"Adrift"
Writer: Greg Johnson
Director: Steven E. Gordon
Original Air Date: November 3, 2001
Synopsis/Review: This episode starts
out with Scott watching his brother, Alex, surfing it up on some high waves.
Scott's apparently on a short vacation in Hawaii to visit his brother.
Scott is watching Alex do some surfin' moves via his laptop, which is hooked
up to a miniature camera on the front of Alex's surfboard. Scott's computer
is also hooked up to the local news channel, and, according to the weatherman,
quite a storm is going to be hitting Hawaii pretty soon. Scott yells to
Alex to come in, as a storm's definitely heading this way. Alex just insists
on a few more waves- after all, a storm is known for breeding great surfing
waves! Scott gives in, and lets Alex do one last one. However, midway through
the wave, Alex wipes out (which I'm sure we all saw coming). Scott drops
the computer and runs out to the tideline, yelling for Alex... but he gets
no response...
Finally, Scott hears
Alex calling his name from the computer. He comes back to the computer,
and finds Alex clinging to his board. Scott asks Alex where he is, and
Alex replies that he got caught in a riptide- it's pulling him out to sea.
Scott immediately starts to contact the Coast Guard, but Alex (ever the
voice of reason) tells Scott to forget it, he'll make Havok look like a
fool. Just borrow a motorboat and come out and get him. In an unusually
unwise move for Scott, he reluctantly agrees and runs to the boathouse,
blasting his way in the closed place and hitching up a motorboat, and goes
out for Alex. After a while, Scott still can't manage to find Alex, so
he convinces the latter to shoot up a laser blast so he can find him. Alex
does, and Scott sees it, heading off in the appropriate direction.
Back at the X-Mansion,
Kitty is chatting with Lance over the phone in her room when Kurt walks
in. Originally, this wouldn't cause Kitty to hang the phone up, but Kurt's
now comic-book-esque muscular (i.e., almost inhumanly buff). Kitty asks
Kurt what the heck he did to himself. Kurt just smiles and talks about
how he's been working out, showing off his muscles- that is, until his
holowatch malfunctions and he's back to his "normal" self, teehee. Kitty
just giggles and tells Kurt to stop playing with his image inducer, but
he doesn't listen and walks down the hallway, messing with the holowatch's
programming as he makes his way to the kitchen. Kurt's image changes into
that of an incredibly obese Kurt when he passes Evan, who's definitely
a bit freaked out by this...
Anyway, Kurt makes his
way to the kitchen, where Jean's watching the weather report on TV. As
guessed, it's talking about the severe storm overtaking Hawaii. Kurt asks
if that was where Scott was, and Jean replies with an affirmative. She
tells him that Scott definitely wouldn't be out in that kind of weather,
but Alex? Well, he just might be (that's polite talk for Jean thinks Alex
is stupid... which is kinda is, really). Further conversation is interrupted,
however, as Jean turns around and comes face-to-face with huge-headed Kurt.
Guess it's back to the drawing board, Kurt...
Back with Scott and
Alex, Scott finally manages to find his little brother. Alex is really
tuckered out, though, from trying to fight the waves and firing the occasional
blast to tell Scott where he is. Scott helps Alex on board, but, wouldn't
you know it- the boat runs out of gas. Scott's had enough, and contacts
the Coast Guard. The operator answers, and Scott tells them their situation,
but before he can give the coordinates, the com cuts out. And, just to
make things worse, the boat's out of gas. Alex looks for a gas can, just
as a HUUUGE wave manages to form. Scott manages to cut it in half with
his optic blasts, inadvertently telling the far-away rescue team where
they are. Another huge wave comes up, though, this time directly under
the boat. As the wave crashes down, the boat simply can't take the strain,
and breaks apart. Both Alex and Scott manage to make it out okay, and cling
to a piece of the broken boat. Alex's a bit down by now (understandably),
and Scott does the typical reassuring "we're gonna be okay" thing. The
rescue helicopter then shows up- "See, what did I tell you?" They send
down a raft with a rope attached to the helicopter. Alex gets in it first,
and the rescue team starts to pull him up- until a stray lightining bolt
hits the helicopter, frying its systems. The helicopter plummets into the
ocean, Scott secretly managing to smack it back with his optic blast just
enough so that the rescue team can escape the helicopter safely. Alex,
with Scott's help, barely manages to get the raft off of his neck before
it pulls him down too far into the water. When they come up, though, they
can't find the rescue team...
