Since I’m not too depressed to do this on election night, here’s a recap of the latest adventure from your favorite band of C-list mutants!
NOTE: For the sake of clarity, I’m using the characters’ hero (or villain) names, instead of switching between them based on context. It should make it easier to keep track of a sizable cast, and I hope using their code names doesn’t prevent you from connecting with these very human characters.
This flashback features the Frost sisters at a young age. They’re kept locked up and forced by a creepy guy in a lab coat to perform “exercises” like figure out where a man is hiding his mutant children with their mind control abilities. We cut back to the present day when they’re running their own tests with Reeva on Polaris, Andy, and Rebecca in the Hellfire Club’s version of Cerebro to prepare them to take on a S.W.A.T. team. Polaris shows Reeva some attitude, venting about her absence and lack of forthcomingness about the Club’s larger plans. She threatens to leave if she isn’t given more information.
Caitlin tells Lauren she’s recovered from her fight with Andy two episodes ago and says they’re going to meet with a doctor at the mental hospital where Andy’s new girlfriend stayed to figure out why the Hellfire Club wants her. Reed wants to go with but Caitlin says they need to get his long-dormant powers under control, indicating the side effects have gotten worse and pushes him to let Thunderbird help him get them under control.
Reeva complains to the Frost Sisters about Polaris’ dissonance. They explain she’s used to being a leader of the Mutant Underground and doesn’t like being left in the dark and say they need to trust her in order to not lose her. Reeva gives them permission to share more but based on a mysterious phone call she takes after they leave there’s reason to believe there’s information even the sisters aren’t aware of.
Thunderbird tells Reed the key is to get his emotions under control. He gets him angry to get his Reeds powers to manifest, making him burn through the radiator he’s touching. They’re interrupted by news of Purifiers bombing a sanctuary church and go to help the mutants who had to evacuate. There, one of the leaders, Shatter, talks to Reed upon hearing about his difficulty with his powers. He describes shooting himself in the head because he felt like a monster after waking up with mutant powers and how it disfigured but didn’t kill him. The lesson: the more you reject the things you can’t face the worse you make it.
Esme Frost takes Polaris out to see their target: a bank owned by Creed Financial a company that funded mutant slavery and pushed anti-mutant bills through the government, with hands in local Purifier groups. She goes on to explain that Creed Financial is the group that held them and forced them to what was seen earlier in the episode and worse. It’s also revealed that the three of them are clones.
Reed is speaking with Thunderbird and Eclipse, asking if the Purifiers bombed the sanctuary why were no mutants hurt. They realize it was all a trap when they’re like thirty seconds away, which is some really fortunate narrative timing. Jace Turner says through a megaphone they’re surrounded. His fellow Purifiers want to murder all the mutants, not accept their surrender, which surprises him but really shouldn’t since they all had seemed to own semi-automatic guns to bring with them on this mission.
Polaris hears Esme humming the song she sings to her baby and realizes she’s been in her baby’s head. She starts choking Esme with her own necklace and threatens to kill her if she so much as looks at her kid again, seen by Reeva and the other two Frost sisters.
Caitlin tells Lauren she still feels like she can get through to Andy, but Lauren counters by sharing the psychic dream she shared with Andy where he seems full-on evil douchebag, saying he doesn’t want to be saved. They meet the doctor from the mental ward, asking about what happened to Rebecca, saying they’re family members. The doctor is noticeably scared and Lauren hears her calling the police. Lauren breaks her phone and orders the doctor to tell them about Rebecca. She shows them a video of her “dimensional manipulation” abilities that turned a hospital worker’s insides out and says she knew they weren’t family because Rebecca killed them all. That explains a lot because only a psychopath could be romantically interested in Andy.
Reeva and the other Frost sisters are furious at Esme for losing Polaris’ loyalty. They need her for their plans tomorrow. The other sisters and Reeva choose to just take over her mind. Esme, hoping to keep that from happening, reaches out to Polaris, saying she only read her baby’s mind because it was the first time she’d ever felt love, which… yeah. Esme proceeds to share more about her past, explaining there were originally five Frost sisters but they were killed when the three began their escape. She describes feeling death, the pain, the terror when her sisters die and she’ll do anything to protect Polaris’ daughter from that.
The Mutant Underground begins plans have Blink teleport them away but before that happens the Purifiers throw gas canisters into the building, rending basically everyone who isn’t a named character on the TV show and Blink unconscious. They learn of a way out, which is made possible by Reed melting down a wall with the powers he’s been suppressing while Shatter runs out to distract the Purifiers, ending up a martyr.
The head of the local Purifiers wants to celebrate the taking down of the mutant faction with Jace, but Jace was sad about their comrade who died trying to kill a lot of mutants. The Purify tells him they inspired a lot of people and that Shatter was one of the mutants who was supposed to have died in Atlanta. So Jace now knows he was right that they’re still alive, which can only lead to bad things unless you’re a human supremacist. You’re not, right?
Caitlin says it’s not Lauren’s job to bring Andy back, it’s hers. Lauren says that if he won’t come back on his own she’ll bring him back herself. It was exactly as cliche as it reads, sorry. They come home to Reed, radiating heat, saying he can’t turn his powers off.
And that’s it for the episode. Not particularly good, to be honest, but that kind of makes these reviews more fun. Hope you feel the same and see you next week!
