X-Men ’97 Season 2 Episode 7 Recap: Who Are the Acolytes of Magneto?

The seventh episode of X-Men ’97 Season 2, titled Strange Land, Savage Heart, opens on a painful memory. We flash back to Colossus, aka Piotr Rasputin, and his sister Magik, aka Illyana Rasputin, only to watch Illyana die when Sentinels attack them. That loss hangs over everything that follows.

In the present, Graydon Creed, the son of Sabretooth and Mystique, announces his run for president with a hateful anti-mutant speech, before a group of mutants storms in and drags him away. Piotr is now one of them.

X-Men ’97 Season 2	Details
Voice Cast	Ray Chase, Jennifer Hale, Alison Sealy-Smith, Cal Dodd, J. P. Karliak, Lenore Zann, George Buza, A. J. LoCascio, Holly Chou, Isaac Robinson-Smith, Matthew Waterson, Ross Marquand, and Adrian Hough
Release Date	July 1, 2026
Episodes	9
RT Score (As of July 29, 2026)	100% | 91%
Streaming on	Disney+

They are the Acolytes of Magneto, and their prisoner becomes the spark for a jungle-set showdown in the Savage Land, a lost world full of dinosaurs, ancient evil, and Mister Sinister’s old experiments. Here’s everything that went down.

Why Did the Acolytes of Magneto Kidnap Graydon Creed?

The Acolytes of Magneto are a radical group that lives and breathes Magneto’s mutant-first ideology. They follow Exodus, a zealot who wraps his hatred of humans in religious language. Their goal in grabbing Graydon Creed is simple. By holding the anti-mutant politician hostage, they demand that X-Factor release every mutant it has locked up.

When Valerie Cooper contacts Charles Xavier for information on the Acolytes, he tells her his X-Men are already on their way. Beast, Rogue, Nightcrawler, Bishop, and Polaris fly toward the Acolytes’ base, which turns out to be the Savage Land. The team describes it as a place frozen in time, home to ancient spirits, and, worse still, the leftover experiments of Mister Sinister.

Nightcrawler and Graydon Creed are half-brothers, both sons of Mystique, which also adds drama to this adventure. The former believes that his brother isn’t beyond redemption, something the rest of the group clearly don’t agree with.

Things go wrong fast. Two missiles strike their jet and knock out their powers. Bishop is thrown from the aircraft, Polaris dives after him, and the team splits in two. Polaris and Bishop crash-land in a forest and barely survive a charging dinosaur, while the chemistry the show has been building between them keeps simmering.

They soon realize the Acolytes have switched Mister Sinister’s old Inhibitor Tower back on, which explains why Bishop can’t control his powers and why the rest of the team lost their powers.

The rest of the group is rescued by Colossus, an old friend, who walks them through the Savage Land. It becomes clear that Illyana’s death is what pushed him into the Acolytes. When Nightcrawler finally meets Exodus, his ruthless methods don’t sit right with the X-Men. So Nightcrawler challenges him and demands a proper trial for Creed, with the condition that Colossus will preside over it.

Did Nightcrawler Convince Colossus During the Trial?

Not exactly, but the answer is more interesting than a simple yes or no. As the Acolytes and X-Men gather in what they grandly call the “court of the Independent Haven of our Lord Magnus,” Colossus takes his seat as judge. Nightcrawler has agreed to a heavy price: if he loses, he joins the Acolytes.

Exodus lays out a damning case. He reminds everyone that Creed founded the hate group Friends of Humanity, tried to frame mutants for an attempt on the president’s life, and even worked on a virus to wipe mutants out. His summary is brutal and hard to argue with. Creed’s one original sin is his hatred of mutants.

Nightcrawler takes a different road. Instead of defending what Creed did, he reaches for the broken person underneath, drawing out the pain of a boy abandoned by his own mutant parents. He refuses to see his half-brother as a monster.

Colossus, caught between grief and mercy, struggles to hand down a verdict, and that hesitation sets everything off. Exodus loses patience, attacks Colossus, and moves to kill Creed himself. That’s the moment the tide turns. Bishop and Polaris finally take down the Inhibitor Tower, the X-Men get their powers back, and the whole team joins forces against the Acolytes.

In the chaos, Creed kills Exodus, and Nightcrawler teleports him out of the Savage Land. Rather than hand him over for revenge, Nightcrawler leaves Creed alone in the snow with a quiet sermon about forgiveness, and X-Factor picks him up soon after.

Colossus joins the X-Men once more and admits to Nightcrawler that his argument didn’t actually change his mind. But then he adds that Illyana would have been convinced. It’s a bittersweet way to honor his sister and a sign that mercy still means something.

What Did the X-Force Find in the Episode’s Ending?

The episode saves one last gut-punch for its final moments. Away from the Savage Land, X-Force tracks down Apocalypse’s lair under the Parthenon in Athens. But instead of the villain himself, they find only his skeletal remains. Something has clearly gone very wrong.

Then Jubilee spots a magic card lying nearby, and the meaning clicks into place. It confirms what Episode 6 set up. Gambit is back, resurrected by Apocalypse as the Horseman of Death. With only two episodes left this season, this discovery points the X-Men straight toward a painful reunion with their fallen friend and an all-out clash with Apocalypse’s growing forces. The stage is set for a brutal final stretch.

As for Apocalypse, he is likely to return from the dead, as he has done many times in the Marvel main universe in the comics. However, we will have to see what happens in the final two episodes to comment on his final fate. Callie Hanna of FW shared in our review of X-Men ’97 Season 2 that the “sophomore outing continues to be the best X-Men adaptation.”

What did you think of Strange Land, Savage Heart? Let us know in the comments below!

The seventh episode of X-Men ’97 Season 2 is now available for streaming on Disney+.