Blink and Ahab and Sage, Oh My! Meet The Most Obscure X-Men In Fox’s ‘The Gifted’

Portrayed By: Emma Dumont
In The Comics: The daughter of Magneto and one of the comparatively few canonical Silver Age X-Men, Polaris is the most A-List mutant that has yet to be adapted into a live action property–until The Gifted. She’s been around for almost 50 years, serving on teams ranging from X-Factor to the X-Men in that time and becoming one of the most powerful mutants on Earth.
On The Gifted: A much greener (pun intended) Lorna is a freedom fighter and member of the Mutant Underground, and she gets arrested in the opening episode during the team’s mission to recruit Blink. She still has her powers, although she doesn’t seem as experienced or powerful as she is currently in the comics. Also she’s paired up romantically with original character Eclipse.
Obscurity Rating: ✖

Portrayed By: Jamie Chung
In The Comics: Clarice Ferguson has a rather complicated presence in the comics. There’s the original Blink that died shortly after her first appearance, and then there’s the Blink from the “Age of Apocalypse” timeline that became a fan favorite character and led her own ensemble comic (Exiles) for close to a decade. Both versions of the character are lavender-haired teleporters, and the original Blink has even adopted the “AoA” Blink’s feistier personality since recently returning from the dead.
On The Gifted: Clarice Fong is a new recruit in the Mutant Underground, having escaped a mutant prison. Her powers are still in their formative stages and not easily controlled, something that causes problems for her teammates in addition to saving them at times.
Obscurity Rating: ✖✖

Portrayed By: Blair Redford
In The Comics: John Proudstar is basically remembered as the X-Man that died on his second mission. Thunderbird was recruited by Professor X alongside Storm, Nightcrawler, Wolverine, and Colossus–you know, characters you’ve actually heard of. With Thunderbird’s super strength and badass attitude already replicated in Colossus and Wolverine, respectively, the creative team decided to kill him off early as a sign to readers that no X-Man was safe. Surprisingly, Thunderbird has stayed dead for over 40 years; his younger brother James, however, has become a prominent member of many X-teams.
On The Gifted: A much more level-headed John is the apparent leader of the Mutant Underground, using his super strength and excellent tracking skills to find and protect mutants that are in danger.
Obscurity Rating: ✖✖✖

Portrayed By: Hayley Lovitt
In The Comics: Where to even begin? Okay… Sage was initially introduced as Tessa, an associate of the Inner Circle of the Hellfire Club and therefore one of the X-Men’s foes. It was later (as in decades later) revealed that Sage was in fact a mole, placed in the Inner Circle by Professor X himself in the early days of the X-Men. With that secret revealed, Tessa took on the codename Sage and joined the X-Men.
On The Gifted: We only got a brief scene with the character, and she wasn’t even named, but both the actress and the show’s credits confirm that she is Sage. Whether or not she’ll get her character’s distinctive facial tattoos or use her computer brain (which is as vague as it sounds) remains unknown.
Obscurity Rating: ✖✖✖

Portrayed By: Natalie Alyn Lind, Percy Hynes White
In The Comics: While there’s no Lauren and Andy Strucker in the comics, there are the Von Strucker siblings Andrea and Andreas–a pair of vile mutant twins known as Fenris. Know this about Fenris: they are the children of a legit Nazi, and they are terrible.
On The Gifted: Lauren and Andy are, obviously, very different from Andrea and Andreas–so different that you wouldn’t even think they’re connected aside from similar last names. Whereas Fenris have to hold hands in order to use their mutant bio-blasts, Lauren and Andy each have their own vaguely telekinetic-y powers that they can use independently of each other. Still, their last name is Strucker and we saw Andy doodling a wolf in the pilot episode (Fenris is the Norse word for wolf).

Obscurity Rating: ✖✖✖✖

In The Comics: The Mutant Liberation Front are a team of aggressively ’90s super-villains and mutant extremists, usually led by the sharply dressed (literally) Stryfe. Their members include a time-manipulator named Tempo, a girl with artificial dragon wings named Dragoness, a dude with a scythe named Reaper, a giant sumo wrestler named Sumo, a time-traveling robot called Zero, and a mutant with four arms codenamed Forearm.
On The Gifted: Okay, we don’t see any of them, although we know the team name exists in the universe. They’re listed by Agent Turner as one of the many mutant organizations they’ve had to label as terrorists.
Obscurity Rating: ✖✖✖✖

Portrayed By: Garret Dillahunt
In The Comics: Dr. Roderick Campbell seemed nice enough when he arrived on the Muir Island Mutant Research Center to assist with sciencey things, but his close association with the UK mutant team Excalibur led him to discover his horrible destiny: he was, at some point in the future, going to turn into the mutant-hunting villain Ahab.
On The Gifted: We meet the potential Ahab at the end of episode 2, and all we know about him so far is that he’s very interested in a pair of mutant siblings that were active in Rio de Janeiro in the ’60s. He doesn’t have a ghastly complexion, harpoon and cybernetic peg leg just yet, but he is rocking Ahab’s beard.
Obscurity Rating: ✖✖✖✖✖

Portrayed By: Elena Satine
In The Comics: This is why Dreamer is so obscure: there is no character in the comics named Dreamer, but there is a mutant character named Beautiful Dreamer–and she’s crazy obscure. Beautiful Dreamer was seldom seen member of the Morlocks, a group of ostracized mutants that had taken to living in the sewers underneath Manhattan. Her powers allowed her to implant false memories in the minds of others.
On The Gifted: Dreamer is a member of the Mutant Underground, and apparently high up enough for Thunderbird to bounce ideas off of during a crisis. You know, it’s not even clear if Elena Satine was playing Beautiful Dreamer in her brief appearance in episode 2. She didn’t use her powers, and she looks nothing like the character in the comics. Of course if you pay attention to the X-Men movies, you know that looks and powers aren’t always taken into account during the adaptation process.
Obscurity Rating: ✖✖✖✖✖

Where to stream The Gifted