I feel so alone when talking about X-Men ‘97, specifically the Rogue-Magneto-Gambit love triangle. It seems that the only two opinions regarding that storyline are “Rogue is a shameless slut and I hate her” or “The showrunners were weird for writing that” — and I disagree with both.
Love triangles work best when they’re a vessel to reveal the values of the character at its center. Suzanne Collins laid it out masterfully at the end of her Hunger Games trilogy: “That what I need to survive is not Gale's fire, kindled with rage and hatred. I have plenty of fire myself. What I need is the dandelion in the spring. The bright yellow that means rebirth instead of destruction. The promise that life can go on, no matter how bad our losses. That it can be good again. And only Peeta can give me that.” Rogue goes through a similar journey in this storyline.
Gambit, through no fault of his own, represents her inadequacy. A relationship with him means gloves and restraint for the rest of her life. Magneto, in contrast, offered her freedom. Being with him was her only chance to live and love like a normal woman. It wasn’t until after she chose Magneto and then witnessed Gambit’s death that Rogue realized that there’s another side to her conundrum; love is more than touch. Magneto can have sex with her, but would he ever put her needs before his? Would he be patient with her? Would he even consult her before declaring her as his queen? And that’s why the triangle ends in tragedy. Rogue already had what she needed, but she got distrated by the prospect of having even more, and had to lose the one thing that truly mattered to her to realize the error of her ways.
Though their relationship was presented more as a nebulous, friends-with-benefits type thing at the beginning, Rogue claims him as “[her] man” after his death — which reminded me a little bit of Rose claiming Jack as her husband after his death in Titanic, but I digress.
I think that this storyline gets so much hate because of 1) misogynists who completely dehumanize a woman after she makes 1 mistake and 2) viewers who can’t deal with discomfort. Seeing Rogue choose Magneto is supposed to make you uncomfortable because it’s being portrayed as a mistake! It’s a feature, not a bug!!
