"Hated and Feared" Re-Watch: "Time Fugitives" Part 1 & 2

 X-Men

If you're an X-Men fan, you know they love time travel so if you thought that "Days of Future Past" was the last of the time travel episodes, oh buddy. Do I have news for you. What's better than one mutant time traveler? You got that right. It's two.

"Time Fugitives" Part 1

Rogue: "That ought to put that peckerwood in his place!"

Bishop: "SOMEBODY should."

In Cable's time, he is fighting Apocalypse when a temporal storm erupts and begins erasing people from time. His computer tells him that something has happened that is erasing his timeline. Meanwhile, Bishop is talking to Forge who has no recollection of sending him back to the past int he first place. And apparently, mutant kind is on the brink of extinction due to a virus that originated in... you guessed it... the X-Men's time. Bishop travels back to put things right, but doing so threatens to eradicate timelines? Which timeline should be preserved?

Why do people listen to Bishop?

Bishop's back and this time he's brought Cable with him. What could go wrong? So, I know that people seem to enjoy this two-parter, but I'm not super into either of them. There is a lot here that feels like we've seen it before. The Friends of Humanity and Graydon Creed are super one note. They are shouting the same stuff and their plots are all basically the same. It's so one dimensional that it's very like why should anyone care about this? 

I will say that I feel like whenever there is a FoH plot against mutants it's that one random mutant that always gets the shaft. The one that looks like Alf kind of. Like completely furry except for his face. He always has sunglasses on and the anteater beak. In the premiere, he's terrorized by the FoH and when they announce that mutants are being quarantined because of the virus, he's front and center in the quarantine house. This guy seriously can't catch a break.

I also have to keep in mind that this came out during the early '90's and at that time X-fans were obsessed with Bishop and Cable. Bishop debuted in the comics in 1991 and Cable in his Cable identity in 1990. They were fan favorites so it's completely understandable that the animated series would want to bring them in as much as possible particularly in the early goings of the show. I get that even if they aren't my favorite characters.

But like I said, a lot of these elements feel like they have been pulled from previous episodes. Bishop trying to wind down the riotous crowd and them just getting worse. Apocalypse masquerading as a doctor when in reality he is engineering things that will harm mutants. It's not bad, but it's just not great.

Grade: B-

"Time Fugitives" Part 2

Cable is torn. He is told that in order for his future to survive, the virus that Bishop and the X-Men just destroyed must infect humans and mutants in order to produce antibodies that will allow future mutants to survive. Can Cable really aid his mortal enemy Apocalypse and allow thousands of mutants to die all for the sake of his future? And will the X-Men and Bishop allow this to happen?

Apocalypse is such a size queen.

I think on the whole, this episode is better than the first episode. In a way, it is a re-tread of part one, but we get to see things from Cable's point of view. One of the first things I thought about when the episode was started was how willing Cable was to just go along with this plan to potentially murder lots of people. All because his little computer told him too. Now, I get why Cable would be kind of gung ho about this to start off. He doesn't want his future to cease to exist. He has a son named, Tyler. That was honestly the most difficult thing for me to wrap my brain around. A son named Tyler. Tyler. It was just so weird to me. This guys name is Cable. Don't forget we don't know his actual name yet. And he has a son named Tyler. With no mother? It just felt like kind of a way to give Cable a reason to be so just immediately fine with going back in time and allowing his arch nemesis to cause a lot of deaths.

To the episodes credit, it takes on my concerns head on. Cable is all in, but he is also like, wait a minute, maybe I shouldn't be all in on this. It's very wishy-washy and flip-floppy but at least they are trying to confront this and make it make sense with what we know of Cable's character.

There are some fun little Easter eggs for "X-Men" fans. Jean reads Cable's minds and learns some kind of disturbing information. Thirty five year old spoiler alert: Cable is the time displaced son of Jean Grey and Scott Summers. So, that's fun. And, I think is addressed in the show sometime down the line, but I don't remember right off the top of my head. I also love that Jean doesn't say anything, she just makes cryptic comments to Scott about it.

The solution to this problem is both clever and obvious. They infect Wolverine with the virus. Because of his healing factor, Logan creates the antibodies that the people of the future need to live. It's a win/win. Cable heads back to his time... and Tyler. And Bishop returns to the future we saw at the end of DoFP. So, alls well that ends well?

Grade: B

Next up, we get some Rogue backstory guest starring Ms. Marvel, Beast falls in love and the X-Men head to Mojoworld.

What do you all think of these episodes? Like I said, I know that people really like these episodes, so if you do, let me know why in the comments.