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Inferno Oh god, an Emma episode. Of the members of Mutant X we know the least about Emma’s powers. We know that her mind is capable of many things, and now it seems that those who die can affect her when she is emotionally open. “I think I died with him,” she says to Brennen. Shalymar’s fear of fire is brought to the front again and gives Emma the opportunity to talk “firemen” so we know that somehow she and Ray Larkin, the lead fire investigator that died, share her consciousness. Jesse gives Shalymar good advice about just accepting her fear of fire, that it’s a natural fear for her being a feral, and that stubbornness itself has killed more than it has saved. Unfortunately, Shalymar herself is too stubborn to follow the advice. She hates weakness, especially in herself. Emma takes charge of by forcefully suggesting the cover of reporters to get close to the deceased wife. And evidently all you need to make yourself seem like a journalist are glasses; they’re the perfect physical prop since that’s all Brennen does to look the part. Well, that a suit. I think they overstepped their bounds with wanting pictures of the house, under the guise of their reader’s interest. It seemed disrespectful to me to even ask. The mirror effect, Emma looking at herself, then changing to Ray and the glass cracking when she tried to touch it was cool. As though the two worlds aren’t supposed to interact. The writers need to work a little harder at masking the mystery. As soon as Ray’s brother arrived, I knew immediately that he was the fire mutant; the obvious problem with that was that he spoke so highly and so passionately about Ray. It was too much, all the guy needed was a neon star flashing above his head. Another point was that there had to be a reason why Ray went into the warehouse alone, the reason being he was trying to catch his brother, Billy. In an attempt to shift the suspicion from Billy to someone else, Shalymar accuses Inspector Sanders, a lifetime friend of Ray’s, that he had something to do with the fires. She jumped where there wasn’t really a clue for her to do so; the watch she saw Sanders pocket wasn’t enough of a reason to accuse a person of arson and murder. So the desperate attempt to make the storyline seem more complicated just added to the stupidity of one of the characters. The background of everyone involved with Mutant X is sketchy, and that’s fine, it allows different information to be added later if things are left slightly vague. I just think that Emma might have mentioned her mom being involved in the occult and deep spiritualism before, especially after Emma’s powers became stronger. While I like the holes in everyone’s pasts, I would rather not have facts revealed to me in the episode in which that fact is needed. Emma admits that this isn’t the first ‘ghost’ she has had an encounter with and Brennen’s concerns were well founded that his (Ray’s) emotions and agendas would cloud Emma’s head. That was very insightful and surprising coming from Brennen, it was something you’d expect Jesse to say, not hot-headed Brennen. The idea that the energy within a person’s body has to go somewhere after it dies, and that Ray’s spirit went into Emma, is a little farfetched. And this is a fantasy-type show and I should suspend my belief, and for the most part it’s suspended, but I had thought this happened to Emma because of her mutant powers, not some blending of energies. I also think it was odd, no matter how much Ray’s wife feels as though she knows Emma somehow, that she would invite Emma in and share her memories so easily. Isn’t the point of a comlink to be able to locate any of them at any time? I remember an ep in which they were following Adam until he took it off and they found it in the street. Don’t understand why they just didn’t do that with Emma. The voice of Ray coming out of Emma was a surprise and a pretty cool effect to add to the drama of the scene. I also like the irony that the brother of a fireman had the mutant power to start fires. While it was predictable it was still a nice plot point. Another event that came as no surprise was Shalymar overcoming her fear long enough to save Emma. We didn’t need the confirmation and heart to heart talk between her and Jesse to remind us of her fear of fires; the rescue at the end would have been less “cookie cutter” if it hadn’t taken place. I liked the follow through that was portrayed with Brennen, as he told Ray to move on. He was the reluctant believer in this episode, but he was there for his friend and that’s what matters. I enjoyed seeing the softer side of Brennen here, after so many episodes where he orders the others around as he has an attitude, it was nice to see. The closest relationship of the team seems to be Shalymar and Emma, they share many silent looks, sensitive talks and have an easy rapport with each other. Shalymar’s: “Fear of losing you was stronger than the fire… I don’t want to try that again..” to Emma is a clear indication of that. It’s nice, wish they would spread around the warm and fuzzies to the other team-mates sometimes.
Final
Judgment Another
episode that starts out with another secret caller from Adam’s past.
Seems like Adam has all these contacts and every one of them are
secretive and suspicious. During
this season, it seems that the crew of Mutant X no longer respect
Adam’s authority; always questioning him.
He deserves some of the questions, but they have all taken their
turns at pushing Adam into confrontations and justifications. “Power
behind the Power.” The
Tribunal uncovers the truth, punishes the guilty and prosecutes those
criminals that seem to think they are above the law.
