"Hated and Feared" Re-Watch: "Proteus" Parts 1 & 2

 X-Men

We have another two parter and this one is an adaptation from the early run of Chris Claremont. How does the animated adaptation stack up to the comics? Let's get to it.

"Proteus" Part 1

Beast: "Professor, we found something! A worker was discovered severely weakened, but otherwise unhurt. Not unlike Banshee."

Professor Charles Xavier: "Did he say anything?"

Beast: "Delirious ravings about a big evil thing."

Wolverine: "Probably talking about Beast."

On Muir Island, Moira MacTaggart and Sean Cassidy aka Banshee are working with a powerful mutant. He escapes and Moira calls Xavier who goes to help along with Rogue, Beast and Wolverine. The team searches for the boy who calls himself Proteus. His strong telepathic powers and reality warping powers throw the team for a loop, particularly Wolverine, as the boy becomes fixated on finding his father.

Biiiiiggg Stretch.

So, the comic story that introduced Proteus was "Uncanny X-Men" #125-128. It happened near the beginning of the X-Men resurgence. It's one of the classic Chris Claremont/John Byrne stories. Jean has just been possessed by the Phoenix and is actually having tests ran on her by Moira on Muir Island. One of the things I love I about the early Claremont stories is how organic they felt. But that is really neither here nor there. I bring all this up because there are a lot of times when "X-Men: The Animated Series" does a great job of adapting these classic comics stories. Unfortunately, Proteus is not one of those times.

One of my main issues with this first episode is that a lot of it is spent in flashbacks showing things that we have seen in previous episodes. These episodes are 21 minutes when you remove all the commercials, so it's strange that they are taking up precious real estate with stuff they could have put in the "previously on..." Pretty much all the stuff that we see with Xavier and Amelia Voght we saw before and it really has no bearing on the story. We know what Xavier has been up to since he left Moira so why show that? To show that he has had failed relationships? Again, we know this and it's not adding anything to the story they are trying to tell in this episode.

Another issue I have with all the flashbacks is that it feels like they are there to show how in love Moira and Xavier are, but I still don't really feel it. There is all this talk about how Moira is the love of Xavier's life and I have to ask myself, how many "loves of my life" does Xavier have? I mean, we've met Amelia. And now Moira. And isn't he still with Lilandra? Like, who cares about this?

I didn't understand why there was all this secrecy around Proteus and his relationship with Moira. I felt like it was pretty obvious that Proteus was her son? And, wouldn't Xavier know that? I mean, even if he wasn't trying to read her mind, I feel like he'd just pick up a stray thought. Moira hiding this familial relationship just felt like a cheap way to insert unnecessary drama into a boring episode.

I did like how they showed Proteus' powers. Proteus has a really cool power set. He's able to warp reality and when they allow him to let loose it looks really cool. My favorite part of the episode is when Proteus attacks the X-Men. Though, there are some head scratchers there too. Like why would Rogue think it was a good idea to touch Proteus? Would what Proteus do to Wolverine unnerve him that much? More on that with the next recap.

Grade: D+

"Proteus" Part 2

Professor Charles Xavier: [Xavier would rather reason with Proteus than fight him.] "I have to try one last time."

The X-Men and Moira are working overtime to stop Proteus from hurting his neglectful father. Can the X-Men bring this family together? And can Wolverine get over what Proteus has done to him.

Censorship!

Y'all. I really struggled with writing about these episodes. They just feel so slight. It doesn't make sense to me why they divided them up into two episodes when there doesn't seem to be enough material there to fill a two parter. 

This episode is basically about Proteus and his daddy issues. And like, none of it is really compelling. Joe MacTaggart is a caricature of a person. He's basically any random member of the Friends of Humanity with a Scottish brogue. It just feels like everyone is dumb in this episode. They go and try to reason with him and think it will actually work. Of course, it doesn't. I'm not sure why anyone would think he would be a decent person. The resolution is so weird and rushed. Like one minute he's totally against his mutant son and then the next he's ready to be a good dad? I don't get it.

The Wolverine of it all makes zero sense to me. When you look at all the stuff that Wolverine has gone through it shocks me that this would unsettle him so much. I get it probably was a lot, but this is what is going to cause Logan to cry and literally run from the room when Proteus shows up. When that happened, I had to pause the episode I was laughing so much. It just felt like a giant joke to me. And that's not a great sign.

This episode is just awful. I didn't really like any of it. I don't want to talk about it anymore and I don't think you all want to read about it anymore. So let's just move on.

Grade: F

Next up, the High Evolutionary shows up and Nightcrawler is back.

I need to know what you all think? Am I just being way overly harsh with these episodes? What did you all like about them? Let me know in the comments.