Night of the Sentinels Part One

X-Men: The Animated Series was a lot of kid's introduction to the X-Men.

Yes, the comics had already existed for more than 20 years and there was Pryde of the X-Men, which some people had on VHS. (Nothing moves the Blob.)

But neither the comics nor Pryde had the ubiquity of Saturday morning cartoons.

Since 1992, there have been four different X-Men cartoons and five more movies. (X-Men Origins: Wolverine never happened.) Consequently, the average American can probably name twice as many X-Men as they can Supreme Court justices.

But there was a time when kids didn't all know Wolverine, Storm, Cyclops et. al. And, as I said before, the awareness started for a lot of kids with this show.

So how does Night of the Sentinels open? With Wolverine? Professor Xavier? Perhaps an iconic villain like Magneto or Apocalypse.

Nope, Jubilee. Oh, you've never heard of her? She's basically a character from Mallrats with sparkle powers.

In the comics, she exists because Kitty Pryde got too old for Wolverine to baby-sit; and, because someone in the Marvel office thinks Wolverine is adorable when paired with spunky teenage sidekicks, they created Jubilee to replace her.

So she's basically the Cousin Oliver of the X-Men.

And while it would be easy to mock the creators of X-Men: TAS for opening with a D-lister or (contrarily) laud them for introducing a point-of-view character that kids could relate to, I opt to do neither.

Instead, I just want to talk about Jubilee's outfit.

The 90s called... on an enormous cell phone... and said "rad."

Everything about this outfit is incredible. The sunglasses match the turtleneck. The rubber gloves match the raincoat which matches the belt buckle. And, you can't tell from this picture, but the jean shorts match the apparently denim boots.

I hope this makes you love Jubilee. Because it won't be her personality or skill set.

So Jubilee runs away from home because her foster parents found out she's a mutant and they don't know how to deal with it.

Little do they know... Jubilee's being followed.

When people say Santa watches you while you're sleeping, this is what I imagine.

Those are the evil glowing red eyes of a Sentinel, a robot designed to track and capture mutants. The most important thing to know about Sentinels is -- even though they are 30 feet tall and bright red and pink -- nobody ever notices them.

Somehow, these building-sized robots are ambush masters. As we'll see.

Also, they hate doors.

So Jubilee evades the door-hating Sentinel by not being home. And, if Jubilee isn't home, where is she?

Not the way you're supposed to blow the cartridge.

That's right, Robin Scherbatsky, she's at the mall.

And, because Jubilee is the early 1990s distilled into an animated character, she's in an arcade. (Thank goodness for Wreck-It Ralph or my as-yet-unborn children wouldn't know what an arcade is.)

So Jubilee accidentally uses her sparkle powers to destroy a game. And the arcade owner, distraught at his financial loss, asks Jubilee if she knows "how much that game costs?"

Jubilee coolly swigs from her soda and replies, "Yeah, a quarter."

Swiggin', brah.

The arcade owner, unamused by her jests, kicks her out. And she coincidentally runs into two X-Women on a mall run.

Do you see Storm's lightning-bolt earrings? Those are so beyond swag they have reached the realm of "aura."

Which is good because that Sentinel is back.

And he is not using your door.

So the Sentinel tries to kidnap Jubilee again, but now she's got two Rogue and Storm with her.

It's easiest to explain what happens next in photos, so we're going the picture-book route for a moment.

Storm is not amused.

First, Rogue and Storm realize their shopping trip is ruined.

Storm invented monologuing.

Then Storm warns the robot to step off.

Without watching the episode, I can tell you her exact words. She says, "Storm, mistress of the elements, orders you to release that child."

After which, Rogue encourages Storm to "lighten up on the speeches, sugar." If you've ever seen a single episode of this show, then you know Storm ignores Rogue's advice.

 A brief note. Storm is listed as 5'11'' and 127 pounds. Taking into account that every body is different, the weight range considered healthy for a woman of Storm's height is between 143 and 178 pounds.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, we should be worried about Storm.

When the robot ignores Storm's warning, she somehow changes her clothing using lightning.

Once again, this was many children's introduction to the X-Men, including my own. So I assumed that part of Storm's mutant powers was that she could magically change her clothing.

Later, this would play a key role in some stories when my family would play with our X-Men action figures.

