The Gifted, Season 1, Episode 12/13: eXtraction/X-Roads
Yep, this is the final two-parter to close out the first season of The Gifted, and it's... pretty neat. The two-episode special honestly works better like one extended final episode of a season, and it works particularly well. Again, it's still plagued by a lot of the inherent problems that The Gifted has throughout its run,
Still, it's got a pretty neat final-confrontation plotline going on, all the while building up to the schisms running through the members of the Struckers and the main members of the Mutant Underground that's been building up throughout episodes 10 and 11. The first half of this two-parter (or, y'know, episode 12) deals with the two-pronged storyline. The Struckers have to go off and rescue Grandma Ellen from being accosted by Sentinel Services, who are desperate to get the missing chunks of Otto Von Strucker's research, while the Mutant Underground, now working together with the Frosts, are off to take down Dr. Roderick Campbell in his big attempt to get a bill passed to essentially allow more brutal weaponization of Hounds against mutantkind.
And... and I know the actors working as the Struckers really try their best, but at the same time they're just rehashing the same arguments they've been having since episode 4, and, yes, maybe it's slightly more explosive this time around, with Andy actively attacking a pair of Sentinel goons, causing Lauren to exchange mutant blows with him... but, y'know, if someone went after my grandmother with intent to harm, I'd telekinetically blast them as well. Lauren's argument really ends up ringing hollow when The Gifted has shown us, time and time again, how horrible and extremely dickish Sentinel Services really are, and honestly, it's not really hard to root for Andy finally taking a stand. All in all, though, the Strucker storyline really feels very bland and repetitive, and I'm not sure Caitlin has a leg to stand on when she argues with Fade and Sage about whether they've "given more", considering the Struckers honestly just pick up and leave, only to come crawling back, every other episode. The show isn't really making their arguments hold up particularly well.
The Andy/Lauren is a bit more interesting, with Andy taking a more apologetic stance towards their terrorist ancestors, noting that maybe the Von Struckers aren't actually terrorists, but are freedom fighters who aren't afraid to get their hands dirty. Andy ends up idolizing the Frosts and Fenris, and while his arguments are kind of one-dimensional, actor Percy White manages to deliver them with enough gusto that a frustrated kid with reality-warping powers is definitely going to have. It's the same dick-headed cockiness that any teenager has, except Andy actually has the powers to back his bluster up.
Meanwhile, the assault on Campbell's organization as he talks to a Senator while giving a speech to a lot of rich people ends up being the stage for the far more interesting Mutant Underground storyline. And it's essentially whether the Underground members want to work with the Frosts. The Frosts are happy to play ball with not torturing and killing a bigoted jackass when asked to, but at the same time, their presence (and their inexplicable inaction throughout all this) causes the Underground members to go through a bit of a crisis. Marcos is the most opposed about working with the Frosts, while Blink and Thunderbird don't like them, but accept the fact that they needed allies. Polaris, meanwhile, is the most receptive. She puts up this huge front about telling the Frosts to fuck off, but it's clear that all the references to Magneto (who they also never actually say out loud) causes Polaris to... reject her father vehemently, but the seeds of doubt are kind of planted.
Polaris is perhaps the most fascinating of these characters. While Marcos is absolutely flat and the pair of Blink and Thunderbird go through a bland "I'm mad not because you did a bad thing, but because you lied" faux-conflict, Polaris's conflict of ethics and ideals feel far more genuine, making her eventual decisions in episode 13 far, far more relatable and understandable. We get to see a flashback of what appears to be a member of the X-Men called Evangeline (some lady with the ability to turn her hand into a devil hand?) telling Polaris that she's the successor of the X-Men, playing into the whole "X-Men Chose Us" concept of the Mutant Underground in a more genuine way.
And, of course, the Campbell mission goes awry. No one is really at fault, because Campbell holds a bunch of kids hostage, and no one present but the Frosts is going to shoot through children to get to Campbell, causing Campbell and the senator to run off and try to escape on a plane. All the while, Jace Turner, reduced to an uninteresting flat Mutie-Hating character, continues on his one-man pursuit to destroy the Mutant Underground with his Hounds, setting up the big fight scene.
And, well, it's an interesting fight scene that theoretically builds up on everything we've seen before. We see Turner face off against the mutants, fully consumed by hatred. We see the Hounds used against their fellow mutantkind. We see Polaris's little class of children help Reed, Andy and Lauren fight off the Sentinel goons. We get to even have minor characters Shatter and Pedro show off their powers (also some random huge mutant with super-strength that we've never seen before). It's all well and good, and has lots of tension as the mutants exchange powers and shit. Of course, Andy and Lauren end up using their hands-joined power-up to unleash devastation, covering their friends' escape, blowing up the mansion and killing a couple of Hounds.
And... they get off and rejoin their buddies off-screen. Okay, after a pretty badass power display, that handwave felt really dumb. Still, the action sequence was really good, with lots of great small moments (Reed's pep talk to the other kids, Fade and Caitlin's respect for each other, Andy and Lauren putting their differences aside for the moment) so I'll let that slide.
Again, Polaris and the Frosts still the lynchpin of what makes this episode so successful. While the Frosts are being prissy about missing the chance to kill Campbell, Polaris decides to take matters into her own hands. Partly manipulated by the Frosts and partly going through her own crisis of ethics -- especially confronted with the fact that there's so, so many racist fuckers ready to kill her and her people without a second thought, and Frost's constant repetitions of the "better us than them" mantra, Polaris ends up being so scared about bringing her child into a world with so much mutant hate.
She goes off to face off against the plane with Roderick Campbell in it, and while Blink, Eclipse and Thunderbird show up, Polaris wards them off with a chainlink fence, telling them that it's not Frost that's making her do this. It's her own will, and the scene of her ripping apart the plane is amazingly emotional. Again, the scene is made into a crossing-the-moral-horizon event not because she kills Campbell and Senator Douchehole -- because no sane person will shed a tear for them -- but because Polaris ends up killing a plane full of aides and whatnot in the process.
And thus leads to the final scene, a very powerful scene where the Frosts's main plan is revealed. Using Polaris as a new leadership figure, they show up in the Underground's new meeting ground, stating their plan to join and rebuild the Hellfire Club -- using ideals that's far more akin to the pragmatic Brotherhood as opposed to the pacifistic X-Men. It's a very powerful scene, with some of the minor characters like Fade and Sage joining the New Hellfire Club... and, of course, Andy. The Struckers have been inconsistent and problematic all season long, but Andy's frustration and descent into darkness is done particularly well, and none of the parents' "listen to us!" arguments work anymore. The final episode ends up with Andy and Polaris going off with the New Hellfire Club. Oh, and Jace Turner quits Sentinel Services, but I'd be lying if I said I cared about Turner at this point.
Overall, the ending two-parter is definitely exciting, especially in any scene involving Polaris and the Frost sisters. The action sequences here, particularly the last stand in the Undergrounds' base, as well as the attempted kidnapping of Campbell, and especially the emotional plane-wrecking sequence, are all done well. Of course, The Gifted has some really fundamental tone and writing problems that rear their ugly heads even now in the final episode, so it falls short from being great, but it's still definitely a very enjoyable finale with a far more solid emotional core in Polaris's story than I expected. Overall, the show has been rocky, but I'd argue that it really ended sticking the landing, and I'm definitely somewhat excited for the second season. Just... just maybe be less repetitive in the second season, yeah?
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