"Hearing Things"
Writer: Devin Grayson
Artwork by: Udon Studios
Month Published: January 2002
Takes Place: Before "Strategy X"
Synopsis/Review: This episode begins
with Jean and her parents at the Xavier Institute. They're in the main
room, discussing with Xavier, Cyclops, and the others what to do with Jean's
emerging Mutant powers. Apparently Jean's father has known Xavier personally
for sometime, which is why Xavier was able to grant them an audience so
quickly. (Scott, meanwhile, is completely mesmerized by Jean.) Xavier lets
Jean stay at the Institute from now on, and he asks a bumbling Scott to
show Jean around as he assures her parents that their daughter will be
safe here. What's interesting during this whole sequence is that we see
thought bubbles as well as speech bubbles. In fact, there's many, many
more thought bubbles than speech bubbles- so many, in fact, that's it a
bit hard to keep track of the actual conversation going on. I think that
this bit is BRILLIANT, and shows the reader how hard it would be to have
Jean's powers without a good degree of control.
Meanwhile, at Bayville
High, Todd Tolensky is watching some guys play basketball. He hops up,
wanting to play, but they turn him down, for obvious reasons. Todd is at
first a bit put-down by the rejection, but he quickly thinks that, hey,
maybe if he shows these guys how good he can be at basketball, they'll
like him better! So he steals the ball with his tongue, hops up to the
basketball hoop with no problem, and slams the ball in. It doesn't work,
of course, and just grosses out the guys more. They tell him to get lost,
and he angrily hops off, splurting one of them with slime before doing
so. (The guys apparently aren't surprised that he's a Mutant.)
In school, Scott is
leading Jean down a hallway, telling her various odds and ends about Bayville
High. However, Jean is having the same problems she was having earlier-
what with not being able to control whose mind she is reading (and we're
treated to the "onslaught of thought bubbles again"). She eventually just
runs out of the school, weeping, leaving behind a confused Scott.
Jean runs to the Institute
and enters the main hallway, collapsing onto the stairs and weeping. Storm
sees her entering the Mansion, though, and follows her in. They have a
brief discussion, in which Storm tells Jean that she's not the only one
who has trouble tuning stuff out- Storm notices whenever there's any change
in the weather nearby at all. Storm urges Jean to talk to the Prof when
she has any trouble at all...
Later on, Jean and Xavier
are having a little one-on-one power-tuning session, in which Jean is using
her powers to "see" with her mind's eye what shape is on a card that Xavier
is holding. Scott comes in, wanting to ask Xavier about something, when
he notices they're busy. He's about to leave, when Jean comes up to him
and apologizes for her sudden outburst earlier that day at the school.
This discussion leads to them getting a little....intimate... until Scott
tells her about an English class field trip the next day, and if she's
going to go. They ask the Professor, and he says yes.
The next day, Scott,
Jean, and some other students (including Todd) are on the bus, and it starts
off towards its destination. Jean starts talking to Scott about how the
Professor has helped her to "modulate" her powers into an "all-or-nothing"
gig right now- which means she can have it either completely on or completely
off currently, she can't choose to read a select person's thoughts and
no one else's. Jean just wants to go back home, though, she just wants
to be normal again.
Suddenly, a huge long
green thing shoots out from the back of the bus, commandeering the steering
wheel. Scott, completely confused as to what's going on, tells Jean to
hit the "on" switch on her powers, and Jean manages to find Todd Tolensky's
thoughts, right as he hops up to the drivers' seat. Todd spits a bunch
of slime at the driver and takes over the steering wheel. Scott runs up
to Todd and urges him to stop, he's endangering everyone- but Todd says
he doesn't care. Scott starts to take over the steering wheel, but Todd
refuses to give it up, and the two wrestle for control. However, an oncoming
truck nearly hits the bus as it swerves off onto the side of the road.
