Runaways in back for season 3! It’s bigger! It’s bolder! It’s…ending. But that won’t hold us back from having a great time watching. This show has been one of Marvel’s strongest for two years now and this season seems like it’ll be bonkers in all the best ways. So watch with us! We’ve got prophecies, cool weapons, and evil witches to spare.
1. Wayward Son
This episode gives us a real look at the man of the hour (well, 50 minutes), the Son. He’s a bad dude according to everyone- someone who relishes in causing pain and suffering in anyone he can. Just in the first five minutes of the show, he negotiates with the Magistrate over Leslie and her unborn child, lies to Leslie about being Alex, and kills a guy for the sake of free donuts
Rhenzy Feliz is clearly having fun playing the bad guy here and that inherently makes this an interesting performance to watch. The Son isn’t the deepest villain (“Bad to the Bone” might as well be playing every time he does something bad) but that’s kind of the point- he’s evil because he likes it and that’s a lot more dangerous than the rest of the family.
2. Making Weapons and Googly Eyes
The best subplot of the night is pretty easily the continuation of Gert and Chase’s drama. I’m not really into stan culture but oh man does this couple make me reevaluate that stance. Gregg Sulkin and Ariela Barer have an easy chemistry and paired with performances that carry the weight of the pair’s history, every scene that focuses on them sings more than anything else in the show. Their storyline this episode, building weapons that will inhibit the Magistrate family’s powers is simple but they make it into something magnetic; they compliment each other perfectly in this process and they’re clearly deeply connected to one another. Later on, before the whole team heads out on the big mission of episode 4, Chase confesses to Gert that he loves her but she doesn’t respond. It’s heartbreaking- she feels the same way (she says as much to Old Lace a couple of minutes later) but she can’t tell him. We all know where their story is going but I’m enjoying the ride. The potential behind will-they/won’t-they stories is wildly exciting and I’m savoring every sweet second of it.
3. Welcome to Babytown
One of the biggest events of the episode is Leslie giving birth. After the Son brings her to Tamar’s house, she sends Tamar away, sending the Son into full scary villain mode. Tamar promptly returns and takes him down but then he gets right back up and knocks her out! But then the Runaways show up! So he runs! And gets caught! But then talks Nico into not killing him! And then the baby is born! Her name is Elle. It feels kind of like watching a tennis game, with every plot development that benefits one side immediately followed a different plot development that benefits the other. Also, it feels really weird to be rooting for Tamar in this situation. I mean, she’s responsible for the death of Alex’s mom and just an episode ago that was portrayed as a tragedy. Catherine Wilder was certainly no hero but the idea that we’re supposed to turn around and actively celebrate Tamar without interrogating that at all feels a bit strange. We get some great Xavin development here as well, most importantly that the prophecy she needs to fulfill isn’t actually about Karolina- it’s about Elle. Leslie’s father (founder of the Gibborim Church) also wrote the prophecy, this one predicting that a great warrior would protect a child of the Magistrate and a human. It turns out the love that Xavin is supposed to feel isn’t romantic, it’s maternal. This is definitely interesting progress and it’s yet another departure from the comics that feels pretty deeply interesting. It would be nice if the developments had a little more time to breathe but hey this is a short season and fast plotting is definitely better than decompressed plotting.
4. Runaways? More Like RunTowards, Am I Right?
As the Magistrate family is powering up their portal, the Runaways show up in true scrappy Power Rangers form, each with an inhibitor weapon in hand. The sequence is an illuminating one, sending each member of the team to fight their parent (read: parent’s possessed body). Gert immediately throws a dagger into the Bride’s chest which is awesome but then she just keeps playing with a butterfly knife in a vaguely threatening and pretty quickly gets taken down; but then Molly steps in to save the day! At face value, that’s a predictable plot point but it shows that Molly is willing to fight the Magistrate family with everything she’s got, even if it means attacking her adopted mother. Nico has a fight with the Daughter, who says that Tina’s mind is gone (the development doesn’t get a ton of play here so hopefully it’ll be addressed meaningfully in the future) and the Daughter wins without too much effort. Chase’s confrontation is with Karolina’s father who’s in his father’s body, which is way trippier than anything else going on here. The whole sequence is fun but in retrospect it kind of brings us nowhere. Ultimately, the Runaways end up using the portal to send Xavin back to her planet with Elle, after which they’re immediately cornered by the Magistrate family.
5. Morgan le Finally
It’s no secret that I’ve felt that the Morgan le Fey stuff has been the weakest aspect of this season by a long shot. It’s felt shoehorned in and is so different from the rest of the show that I just haven’t been vibing with. Finally, though, the seeds they’ve been planting pay off at the Magistrate family confrontation. This episode, Nico gets another visit from Morgan le Fey, who tells her some more stuff about untapped power, then says the Staff of Destiny is still alive and ominously touches Nico’s sternum. Any comic fan could tell where this was leading to, the coolest moment of the episode. Under an all out assault from the Magistrate family, the staff emerges from Nico’s chest and Morgan le Fey teaches her a spell to send the family away. It’s crazy, it’s exciting, it’s not something that can be critiqued properly because it’s cool magic and also we don’t really see much of the fallout. After that, Morgan le Fey appears at Robert Minoru’s hospital bed, waking him up and telling him there’s work to do. It’s exactly the type of exciting potential that this storyline needed and I can’t wait to see where it goes from here.
