Stolen Lives


Season: 1
Episode Number: 14
Season Episode Number: 14
Production Number: 114
Airdate: January 17, 2009

Writer: Joshua Fine
Director: Steve Gordon

Voices: Steven Blum (Wolverine), Kari Wahlgren (Emma Frost, Christie Nord), (Mystique), Peter Lurie (Sabretooth), Tom Kane (Doctor Cornelius, Professor Thornton), (Maverick).

Plot: Wolverine teams up with Mystique to stop the Weapon X program from destroying the life of Christie Nord, the daughter of Maverick, and ends up learning a thing or two about his past.

Review (Warning! Spoilers!): Stolen Lives is a Wolverine-centric episode spinning directly out of Past Disgressions. I am a little disappointed that the momentum built from the last episode wasn't carried through this episode. But I guess this is the calm before the storm. Some questions are answered in this next chapter of the Weapon X storyline, but more are raised.

First question, who is the little girl with the claws? Any fan of the modern X-Men will know that this is X-23, a clone of Wolverine who is a popular character in the comics. Craig Kyle and Christopher Yost, the head writers of Wolverine and the X-Men, wrote two episodes of X-Men: Evolution where they created a new character for the series, X-23. The clone of Wolverine became so popular that she soon made her debut in the comic book world. It's not surprising that Kyle and Yost would bring her back in this series.

Second question, what sort of past did Mystique have with Logan? In an attempt to stay very current with the comics, the series writers decide to look into the romantic past between Logan and Mystique, something that was revealed to Wolverine in the comic books less than a year before the debut of this episode.

It will be interesting to see how this develops as it is a side of Mystique that is rarely seen, and since we have only seen Mystique in a few episodes, we don't really know which direction the writers are taking her character. Every great television series can't rely on action alone, there is always an element of romance, something that has been missing in this show so far.

Last question, has Maverick turned and joined the good guys? I love Maverick and think he's a great character, but he was very underused in this episode. I'm not sure if they are going to put him in a better role as an ally in a future episode, but they sure missed the boat on making him a cool character.

While this was an enjoyable episode, I was expecting to find out more about the Sentinels and Magneto's plan but was instead fed an episode where Wolverine doesn't even seem to care about what happened in the last episode. Hopefully we will get back on track next week.

DVD Releases:

Wolverine and the X-Men, The Complete First Season (Canada Exclusive)

Wolverine and the X-Men: Fate of the Future

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