oMens
"This is the fight of our time, Cait. I can't just sit by on the sidelines."
Written by Matt Nix
Directed by Robert Duncan McNeill
Directed by Robert Duncan McNeill
Reed: You can’t build a nation on the murder of innocent people.
Reeva: Read your history books, that is the only way you can build a nation.
Reeva: Read your history books, that is the only way you can build a nation.
Reeva turns the Purifiers on the Underground, while the Underground decides to mount a last-ditch assault on the Inner Circle.
Tropes:
- A Death in the Limelight: As soon as there is a second flashback after the usual opening one, you can tell that Reed bites it in this episode.
- All Your Base Are Belong to Us: Reeva tips the Purifiers off to the Mutant Underground's hideout in an attempt to wipe them out for good.
- Armor-Piercing Question: When the Underground members reach the Cuckoo sisters and the captive Strucker siblings, Lorna asks Esme if mentally coercing the siblings was any different from what she and her fellow triplets suffered as children. Esme's crisis of conscience is enough for Marcos to blast the other two and free Lauren and Andy.
- Asshole Victim: While the circumstances were horrible, the destruction of Sentinel Services headquarters is still no big loss. In addition, no one mourned for Reeva when Reed destroyed her.
- Batman Gambit: Reed confronts Reeva alone, gambling that she'll try to kill him with her sonic scream, thereby destabilizing his powers and releasing all his stored energy at once, blowing himself up and her along with him.
- Big Damn Heroes: Erg comes to John's help against the Purifiers.
- Bittersweet Ending: Reed's dead, but so is Reeva, putting a stop to her plans of destroying Washington DC. Various mutant groups are looking to the remnants of the Underground for leadership, hinting at a revitalization of the group. Blink is also alive, though it's hinted that their reunion comes with its own problems as she prepares to take them somewhere.
- Brainwashed: The Frost sisters force Andy and Lauren to tear down Sentinel Services headquarters.
- Call-Back: Reed remembers the enmity between him and Fade.
- Chain Pain: One Purifier tries to restrain John with a big chain. John, being much stronger, just yanks the chain from the Purifier and employs it himself.
- Corrupt Cop: The cops are willing to look the other way and have the Purifiers kill the Underground as payback for Ted Wilson's death.
- Curb-Stomp Battle: Despite getting shot a few times, John easily tears apart the Purifiers in the initial fight. Afterwards, however, he is riddled with bullets and barely gets away. Had Erg not found and helped him, he probably would have died.
- Decapitation Strike: Reed asks if killing Reeva will end the Inner Circle. He ultimately sacrifices himself by relinquishing control of his powers to do the deed.
- Deliberate Injury Gambit:
- Reed deliberately goads Reeva into using her power on him. Since he already has barely any control over his power, he gambles that completely losing control would release all his stored energy at once. He ends up vaporizing her and the upper floors of the building.
- Erg asks John to hit him to draw out his Counter-Attack based Eye Beam powers, which he uses on the remaining Purifiers.
- Draw Aggro: John draws the attention of the Purifiers away from the rest of the Mutant Underground so they can escape.
- Engineered Public Confession: Esme forces Benedict Ryan to confess to his leadership of the Purifiers on live television.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Esme, once again, to the point of finally pulling a Heel–Face Turn later.
- Flashback: To 4 years ago, with Reed becoming a prosecutor for mutant crimes after witnessing the 7/15 incident on TV and an apparent attack on his daughter during a friend's party (which was actually Lauren's own power awakening).
- Freudian Slip: Rather than the usual phrasing of "your grandfather and his sister", Reeva comes out and calls them "your grandparents."Reeva: You know, your grandparents understood what it takes to create a homeland. Such a shame that you never could.
- Forgot About His Powers: Lorna is extremely ineffective during the whole episode, most notably when the Purifiers have them surrounded and she doesn't even think about just taking all their guns away. This is handwaved as them having set up overlapping fields of fire and snipers, but she could have disarmed them from the apartment if she wanted.
- Get It Over With: Jace begs John to kill him after the latter has him pinned to the ground with a knife drawn, not so much for an honorable death as it is to be reunited with his daughter. John doesn't give him the satisfaction, as he is seen getting treated for his wounds at episode's end.
- Good Cop/Bad Cop: Esme apologizes to the Strucker siblings and tries to convince them to help them willingly to ease the pain, while Sophie and Phoebe outright enjoy torturing them.
- Guns Akimbo: Caitlin fights with two guns during the climactic battle.
- Heel–Face Turn: Esme is seen with the rest of the Underground at episode's end, having presumably joined them for real.
- Heroic Sacrifice:
- John takes on a suicidal mission to distract Jace and the Purifiers, and would have been killed had Erg not intervened.
