Lastly, come on, Jean’s basically been absent since “Xavier Remembers”. Give the gal something to do.

This is a middling episode that would probably be stronger if you viewed it as Part 1 of a two-parter with “Lotus and the Steel”, which directly deals with the loss of control that Wolverine experiences in this story. Unfortunately, Disney Plus lists the show in production order (where these two are back-to-back but in the wrong order), while other services use the airing order (chronologically correct, but eight months apart in two different seasons). As it stands, the only good way to watch this pair of episodes is with an asterisk.

Stray observations:

• There’s a wild animation error during Wolverine and Sabretooth’s initial fight, in which their lines are synced to each others’ mouths.

• Jean snoops around in Wolverine’s bedroom to find that photo with the coordinates on the back. The coordinates are written as “53º / 120º”, which Beast immediately says is in “southern Canada”. Whole degrees cover huge distances, so at latitude 53º, we’re talking about a region slightly larger than Delaware. It should be nearly impossible to pinpoint a single, extremely secret building in such a large area, but then again, Wolverine has his traumatic memories to guide him and Beast is a genius. Given Wolverine’s history, Beast reasonably assumed that the unlabeled coordinates were meant to be 53ºN by 120ºW, which is indeed somewhere in Canada (though “southern” is a stretch). Hank’s other options were eastern Russia, the middle of the South Pacific, or about halfway between Australia and Antarctica/the Savage Land.

• On the toilet: Rogue, Storm, Jubilee, and Gambit. Cyclops appears and even gets to utter exactly one word (he shouts, “Wolverine!”), while Jean gets a small speaking role for the first time since “Courage”.