"The HeX Factor"
Writers: Cydne Clark and Steve Granat
Director: Gary Graham
Original Air Date: April 20, 2002
Introducing: Scarlet Witch and Agatha Harkness
Synopsis/Review: This episode opens
in a mental hospital. Professor Xavier's being led by a security guard
to a holding cell, where the Prof is to wait until the patient is brought
to him. The guard sends the signal to another part of the complex to bring
the patient in, and a metal cage is opened, revealing to guards holding
onto a haggard teenage girl via poles hooked onto a belt on her straightjacket.
They start to slowly bring her along, but the girl starts to frantically
struggle to get free while they're doing so. They try to stop her, amidst
cries of "Don't let her move her hands!", but it's all in vain. The girl
DOES manage to get her hands free from the straightjacket, and melts the
clasps holding the rest of her straightjacket together...
Finally free, the girl pushes all of the
guards off her (wow!), and explodes all of the lights in the room just
by willing it, and the guards scatter from the sparks falling from the
ceiling. The girl melts the iron security door in front of her and escapes
down the hallway, collapsing in a hallway a little ways ahead of her to
keep more guards at bay. She makes her way to the room where Xavier is,
and, swinging the door open, stalks up to the Prof, grunting and waving
her hands...
Xavier manages to get
over his surprise in time, though, and sends a mental pounding to the girl,
sending her down to the floor in pain. Two guards run into the room, but
Xavier tells them that he's got it under control, and they leave. Xavier
reprimands the girl- Wanda- for this outbreak- he thought that she had
gotten over her anger at least this much. Wanda just glares at Xavier,
telling him menacingly to just "Get...me...OUT". Xavier sighs and tells
Wanda that he can't do that, at least not yet. He'd love to have Wanda
at his Institute, but she's simply to much of a danger to others at this
moment.
At this point, a doctor
comes into the room, telling Xavier that he's sorry, but the appointment
has to be cut short this time- additional MRIs on Wanda need to be taken.
Xaiver nods, and tells Wanda that she needs to behave better this time,
to which the girl reluctantly nods and continues with the doctor on their
way.
They make their way
through a security gate and continue on... but they pass the Radiology
room and keep going... Wanda turns back to the doctor questioningly, but
he just tells her to keep moving.
They quickly make their
way down the stairs, Wanda growing increasingly more nervous by the second-
and it shows, and things start to go haywire around her. The doctor tells
her to stop worrying, he's trying to get her out of here, but it doesn't
work much. They hurry out of the hospital, and an old lady in a cloak is
waiting for them next to a limo outside. She takes hold of Wanda and says
some cryptic words, which seem to calm Wanda down, almost putting her into
a trance of some sort...
The doctor morphs into
Mystique and tells the old lady to keep Wanda under control- she has some
other things to take care of, she says, morphing into a guard and walking
back into the compound...
Meanwhile, at Bayville,
Kurt's having trouble getting his books out of his locker, as it's stuck.
Kitty comes up, asking what's wrong, and Kurt tells her. Kitty gets the
books out of Kurt's locker via her phasing, and Kurt thanks her, promising
to repay the favor one day. Kitty abruptly stops Kurt, though, asking that
she does need a favor, actually... could he try one of these muffins that
she made in Home Ec. class?
Kurt eyes it questioningly,
but takes a bite- it's obviously horrible, and although he doesn't outright
say it to Kitty, it shows. He hurries off to get something to drink, dropping
on the muffin on the floor.. which promptly bounces back up about three
feet, heheh.
Outside in the courtyard
after school, Scott and Jean are chatting it up. Jean asks how's it going
with Terran, and Scott seems about ready to tell Jean that it's not working
out with her, when something intervenes, as it always does. This time,
it's Duncan, beeping for Jean to get into his car so he can drive 'er home
or something. And he won't wait, so Jean just frustratingly tells Scott
that they'll talk later before she leaves.
Later that evening,
at the Brothahood house, the male members are just hanging around, when
Mystique suddenly busts in, scaring the bejeebus out of them all. Toad
hops up to Mystique cautiously, wondering if it's really her- and them
Mystique grabs Toad by the shirt and hurls him into the wall- yep, it's
her... Heheh. All the male Brotherhood members promptly line up in front
of Mystique nervously, and Mystique yells at them for ruining her house
while she was gone. Blob responds that they were gonna clean it up.. sometime...
and Quicksilver quickly changes the subject, wondering where Mystique was,
exactly, during all this time, anyway. Mystique cryptically responds that
"All you need to know is I'm back", before launching into a tirade about
how pathetic the Brotherhood has become. And even worse, one of them even
joined the X-Men for a short while, she says, glancing menacingly at a
downcast Avalanche.
About this time, Boom
Boom comes down the stairs, mentioning snidely that this must be "Mystic".
This sets the two off to a bad start, and Mystique eventually asserts her
authority and tells Tabitha to move out of her room, NOW. Tabitha angrily
creates one of her booms, which Quicksilver quickly swipes out of her hands,
telling her that that is NOT a good idea. He tosses it to Blob, who tosses
it to Toad and pushes him out of the room. Toad shrieks as the boom explodes
in his hands in the kitchen. Poor Toad...
