BRIEF SUMMARY
A very angry new mutant, identifying himself as Kilohertz, with the power to surf radio waves breaks into the world’s communication network, threatening to wreck havoc unless mutants are recognized and respected. In order to make a statement, he manages to cut the power and bring the Double Helix’s computers down. The craft might crash with Shalimar and Jesse in it. Brennan throws a lightning bolt at Sanctuary’s main computer, rebooting the system and returning the control of the VTOL to Jesse.
Kilohertz antics, invading the power grid and blocking communications, makes both Mutant X and the GSA hunt for him, but nobody knows who he really is. Mason Eckhart manages to track Kilohertz’s signal to a local TV station. He sends a young agent on his final semester of training, Mr. Renfield, a new mutant with the power to put people in a kind of stasis, disguised as an FCC operative, to investigate.
Meanwhile, working from a few frames collected from Kilohertz’s transmission, Jesse reconstructs the guy’s face and runs it against Adam’s database. There’s a match in Barry Sterling, a production assistant on Channel 13. Brennan and Emma must bring him to Sanctuary, but he escapes them by turning himself into radio waves and jumping into a satellite dish.
Kilohertz breaks into the world’s communication network again, urging the freaks of the world, meaning new mutants, to unite and fight the powers that be. Both Adam, busy building a contraption that will supposedly help bring Kilohertz down, and Renfield, who’s impressed with the rogue mutant’s diatribe, are listening.
Kilohertz threatens to bring down the stock market, hitting Wall Street hard. Adam and Jesse build a firewall to keep the market’s database intact, while Brennan and Shalimar seek Kilohertz out to bring him to Sanctuary, whether he wants to come or not. They arrive at Channel 13’s headquarter at the same time Renfield and his goons and both groups are out to get the wave-surfing mutant. Both fail as he jumps into a satellite dish again. When Kilohertz returns to the world of the solid, Renfield tries to grab him, but in a bungee jump, Shalimar snatches him from the GSA’s clutches and brings him back with her. Renfield is quite pleased with the failure of his mission and is sent to indoctrination, actually torture and brainwahing.
Barry Sterling, the Kilohertz, wants to join Mutant X and when he is turned down, he tries to run away, but is sedated and stashed in the lab. When he wakes up, he promptly escapes Sanctuary and uses Channel 13’s satellite dish to escape Mutant X, who followed him there. They capture him while in energy form, but they’re less than successful and Kilohertz takes control of Sanctuary’s computer system, blocking up the life support system and cutting off the oxigen supply. Adam manages to overload the mainframe and bypass his firewall, while making Brennan hit the main computer with a lightining bolt, pushing him away and cleasing the system.
Kilohertz runs away and reconstitutes inside Eckhart’s office, where he is talking to a newly brainwashed Renfield, who puts him in stasis, podding him.
THEME OF THE EPISODE
Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.
PLOT HOLES
So many... Why would Eckhart use a half-baked agent? Why would Kilohertz want to join Mutant X? Why would Adam leave Kilohertz unattended in the lab, knowing he could destroy Sanctuary’s computer system? Why would Adam try to pin him down while in energy form if he knew Kilohertz’s DNA was completely unstable, dangerously fluctuating between matter and energy, and giving him almost unlimited power? Why would Emma say Adam saved the day, when he did nothing more than act as an antivirus and clean a bug out of Sanctuary’s system, leaving the bug free to roam the ether? And what was that thing Adam was so busy building up that was forgotten, never used, and never mentioned again?
CREEPY MOMENTS OF THE EPISODE
None! All was bland, flavorless and boring. Not even the team, trapped inside the Zen hole in the ground with no oxigen flowing managed to raise even a single hair in my head. Come to think of it, the fact that Renfield’s torture section was so laughable really did creep me out. Ridiculous torture? Oh, boy...
ENDEARING MOMENTS OF THE EPISODE
Well, I could say Jesse trying to teach computer skills to Emma was kind of endearing. And she sounded completely computer iliterate, even though she was, in Season 2, capable of some serious computer research. And she talked about her parents, the flower children.
BEST CHARACTER AWARD
I would bestow the Least Annoying Character Award on Nick Renfield, Mason’s lackey of the week, who actually managed to really save the day, endured a ridiculous torture section, and looked impossibly young, with the rebellion of youth bubbling inside him until Mason had him reeducated.
WAS IT CENTRIC?
No, everybody had equal screen time, equally meaningless, with equally cretin dialogue.
UNEXPLAINED EVENTS
Mason using an untrained agent... Sanctuary’s system easily crackable system... The contraption Adam was working on that was never used and was forgotten halfway through the episode.
THINGS WE NOTICED
Adam eats, proving he is not an android. The Japanese feel in Sanctuary is reinforced by the “bento” meal the team shares while discussing what to do with Kilohertz.
Somebody on Mutant X writing team is a trekkie, as proved by the best line in the episode, listed below.
BEST LINE
Kilohertz: “Don’t you know resistance is futile?”
WORST LINE
All the others, no exception?
PURIST REACTION
This episode gets... half a WADJET, and I’m being generous.
Everything tastes like unsalted, unseasoned oatmeal. Bland plot, bland acting, idiotic dialogue, stupid characters, ridiculous props. If this was the first episode showed, Mutant X would have folded in two weeks.
Falconia
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