The Gifted’s “outMatched”

In The Gifted’s “outMatched,” the new mutants meet up with the HellFire Club at Lynwood, a mental hospital that detains mutants indefinitely.

Throughtout this episode, the Hellfire Club is hacking. Specifically, Blink tells Thunderbird, “He [Erg] said the Frost’s were tapping into a data cable under the health dept.” Apparently, we learn in this broadcast, the Frosts are hackers.

Meanwhile, Reeva continues to test the loyalty of Hellfire Club members. Reeva informs Andy: “I need people who are strong enough to stand up to their friends.” Reluctantly, Andy agrees and stares at Reeva.

After Graff’s brother, Wire, is killed by the Frosts, Graff shoots Thunderbird, which raises questions about the mortality of Thunderbird. Blink questions Thunderbird: “I thought you were indestructable?” That being said, in Uncanny X-Men issue 95, Thunderbird died in a plane crash as a result of trying to save his friends.

As a result of Wire being killed, Graff is terrified of Reeva and the Frost sisters. While in deep drug withdrawl, Graff painfully screams at the underground: “She’ll kill anyone that gets in her way. I don’t need another visit from the suicide girls.” Graff breaks down in front of the underground.

Also, in the show, the Hellfire’s plans of hacking the health department come up in an underground meeting. Marcos tells the underground: “He told us the inner circle were looking at a mental facility.” The Hellfire Club is up to something and the underground is catching on.

Apparently, Lynwood mental hospital (which sounds like Quantanamo Bay) imprisons mutants. Thunderbird explains Lynwood to the underground: “You talking about Lynwood? It’s more prison than hospital. They declare mutants mentally unstable and detain them without trial.” Here, mutants are denied hapeas corpus, detained indefinately, and nobody knows how many mutants are held in Lynwood.

Furthermore, the underground doesn’t understand the law behind Lynwood. When discussing the detainment of a person without a trail, Lauran admits she doesn’t know the law: “How is that legal?” The underground is blind about the law regarding detention centers.

However, Blink understands a bit of the detention process. In regards to her own personal experiences, Blinks tells Lauran, “You just get a shrink to say they are a danger to themselves or society. That’s all they need.” A psychiatrist can evaluation anyone and lock them up indefinitely.

According to Marcos, Polaris was in a mental institution. Marcos said, “When she was young, a judge put Lorna into one of those hell holes. She had nightmares about it for years.” 

However, Polaris got out of the asylum. Thunderbird tells the new mutants, “Someone made a call.” The right person can get a person released from a mental institution.

The underground discusses what happens to patients in the detention centers. Thunderbird explains to the underground, “These patients are on lock down. Most of them look heavily sedated.” Basically, patients are locked up and kept on heavy drugs.

In regards to Sentinel Services whereabouts in this installment, Jace is recruited by the Purifiers. Apparently, a Purifer, working as a cop, shows his tattoo, a religious cross, to Jace: “What? A hate group? I get it. You hear the lies on the media how we are all bigots. Fact is we are regular folk who love our species. Our countries. Our families.” This meeting takes place at a secret location.

However, Jace isn’t impressed with the Purifiers. Initially, Jace replies: “It’s the whole secret society thing. And the outfits. It’s not really my jam.” Later, Jace joins the Purifiers aka white supremist group after the latest mutant “uprising” on the news.

While new mutants discuss the health department hacking, the HellFire Club is staging a jail break at Lynwood. As the Struckers watch the hacked video of Lynwood, Reed says, “I used to go to places like this when I was a prosecutor. They keep the mutants they can’t control, with collars, in secure rooms underground. If they’re blasting something, chances are they are down there. Trying to free someone?” The Hellfire Club is breaking  someone special out of the basement at Lynwood.

At the end of this segment, we hear about a mutant attack. The news channels, as well as social media, report of a “mutant uprising” at Lynwood. Furthermore, doctors on television state: “We have willingly participated in the unlawful and torture of innocent mutants.” The news reports don’t reveal much about this event.

In summary, this was an informative episode. We learn about the detention centers. Also, we learn about the Purifers. Moreover, we see the new mutants outmatched at Lynwood by the Hellfire Club. Finally, we learn the Hellfire Club broke out an omega level mutant at the mental institution.