Anyway, Tabitha just
is finally like, oh, whatever, I never liked it here anyway, and goes upstairs
to pack her stuff.
After Tabitha's gone
back upstairs, Mystique turns her attention back to her four main members,
telling them that she's gotten a new recruit while she's been gone, and
she'd like them to meet her... Mystique stands out of the way as Wanda
walks up to the doorway. Pietro yelps Wanda's name in recognition, and
Wanda does the same in surprise. She quickly turns angry, though, and unleashes
her powers, and everything goes haywire. The Brotherhood members freak
out and run for cover behind the living room couch. Todd asks Pietro if
she's his old ex-girlfriend or something, but Pietro responds that it's
even worse- she's his sister!
Meanwhile, Wanda continues
her assault on... the couch, sending fans and everything spinning at or
around her. She demands Pietro come out, and Avalanche tells Pietro to
make her stop! Pietro retorts that why doesn't HE try to stop her, and
Avalanche starts using her powers- only to have Wanda "reverse" the powers
and send part of the ceiling crashing down on the Brotherhood. Toad hops
up suddenly and shoots some slime at Wanda, who sends it sailing right
back at him.. WHAM! Again, poor Toad...
Finally, that cloaked
old lady comes in, telling Wanda that that's enough- the lady repeats those
cryptic words of hers, and Wanda calms down again as the lady takes her
into the kitchen and closes the door.
Mystique just smiles
as she tells the stunned Brotherhood members that they've just experienced
a small portion of Wanda's power. Pietro immediately jumps out from behind
the couch- what the heck was Mystique thinking!? Wanda's incredibly dangerous,
he reiterates, and he's not exactly her favorite person...how does Mystique
even know that Wanda will cooperate!?
Mystique responds that
she'll cooperate- when the blue lady had entered the X-Mansion earlier,
she stole a disk of Xavier's past psychological examinations of Wanda.
Mystique knows why Wanda is so mad, and she says that Wanda will stay with
them because she can give Wanda the thing she wants most- revenge. Besides,
Mystique says, she's brought an old friend, Agatha Harkness (the old lady)
to focus Wanda's revenge into an unbeatable power.
Just then, Tabitha comes
back down with her stuff. Bye, she's outta here, too many women now. As
she leaves, though, you can see Mystique's bedroom explode from within
as Tabitha laughs...
Meanwhile, at the X-Mansion,
Kitty's trying to get Kurt to try another, newer, batch of her muffins
when Xavier informs them both that he needs them all to meet in the Library,
he needs to tell them something important. Kurt's like, ooooh well, you
heard him, bye! And teleports out- dropping the muffin again, but this
time... it makes a hole in the kitchen floor.. Kitty nervously giggles
and asks a nearby Scott if maybe he wants one...?
A little later, in said
library, Xavier explains to the X-Kids the situation about Wanda, and how
she had escaped earlier. He tells them that Wanda's a very angry individual-
and, after a "Why?" question from Jean, he explains to them that her father
abandoned her at the hospital several years ago when she became unmanagable.
Rogue says that what's the big deal? Wanda probably just ran away. Xavier
says that that MAY be the case, but he doubts it... he had a feeling Wanda
had outside help in escaping. But he'll keep the X-Kids informed as the
situation develops.
Back at the Brotherhood
house, we see a little training session between Agatha and Wanda taking
place in the backyard. Wanda has a circle of green flame around her, and
Agatha's telling Wanda something about "the flame in your anger, it will
extinguish with serenity". Apparently, Agatha has either illusionary powers
or powers similar to Wanda's, or something, I'm not that familiar with
Agatha. Regardless, Wanda can't manage to get over her father abandoning
her at the Institute, and eventually Agatha gives up.
Another short training
session takes place the following day, with some kind of illusionary crystal
acting as the former green flame circle (I know, this part's kinda confusing...),
and although Wanda manages to "keep it together" for a little while, she
soon loses it... again.
Later, Wanda's in the
bathroom, cutting some of her hair off so that she looks less unkempt,
when Quicksilver comes in. Upon seeing, him Wanda turns around angrily,
her powers cracking the mirror in warning. Pietro holds up his hands quickly-
hey, he's just here to talk, nothing else. Wanda angrily asks Pietro what
he wants, and Pietro nervously says that he just wanted to tell Wanda that
he didn't WANT their dad to take her to the hospital all those years ago...
he just convinced him that it was for the best...
We then go to a flashback
of Wanda's memory. A young Wanda- no more than eight- is crying for her
father to stay with her as she's dragged into the hospital by guards. Her
father- who we recognize as Magneto- stares impassively as she's taken
into the hospital, and the main doors close. Magneto then opens up the
car doors, and he and his saddened son (a young Quicksilver) get in and
drive off...
...We then come back
from the flashback, and Pietro says that he really didn't want Wanda to
be taken away- at all. But Wanda just comes back in his face with she doesn't
believe him- Pietro was just like Magneto, and he still is. She angrily
storms out of the bathroom, leaving behind a surprised/saddened Pietro.