For example, Storm would need the keys to the doohickey that will stop Magneto's evil machine from making it snow at the beach; but she left it in her other fashionable pantsuit. So what is she to do?

She magically transform her uniform into her pantsuit, which still has the keys in her pocket.

And the day is saved.

Next, Storm uses lightning to free Jubilee from the robot's grip; and that somehow doesn't kill Jubilee. Even though she's surrounded by metal -- metal that just got hit with enough electricity to rupture an enormous coil.

Dear Rogue, I love your headband. I am not being sarcastic.

Then Rogue punches the holy hell out of the robot.

Unfortunately, the combined efforts of Rogue and Storm are not enough.

Fortunately, this must be the X-Men's shopping day because another teammate is nearby.

Unfortunately, that teammate is Gambit.

Hey, Gambit, how can you help? Are you going to use your superpowers to kinetically charge the very ground the sentinel is walking on and, thus, blow him up?

Oh, you're going to throw a card at him. How do you think that's going to work out?

Exactly.

How ineffective is Gambit? So ineffective that Jubilee actually contributes more to the fight than him.

Wait. Do the sparkles come out of her hands or gloves? If it's her hands, how has she not burned her gloves off? Or her hands, for that matter?

So Jubilee uses her sparkle powers and then flees to the parking lot, where the robot follows.

You couldn't even go through the same window as before. You had to break another window.

The sentinel gasses Jubilee. But, before he can nab her, Cyclops shows up and blasts the robot to kingdom come with one shot.

Still a tool.

So, if we're rating the X-Men's relative worth, the equation looks something like this:

Cyclops > Rogue & Storm > Jubilee > Gambit.

Congratulations, Jubilee, one mission in and you're already better than Gambit. Bad news: You're not climbing too much higher on the Power Rankings.

When Jubilee regains consciousness, she is in the X-mansion. She sneaks out of her hospital bed and peeks in on a few previously unintroduced teammates.

This is Beast. The first words out of his mouth are, "It would be disconcerting if this were to detonate -- disconcerting, yet provocative."

He's not talking to anyone. He thinks he's alone. Yet he still feels the need to haul out the $5 words like "disconcerting" and "provocative." He sounds like that 6-year-old who just learned a new impressive-sounding word and he's going to use it regardless of whether or not its apropos.

"It would be gymnasium if this were to detonate, gymnasium but monogamous."

Maybe if Morph would have spent more time training and less time watching TV, he would have lived to see the second episode.

This is Morph. I don't think it's spoiling too much to tell you that he's not long for this world.

You can tell because he's wearing the generic blue and yellow uniform. It's the X-Men equivalent of a redshirt.

Professor Xavier has angry eyebrows.

Then Jubilee sees Xavier and Jean Grey.

I don't want to dwell on them because...

Shit just got real.

Jubilee stumbles upon the Danger Room, the X-Men's training facility. She finds Wolverine and Gambit sparring and misinterprets the situation.

Wolverine quickly gets the best of Gambit. (Duh.) But then Jubilee intervenes.

F'real, Wolverine sold that hit like a Dolph Ziggler.

For comparison purposes.

So the updated Power Rankings: Cyclops > Rogue & Storm > Jubilee > Wolverine > Gambit.

At this point, the team is introduced to Jubilee. Wolverine agrees not to skewer her, Storm gives a long-winded monologue about embracing powers and blah-blah-blah -- MISSION TIME!

The X-Men are going to break into the Mutant Control Agency -- an independent business that is providing information to the Sentinels. Their logic: they destroy the information; the Sentinels won't be able to find mutants.

However, while the X-Men are talking, Jubilee slips away to check on her foster parents.

But she gets ambushed... because she doesn't notice a 30-foot robot.

Sentinels are sneaky.

Wolverine decides to go after Jubilee. Cyclops tells Wolverine to focus on the mission.

Wolverine tells Cyclops where he can shove it. Then, he shoves Gambit for good measure.

This is the exact sort of behavior that makes the X-Mansion a hostile workplace.

So the X-Men, sans Wolverine, leave for the Mutant Control Agency. They use the mission as an opportunity to reminisce.

Rogue recalls how she discovered her power, which is to drain the power and life force of a person through skin-to-skin contact.