I was surprised that he was assigned a lawyer, I really thought
it would one of those storylines that has some archaic proceedings with
no real search for the truth. Not
that the trial is legitimate but it seems to be trying to base itself in
some sort of organized law. The
chair of truth, or memories. Farscape
had a similar chair (the Aurora Chair) in which the seated goes through
great lengths of pain as memories and secrets are extracted from them.
This chair seems less painful but still exhausting.
The biggest problem with this is that the memories that were
being displayed from Adam’s memory... were scenes that Adam wasn’t
there (ex: Brennen breaking into the bank, electricity being sucked from
the power lines). Some of
them he was present for but many he wasn’t even in the area – the
editors and writers should have chosen the scenes better. A little side
note: The lawyer (Amy Price Francis) is from “Tracker”, the chick
that did the unspeakable and invited Cole into her life, car and
apartment. Shows that when a
show is filmed in So, this week
Shalymar is in charge, it switches week to week and lets hope that Emma
never has to take over - - one member with horrible fashion sense is
enough, we don’t want her inflicting her taste onto the others. Another
side note: this is the
second episode that Emma is on roller-skates.
Why does she keep wearing them?
Does she think it’s cute, or do the directors think it’s a
neat quirk to give that character? Either
way, it’s annoying, not a neat quirk or endearing trait. Brennen is
frustrated in every episode, add to that he’s whiny and impatient, and
you get a character that is not very likable.
And I like Brennen, but this season they’ve slowly changed his
character into something that isn’t all peachy.
They’ve changed everyone’s a little, Jesse is more the
computer-geek and researcher than always kicking ass; Shalymar is more
sensitive than before. I really
enjoyed the way Adam’s friend described Mutant X: “Made to order
super kids.” There are
kisses abound. Adam kissed
Shalymar, then Emma. He gets
around eh? Those
actions seemed very un-Adamlike. I’m
glad that a main evil is going to become a focal point again, the show
may have some sort of direction again.
I like the independent storylines but the show was a bit better
when there was a central bad guy. I
read in SciFi Magazine that the show is going to have a main bad guy, or
a worse enemy for the team. As
long as they can find a balance between storylines that involve the new
main evil and the “plots of the week” I think it will be good.
Once Around The plot:
Adam and Mutant X have to protect a key witness as he prepares to
testify against a big bad mob-type man.
The plot is a cookie-cutter one, seems that the idea always gets
around to all the shows, but what makes this episode stand out against
the rest of season two is that there is no hard-to-believe science that
we have to swallow to enjoy the show.
Sure, mutant abilities are always creative and need some sort of
suspended belief, but that is a given considering the nature of the
show. But there are no
robotic-like humans, or stretches of science in addition to the
abilities. I liked that. The best
sequence had to have been the scenes on the Double Helix as it
experiences problems with Brennen trying to fly it, Jesse trying to fix
it and Shalimar trying to calm their reluctant guest.
While the situation was dire the humor was there: side-long looks
between the team and then the outrageousness of the witness.
Funny stuff. Brennen,
once again, is my biggest problem. I’m
not sure when he turned into a whiny bitch, but he has.
It seems that the majority of the episodes lately have had
Brennen complaining about something.
Whether it be who was in charge, a teammate’s behavior or the
behavior of someone else. He
seems to find fault in everything and then has no qualms about stating
his problems. I’m
surprised Shalimar hasn’t punched him yet and told him to grow up.
Shalimar did give him some attitude but by the end everything was
ok again. If the writers
want to make one of the team have a conflict with the victim on the
week, they need to have some consistency and maybe spread the issues
around. Brennen has been
used too much this season already. What
about Jess, he hasn’t been used nearly enough with character
development storylines. It seems that
they are still flirting with the idea of putting Brennen and Shalimar
together – I don’t like it. This
is one of the shows where I really don’t want to see any of the main
people in a romantic relationship with each other.
I can’t explain it, but I think they are all better off
exploring the deep friendship and the problems can occur between people
with dangerous and stressful careers (if you can call what they do
careers that is <g>)
Under The
Cloak of War I’m
beginning to think that the members of Mutant X really had sucky lives
before coming together. Each
time it comes up, it isn’t a happy memory (normally).
Again they have to deal with something from Adam’s passed, the
son of a friend and co-worker wants revenge on Adam for destroying his
family home life. Adam
really needs to stop falling in love with woman that are bad for him.
Even though it seemed like a well-used idea, the fact that it was
the son and not the actual passed friend was the small twist that the
storyline needed. This was the
first episode where the science was toned down slightly, in my opinion.
The DNA seeking bullet was a tad unbelievable, but at least it
wasn’t man-made assassins. Shalimar
really takes her duty first as she sleeps with the suspect in order to
keep her cover. There is
still some room for doubt on whether she did or did not sleep with him,
but I don’t see any way that they did not. Jesse’s phasing skills
are being explored, I really like the idea of him being able to phase a
knife, I thought that was pretty cool.
