Tag: Amy Acker

The Gifted Season 1 Episodes 12 & 13: eXtraction & X-roads Recap

~ Metacrone

TG110EsmeLorna

The Gifted ends its first season with a splashy two part finale which forces the entire cast to reevaluate their beliefs. Except for Campbell. His beliefs are firmly set in stone, so the finale has other challenges in store for him, like proving just how evil he is. The Mutant Underground faces its worst crisis yet, and it’s not clear that the members have the will to keep the organization going after so many setbacks. The Frost Sisters continue to whisper in the ears of anyone who’ll listen, changing the course of the mutants’ lives forever. The good news is that The Gifted is already renewed for season 2, so we know that the mutants will be back next fall (ish) to continue the fight.

eXtraction

Let me say first, for anyone watching these later, that I’m making an educated guess as to where the episode break is. Be careful as you approach that point in the recap if you want to be sure to avoid spoilers! (Pretty sure it ends on the cliffhanger, but I’ve been wrong before.)

Four years ago, Dr Campbell’s brother was dying of cystic fibrosis, an incurable genetic respiratory disease. He’d already outlived his expected lifespan, and watching him slowly fade away was torture for Campbell. Campbell doesn’t want to leave his brother alone for the day, but his brother sends him to the presentation he has scheduled.

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The Gifted Season 1 Episode 11: 3×1 Recap

~ Metacrone

TG111Marcos&Lorna

The end is near! This the last episode before the two part season finale, so much of the time is spent getting all of the pieces in place for the big showdowns of the season. We’re given a proper introduction to the telepathic Frost Sisters, Esme, Sophie and Phoebe, who dress identically in the most adorable little tailored outfits and move in sync whenever possible. The Struckers decide to abandon ship, yet again, and, as always, destruction and Sentinel Services follow them. Campbell introduces us to the first fruits of his research using the information he gathered from Lauren and Andy, a huge manacle that mixes the blood of the two mutants who wear it, and brings their powers to an intensely destructive level.

The episode begins with a flashback from two years ago, when Clarice was on a movie date with a human guy. He convinced her that it would be okay to go out in public, but when they come out of the movie and into the parking lot, a mob wearing tshirts with giant crosses is waiting for them. They’re members of the antimutant group the Purifiers. They set Clarice’s car on fire and tell her to run, as her boyfriend quickly backs away, making sure everyone knows he’s human. That’s the end of that relationship. Hope she at least made him pay for the movie.

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The Gifted Season 1 Episode 10: eXploited Recap

~ Metacrone

TG110Esmex2

We lose some familiar faces on The Gifted this week, and gain some familiar faces as well. eXploited would have been the season finale under the original 10 episode order, and it feels very much like one. The stakes are high, loyalties are in question, and the game changes in the final act.

We start with a flashback to two months ago, when Esme was posing as a campaign aide to an antimutant senator, using the name Stacy. Or Stephanie, depending on who you ask. She’s just talked herself into a meeting between the senator and Trask Industries when she gets a telepathic distress call.

Her family has been discovered and captured. Sentinel Services knows where she is, and are on their way. Esme/Stacy scurries away from the Senator’s location as quickly as she can, while telepathic voices urge her to hurry and to find a way to rescue them.

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The Gifted Season 1 Episode 9: outfoX Recap

~ Metacrone

TG109DreamerBlinkFenris

This week, The Gifted continues to explore its central theme of family. The main theme of this season is the question of protection: How far is too far when it comes to protecting family? How much pain and suffering is it okay to cause others in your quest to save or avenge your own? How far can you go before you become the monster?

But there is also the question of who counts as family, and the necessity of making hard choices. Will you be able to live with yourself if you don’t go far enough to help someone, save someone, or catch someone? How do you find balance?

One of the best things about this show is that we’ve been given both sides of the conflict all along, and with extreme and reasonable characters on both sides. Jace’s need for revenge is very understandable, but now, after this episode, he’s faced with destroying a family that he knows, and a father who loves his children the way Jace loved Grace.

Except Andy and Lauren won’t die the quick, clean death that Grace did. They’ll be tortured and exploited for as long as Campbell wants to use them, then murdered, with their bodies left to rot somewhere.

You could see it in Jace’s face at the end of the episode, when he realized who he’d caught. He’d finally reached the point where he had to ask himself, “How far is too far?”

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The Gifted Season 1 Episode 8: threat of eXtinction Recap

~ Metacrone

TG108Reed&Johnny

This week is an exciting week for The Gifted, as we get a big mythology dump, including the answer to the question of how Lauren and Andy turned out to be mutants when there didn’t appear to be any other mutants in their family. The answers are game changing for the Struckers, the Underground, and Sentinel Services. Sentinel Services also tries its own game changing plays, with less success. Issues of trust and loyalty continue to be important.