Her first boyfriend kissed her and spent three days in a coma.

Totally worth it.

 Also, Gambit gets hit by a tree branch.

 

That makes the Power Rankings: Cyclops > Rogue & Storm > Jubilee > Wolverine = Tree Branch > Gambit.

Next, Wolverine returns empty-handed; so he, Beast, Storm and Morph can break into the building. The rest of the X-Men will stay behind as serve as backup, if needed.

You break my window, I slash your door.

We don't get too far into this caper in Part One. Two things happen that bear mentioning.

One, Beast quotes Coventry Patmore while shutting down the building's security system. (And there is no freaking way I would know who Coventry Patmore was if it were not for the X-Men.)

"A minor poet for a minor obstacle."

Two, Morph speaks the words that guarantee his death.

"It looks like smooth sailing from here."

Either the Mutant Control Agency is guarded by redheaded triplets, or the character designer for this show got lazy.

See you in Part Two.

X-Men: The Animated Series -- The Title Sequence.

 You probably found this blog out of a sense of nostalgia. (Either that or you got lost on your way to the pornography.)

Somebody said, "I go where I want to go," and a wave of memories washed over you, forcing you to Google things like "X-Men cartoon," "Wolverine quotes" or "Gambit does not make TV dinners." But not "Morlock Christmas." Never "Morlock Christmas."

Never forget.

And it brought you here.

So you think, "I watched the cartoon as a kid. I have a passing familiarity with X-Men lore. I'm ready for the heavily annotated version of X-Men: The Animated Series."

But you're not.

I mean, we're dealing with some profound stuff here. We're talking layers on layers on layers. So before we get into "Night of the Sentinels" or that one episode where Jubilee spends that whole time complaining, you should consider the title sequence.

You may start humming the theme song now.

In 1992, this was pretty much my introduction to the X-Men. (I may have had some trading cards first. The timeline is fuzzy. I think I owned the cards first, but why would I buy the cards without the cartoon to indoctrinate me?)

So, basically, I was dependent on the title sequence to explain to me who the X-Men were and what they could do.

And, boy, did it steer me wrong.

This title sequence is a House of Lies -- a ridiculously awesome House of Lies.

We open with some establishing shots of Rogue and Storm flying alongside the Blackbird. The takeaway for a 7-year-old kid: These are the X-Men. Two of them can fly. So far, so good.

But then things started get confusing when we got to the typical roll call.

Your reaction when they cancelled Firefly.

First we meet Cyclops. The title sequence accurately displays him as shooting blasty things out of his eyes. But it also shows him being all tortured and alone on a mountaintop.

I hope you like this mountaintop, because you're going to see a lot of it.

So one could rationally assume from this imagery that Cyclops is some kind of angsty badass. Except he's not. He's a pedantic older brother mixed with an office dullard.

It would be more accurate to show him shuffling through paperwork, chastising Jubilee for running in the halls or explaining garbage-disposal etiquette to Beast.

 

Speaking of angsty badasses...

This is Wolverine. He's the reason that 90 percent of you are here. You already know his spiel -- big claws, heals fast, likes beer, goes where he wants to go.

And according to this title sequence, he shoots electricity from his claws.

Maybe I was an especially stupid child -- there is abundant evidence for this -- but I assumed that, because he did it at the beginning of every X-Men episode, Wolverine could generate wavy sparkle lines from his claws.

This got me in trouble on the playground a couple of times. A group of kids would be playing X-Men -- if you've never played playground X-Men, it's just a bunch of kids pretending to punch each other and screaming, "No, I'm Wolverine" -- and I'd be Wolverine (like every other kid) and I'd shoot electricity at some other Wolverine.

Then Other Wolverine would be like, "You can't shoot electricity. You can't be Wolverine and Storm."

And I'd be like, "Wolverine can do it to. It's in the cartoon."

So then we'd have to convene The Playground X-Men Caucus (also known as The Council of Wolverines and, maybe, One Rogue if Jessica Feels Like Playing Today) to discuss if the cartoon precedent withheld scrutiny.

(Like most playground games, X-Men was surprisingly bureaucratic and ended in caucuses far more often than melees.)

