Jay & Miles X-Plain the X-Men

482 – The Mutant Gene for Murder

In which Pete Wisdom canonically smells weird; we are inordinately entertained by a villain; everyone levels up their superpowers; and you probably shouldn’t shave the logo of your secret super team into the side of your head.

X-PLAINED:

  • Nasty Boys disambiguation
  • X-Force #106-109
  • Counter X (more) (again)
  • Shockwave (more) (again)
  • Turn-of-the-millennium cool
  • X-Force (more) (again)
  • How to dress for funerals, I guess?
  • How Pete Wisdom smells
  • Romany Wisdom (again)
  • Marcus Tsung
  • Mind bullets
  • Nightman
  • Our first audience challenge in a really long time
  • A bad nickname
  • X-Force’s new looks
  • A thing growing out of Domino’s back
  • Several enigmas shrouded in mystery
  • The worst birthday party
  • Abel, Baker, and Charlie
  • Fish
  • The Factory
  • Telepathic “voices”
  • The miracle of magnetism

NEXT EPISODE: The return of Chris Claremont!


LISTENERS! We want to hear your Marcus Tsung murder ballads! Send ‘em to [email protected] with the subject line MUTANT MURDER BALLAD, and we’ll stick ‘em on the web or play ‘em on the show!


Jay’s having a fucking ludicrous month, so the visual companion to this episode will be up later this week.

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4 comments

  1. The “mutant gene for murder” makes me think of the Riverdale plot twist that Betty has “the serial killer gene”.

    I’m afraid I do not share in any enjoyment from such a tediously dull villain as Tsung. If Grant Morrison were writing him, I think I could see them playing him up as an absolute idiot to be mocked the way you chaps tend to mock Shinobi Shaw, with his whole “Look at me, I killed an air stewardess for no reason. Look at me, I killed crowds of small kids at a birthday party because I want to use a phone. See? EEEEVIL!!” but I suspect here we’re actually supposed to take Tsung dead seriously. The Joker this guy is not (and I was over “murder death kill” Joker by about 1988)

    I think it’s the difference between a “So bad it’s good” movie and a “It’s so bad it’s utterly bad” movie. Tsung misses the mark for me. He’s had no build up so he’s got no stakes behind him to make me think he’s anything other than one note… which he is.

    I imagine that the difference between his mind bullets and general telekinesis is that the death bullets are automatically fatal. Telekinesis CAN kill, but doesn’t have to, simple contact with a death bullet, even in a non vital area, would kill instantly.

    Interestingly, Sam’s costume does sort of retain something of his classic New Mutants uniform: yellow central stripe down the chest and stomach, with black stripes down either side from both the suspenders and the jacket. I suspect that’s deliberate.

    Jimmy’s outfit reminds me of Harpoon of the Marauders, another guy who wore an off the shoulder look. I suspect that it might be a nod to several variations of gladiator outfits which usually had one armoured and one exposed arm.

    Boom-Boom’s I have no explanation for, except it makes me think of the catwalk model outfits you see which are aesthetically stunning, but so absolutely impractical that they could only be worn on a catwalk.

    I also just don’t think Wisdom works in this role he has here at all. He’s never been a leader (or shown interest in wanting to be), he’s never been a team tactician (If anyone had that role it was Nightcrawler). He’s the “too cool for that sort of a thing” loner for a reason. So for Wisdom to suddenly have in depth awareness of other charcters potential (which even they don’t suspect but he does because… well… reasons I guess). It feels like John Constantine showing up to train Power Pack and everyone being instantly “Oh that makes sense, of course he’s the perfect person to train small children because he’s THAT cool”)

    And the art… yes The Matrix was big (for our sins) so black and monotone where in, but this is just painful to read in many cases.

    The discussion about how telepathy might be perceived was fascinating. I guess I default to the “voice in the head” approach, because of how many times characters say “I can hear [telepath’s name] voice in my head”, and because Chamber has an actual audible accent when he speak telepathically. Plus they do tend to differentiate between “speech” and “memory/infodump sharing” but still, it’s an interesting one to ponder.

  2. Just one clarification. You said that Wisdom was X-Force’s 4th teacher after Xavier, Magneto and Cable but he’s actually their 5th. You forgot to mention X-Factor, whom served as mentors for the X-terminators and later the New Mutants in between Magneto and Cable

  3. Minor little note on the Nasty Boys Disambiguation: there is a third possible Nasty Boys – the tag team of Brian Knobbs and Jerry Sags, which started their career in 1985 in the American Wrestling Alliance, before later going to WCW in 1990.

    They helped solidify the gimmick (which would become a big part of the independent wrestling scene for the 90s and 2000s) of “Guys who don’t have a look, can’t really actually wrestle, but can brawl real good” – also demonstrated by such luminaries like Public Enemy, and Bad Breed – though some teams who did have a look but couldn’t wrestle (like Insane Clown Posse in their wrestling career), or could wrestle but didn’t have a real unified look at first (like the Hardcore Chair Swinging Freaks, or the Dudley Boys outside of Bubba Ray and D-Von) would build off of that foundation.

  4. It definitely should be processed in people’s heads as the telepath’s voice because we do see comments that they’re hearing that person’s voice. I like the idea that it’s so intimate that it’s hard to describe or might have additional components, but I doubt that’s been established.

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