The X-Men are captured and taken to Mr. Sinister to be employed in his experiments. Wolverine teams up with Kazar.
Tropes:
- Always a Bigger Fish: Wolverine gets chased by a medium-sized dinosaur, until it is chased off by a much bigger dinosaur.
- Anguished Declaration of Love: When Rogue is selected to be subjected to Sinister's machine, Gambit confesses his love for her, and they share a kiss.
- Beam-O-War: After Cyclops blasts him through the wall of the citadel, Sinister responds with his own energy blasts. The ensuing volley is a stalemate, with Morph's laser pistol making the difference in Cyke's favor.
- Bring It: With the X-Men's powers disabled, Hairbag was certain Wolverine would be easy pickings, so he relished this opportunity.Hairbag: It'll be a pleasure rippin' you apart!
Wolverine: Good luck, pal! There's nothin' mutant about these! [extends his claws] - Brought Down to Normal: The X-Men for most of the episode.
- Brought Down to Badass: Wolverine, on the other hand, still has his claws and metal skeleton to fight with and soak up damage as they're fused to his body and unaffected by the power loss. With them, he's able to hold to his ground, though he quickly bemoans the loss of his healing power as the episode goes on and he gets more and more worn out, and using his claws without his power causes him significant pain. By the time he brings the battle to Sinister, he's mostly on his last legs, but getting his power restored quickly heals him up again.
- Curb-Stomp Battle: The Nasty Boys, Savage Land Mutates, and random mooks easily take down the powerless X-Men. The X-Men and Magneto return the favor after getting their powers back.
- Distracted by the Sexy: Shanna distracts a guard long enough for Ka-Zar to knock him out.
- The End... Or Is It?: After the X-Men and Magneto depart, Sauron gloats that the Savage Land is now free of outsiders and now his for the taking. Meanwhile, the fragment remains of Mister Sinister wash up on a beach, and they form an outline of his visage as his laughter echoes. Fade to black. Credits.
- Family-Unfriendly Death: Sinister gets blown to pieces on-screen, presumably getting past the censors on account he's immediately shown to survive that.
- Fire-Forged Friends: Ka-Zar and Wolverine have a brief skirmish, but when the former learns that Wolverine is not one of Mister Sinister's minions, but opposes them, they team up to free both the X-Men and Ka-Zar's people.
- Friendship Moment: Magneto says it was good to fight alongside Xavier again, after all this time. Xavier gives his Friendly Enemy a sincere goodbye, as he flies off.
- Hazy-Feel Turn: Magneto rejects Xavier's offer to join forces to fight together for the good of mutantkind, stating he must follow his own path, but it does mark his slide from the Knight Templar terrorist from Season 1 to the Noble Demon advocating mutant separatism we'll see later.
- Let's You and Him Fight: Ka-Zar wants to take down Mister Sinister and free his people, but he picks a fight with Wolverine, whose team has just been captured by the Nasty Boys and the Mutates. Of course, they team up afterwards.
- Logical Weakness: Wolverine can still pop out his claws while his mutant powers are disabled, but claws coming from inside of his hands causes him pain and makes them dangerous to use without his Healing Factor.
- The Pigpen: Downplayed. Ka-Zar looks pretty clean for a guy living in the Savage Land, but not so to someone with a heightened sense of smell.Wolverine: I don't like being tracked, and you need a shower.
- Poor Communication Kills: The reason Ka-Zar picked a fight with Wolverine is because he assumed that, as a mutant not native to the valley, the guy must be another one of Sinister's underlings. After a little back-and-forth, Wolverine points out he's out to take Sinister down, not work for him.
- The Power of Friendship: Xavier telepathically coaxes Morph to fight his brainwashing, reminding him that he will always be one of the X-Men, which allows him to turn on and shoot Sinister.
- Pre-Mortem One-Liner: "You deny the future, so you shall not live to see it!"
- Put on a Bus:
- As the team is about to depart, Xavier notes that it will take some time for Morph to physically and mentally recover before he can be on the team again. Outside of cameos, he won't reappear until Season 4.
- Saying goodbye to Xavier, Magneto leaves the Savage Land on his own. He also won't make a major reappearance until Season 4.
- "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Sinister mocks the goals of both Xavier and Magneto: "You'd rather fawn over humankind in hopes of a sniveling co-existence or fight among yourselves to prepare for a war."
- Save the Villain: Cyclops blasts Mister Sinister before he can kill Magneto, though this is more about their personal vendetta than anything else.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Everyone but Brainchild flees after Sinister gets blasted to pieces.
- Self-Destruct Mechanism: Magneto's citadel can be blown up by pulling one big red lever.
- Shut Up, Hannibal!: During their final confrontation, Sinister is about to go into yet another self-righteous speech about the future, but Cyclops doesn't even bother letting him get a few words out.Cyclops: [blasts him] I warned you before to leave us alone.
Mr. Sinister: I can't. I won't! The world needs—! [gets blasted again]
Cyclops: What was that? I don't think I heard you right. - So Proud of You: As the team is about to depart the Savage Land, Xavier is proud of how his students were able to continue with the work in his absence.
- Spanner in the Works: Wolverine still having his claws is the only reason he avoids being captured.
- The Starscream: Sauron allows Cyclops and Morph to destroy Sinister and then activates a number of explosives, clearly intending for the X-Men and Sinister's followers to perish, so no one can rival him in his plans to become the ruler of the Savage Land.
- You Are Not Alone: After he and Wolverine hash things out, Ka-Zar says everyone else in the valley that didn't want to serve Sinister were captured and taken to the citadel.Ka-Zar: I am the only one left.
Wolverine: Not anymore, bub.
