Evolution Reviews

[stormkeeper_lovedoris]

Episode: Spyke Cam

Brief summary: Spyke is given a videocamera by a teacher; meanwhile Sabretooth reappears and uses the footage taped by Spyke to his advantage.


- Dracula fans should rejoice. An earlier episode showed Rogue reading the book, and now the school play is an opera based on Dracula. (Which sounds even weirder when I type the words).

- Nine minutes in, I’m not too impressed here. We see a teacher lend Spyke a videocamera, Rogue and Kitty bitch at each other, Sabretooth – replete with creepy long fingernails - chase a skateboarding Spyke, the icky Toad posing for the camera, and Spyke peeping on a half-dressed Jean. Was this episode just a first draft?

- So Sabretooth had gotten a hold of Spyke’s camera and made a menacing clip thanking Spyke for showing him where Wolverine lives. We don’t see this until Wolverine gets his hands on the camera and watches it. Why didn’t Spyke see this before? (Too busy filming to ever watch what’s actually on the camera?) And the timing of Sabretooth’s attack on the Institute is pretty incredible too, occurring moments after we see the aforementioned video.

- I’m impressed with Storm telling Wolverine that this is not the place for his private war. I also enjoyed the shot of the X-men running out the main door and ready to defend their place against Sabretooth. Unfortunately these were about the only two moments in the episode I enjoyed.

- Was anyone else weirded out by Rogue and Kitty dancing in the woods as Spyke films them? I know it was part of a plan to trap Sabretooth but it just looked wrong.



- I should have an “awww” moment at Spyke’s touching video at the end, but honestly I think this episode is the corniest X-men thing I’ve ever seen.


Rating: One star. What were they thinking??


Episode: Survival of the Fittest

Brief summary: Mystique breaks Juggernaut out of prison while the X-men and the Brotherhood (assuming that’s what Mystique’s people are called here) are away at boot camp.




- Great “maximum security” prison Juggernaut is in. Granted Mystique can get to him because of her shape-shifting abilities, but why are there no live guards in the room or anyone monitoring the room on video?

- I enjoyed the Jean and Scott interaction in this episode. Early on, one of the Brotherhood cheats and Jean says, “Scott’s cool. He’ll handle it as a group leader should”. An instant later, Scott cheats too so Jean has to amend her statement, “Or not.” The scene at the end was good too where he welcomes her to “nudge” his conscience when needed.

- When I think about some fandoms that I’ve enjoyed, fandoms that had “good guys and bad guys”, I think that the successful ones have “bad guys” who are multi-layered and intriguing. Generally in the overall X-men realm, there are bad guys who have the multi-layered thing going on like Magneto. But watching Toad, Blob, Quicksilver, and Avalanche here, I think Evo really lacks this. Nothing about those four draws me in and still this far into the series, the four boys appear very one-dimensional.

- Interesting that in Evo, Xavier and Juggernaut have the same father. In XTAS, it’s made clear that they are actually step-brothers and not biologically related.

- Is Juggernaut voiced by the same actor as Wolverine?

- Xavier cues up a program called “Logan’s Run X13”. An homage to the old, low-budget sci-fi classic “Logan’s Run”?

Rating: Three stars – average. A few good interactions in here but nothing that’s making me feel it.