It's about to fall off a nearby cliff, but Scott slices down a street light
with his optic blasts, and the street light slams into the side of the
bus and tips it over right before it's about to fall off the cliff.
Scott and Jean crawl
out of the bus through a window and help out the other students- that is,
everyone except Todd, who's trapped under the light pole in the driver's
seat. As they near Todd, he tells them not to bother, he's not worth it...
but Jean uses her telekinetic powers to lift up the pole long enough for
Scott to pull Todd out. Todd half-heartedly thanks them for their help,
but Jean picks up a stray thought from him- "Why couldn't you have just
left me there?" She's a bit surprised by so suicidal of a thought as the
paramedics arrive and carry Todd off on a stretcher. Scott tells Jean that
they need to talk to the Prof ASAP, so they can see if Todd can join up
with the Institute or not, and they leave.
Later that night, Jean
and Xavier are having a talk, and Jean thanks Xavier for all his help.
She's having a much easier time controlling her mind-reading powers now.
Scott comes in and mumbles something ("Wow", which is what he's been thinking
in thought-bubbles ever since the beginning of the comic), but Jean thinks
that she accidentally picked it up via her thought telepathy again- that
is, until Xavier tells her Scott actually SAID it, and they all have a
good end-of-the-story laugh.
Art Comments: The art in this one wasn't much different from the last two in terms of quality, unfortunately. The cover art was a bit worse, though, in that it looked like a regular panel of a comic instead of a cover page that was spent more time on. (The cover, by the way, shows Jean on her knees and holding her hands to her head in the middle of a school hallway, with Toad watching her.) I'm reeeally not fond of how Udon draws Toad and Jean, though. They just... don't really LOOK like them. I mean, with Cyclops, Storm, and the others, even though they had an animeish "tint" to them, they still looked like the same characters. Although they have the same hair color, clothes, and whatnot, Todd and Jean just LOOK different than their show versions, almost like they're look-alike wanna-bes or something. Meh.
Last Words: This one is probably
my favorite comic of the series. Although some things, such as the whole
"bus-hijacking" scene, certainly felt rushed, and the art was very mediocre,
I loved two things in particular. The first, and one that I've already
discussed above, is the way the panels were laid out when Jean was having
trouble controlling her mind-reading powers. Having all those thought bubbles
with a few actual speech bubbles spread in between them made it hard to
follow the conversation, which is a GREAT way to show us how hard it would
be to concentrate on an actual conversation if you could hear everyone's
thoughts.
Secondly, I really liked
Toad's characterization in this comic- we see a completely different side
of him here. Now, many people think that Toad's characterization in the
comic is very inconsistent with the way he's portrayed in the show, and
I'd have to agree- at least, with how he's portrayed in the show LATER.
Pay close attention the the first episode of X-Men: Evolution, "Strategy
X". Toad is decidedly different there than he is in the rest of the series,
where he becomes more of a goofy, fun character. In "Strategy X", as well
as this comic, Toad "plays it cool", even though he's really not. He's
not nearly as happy-go-lucky as he is later on in the show, and he is,
in fact, a tad depressed at his social status. Yet, later on, when the
Brotherhood has more teenage members in it than just him, he becomes happier!
I think that this is because he finally found a place where he fit in among
Avalanche, Blob, and the others. But this early in the game, Toad is alone,
a freak all by himself. And it would be very unrealistic to be so light-hearted
in a situation such as this. That's why I LOVE Toad's two-sided characterization
like this. All he wants is some like-minded, freaky friends, and he's happy.
And that's what he gets, later on down the line.
However, like the last
comic, this suffered from some inconsistencies when compared with the show-
for one, Scott and Xavier apparently meet Toad the first time in "Strategy
X", but if we go by the comic, then they should already know him by the
first episode. Also, just like the last comic, Mutants are apparently known
at this time in the comic series, even though it's been made very clear
that they are not publicly known in the first season of the television
series. Meh.
Overall Rating: 8/10 Great