Rachel Bellwoar reviews the third episode of Marvel’s The Gifted…
Next to the first two episodes, ‘eXodus’ is a quieter hour of TV, but it isn’t without its moments. Discouraged by the Mutant Underground from calling on her connections, Kate sneaks out to her brother, Danny’s, for news about Reed. Lauren and Andy decide to tag along.
At first, I mistakenly thought Danny was Reed’s brother but his reception to his sister’s arrival is so unwelcome, it’s a wonder that she didn’t see it coming. He finally starts to change his tune after his front lawn gets sieged on by a bunch of well-armed neighbors, but since one of those neighbors (at least) was prepared to shoot his nephew, it wasn’t a moment too soon.
Following what we’ve seen so far, people only change their minds about mutants after spending time with them. It’s how Kate changed her mind, and it’s how Reed does, too. After being isolated in an interrogation room most of last week, he was steeled to tell Sentinel Services everything about the Mutant Underground. To his credit, it doesn’t take long on the outside for him to change his mind.
The trouble is most people don’t take the time to get to know mutants. Rather than spend all day depicting human’s being woke, ‘eXodus’ also makes sure to tackle what it means, as a mutant, to be surrounded by adverse rhetoric that says being a mutant’s bad. Being a mutant is something to ashamed of, and if you can’t hide your powers, you should agree to be locked up in a prison for the rest of your life.
Instead of ever getting a chance to view their powers in a positive light, you have mutants like Blink, who believe fear is a key ingredient to accessing their abilities. It takes time to work through that kind of stigma, and when Dreamer doesn’t have any time to give, she uses her powers as a shortcut. Sabotaging her love life in the process (it’s not every day you see a person draw up their own love triangle), Dreamer plants a memory in Blink’s mind so she can have a reason to fight. The outside world wants to sell all mutant abilities as dangerous but with Dreamer it seems more up to a mutant’s discretion to use or abuse.
Another mutant feeling the damage of an anti-mutant message is Andy. Lauren and Andy’s cousin, Scott, doesn’t mean any harm, but his decision to start calling Andy “Destructo” reflects casual bias. He honestly doesn’t pick up on the negative connotations, and this is after Andy asks him multiple times to stop. His words are almost more hurtful than those fueled by hate because he doesn’t think anything of them. Talking trash about mutants, or seeing them as a menace, is a normalized behavior, and that’s terrifying.
It’s not a coincidence, then, that the happiest scene this episode comes courtesy of a flashback. Featuring Eclipse and Polaris’s chemistry, it’s not easy to sell a couple that viewers have mostly known for being separated. The Gifted has been doing a masterful job and the image of their powers interacting deserves a bit of gushing over. Even without the explanation of the Aurora Borealis, and how light and the magnetosphere work together, it’s an image that visually represents their love more than any words could.
A change of pace from superhero shows, where you mostly come across new powers because of villains or antagonists, it’s nice to see The Gifted bulk up its world with powers that support the Mutant Underground (the invisible bartender being a highlight). The first step to standing up to hate is encouraging love, and introducing positive, mutant role models is a great place to begin.
Rachel Bellwoar
