The Breakfast Club gets superpowers.
The first three episodes of Marvel’s new show Runaways have been released to Hulu, instantly making it one of the most exciting and original superhero television properties that the studio has released.
Runaways is based on the popular, yet obscure (in the sense that one of the characters has a telepathic link to a dinosaur, at least), comic of the same name. The property was originally considered for a film adaptation before being shelved completely. Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage then revived the project with a television series in mind, deciding to bring it to Hulu.
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Therefore, Runaways stands apart from what Marvel is doing with their shows on Netflix and ABC. While they all supposedly take place in the same universe, we’re being lead to believe that we won’t be seeing Daredevil or the Agents of SHIELD show up in Runaways anytime soon.
And, on a purely thematic level, this makes sense. Runaways feels different than anything Marvel has yet to create — this is a teen-based drama with superhero elements. The show focuses on a group of high-school students, living in their various cliques, and the daily drama that they’re lives must endure. It all changes, of course, when they discover their parents are super-villains and that they have powers, but the high-school conflict remains central to the show.
The first episode of Runaways — entitled “Reunion” — sets the tone with some darkly lit camera work and a bleak, tense atmosphere. We see a young girl, later revealed to be a character named Destiny (Nicole Wolf), trying to run away from home. Right as she’s about to board of a bus, she’s stopped by a middle-aged woman representing the “Church of Gibborim.” She invites Destiny to join them instead, which she reluctantly agrees to only after she’s reassured they aren’t a cult.
Cut to six months down the line, and we’re introduced to our new squad. Alex Wilder (Rhenzy Feliz), the nerd of the group, is the son of Geoffrey (Ryan Sands) and Catherine Wilder (Angel Parker) — two incredibly wealthy lawyers who will always put the needs of their son before their own. Then there’s Nico (Lyrica Okano) — the goth — who lives with her parents Tina (Brittany Ishibashi) and Robert (James Yaegashi). Chase (Gregg Sulkin) takes on the role of the dumb jock, who, more often than not is trying to protect his mother (Ever Carradine) from her somewhat abusive husband Victor (James Marsters).
There’s also Karolina (Virginia), the #blessed daughter of the infamous Church of Gibborim leader Leslie (Annie Wersching), and finally Gert (Ariela Barer) — the sassy liberal — and her adopted sister Molly (Allegra Acosta) who live with, well, the parents no one really likes to associate with, Dale (Kevin Weisman) and Stacey (Brigid Brannagh).
Years ago, all of these kids were best friends. They met due in part to their family all being part of The Pride — an organization that frequently meets to do fundraising work to benefit the community. However, two years ago from when Runaways begins the group suffered tragedy: one of their own, Amy (Nico’s sister), was tragically killed.
The group hasn’t been the same since. They’ve all gone their separate ways, joined their separate cliques and, for the most part, have done their best to forget everything that’s happened — which includes forgetting each other.
However, right on the two-year anniversary of Amy’s death, Alex is looking to get the group back together. Granted, he’s encouraged to do so by his parents — seeing how they're hosting a Pride meeting later that night — but Alex thinks it actually doesn’t sound like a half bad idea. So, he calls up his old friends and requests their presence in his mansion on that evening.
Everyone, not all that surprisingly, pretty much gives Alex the kibosh. “Seriously Wilder? You think I’ll come over to hang out like we’re still friends?” Chase angrily tells him once approached in class. The confrontation only leads to arguments and hurt feelings, the group no closer to reassembling than it has in the past two years.
However, while perhaps unintentionally, it does get Chase talking with Gert once again. Gert —who’s obviously trying to fight off feelings for Chase — offers to tutor him in Spanish class once she finds out how bad he’s doing, to which Chase agrees. They make plans to study that evening, which are almost immediately trampled on when Chase’s hot-heated teammates come barging in and tell him there’s a party they all have to go to tonight.
Alex moves on to Nico, suggesting for the first time that the two were seemingly a couple at one point and their relationship now stands in limbo. The brief conversation the two of them have sends Nico to the bathroom, crying, where she runs into Katherine, also crying. “I think it’s just allergies or something. Is it just me, or is there, like, an impossible amount of pollen in the air?” Katherine says.
During all this, Molly has been having her own problems. She started feeling sick earlier in the day and, after going to the nurse’s office, felt some sort of power surge go through her. Basically, her eyes lit up a weird color and she dented the nurse’s chair with her fists, despite not knowing how such a feat is even possible. She later heads into her parents' garage to try and make it happen again, which it does eventually, but only after she’s nearly crushed by the family’s Volkswagen van.
We also get a quick glimpse of Leslie, working in the offices of the Church of Gibborim. We still have no idea who they are or what they do, but we see her enter a room in which an elderly, injured looking person lay on a bed with some sort of weird, gas-mask looking thing covering their face.
Night comes and all the parents gather at the Wilder’s house for the Pride meeting. Alex tells his parents that everyone denied his invitation and that he’s going to hang out by himself, which makes them feel pretty bad. He’s not the only one alone, however, as Gert is at a coffee shop waiting for Chase to show up to study.
Chase decided to go through with the invitation to the party instead and walks into a house full of teenagers, red solo cups and dancing. He’s not there long before he runs into Katherine, passed out on a mattress with a couple of guys creepily hanging around her. He throws them off of her, picks her up and takes her out of the house.
Katherine has no clue what is happening. Earlier, she removed the Church of Gibborim bracelet from her arm — the first time she’s ever done so — and say a strange spectrum of rainbow colored lights dance on her arm. They all promptly disappeared as soon as the bracelet was put back on, however.
We also get a quick cut back to Molly, now exploring her parent’s basement and looking into a sealed off room. There’s a bunch of trees and shrubbery in there, but after some closer examination, something much larger appears. Yup, it’s the dinosaur alright.
After Nico has some sort of weird, failed satanic experiment on a beach (we have no clue what was going on in that scene, to be honest) everyone comes to their own conclusion that they don’t want to be alone. So, one by one, they all end up knocking on Alex’s door, deciding to accept his invite to hang out.
Things are awkward at first, as you might expect they would be between a group of friends who haven't hung out in two years. However, Chase gets the idea to go raid Geoffrey’s liquor cabinet, which is in his study. The group heads over there and begins poking around — which is when Alex discovers the entrance to what appears to be some sort of secret lair.
Curious, they all head down this mysterious twisted staircase. At the bottom all of their parents, dressed in long red robes, standing in a large room and huddled around some sort of black chair of sorts. “What kind of charity meeting is this?” Chase asks.
They also soon realize there’s some kind of barrier around the room, allowing no sound to enter or exit — therefore they can’t hear what their parents are saying, and their parents can’t hear them.
That’s when Destiny, wearing white robes reappears. Leslie brings her in before the rest of the group surrounds and disrobes her. The black chair thing opens to reveal some sort of bright light that resembles a portal, and Destiny is put inside it.
The kids are all shocked and terrified. They don’t know what they just saw, but it looks like Destiny isn’t coming back anytime soon. In a reactionary move, Molly pulls out her camera and takes a picture — but forgets to turn off the flash. The parents all turn to look and the kids take off running, as the episode leaves us hanging on whether the children were spotted or not.
The first episode of Runaways starts off strong, introducing us to fresh and new characters who we find ourselves quickly rooting for. We still find ourselves with all kinds of questions: What happened to Destiny? Who was the old person with the breathing mask? How did Amy die and why did Alex and Nico breakup?
We can’t wait to find out the answers because so far Runaways has been nothing but delightful surprise after surprise. May sure to check Hulu on Tuesdays to see new Runaways episodes and to read all of our other Runaways recaps before then.