- Reed gives his life to kill Reeva and destroy the Inner Circle.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Reeva using her destabilizing sonic scream against the already unstable Reed, causing him to completely self-immolate and kill them both.
- Human Shield: John uses a Purifier like this against the hail of bullets.
- Improvised Weapon: John throws a mailbox, and steals the chain used against him and uses it to dispatch a couple more Purifiers.
- It's All My Fault: Lorna beats herself up over having helped Reeva so long.
- It's Personal: Between Turner and John. Both men are hellbent on payback towards each other, and John figured his distraction would be more effective because of how Turner would react.
- Karma Houdini: Heather, Tico and Mark apparently all get away in the end.
- Killed Off for Real:
- Fade gets shot by Caitlin, having given away his position by choking Reed.
- Reed dies in a Heroic Sacrifice against Reeva, taking her with him.
- Last Kiss: Reed shares one with Caitlin before running off to the elevator to face Reeva alone.
- Let No Crisis Go to Waste: Reed has known he will eventually die, and his control over his powers is already worsening, so he uses it to his full advantage by taking Reeva down in the process.
- Let the Past Burn: Before leaving, the Underground burns all the files on their fallen mutant friends.
- Loophole Abuse: The Purifiers already know about Erg's power, and know well enough not to shoot him, but that doesn't mean Erg can't draw energy from attacks taken from elsewhere (in this case John) and blast them all the same.
- Neutral No Longer: Erg decides to join the fight after spotting a wounded John. The first thing he does, knowing the Purifiers already know not to shoot him because of his power, is to get John to hit him instead in order to charge his eye, which he uses to blast the Purifiers, leaving only Jace standing for John to take on.
- No Body Left Behind: Reed explodes, completely vaporizing himself and Reeva in the process.
- No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: John gives Jace a major beating, but stops short of killing him.
- Not Quite Dead: Clarice steps out of a portal during the final scene, alive and well.
- "Not So Different" Remark: Lorna manages to convince Esme to stop going along with her sisters' plans by telling her that she is not acting any differently than the people who forced them to do things with their powers they didn't want to do.
- Oh, Crap!:
- Turner, once he sees John approaching.
- Reeva, when she realizes how badly she screwed up by making Reed's power go out of control.
- Pre-Sacrifice Final Goodbye: Before going off to his confrontation with Reeva, Reed gives a Last Kiss to Caitlin.
- Sequel Hook: Blink shows up in the final scene, alive and with new control over her power, to show the Underground something at the place she came from.
- Storming the Castle: The Mutant Underground attack the Inner Circle's headquarters in order to prevent their mass attack on DC.
- Straight for the Commander: Knowing he can't hold off the inevitable for much longer, Reed uses it to maximum effect by going straight for Reeva.
- Suicide Attack: Reed allows himself to self-destruct in Reeva's presence to kill her.
- Superpower Meltdown: Reed's final fate. He had been anticipating it for a while, and he makes sure to take Big Bad Reeva with him.
- Taking You with Me: Reed gives in to his Power Incontinence, self-immolating and taking Reeva with her.
- Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: John and Erg are still not quite comfortable near each other, but John accepts his help against the Purifiers.
- This Means Warpaint: John paints a domino mask on his face before heading out to distract the Purifiers by fighting them.
- Trash the Set: The Inner Circle's headquarters gets vaporized by Reed's Superpower Meltdown.
- Underestimating Badassery: Reeva almost completely disregards Reed, calling him "the most disappointing von Strucker", given his history of running from and suppressing his power. She didn't count on his power being barely under his control, and him exploiting her power to loosen said control to the point his entire body begins to go nuclear, taking her with him.
- We Need a Distraction:
- Reeva sics the Purifiers on the Underground not only to kill Lorna for betraying her, but to capture Andy and Lauren while the others are distracted looking for a way to escape.
- John volunteers himself in a one-man assault on the Purifiers to give the remaining Undergrounders an opportunity to escape.
- What Happened to the Mouse?: Too soon to call, but the fates of Phoebe and Sophie are unknown after Marcos knocks them out. Only Esme is seen in the ending, having forced a public confession out of Benedict Ryan for leading the Purifiers, and is last seen among the reunified Mutant Underground members, having joined them for good.
- Xanatos Speed Chess: Lorna and Andy left the Inner Circle? No problem for Reeva, who sends the Cuckoo sisters and Fade to kidnap Lauren and Andy and calls Benedict Ryan to alert the Purifiers to the Mutant Underground as payback for Lorna's about face.
- You See, I'm Dying: One of the reasons why Reed decides to sacrifice himself against Reeva is because his powers are already spiraling out of control and will kill him eventually.
Marcos: Do they understand the Mutant Underground is gone?
Caitlin: It's all right, Marcos. We'll make a new one.
Caitlin: It's all right, Marcos. We'll make a new one.
