"On Angel's Wing" - X-Men: Evolution

Well now that we’ve FINALLY got Thanksgiving out of the way, we can focus on dropping hints about what we want for Christmas and searching our relatives’ houses for any signs of our presents.  Honestly.  What were they thinking, creating a holiday that didn’t involve buying lots of stuff and couldn’t be commercialized from here to the Negative Zone?  So annoying.

We begin in New York City, a.k.a. the home of the entire Marvel universe.  The snow is snowing, the Christmas tree is glowing, and Warren Worthington III is blowing… off calls from his parents who are apparently on holiday in England.  I guess it’s kind of excusable, though, I mean what kind of parents go on vacation for the holidays without their only son?  Well, maybe he’s like that kid from the Monkees Christmas special.



"You know I'm not a terribly good mah-jongg player.  I'd probably be bored."

Sadly, this episode is completely devoid of musical numbers...

 

For the X-fans in the audience (audience?  What’s that?), Warren will be immediately recognizable as Angel (or Archangel as he is occasionally called).  In the comics, Angel was one of the original members of the team, but in Evolution he is reduced to one-shot guest star status.  Even so, he’s got plenty to do.  Like saving disabled ladies from apartment fires. 

And you have to love the expression on the daughter’s face when her mom tells her “a real angel… with wings” got her out of the building.

                                                                                                                            

 “The fire destroyed all of your meds, didn’t it, Ma?”

Meanwhile, at the Xavier Institute, everyone is celebrating Christmas early since most of the students will be spending the actual holiday with their families.  All is merry and bright except for Wolverine cuz, you know, Wolverine.  Logan says he’s leaving because he’s got important things to do over the holiday, which… won’t really become relevant later, but anyway.  By the next morning, only Professor X, Beast, Cyclops and Rogue are left at the Institute.  Rogue is of special concern to Jean, who’s been crushing on Scott since day one but hasn’t said anything because dramatic tension, and now Rogue has been starting to show an interest in “Jean’s” guy.

 

“How dare you make a move on the guy that I want to make a move on but haven’t gotten around to yet!”

Cut to Central Park, where Warren is again on hand to do some superheroin’, this time in the form of stopping a mugger from stealing a guy’s briefcase. (Who steals briefcases, anyway?  What, does he have a thing for legal pads?) But there’s trouble brewing as Angel has a stalker waiting in the wings. *ba-dum-tish*

The pundits reporting on these incidents believe the angel sightings are all exaggerated, which is understandable since at this point in the show, the existence of mutants was still pretty much a secret.  Professor X, however, suspects that the heavenly hero is really a mutant and is concerned that the guy could blow their cover.  So he sends Rogue and Scott into the city to investigate the angel sightings, interrogate the witnesses, etc.  Why any of the witnesses let a couple of random teens into their home to talk about this, I don’t know.

During a break in the investigation, the duo stops in at a café for some chow and has a surprisingly deep discussion on religion and angels.  Granted, they can’t get too explicit because this is a kids’ show and X’hal forbid you pollute kids’ minds with serious discussions of religion, your own or any other, especially during a special episode devoted to a holiday that was kinda-sorta started by the religion in question.
 

You propagandizing zealot!  THINK OF THE CHILDREN oh wait

Maybe this is me reading too much into the episode, but earlier when Xavier says he doesn’t think Warren is an angel and Scott suggests it’s a demon instead, Rogue scoffs pretty definitively.  It’s easy to imagine her saying “There’s no such thing” instead of “Yeah, right.”  And now, in the café, Scott asks if she thinks it could be a really-real angel, and Rogue scoffs again, saying “Come on, you don’t think… You do!  Oh wow!” And when Scott hedges/implicitly admits he believes in angels, Rogue is quick to apologize.  It really does sound like Rogue is an atheist while Scott is struggling with his own Christianity in light of the tragedies of his childhood, which nearly broke his faith, and the miraculous reappearance of a younger brother he thought was long dead, which rekindled it.  I could be making all of this up, but I like to think it was intentional, especially given that so many people in this episode—including your typical crazy homeless man on the street yelling at everyone to “REPENT!”—believe that Warren is an angel for reals.

