[6.0/10] This is another one that felt pretty empty despite nominally a lot of stuff happening. Wolverine fights his way through a bunch of Hellfire Club goons, but there’s nothing particularly clever or distinctive about it. Cyclops fights Mastermind in some kind of mindscape, but for being able to do anything, all the animators come up with is turning Scott into a squire boy and turning his enemy into a brick wall. Unfortunately unimaginative.
And of course, there’s a big battle between the X-Men and the Inner Circle, which isn’t any more exciting. Oh gee, Beast has found a clever way to fight Shaw by spinning him rather than punching him. Only Shaw can still absorb that power! Okay, sure. Look, I was a kid who watched this show. I enjoyed watching the multi-colored action figures smash into one another as much as the next young man. But revisiting the show as a grown-up, you kind of want there to be a little more than that, or at least more artistry and cleverness in the fights.
The one part of this I did like was the continued battle for Jean’s soul. As usual, X-Men is not exactly subtle about this, but it’s still neat to see Jean pulled back from the brink by her memories of Scott and Logan, with a connection that helps keep her from killing any of the X-Men off, despite Mastermind's instructions. To that point, there’s something at least minorly interesting about the coup within the Inner Circle when things go wrong, even if I find most of the members pretty interchangeable.
And while we only get glimpses of it here, there’s also something to Phoenix getting the “thrill” of doing evil things and developing a taste for it, despite Jean’s resistance. Again, it's a bit over-the-top, as usual but it’s a unique villain motivation -- someone who’s treated like a science experiment and a tool to use, only for her to go further than intended and become uncontrollable by the people who tried to manipulate her. There's a certain “be careful what you wish for” quality that I can appreciate.
Overall, a bit of a dull follow-up to a better introduction, but hopefully now that we’re in full blown Fark Phoenix mode (with a costume that looks less like some artist’s dream for fetish gear), business can pick up in the rest of the arc.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParentSpoilers2023-05-18T21:29:05Z
[6.0/10] This is another one that felt pretty empty despite nominally a lot of stuff happening. Wolverine fights his way through a bunch of Hellfire Club goons, but there’s nothing particularly clever or distinctive about it. Cyclops fights Mastermind in some kind of mindscape, but for being able to do anything, all the animators come up with is turning Scott into a squire boy and turning his enemy into a brick wall. Unfortunately unimaginative.
And of course, there’s a big battle between the X-Men and the Inner Circle, which isn’t any more exciting. Oh gee, Beast has found a clever way to fight Shaw by spinning him rather than punching him. Only Shaw can still absorb that power! Okay, sure. Look, I was a kid who watched this show. I enjoyed watching the multi-colored action figures smash into one another as much as the next young man. But revisiting the show as a grown-up, you kind of want there to be a little more than that, or at least more artistry and cleverness in the fights.
The one part of this I did like was the continued battle for Jean’s soul. As usual, X-Men is not exactly subtle about this, but it’s still neat to see Jean pulled back from the brink by her memories of Scott and Logan, with a connection that helps keep her from killing any of the X-Men off, despite Mastermind's instructions. To that point, there’s something at least minorly interesting about the coup within the Inner Circle when things go wrong, even if I find most of the members pretty interchangeable.
And while we only get glimpses of it here, there’s also something to Phoenix getting the “thrill” of doing evil things and developing a taste for it, despite Jean’s resistance. Again, it's a bit over-the-top, as usual but it’s a unique villain motivation -- someone who’s treated like a science experiment and a tool to use, only for her to go further than intended and become uncontrollable by the people who tried to manipulate her. There's a certain “be careful what you wish for” quality that I can appreciate.
Overall, a bit of a dull follow-up to a better introduction, but hopefully now that we’re in full blown Fark Phoenix mode (with a costume that looks less like some artist’s dream for fetish gear), business can pick up in the rest of the arc.