And he was so nonchalant about the change of plans from a bullet
to a gun – he kept his head again. Brennan again
was whiny and antagonistic. During
the formal party he makes a comment about rich people to Jesse, who he
knows grew up in privilege. Even
after all this time Brennan still seems to hold that against Jesse.
He was the bigger man, again, and just let Brennan’s comments
not bother him and gave him tips on how to survive the dinner party.
Brennan’s over-protectiveness of Shalimar was uncalled for and
just a blatant attempt to create tension between the two characters.
It was brought up in another episode earlier in the season
(“Whose Woods Are These”) and I didn’t like it then, and was happy
to see that it just faded away, but now it seems it’s back.
And while Brennan’s attitude toward her going out by herself on
a mission could be explained as worry, the kiss that Shalimar gives him
can’t be construed as friendly.
Hard Time This is one
of those episodes that show you more to the characters than just their
normal, everyday thoughts and feelings.
This season has shown that Brennan has a short fuse when it comes
to Jesse. One wonders there
it comes from. In the
beginning of the series these two had a volatile relationship, always
seemed at odds with each other and attributed it to their vastly
different backgrounds. However,
now it seems that Brennan has a problem with Jesse fulfilling his
duties. Brennan’s
reluctance to have Jesse with him in prison makes sense on the one hand
since Jesse has no experience with prison life.
On the other, it seems like it was another case where Brennan
didn’t want to work with anyone else. In the
beginning of the episode Brennan tries to give Jesse some pointers on
how to stay anonymous, but it’s all tinged with a tone of voice that
seems to hold contempt and barely there tolerance, that it’s no wonder
that Jesse retaliated to the inmate in a physical way.
Once Brennan is juiced with the drug you find out where the
contempt is coming from. In
Brennan’s mind he feels that Jesse isn’t pulling his weight, that
Brennan always has to step in. Why
does Brennan think this? I
can’t remember anything that shows that Jesse was incompetent or let
down the team this season to validate Brennan’s words. There’s no
question that Jesse is hurt by the words and he immediately feels that
everything is his fault, not just the fact that Brennan was singled out
but for everything it seems. It
was hard to watch Jesse get beat up by someone who was supposed to be a
close friend. Jesse avoided
his powers for the most part as to not hurt Brennan and just took it
when Brennan laid into him. The
ending scene between these two illustrated how much Jesse was hurt by
what Brennan said and in the same breath he asks, Jesse then pushes it
aside when Brennan admits he doesn’t remember.
I think this dynamic could be explored more, maybe find out why
Brennan feels that way about Jesse, and what it does to their trust –
do they still have it? There are a
few things that were glossed over and should have been a big deal.
One was that all the people that attended the fight saw Brennan
use his powers. That would
get out into the public mainstream if not contained, but there were so
many attendees how would you contain the information?
Evidently the writers didn’t know either and they glossed over
it, which is ok. Emma has a
power that she only uses when forced to.
Is this because she has compassion for her would be victims in
regards to forcing herself into someone else’s head?
Sometimes I think that her power is overlooked a lot until there
is no other way out of the situation other than using her.
They’ve been overlooking her power since it mutated into
something more, the first season she ‘suggested’ many things to
various people all the time. Now it’s as though she’s afraid to use
it, but she should have the same control over it.
(I won’t go into when she used it on Jesse to make him forget,
that was wrong, and if the writers were smart, it would be brought up
again to create turmoil within the Mutant X ranks.)
Within These
Walls My biggest
problem with the Mutant X this season is that their characters are not
being consistent. I can
overlook the implausible science that has been featured in the episodes,
but the characters sometimes act so far out of their normal range that
it takes away from the episode. In
this one Brennan gets his ego boosted a little more by taking over the
command of the Mutant X team. Jesse
doesn’t put up too much of a fight, but does question why it would
automatically be Brennan. Honestly
it should have been Jesse, he’s the one with the computer and system
knowledge and who has consistently looked at this with a calmer head
than Brennan. Brennan, in
my opinion, over reacts to everything during the episode: Adam
concerning the intel for the mission.
He states that they need to know everything in order to do their
jobs. This is another case
where Brennan gets bent out of shape when a co-worker lies – does he
forget all the times he’s tried to ditch his team in order to fulfill
a personal promise? Everything
works out in the end, everyone’s safe, and Brennan realizes that
Adam’s job is harder than it seems.
The banter at the end of the episode between Brennan and Jesse
and their fighting together to save Adam, did lessen the harshness that
some of the their other displays had, but there still seemed to be so
much unsaid between them. And will the
team ever learn that when the past comes back, it’s always going to
haunt them? Each time it
happens, it’s never good, you’d think they’d start to learn. |