Anyway, the stalker follows Warren—who is now in a costume for some reason, so we’ll call him Angel now—to the Brooklyn Bridge and uses his unspecified mutant powers (okay, fine, it’s Magneto and his magnetism) to cause a car accident that sends a van careening towards the edge.  Warren saves the family inside, but Magneto then pushes the little girl over the bridge and makes it look like Angel did it.  Even though Angel manages to save the girl a second time, the formerly grateful crowd is quick to turn on him, and Angel runs away while the girl is taken to a hospital.

Scott and Rogue have stopped in at a music store where they overhear some people talking about the latest angel sighting and go to the hospital where the girl was taken.  At the hospital, they just miss Warren but chase him to a nearby church.  (WELL DUH.)  Before they can get there, Angel is set upon by Magneto, who tries to “convince” him to join forces.  Angel is less than impressed but Magneto, uh… insists.

 

 It’s hard to tell in this picture, but Angel has stolen the arm stripes from Cyclops’ new costume, which were in turn stolen from Nightwing’s new costume.  Actually, since this episode aired well before either costume change, I guess Nightwing and Cyclops stole both of their arm stripes from Angel.  The more you know.

Anyway, Rogue and Cyclops show up in time to save the day and a big fight ensues, culminating in a victory for Magneto, who then just… sorta leaves.  I like to think that he suddenly remembered it was the holidays and that he still hadn’t finished his Christmas shopping yet.  Or his Hanukkah shopping, if this is the Jewish version of the character.  I can’t remember if they ever bring it up.

Back at the hospital, Scott and Rogue offer Warren a place at the Institute in the middle of the hospital waiting room.  Some secret!  Yes, let’s discuss our “abilities” and stuff in normal voices in a public place!  Genius!  Probably because of this carelessness, Warren decides to continue going it alone.  And, of course, it turns out the girl is going to be just fine.  Nothing you couldn’t have seen coming a mile away.  We end with a montage of all the X-Men with their families and awww darnit!

Why’d you have to drag Spyke into this?!  He wasn’t even in this episode, not even during the present exchange at the beginning!

Okay, for those who haven’t seen the show, I’ll try to keep this brief: one of Evolution’s main characters is Spyke, whose real name I can never bother to remember, and he is supposed to be Storm’s nephew or something.  If he doesn’t sound at all familiar, it’s because he was made up exclusively for this program.  I’m not saying original characters can’t be entertaining (hi there, Harley Quinn), but Spyke is just irritating.  However, in the interests of maintaining the Christmas spirit, I’ll save that particular rant for another review.

This episode is pretty much par for the course for this show: fun with interesting characters and predicaments.  I guess the fight scene may have gone on a bit too long, especially after it became less of a fight and more of a midair chase, but I’m not really complaining.  The only thing I am complaining about is Wolverine, who shows up briefly at the end playing pool alone in a bar someplace.  Probably Canada.  This really feels like it should have been an episode of its own--how Logan deals with the holidays.  Obviously he does not deal very well, and maybe this scene makes sense in the larger context of the season that I’ve forgotten after not watching it in so long, but still. 

I also would have liked to get a little deeper into the religious themes that I’m pretty sure they intentionally teased us with, but as it is, it’s a solid Christmas episode that addresses legitimate questions about mutants’ place in the world and the best way to go about presenting themselves (or not presenting themselves) in order to lead the most fulfilling lives they can--questions that have been raised before and will be raised again with few defintive answers given.  And really, nothing says Christmas so much as badass angel mutants.

Next Time: Aw, man, who invited the Phantom Stranger over for Christmas Eve?!  You know he's just going to do his Ghost of Christmas Past shtick again!

Images from X-Men: Evolution, The Monkees and A Charlie Brown Christmas