He walks out and runs into Mystique, who had watched Wanda's little outburst.
Mystique says that Wanda does raise an interesting question- where does
Pietro stand, her or with Magneto? Pietro responds with a sigh that it's
Mystique, absolutely- Magneto hasn't been a good father to him, either..
Mystique responds that
that's good, as she thinks they're ready to take on the next phase of her
plan- they're going to take on Magneto. But first, she needs to run a little
"test"...
Back at the X-Mansion,
the main X-Kids are sitting at the dinner table/doing dishes when Xavier
comes up to them, telling him what he's learned via Cerebro. Wanda's joined
the Brotherhood, probably via Mystique breaking her out of the hospital,
and now the Brotherhood members are currently at them new mall, which is,
of course, closed this late at night. Scott responds that it's no problem,
they'll go over and put a stop to whatever plan the Brotherhood's cooked
up this time. He high-fives Kurt, and the X-Men go to the lower levels
confidentally to get in their uniforms.
Later, Shadowcat and
Nightcrawler get the other main X-Kids into the closed mall. They agree
to split up and search for the Brotherhood members.
Shadowcat eventually
comes across Avalanche, who hurriedly tells her to leave- he doesn't want
her to get hurt. Kitty responds that she is NOT leaving her friends behind
here- when she hears a yell from Evan nearby. She tries to run towards
the voice, but Lance blocks her, telling her urgently to leave! Kitty eventually
gets frustrated with Lance and phases through him, running off towards
the yell.
Meanwhile, Evan's confronted
Blob in a electronics store. Evan manages to distract Blob by turning on
the main power switch, though, which in turn turns on the TVs. Evan quickly
sends his spikes through the TV screens, shorting them all out and momentarily
blinding Blob as Evan escapes.
Nightcrawler meets Quicksilver
in a clothing store, and Pietro has some fun with Kurt by hurriedly dressing
Kurt up in a bunch of different clothes before Kurt can react, eventually
burying poor Kurt under a pile of clothes. Kurt teleports out of the pile,
though, and shoves a hat over Pietro's face and kicks him into a shelf
of shoes.
Meanwhile, Avalanche
confronts Jean, who just pushes incoming boulders right back at Avalanche
via her telekinetic powers. Scott helps her by destroying some, but Toad
manages to snatch Scott's visor off via his tongue. He plays keep-away
from Scott for a while, until Rogue catches him by surprise and touches
him, knocking Toady out. She gives Scott back his visor, who thanks her
and shoots an incoming Blob into a pond.
Yep, they've beaten
the Brotherhood... again. However, the escalator activates behind them,
and they turn around as Wanda comes down, in her costume. Wanda reaches
out with her powers to their fullest extent and all apeslag breaks lose.
Neon signs explode, pianos crash towards the X-Men, and things catch on
fire for no reason. What's worse, the X-Men can't combat the weird reality-
their powers are going all wonky! Scott can't control when he shoots and
when he doesn't, Kitty gets stuck during her phasing, and Kurt accidentally
teleports them both out of the mall! Jean can't touch Wanda, either, as
Wanda just pushes Jean away using some kind of "reciprocating hexing" powers
or some such. Eventually, so much destruction is caused that the mall starts
to collapse, and the X-Men have to beat a hasty retreat, much to Scott's
chagrin.
The destruction finally
ceases after they're gone, and Wanda stares after the retreating X-Men
as the other Brotherhood members catch up to her. Blob can't believe it-
"they" finally beat the X-Men! All thanks to the Scarlet Witch, Toad adds.
Pietro complements Wanda on a job well done- her father would have been
proud...
Oops, wrong thing to
say, Wanda immediately turns on Pietro- Magneto is HIS father, not HERS.
Magneto will PAY for what he did to her... And with that, she abruptly
turns around and stalks off in the opposite direction, leaving behind a
surprised/confused Brotherhood.
Meanwhile, the X-Men
solemnly walk off into the night, seemingly ignoring Xavier's X-Van waiting
for them, or the fact that Xavier says that it was more his fault, as he
should have taught them how to deal with someone like Wanda. He also mentions
that defeat determines their character more than victory... and apparently,
this was much needed...
Last Words: Wow! What an excellent episode! The extremely dark vibes that came off Wanda were well-done, and she's wonderfully written. As is Quicksilver's apparent concern over her well-being. This is the episode where Pietro especially gets to shine, as well- no longer is he always the snide jerk on an ego-trip. He's TERRIFIED of Wanda, and it shows. He's no longer his cool, confident self. Plus, this episode is the first one to focus on the Brotherhood! Can't beat that! And the lines, and dialogue were mostly well-written. My only complaints are that some of the Agatha Harkness/Scarlet Witch scenes are a little confusing, as neither Agatha's nor Wanda's powers are explained in detail. Also, a few corny lines were said here and there by the X-Men, but these small things are certainly not worth taking off a full point. My favorite episode of the second season!
Overall Rating: 10/10 ...Wow.