The Gifted, Season 2, Episode 16: oMens
Well, I have to hand it to The Gifted... even if the second season is cancelled, they at least did wrap up things well by killing most of the bad guys and tying up most of the loose ends. And it's kind of hard to review this episode through that lens. Judging by the cliffhanger at the end -- the thought of more mutant uprising, and Blink showing up alive, with good hair, and asking the cast to follow her into a burning wasteland, clearly meant that the writers were planning for a subsequent third season. The fact that there are still plot threads left dangling -- like whatever the fuck was up with that music box and the Andrea/Andreas hair charm -- are pretty obvious. But all in all? I guess it's a pretty decent ending. It's such a shame that The Gifted never really ended up living up to its full potential, although for what it was, it's definitely been a charming ride.
The episode was quick to set up the confrontation between the good guys and the various bad guy factions, with the last episode getting all the pieces in place. Fade and the Stepford Cuckoos kidnap and forcibly mind-control Andy and Lauren while everyone else is getting ready to engage in a proper shoot-out with the Purifiers, and this ends up getting Thunderbird to finally break free from his "oh no I miss Blink" power incontinence to finally do some tracking, before deciding to charge straight into battle and take on an entire army of Purifiers on his own.
Acting as bait because he is borderline-suicidal and has nothing to lose is stupid and goes against everything Blink told Thunderbird about, but it's significantly less stupid than his comic-book death of "IMMA FIGHT A PLANE WITH MY BARE HANDS". And, credit where credit's due, that face-paint was pretty badass, and so is him just being a tank and beating up waves of Purifiers, and eventually teaming up with Erg, who talks him out of just giving up. Thunderbird punches Erg a couple of times to build up energy and allow Erg to blast the Purifiers, while Thunderbird embraces his X-Men codename and finally beats the fuck out of Jace Turner, that horribly-written character. That was the most satisfying beat-down I've seen in a while.
Meanwhile, the Cuckoos get Andy and Lauren and force them to use their Fenris powers to blow up a the Sentinel Services building. And by blow up, I mean "send a glowing white ball of light that burns everything but the bleached framework of the building". It's... it's an interesting visual effect. And I guess this was meant to set up something for the hypothetical third season, because after blowing the building up, it's sort of... not really brought up again?
The rest of the heroes show up and face off against the Cuckoos, who are very much ready to use Andy and Lauren to blow up our heroes, until Polaris talks to Esme and, of course, being an actual character, Esme realizes that, shit, maybe they're going too far with enslaving and murdering their own kind. Esme's heel-face-turn is pretty well built-up and kind of obvious, so her deciding to side with the Mutant Underground is understandable. And then Marcos just shoots her sisters in the chest, what the hell! And... and I'm surprised Esme didn't flip out right then and there.
With a couple of sub-bosses out of the way, the adults go off to bring down Reeva once and for all to stop even more atrocities from happening, because this is the night where Reeva's army of mutants (who we never see) will be out of the building. Doing... things that we never see the impact of. There's a shoot-out with Fade and the rest of the ship-killer crew in some loading bay, and honestly, the ship-killer crew is kind of shit, huh? That's like the shittiest usage of the powers of teleporting objects and blowing up objects, honestly. Also, Caitlin kills Fade as he tries to choke Reed.
But everyone's pinned down by the ship-killer crew except for Reed, who decides that, after flashbacking to a conversation with Lauren (which we saw from the first season) about purpose and whatnot, decides to be a hero, charge in solo into the elevator and challenge Reeva alone. Which is kind of stupid, but Reed at least recognizes his power is going to blow up out of control sooner rather than later, so. It's just pretty fortunate that instead of decaying the floor and missing Reeva entirely, Reed's power just straight up fucking explodes and decimates the upper half of the skyscraper. It's... it's a nice end for Reed, I suppose, who's been confused about his place in the world for a good chunk of this season. Not the best arc, and probably took up more screentime than I wished it would, but it was a decent exit.
And... and I don't think we get to see the ship-killer crew die, but the Mutant Underground and their new allies (Erg and Esme) regroup afterwards, with most of their enemies down and out -- Reeva, Fade and the evil Cuckoos are dead; Jace is probably in a coma; and in a short scene we see Benedict Ryan mind-controlled by Esme to confess on live television. The Underground decide to rebuild as a brand-new organization, which is just as well because this season really shows how incompetent their previous organization was. And... and, of course, we get that whole next-season-teaser with Blink being alive and a burning hellscape behind her.
Overall, though, it was... it was a pretty all-right finale, all things considered, for both the season and the show. The Gifted was always a show that had potential, but never really properly realized it, and even if it wasn't due to the circumstances of the Disney/Fox merger, I'd wager they would really have to step up their game in the next season or just fall into the same rut of talking big and not really delivering.
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