Ultimately, I was found to be in the wrong and received a demerit, meaning that I would have to be Gambit the next time we played. (The ultimate punishment was Professor X. You just sat there and thought really hard while the other kids ignored you.)

And we're back on the mountaintop.

This is Storm. She makes it rain on these hoes.

This is also the only time you'll see her use her powers without an explanatory monologue.

Who wears a belt with a bodysuit?

This is Rogue. If you are a heterosexual male, homosexual female or a bisexual either, you probably had a crush on her. (If you are a homosexual male or a heterosexual female, you probably still had a crush on Rogue.)

And what makes Rogue so appealing? The beguiling Southern accent? The headband? The skunk streak in her hair?

Yes, and --

That's right. She single-handedly busts up three-story robots. She's a beautiful bruiser -- like Wonder Woman with better hair and a less strippery costume. (Well, depending on who is drawing her.)

And -- seriously, guys -- did you see that headband?

This is Jubilee. While Rogue can destroy brobdingnagian robots by her lonesome, Jubilee is stymied by a fence.

That is all you need to know about Jubilee.

This man does not make TV dinners.

This is Gambit. You'd assume from the above photo that he can fly.

You'd be wrong. Remember, the title sequence is a lie.

Instead, Gambit can make playing cards explode with his hands. Actually, he can make anything explode just by touching it, but he always chooses to use playing cards; because what's the point of turning basketballs into bombs when you can carry around cards and make bad puns about them all the time?

All the freaking time!

Jean Grey's power is triangle.

You thought Jubilee was going to have the worst codename right?

Nope, there's Jean Grey. The sad thing is that's still a step up from her former nom de guerre of Marvel Girl.

She does stuff with her brain, but her most important function is that of the third point in a love triangle with Cyclops and Wolverine.

Wolverine's better looking but Cyclops has better credit.

Yeah, who could choose, right?

If he'd just finished that last semester, he could have been Dr. X.

I understand that telepathy is difficult to depict visually, but what is Professor X doing here. Using echolocation?

So Professor Xavier the leader of the X-Men. You can tell because they're named after him. If Cyclops were the leader, they'd be called the Eye Guys; Jubilee, the Mallrats; Jean Grey, something overly literal like Group of Colleagues who each Have a Genetic Mutation that Imbued them with Unusual and Unique Abilities that Are Sometimes Employed in the Thwarting of Evil.

That's everybody on the team... wait. What? I forgot Beast?

This is Beast. He needs glasses to read.

The title sequence ends with a symbolic game of Red Rover between the X-Men and the evil mutants led by Magneto.

Magneto was right

First, let's see the sequence in real time.

Now, let's break down the play by play.

Wait? Are they making Mystique play Red Rover in heels?

This is the villains' defensive line. It's comprised mostly of recognizable X-Men foes. In addition to Magneto, they are (from left to right) Juggernaut, Thunderbird, some pink guy, Pyro, Mystique, Sabretooth and Avalanche.

However, there's some oddities here. First off, Thunderbird's not a bad guy in the comics (or any other depiction of the X-Men.)

He's an Apache who got recruited by the X-Men around the same time as Wolverine and Storm but soon thereafter died saving his teammates from the U-Men. (I have no idea what the "U" stands for and I refuse to check.)

So Thunderbird just got downgraded from heroic martyr to nameless lackey in a title sequence.

And that's still better than most depictions of Native Americans in entertainment.

Never forget.

Also I have no clue who that pink guy is.

On closer examination, Mystique seems to be playing in ballet slippers.

OK, I have to question Professor X's strategy in this game of Red Rover. He has Jubilee going up against Juggernaut.

If you were playing to win, wouldn't you put the tiny teenage girl against the equally tiny pink guy as opposed to the unstoppable avatar of Cyttorak? Then, maybe you could swap in Rogue against their powerhouse.

I have two theories here. One, Professor X dislikes Jubilee as much as most of us and is serving her up as a sacrificial lamb. Two, Xavier's trying to tank the season so he can pick first during the next Red Rover draft.

Pick this guy.

The most important thing to remember about the title sequence is that it is dynamic. You can tell it's dynamic because everyone's radiating electricity and everything explodes.

Even the logo.

Also remember that none of this dynamism accurately reflects who the X-Men are or what they do once the theme music stops.

They too spend a lot of times in caucus.