Gen V – God U.

By: Gladys Luna

We begin with a glimpse into the backstory of a young Marie Moreau (Jaeda LeBlanc), a girl who learns about the super power she possesses, in the hardest way. While innocently playing with her younger sister Annabeth (Maria Nash) in the living room of their house, the TV anchor (Chris Handfield) happily announces the newly addition to The Seven, an elite group of superheroes that any aspiring “supe” yearns to be part of. Everything seems to be developing just as usual until Marie begins feeling sick and runs straight to the bathroom and although she tries to hide what it is happening to her, but her behavior does not go unnoticed by her mother (Miatta Lebile) who goes after her. The young girl locks herself in the bathroom trying to make the feeling go away but instead, she sees in terror how some droplets of blood (that she is able to move but not control, with the move of her hands), are coming out of her body, turning into blood clots and start floating around. This makes her scream so loud that her mother forces herself into the room scaring Marie to the point that she accidentally sends one of the clots towards her mother slicking her throat. Right after her father (Ty Barnett) enters the room in desperation something that terrifies Marie even more making her to send him flying against the wall and murdering him as well. Everything has gone just out of control and to make matters worse, Marie’s sister is now standing at the door looking at her in mere horror and asking her to stay away. Flashforward to some years later where we are met with an 18-year-old Marie (Jaz Sinclair) who ended up at the “Red River Institute” after her parents’ incident and has spent her days waiting for the opportunity to finally be accepted into the “Godolkin University School of Crimefighting.” Marie receives the so much expected letter telling her that she has been accepted to “God U,” which makes her as excited as she has never been since a long time ago. She is ready to start again and change the course of her life but knows very well that if she doesn’t make this work she will end up at Elmira, a Vought Adult Facility where things are far worse than she expects. With all of this in mind, off she goes to God U where she encounters herself surrounded by all kind of people like her displaying the most extraordinary super powers right and left. She finally makes it to her dorm room where she is immediately greeted by Emma Meyer (Lizze Broadway) or we should rather say “Little Cricket” as she possesses the super power to shrink herself and grow back to regular size as she pleases. It is as such how Marie encounters her, inside her jerboa’s cage, ready to battle him just to amuse her channel’s followers. Her extroverted roommate plays an essential role in Marie’s life as we see from the very first minute, encouraging to go with her to the battlefield where other high-level superheroes are tested in different challenges while the other students watch them. It is there where she sees Luke (Patrick Schwarzenegger), also known as “Golden Boy,” the most promising of the supes that possesses the pyrokinesis power.  After a display of his powers and abilities where his opponent “The Incredible Steve” (Warren Scherer) ends up in pieces, Marie and Emma are completely amazed and she promises that she will be part of that group someday. While the two are still enjoying the spectacle, Marie receives a text with her new schedule and bolts the place when she realizes that the she has been left out of one the classes she has been waiting to be part of which is in charge of professor Richard Brinkerhoff (Clancy Brown) who is the chairman of the Crimefighting Department at the University, so she goes straight to see him. However, she meets his assistant, another supe named Jordan Li (Derek Luh/London Thor), a gender shifter that informs her that unfortunately not everyone is accepted in the professor’s class. Right that moment Professor Brinkerhoff comes out of his office and has a brief talk with Marie without actually giving her a space in her class.

Later that day Marie decides to take a walk through the campus and everything seems to be so quiet and peaceful until a young man named Sam (Asa Germann) runs by her in desperation followed by a group of men in uniform carrying guns claiming that he has been using some drugs. Marie uses her super power to stop him and then Andre (Chance Perdomo), another supe, joins her and both manage to stop the other guy while he screams that he won’t be back to The Woods, but as soon as he is captured he is put to sleep.

The next day Luke is called into Professor Brink’s office where he is informed that has been chosen to be part of The Seven and will be joining them shortly. Despite what everyone could think of, the guy pretends to be excited about this opportunity yet it’s clear that there is something bothering him. Meanwhile, at campus Andre runs into Marie and recognizes her from the night before. He takes the opportunity to introduce himself properly and invites her to an illegal hangout that will be happening later that night promising that Luke will be there too (he knows that his friend’s popularity always does the trick). Knowing that the slightest mistake would put her stay at God U in danger, she decides to decline the offer but when she tells Emma about it is able to convince her that this could be a great opportunity for her so she decides to go. She meets with the rest of the group where she sees Andre, Luke, Jordan and Cate Dunlap (Maddie Phillips), Luke’s girlfriend. The gang goes to the Vought Tower and spend some time there drinking and using drugs. There Luke takes the chance to talk to Marie and as rare as it seems, he is the first person she opens to about her parents’ death and he also confesses that his brother died as well so he understands what she might be feeling. After spending some time there, they go to a club where they continue to drink among doing other stuffs and this time Marie decides to do the same. She and Cate take the floor while the other congratulate Luke about being selected to join the super heroes group. After some time everyone scatters around the place. In an attempt to impress a woman (Keelin O’Hara) with his metal bender abilities, Andre ends up slicking another woman’s throat who begins to bleed to death before everybody’s terrified look. Marie gathers all the courage that she can and uses her super power to help her while everyone films her with their phones. Meanwhile she is busy and the other group of supes run away. Unfortunately for Marie, while in the real world she has become into a super hero, for Professor Brink this is the perfect opportunity to use her as a “sacrifice” for the supes’ mistakes blaming everything that happened the night before on her and expelling her from the university. Marie leaves the place in a rush feeling completely mad knowing this would only make things worse for her. On her way out she makes a stop to collect her thoughts and makes the decision to not to give up and defend her place before Professor Brink, so she goes back to his office to face him again.

On the other hand, it’s been a while since Luke started to be haunted by hallucinations of his younger brother Sam (Cameron Nicoll) and today he just cannot take it anymore. Caught up in the haze of confusion that this causes to him, he goes straight to Professor Brink’s office completely blinded by the rage and desperation. A few minutes later Marie arrives and decides to open the office door and sees Luke in flames while hugging the Professor who is burned to ashes. Although Marie tries to tell Luke that she won’t say a word about it, he does not trust her and follows her trying to burn her too. While she is running through the hallway she meets with Jordan who asks her to run away and faces Luke attempting to stop him and bring him back to his senses but only ends up hurt in the process. Marie runs outside the building yelling that Luke has killed Professor Brink. Andre sees her but does not believe her until he sees The Golden Boy coming out in flames. He talks to him until he manages to calm him down; Luke hugs him and apologizes. He then flies as high as he can and makes himself explode before everyone else.