In the twenty-ninth episode of the second season of Gargoyles, THIS IS A WORK OF ART, PUT IT IN A MUSEUM. Intrigued? Then it’s time for Mark to watch Gargoyles.Â
Trigger Warning: For discussion of Nazis/nazism, racism, and xenophobia.
Gargoyles: punching and destroying Nazis since 1995, y’all.
I feel like I just can’t convey to y’all just how much I adore this episode, but I hope that my enthusiastic reaction on video, coupled with this review, will help you understand why this might be one of my favorite episodes of the whole show. As much as I miss the rest of the clan, I have been quite thrilled with this arc, which is like an extended social justice vacation. They’re traveling the world, righting wrongs and figuring out their own family in the process!
Yet in “M.I.A.,” the antagonist changes to a real-world monster, and the writers present this without explanation. I love this so much because we have actual monsters uniting to fight against the Nazis and the specter of what they left behind, as well as the phantoms of racism and xenophobia in London. THIS AIRED ON AN ANIMATED CHILDREN’S SHOW AND WE GOT TO EXPERIENCE IT AND I AM SO HAPPY. And look, that’s not the sole plot in this episode, which also deals with fear, guilt, inactivity, and complicity. IN. A. CHILDREN’S. SHOW.
By the way, there’s also time travel and one of those weird ontological paradoxes, too, and I can’t stop loving this episode.
I feel like it was intentional that a griffon, a lion, and a unicorn were used for the London clan of gargoyles, at least because that helps represent England and Scotland fairly neatly. “M.I.A.” helps to expand gargoyle mythology in a huge way, since we now have confirmation that other creatures can still manifest as gargoyles, too. Plus… y’all, how many other clans are there? Where are they centered? What means have they devised to survive human suspicion and violence? My gods, I love that the London clan have a magic shop in Soho that they use to exist in the “open.” ALSO, WHO WAS THAT WOMAN WHO WORKED AT THE SHOP, Y’ALL???
Okay, not the most important detail, but still. Una, Leo, and Griff are some of the best new characters on this show, and I wanted to know everything. It didn’t help that this episode also began with an impossibility: Una and Leo trapped Goliath and his friends because they were convinced that Goliath was responsible for Griff’s death during the Battle of Britain. IN 1940. Now, we all knew that Goliath couldn’t have been in London then because he was stuck in a stone hibernation, sooooooo…. awkward??? Granted, that statue of the gargoyles who, legend had it, saved the British during the Battle, looked an awfully lot like Goliath, but that didn’t mean anything!
IT MEANT EVERYTHING. I figured out the time paradox nearly immediately, but guess what? It didn’t matter. There’s a vicious tension to “M.I.A.” once Goliath uses to Phoenix Gate to travel back in time. He thought he was going back to get his friends, who were actually trapped in the basement of the clan’s store the whole time. By virtue of time travel, Goliath sets into motion the very act that made Griff disappear in the first place. Because of this, I spent the majority of this episode waiting for the inevitable. What thing would kill him? How would Goliath be responsible for Griff? Had he doomed Griff to death? Yet as this episode unfolded and Griff defied Una’s wishes, choosing to involve himself in the war against the Nazis, Griff kept barely avoiding death, as if this episode predicted that whole Final Destination series. It was so unbearable!!! Then Goliath got shot, and then he got separated from Griff, and then a building nearly fell on Griff, and then a plane nearly fell on Griff, and WHY WAS THIS HAPPENING? Was it fate? Was it impossible to save Griff from death because time kept course-correcting to make sure he wasn’t in the timeline? It was so stressful to watch!
But this script is incredible for more than just a clever time travel story. It’s about inactivity, too. Goliath immediately leaps into action when he’s accused of having done something wrong; Griff disappeared because he was so eager to save London from the scourge of Nazism. It’s Una and Leo who choose to remain inside, to hide within their store, and to reason that what happens to the humans doesn’t concern them. Nevermind that the bombing of London does affect them; it’s all a human affair, something both Goliath and Griff know will eventually hold meaning for the gargoyles. HOW INTENSE AND EMOTIONAL IS THAT SCENE IN THE BASEMENT WHERE LEO REALIZES WHAT THEY’VE SPENT THE LAST 50 YEARS DOING? They both have an epiphany that their own guilt has kept them barricaded within their store, unwilling to get involved in anything.
It is not lost on me that this all happens within an episode where two of the biggest villains are Nazis and skinhead punks. Griff fights the Nazis, and at the end of “M.I.A.,” the reunited London clan fights off a group of punks who are racially abusing a non-white person. They even explicitly reference the whole “Keep Britain Pure” bullshit!!! IN A CARTOON, I CAN’T GET OVER THIS. And we are shown that this is a good thing, that fighting Nazis and racism and xenophobia is something to aspire to.
Holy shit, I’m going to love this episode FOREVER. And lord, do we ever need some gargoyles to punch some bigots in the face.
The video for “M.I.A.” can be downloaded here for $0.99.
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