Previously on our Summer TV Binge, we continued our coverage on beloved 90’s Saturday Morning Cartoon X-Men: The Animated Series. Two more stand-alones this week as well as an episode of Perfect Strangers where Larry and Balki visit a tropical oasis in the middle of Antarctica with dinosaurs. Let’s get right into it, true believers! Here’s five thoughts on “Repo Man” and “X-Ternally Yours.” And, I should hope I don’t need to give a warning for a twenty-plus-year-old-show but, as always, beware of spoilers.
1. Falafel Fight
Logan is in his feels again all throughout “Repo Man”‘s “Previously On” segment. Every bit of angst is replayed to bring viewers up to speed on the fact that this is a Wolverine-centric episode. On being called to Canada, he is attacked by Alpha Flight, who intend to bring him back to Department H. Seeing Alpha Flight is great if you’re the type of person who is really into The Great Lakes Avengers, or Justice League Detroit.
2. Claw Montage
“Repo Man” serves up a nice fan-service in its presentation of the Weapon X procedure and facility, tying Logan’s escape and his meeting James and Heather Hudson. But when Logan accidentally popped his claws I had a mental image of an entire comedic sequence where we would see him nearly harm himself or others and other amusing shenanigans.
“Could you pass the salt?” “Sure.” SNIKT. Heather pulls back her hand in time and nervously laughs
Logan is attempting to wrap the corner of a fitted sheet. SNIKT. He slices off a corner of the mattress. Heather nervously laughs.
Logan is petting James and Heather’s dog. SNIKT. The dog is unharmed but Heather’s internal dialogue is “I gotta get this motherfucker outta my house.”
I am available for scripting jobs.
3. Gambit’s Greatest Hits
Every moment of Gambit’s presence on the show is played out in less than a minute during the “Previously On” intro of “X-ternally Yours.” We are shown that Gambit blows things up with cards, speaks about himself in the third-person, flirts with Rogue, likes card puns, and occasionally has a mysterious past hinted at. Three episodes into the second episode of X-Men: The Animated Series and nearly thirty years after the character’s creation and you can still boil him down to a forty-seven-second explanation.
By the way, Cyclops is still bed-ridden from his injuries at the end of “X-Ternally Yours” and yet no one is pissed at Gambit, despite it being his fault. It isn’t really brought up at all. This man turned the Danger Room level to maximum on Cyclops who was training alone. Remy turns into a character from The Outsiders and Rogue is just “okay. Hey, Cyclops, he was spooked by something about his brother and went to go fight a rival gang.”
4. Savage Bros
Scully and Mulder continue their trek across The Savage Land in “Repo Man” and “X-Ternally Yours.” Anyone who has read the classic runs from X-Men history will recognize a number of connections in these dangerous jungles. Though not actually a Mutate herself in comics, Vertigo calls back to Magneto’s creation of them during the Claremont era. Vertigo herself is one of Mr. Sinister’s Marauders, who will be revealed to be the new leader of the Mutates. Sadly we learn that the Mutate’s most-feared enemy is the deadly wasp. So, they’re basically the same as regular humans.
5. X-Traordinary Cameos
The cameo list is a bit sparse over these two episodes. Besides the general appearances of Alpha Flight, Belladonna Boudreaux, etc we only have a few glances through Cerebro as Jean searches for the professor. Cannonball, Psylocke, Domino, Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch appear for the first time. Archangel is seen, who has been in previous episodes. Nightcrawler makes his first appearance but will receive a more prominent episode later on.
There’s lots more cameos and so much to love about this show in general and we’ll be talking about it more next week in our Summer TV binge. Join us, and as always, excelsior!
