Time Travel...and Abuse
Another short one. I’m somewhere in Illinois and not watching TV, sorry ;).
X-Men 2.8 “Time Fugitives”
This episode is weird because it’s 2.7 repeated. Because time travel.
They stop the plague, but that destroys mutants in the future. Cable comes back to get them…well, initially to make the plague happen, but then he has a better idea.
Poor Wolverine, you’re a science project again.
Antibodies against the plague stabilize the mutant genome. Cable, apparently, doesn’t have the active antibodies. So he needed to expose a mutant…except that doing so would start the plague and risk killing the mutant concerned.
Enter, of course, Wolverine. Cable might have asked nicely.
Oh wait, it’s Cable, he doesn’t know how. He’s worse than his dad.
(And Jean now knows who Cable is, but isn’t telling anyone. Some viewers know. Those who don’t know the storyline might be able to guess…)
X-Men 2.9 “A Rogue’s Tale”
And now for something completely different. In Xavier’s absence, Rogue isn’t getting her telepathic therapy.
And that’s bad, because she has somebody else’s mind trapped inside her. Another one people who read or follow the comics will know. Ms. Marvel is still stuck inside Rogue.
Rogue would actually like to let her back into her body, but can’t.
But what this episode is really about is abuse. Mystique’s abuse of Rogue, specifically, turning her into her “daughter” and then using her as a weapon.
She takes advantage of Rogue after she’s thrown out by her dad for being a mutant.
This is one episode that, if you understand it, really leans into mutants as an analogy for queerness…except in the real world, the queer kid is more likely to be trafficked by the abusive street “parent.” Especially if they’re trans.
“You ain’t my daughter anymore” is beautifully echoed with “I ain’t your daughter anymore.”
I think this might be my favorite episode so far.