Back at the Mansion,
Jean and Beast are watching Iceman, Magma, Berzerker, and Jubilee have
a snowball fight near the front steps. Iceman starts using his powers,
and the other three start responding in kind. Soon, it's a bit of a chaotic
"snowball" fight. Beast can't help himself, and joins in. Spyke comes out,
though, and tells Jean that there's something on the news that she needs
to see. Jean immediately comes in, where Storm and Xavier are waiting.
According to the news, Alex Masters and Scott Summers are missing in the
ocean during the storm, and an attempt to rescue them has failed. Xavier
immediately orders Jean and Storm to come with him. They're going to Hawaii...
Meanwhile, back in the
storm, the two "rescuers" are picked up by a nearby Coast Guard boat. They
tell their comrades that they're alright, but they can't find the boys
again.
Speaking of Scott and
Alex, their endurance is almost used up by now. Alex is getting really
cold and tired, and Scott's almost to Alex's point, as well. Alex figures
they're pretty much doomed now- and it just figures, as he's just applied
to have his last name changed back to Summers again. Scott, trying to sound
convincing even to himself, tells him that they may just pull through.
Unfortunately, a waterspout chooses just that time to touch down near them.
Scott and Alex try their best to outswim the pull of the waterspout, but
it's no use. Just as they start to get sucked into it, the X-Jet shows
up. Storm immediately uses her powers to weaken the waterspout some. Jean
uses her powers to pull Scott and Alex out of their around-and-around path
on the side of the waterspout and onto the Blackbird. Xavier immediately
takes them all out of there, and Jean and Storm help Scott and Alex to
the back of the Blackbird, covering them with blankets to help keep them
warm enough until they get to a place where they can fully recover and
rest. Scott and Alex share a "moment" of brotherly bonding as the Blackbird
skims above the clouds. Awww...
Back at the X-Mansion,
the snowball fight is over. Iceman, Berzerker, Magma, Jubilee, and Beast
are all excited. Beast admits that it's going to take a bit more than he
thought to be able to teach and guide Mutants...
Inside, Kurt comes up
to Xavier, asking is Scott is alright. Xavier responds with an affirmative,
and also hands Kurt back the fixed holowatch. Don't do that again, Kurt!
Kurt apologizes, and activates the holowatch, going into the medbay to
see Scott...
Jean's helping Scott
recovering, by hand-feeding him food or whatever. Come on, he's not THAT
weak, he seems to be doing alright enough to talk easily... Anyway, Scott's
definitely thankful for the attention and care, and Jean just says that
it's nothing compared to what Alex's parents are probably doing for him...
Kurt then comes in, with Xavier right behind him. Kurt asks how Scott's
doing, and Scott and Jean just look at Kurt with surprise, which turns
into a smirk. Scott responds that he's "alright.. Ma'am". Kurt's like,
wha?, and goes to a nearby mirror- hey, his hologram shows him as a rather
obvious female! Scott and Jean decide to crack up at that moment, and Xavier
says that he's sorry, he couldn't resist. Xavier, you have such a dirty
mind... Kurt smiles in an embarrassed way as we fade to black.
Last Words: This episode wasn't so much badly written as it was just unnecessary and... well.. boring, really. I mean, even the worst-written Evolution episodes were never BORING, just... badly written. "Adrift" just seems like it was a 10-minute story stretched into 30 minutes. Not...much...really...happened. There was no character development, no sides of characters we haven't seen before. No change in the overall story arc, no fleshing out of characters or their pasts. It was just... easily forgettable. I suppose this episode was just an excuse to get Alex to the foreground again. While it's nice to see a bit more of him, I wish they would have done it in a way that affected the story arc, or something. This just seemed more like a survival story you'd hear on the Discovery Channel than a sci-fi cartoon show. The bits with the snowball fight and Kurt's holowatch were the best parts, and they were very much side-stories. (Although we did NOT need to see Kurt as a female at the end. That was so much more disturbing than it was funny...)
Overall Rating: 5/10 Average