Night of the Sentinels

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"Night of the Sentinels"
'X-Men: The Animated Series' episode
One of the sentinels that attacks the X-Men when they are leaving the Mutant registration center.
Episode no.	Season 1 Episode 1-2
Written by	Mark Edward Edens
Production no.	Part 1: 101 Part 2: 102
Original airdate	Part 1: October 31, 1992 Part 2: November 7, 1992
Episode chronology ← Previous Next → "none" "Enter Magneto"
List of X-Men 1992 TV Series Episodes

Night of the Sentinels is a two-part pilot episode of X-Men the animated series. It originally aired on October 31 and November 7, 1992. This episode is loosely based upon "Uncanny X-Men #14".^[1] This episode introduced an X-Men team similar in look and line-up to the early 1990s X-Men drawn by Jim Lee. The X-Men introduced in this episode composed of Professor X, Cyclops, Beast, Jean Grey, Wolverine, Rogue, Gambit, Storm and Jubilee, as well as an original character, Morph.^[2] The show was originally going to premiere over the Labor Day weekend in September; however, due to production delays, it was soon pushed to the end of October. This episode originally aired as a "sneak preview" even though it truly wasn't ready for broadcast. Therefore, there were many animation errors in these two episodes. The errors were later corrected when FOX re-aired the pilot in early 1993.^[3]

[edit] Plot

Part one

The episode opens with TV news footage of Sabretooth attacking police, indicating a time of unrest between mutants and humans. Jubilee’s foster parents register her under the Mutant Registration Act, designed to help mutants. Later, Sentinels attempt to apprehend Jubilee at the mall. The sentinels are stopped by a group of X-Men who happen to be shopping. Jubilee wakes up, confused, and at the X-Mansion. Storm explains to Jubilee that the purpose of the X-Men is to fight for peaceful existence between humans and mutants.

While the X-Men are briefed on the incident at the mall, Jubilee leaves the mansion to see her foster parents. There, she is ambushed and captured by the Sentinels. Before she passes out, Jubilee sees Henry Peter Gyrich, who is with the Sentinels.

The X-Men discover that the group running the Mutant Registration Program intend to track down and eliminate mutants. Storm is assigned to lead Beast, Morph, and Wolverine into the Mutant Control Agency headquarters to destroy the registration files. The four mutants break in, while Cyclops, Gambit, and Rogue observe from the outside. The episode ends in a cliffhanger when Storm opens the door to a room where many armed soldiers are hiding, waiting to ambush the X-Men.

Part two

Wolverine smells the soldiers’ gun oil and quickly closes the door before the soldiers fire. Storm enters and sweeps the guards away with her wind power. After destroying the files on mutants, the X-Men escape to the Blackbird, but are stopped by the sentinels. During the fight with the Sentinels, Morph is shot and presumed dead. Beast gets blasted against the fence and is electrocuted and ultimately captured. The rest retreat to the Blackbird on Cyclops’ command. On TV, the President of the United States states that several mutants attacked the Mutant Control Agency and that there will be a counter-offense. But after meeting with Gyrich, the President decides to cancel the Mutant Control Registration.

Later that night, Cyclops goes to Jubilee’s foster parents’ house. Jubilee’s foster father calls Gyrich, to tell him Cyclops is in his house. Gyrich sends some Sentinels, but later the father regrets his decision when his wife tells him that Cyclops thinks that Jubilee was kidnapped by the Sentinels. Subsequently, he tells Cyclops everything. Cyclops leaves, but is attacked by a Sentinel. Cyclops blasts the Sentinel’s arm off. The wounded Sentinel escapes and the Blackbird follows it to the Sentinels’ base.

Landing clumsily, the wounded Sentinel damages the electrical box and the electricity goes out on the base. While the X-Men attack the base, Gyrich and Trask try to escape. After the sentinels are defeated and Jubilee rescued, Jubilee decides that it’s best to stay at the Mansion and waves goodbye to her foster parents, heading for a new future.

[edit] Production

Storm's voice actress in season 1 and most of season 2 is Iona Morris. After the season 2 episode "Mojoworld", Alison Sealy-Smith takes over for the rest of the series.^[4] An original X-Man to the series, Morph, is loosely based upon a shape-shifting character, from early X-Men comics, named Changeling. He became so popular, that an alternate version of Changeling in the "Age of Apocalypse" comics run was named Morph.^[5]

Morph was originally placed in the series simply because the writers wanted to have a character die in the opening story arc, in order to show how serious the show was.^[5] Changeling was chosen because of his past ties to the X-Men, as well as his deceased status in the comics. He was practically a blank slate, so the writers were free to do anything without really angering fans of the character. The name was changed from Changeling to Morph, since DC comics had the rights to the name Changeling at the time. (DC's Changeling is better known now as Beast Boy from the Teen Titans). Morph's death was, in fact, intended to stick, but due to his unexpected popularity, he was brought back.^[5]

In this episode, Beast was captured and sent to jail. There were two principal reasons for why Beast was chosen to be captured in this episode. The first was that in preparing for the first season, Beast hadn’t been included as one of the core characters. So, since he was a “guest” or secondary character, the writers felt he could be off-screen a lot.^[5] The other reason came down to his character. Beast is so articulate that he works beautifully in a court scene. And he is so reasonable and likable; it’s hard for the prosecution to make him out to be a monster. (If Wolverine were on the stand, a reasonable judge might think it wise to lock him up.)^[5]

[edit] First appearances

The X-Men, Senator Robert Kelly, Henry Peter Gyrich, Bolivar Trask and the Sentinels make their first appearance in this episode. Sabretooth also had a brief cameo at the beginning of the first part.^[6]

[edit] Cultural references

When Wolverine says, "Hey, Tin Woodsman I'm gonna send you back to Oz, in pieces!" Wolverine refers to the Tin Woodsman and Oz, from the L Frank Baum series of "Oz" books.^[7] When Beast says, "As Archimedes said when he discovered the principal of displacement... eureka!" Beast refers to the famous Greek, who actually did say "eureka" after discovering what is known today as Archimedes' principle.^[8] Also when Beast says, "Though I am always in haste, I am never in a hurry. John Wesley." Beast quotes the 18th century Methodist Church founder.^[9]. If one looks on the screen of the computer Beast is typing on you will see that on the list of registered mutants John Wesley's name appears as one just as Beast completes quoting him.

[edit] Reception

At the height of the series' popularity, Pizza Hut sold two VHS tapes that featured "Night of the Sentinels (Parts 1 & 2)" and "Enter Magneto"/"Deadly Reunions". Also contained were round-table discussions between prominent names such as X-Men creator Stan Lee and 1990s writer Scott Lobdell.^[10] The story of this pilot was also adapted in the comic book "X-Men Adventures (vol 1) #1-2".^[11][12] According to Marvel Animation Age this was one of the best episodes of the series.^[6] This episode has a rating of 8.8 out of 10 on Internet Movie Database^[4][13] and 9.2 out of 10 on tv.com.^[14]

[edit] Cast^[4]

[edit] References

• X-Men — Night of the Sentinels/Days of Future Past — Special Edition [VHS]. Buena Vista Home Entertainment.

[edit] External links

• "Night of the Sentinels, part 1 review". Marvel toonzone. http://marvel.toonzone.net/xmen/episode/nightsentinels1/. Retrieved 2008-01-16. 
• "Night of the Sentinels, part 2 review". Marvel toonzone. http://marvel.toonzone.net/xmen/episode/nightsentinels2/. Retrieved 2008-01-16.