The cold open takes place in London in 1952. We see newspaper reports of mutant siblings terrorizing countries around the world. The mutant brother, Andreas, is sitting at a desk, writing a note to tell someone that he and his sister are still in hiding. The phone rings, but no one except “the organization” should have their number. His sister, Andrea, runs into the room. We hear multiple vehicles speeding up to the building. They realize that they’ve been found. A large group of armed men break through the door. The siblings hold hands, and energy glows from their hands. The camera cuts away to the opening sequence as we hear screaming.

We jump to the Atlanta Underground way station and the present day. Reed is informing the rest of the family that the company his father worked at for 30 years, Trask Industries, seems to be the defense contractor that’s turning mutants into weapons that hurt other mutants.

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The Gifted Season 1 Episode 7: eXtreme measures Recap

~ Metacrone

TG107Carmen&Marco

This week on The Gifted, everyone follows a thread from their not so pleasant past. Carmen calls in the favor that Marcos owes her. Clarice discovers what happened to her foster family. Jace discovers the cost of doing business and getting revenge with someone even more unscrupulous than he is. And Reed is shocked, SHOCKED to discover that a homeless teen mutant had to turn to crime to survive. More classism and shaming ensues. I’m starting to wonder when they’re going to throw Reed out of the way station for harassment.

In an opening scene from 3 years ago, Marcos is meeting Johnny and Lorna in a rural diner to discuss the Mutant Underground. Marcos is dating Carmen and heavily involved with the Cartel, but he’s already smuggled a few truckloads of mutants across the border. Lorna and Johnny want him to come work with them full time in the Underground.

Marcos explains that he already has a job and a very demanding girlfriend. Lorna suggests that he get a new girlfriend. Sparks fly between Lorna and Marcos. Johnny reminds Marcos that the X-men are gone and it’s up to them to ensure that mutants survive.

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The Gifted Season 1 Episode 6: got your siX Recap

~ Metacrone

TG106LornaLauren&NewGuy

This week on The Gifted, everyone is very aware of their connections and responsibilities to each other. With Reed back in his role of patriarch, the Struckers struggle to figure out who they are in their new lives as fugitives. Lorna and Marcos embrace their roles as future parents in their own unique ways. Jace renews his commitment to avenging his daughter’s death, taking his mission to an even greater extreme in the wake of Dreamer’s brain scramble. And Johnny questions whether he’s the right man to lead the Underground. The X-men said a war is coming, and he couldn’t even keep his best friend out of the clutches of Sentinel Services.

Clarice realizes that her connection to the others has never truly existed at all.

We begin with a flashback to four years ago. Johnny and other mutant military veterans are in Phoenix raising money to help victims of the Dallas 7/15 incident. That was the peaceful mutant rights march that spiraled out of control until at least one mutant released their powers, killing many people, mutant and human, including Jace’s daughter.

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The Gifted Season 1 Episode 5: boXed in Recap

~ Metacrone

TG105Lorna&Marco

It’s payback time. Jace does not take the mutants’ escape lightly, as promised last week. The search turns into a man mutanthunt with Sentinel Services throwing every resource possible at it. The Mutant Underground has to stretch its own resources to the limit in response, and put aside differences until a better time.

But first, we see how Javert Jace lost his daughter. He was working in Dallas, but had taken a day off to picnic with his family in a park. There was a Mutants’ Rights March on the other side of the park that got out of control. Before Jace could get his wife and young daughter out of range, a powerful mutant let off a blast that knocked out Jace and killed his daughter. Jace has had a vendetta against all mutants ever since.

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The Gifted Season 1 Episode 4: eXit Strategy Recap

~ Metacrone

TG104Marcos&John

This week on The Gifted, characters are faced with decisions that force them to cross lines they don’t want to cross, and work with people they don’t want to work with, in order to successfully rescue Lorna and Reed. Some are faced with the negative consequences in this episode, others will face continuing consequences down the road. Jace is just plain old screwed, and even more determined to screw everyone else in the future.

We begin with a flashback to a rescue op two years ago, at a mutant relocation facility, somewhere in Georgia. John and another mutant, Pulse, wait outside a security fence for the mutants who are inside.

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The Gifted Season 1 Episode 3: eXodus Recap

~ Metacrone

TG103TBird&Clarice2

Welcome back to the Mutant Underground! Let’s see what those crazy mutant kids are destroying this week, and whether Reed is swinging toward the Vampire Bill or the Captain von Trapp end of the scale.

In a flashback to three years ago, Lorna and Marcos, who don’t seem to know each other well, are taking a walk outside of the compound. She explains that the building was condemned after the Oakwood riots. The National Guard stormed a nearby mutant orphanage and scared a kid into letting his powers get out of control. It destroyed the whole area.

Marcos wonders what he did in a past life to deserve the punishment of being a mutant. Lorna says she wouldn’t change the way she is for anything. She asks him what he did the first time he used his powers just for fun. Marcos tells her that he was homeless in Bogotá, he wasn’t doing anything just for fun.

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