In the thirtieth episode of the second season of Gargoyles, the traveling team is sent to Egypt to stop a plan to give Xanatos immortality. Intrigued? Then it’s time for Mark to watch Gargoyles.
Trigger Warning: For talk of death/grief.
This show is something else, y’all.
I’ll start by pointing out that this is a Xanatos episode that technically does not feature him at all. Avalon sent Goliath and the others to Egypt to counter the research that Xanatos was having done remotely. That research, however, had horrible implications for the whole world, and absolutely all of it hinged on one man’s grief. I keep coming back to that detail, and it haunts me. Xanatos had to have somehow been put in contact with Emir, who must have been pursuing this particular spell for quite some time. In this instance, Xanatos did not order Coyote or the Pack to outright steal the spell for him. They were to wait. Observe. Let Emir report back his findings. Meaning that they intended to let him go through with his plan. There’s a chance that none of them knew he was mourning his dead son, sure, but I got the sense that Emir had long been open about his grief.
Regardless, the writers for “Grief” center this story on a tragedy, and it was impressive to see them never lose sight of such a very personal thing. By contrast, I found the Pack less interesting, at least until Jackal took Emir’s transformation from him, though that’s mostly because Emir’s characterization was so compelling. The Pack are more or less immaterial here in a larger sense, which speaks to how little Xanatos thinks of them. Did any of them need to be in Egypt? Was there really a danger that required them to be a part of the team? Not really, and yet, Jackal finds a way to make himself more important than anyone else. Metamorphosis is repetitive theme for his character, first in “Upgrade” and now here, as he transforms his body into a vessel for Anubis and rains destruction and death upon the world. (Which was one of the most disturbing sequences in this whole season, GOOD FUCKING GOD.) Why do that? Well, why not? Jackal has always been a cynical character, one interested in causing chaos and harm more than anything else. So… yeah, giving him the power to control life and death? WHO WAS SURPRISED HE WOULD DO SOMETHING SO AWFUL.
It’s a huge twist, obviously, since I figured that Emir would bring his son to life and then we’d all learn an important lesson about grief and loss. That lesson still happens, but only after unending body horror. It’s only after Jackal kills untold number of people (I CANNOT BELIEVE THIS SHOW KILLED OFF POSSIBLY MILLIONS OF PEOPLE IN THIS EPISODE) that Emir is encouraged to take matters into his own hands and stop Jackal. It’s still so heartbreaking, though, because this man was clearly desperate to have his son back in his arms. He gave it up, however, in order to save the world! IT’S SO SAD TO ME, OKAY??? (Also, was this the Emir mentioned before by Xanatos? OH GOD IT WAS, WASN’T IT?)
Seriously, y’all, this week’s episodes all knocked it out of the park.
The video for “Grief” can be downloaded here for $0.99.
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