Jay & Miles X-Plain the X-Men

334 – Genetic Nonsense

In which William Stryker is exceptionally difficult to kill; the terminology around Emplate’s powers is absolute nonsense even by comic-book standards; inkers deserve more credit; we would totally read comics about Murmur the Softpoken Mummy; Bishop comes to the rescue; and nothing really resolves.

X-PLAINED:

  • What happened to William Stryker
  • Gratuitous use of the adjective “genetic”
  • Emplate (again)
  • Generation X #12-14
  • Inks
  • Penance’s original backstory
  • Pining
  • A really unpleasant reunion
  • Accent problems
  • Gayle Edgerton
  • Vincente
  • Bulwark
  • D.O.A.
  • A somewhat chaotic victory
  • Mutant teams from non-anglophone countries
  • X-characters Miles would like to write

NEXT WEEK: HAWK TALK

NEXT EPISODE: ClanDestine!


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333 – Fight Train

Art by David Wynne. Wanna buy the original? Drop him a line!

In which Miles discovers owl legs; Iceman dwells in subtext; Dark Beast overperforms; Daredevil is a delightful trash fire of a person; Graydon Creed’s presidential run is somewhat less shocking in 2021; Rogue does not enjoy playing ‘Got your nose’; and Mister Sinister is not a friend to public transportation.

X-PLAINED:

  • Post-Decimation resurrections
  • Owl legs
  • Uncanny X-Men #331
  • X-Men #51-52
  • Iceman’s complicated personal life
  • Casual crossovers
  • The facial hair of Warren Kenneth Worthington III
  • The terrible decisions of Matt Murdock
  • How to subtly test your in-laws for mutant powers
  • What Mister Sinister sounds like
  • A bad plan
  • The debut of Bastion
  • DNA
  • Foreshadowing

NEXT EPISODE: Emplate Sucks


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332 – Gideon Falls

Art by David Wynne. Wanna buy the original? Drop him a line!

In which Swimsuit Catalog is not an actual style of martial arts; Onslaught dabbles in vandalism; Crule is a special guy; we identify briefly with X-Force; and Charles Xavier is the Keyser Soze of Onslaught.

X-PLAINED:

  • Externals on Krakoa
  • Relative levels of violence in X-books
  • X-Force #52-54
  • Camp Hayden, KY
  • Onslaught-facilitated power-ups
  • Gideon (again)
  • At least one apparent death
  • How it feels to be us
  • Businesswear
  • Whether Cannonball is an external
  • Nazis in the Captain Britain Corps
  • Doop

NEXT EPISODE: Sinister vs. Public Transit


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HAWK TALK – Hack the Planet

This would usually be a skip week, but the world is still being a jerk, so we made you a bonus, entirely unedited, and almost entirely off-topic episode. This time, in honor of the 1995 film’s 1337-week anniversary, we talked about the finest movie about technology ever made, Hackers.


Topics, roughly:

  • Hackers
  • Mister The Plague
  • What David Bowie and Angelina Jolie have in common
  • Razor & Blade
  • The glory of Matthew Lillard
  • Counterculture
  • Queer (sub)text
  • Focal characters
  • Jay’s sequel pitch

In retrospect, we should have talked way more about Phreak, played amazingly by Renoly Santiago. Sorry, Renoly! That’s what we get for doing Hawk Talk without our usual outlines.

331 – Surprised by Brood

Art by David Wynne. Wanna buy the original? Drop him a line!

In which we take a break from the lead-up to Onslaught; Hannah Conover is the queen of dangling plot threads (and also of the Brood); Wolverine is the strangest angel; William Conover is the chillest minister in the Marvel Universe; and Excalibur writer Tini Howard gives us the inside scoop on Gambit’s trench coat.

X-PLAINED:

  • Mutant Brood
  • The Brood vs. Brood X cicadas
  • X-Men vs. Brood: Day of Wrath #1-2
  • Theological origins of John Ostrander
  • Hair
  • An unspoken motif in pin-up art
  • Reverend William Conover (more)(again)
  • Hannah Conover (more)(again)
  • The Brood (more)(again)
  • The Brood Empress
  • The Firstborn
  • Atypical Queen-Broodling power dynamics
  • Brood of the future
  • A strange angel
  • What Gambit’s trench coat is made of

NEXT WEEK: Hawk Talk

NEXT EPISODE: The end of the Externals!


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Jay and Miles X-Plain the X-Men is 100% ad-free and listener supported. If you want to help support the podcast–and unlock more cool stuff–you can do that right here!

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330 – Suddenly, Ninjas

Art by David Wynne. Wanna buy the original? Drop him a line!

In which the podcast turns seven; Matt has officially edited half the podcast; a lot of things are made by metal; Doctor Strange is a big weirdo; Gambit is a scoundrel, not a villain; Wolverine goes goth; Onslaught could probably use a better herald; Bishop fires two guns whilst going aaaaaaa; and we commit to making what sense we can of Onslaught.

X-PLAINED:

  • How Betsy got her body back
  • Several simultaneous anniversaries
  • Uncanny X-Men #329-330
  • X-Men #50
  • Some ninja bullshit
  • A lot of less-benign-than-it-looks racism
  • Excellent use of a neon sign
  • An odd couple
  • The evolution of art tools
  • Steam vs. metal
  • Gomurr the Ancient
  • The Ebon Vein
  • Catastrophic magic
  • Our favorite iterations of Doctor Strange
  • The Crimson Dawn
  • How one becomes Gomurr the Ancient
  • Tar (Proctor of the Crimson Dawn)
  • Post (Herald of Onslaught)
  • An entity who may or may not be Onslaught
  • Continuity party tricks
  • Survivors of the Age of Apocalypse

NEXT EPISODE: Brood X!


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Jay and Miles X-Plain the X-Men is 100% ad-free and listener supported. If you want to help support the podcast–and unlock more cool stuff–you can do that right here!

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329 – Scheming and Argument

Art by David Wynne. Wanna buy the original? Drop him a line!

In which Nate Grey has the soul of a man in a mesh shirt; Black Air is somehow even worse than you thought it was; Hulk does not want to be x-treme teen from alternate dimension; we are excited as hell for the upcoming Frasier/Ewing Gamma Flight; and Moira MacTaggert is (sometimes) the adult we need.

X-PLAINED:

  • Nate Grey’s (possible) demon zombie baby
  • What Excalibur’s been up to lately
  • Excalibur #94-95
  • X-Man #12
  • Yet another take on roughly the same dark future
  • Dark-future disambiguation
  • Bangs
  • The Black Wall
  • Leather vs. vinyl
  • Sentinels pooping sentinels
  • Nate Grey (more) (again)
  • Gamma Flight
  • Excessively silly diagnostic technology
  • Squeezits(TM)
  • A minor intervention
  • X-characters most likely to lead a successful book club
  • Warlock on Krakoa

NEXT EPISODE: The Herald of Onslaught (for real, this time, we promise)!


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328 – Single Blue Male

Art by David Wynne. Wanna buy the original? Drop him a line!

In which Sam Guthrie will take all your money; Gambit has exceptionally poor judgment; having friends who are couples means getting to be the big spoon AND the little spoon; Hank McCoy is the agrarian Rube Goldberg; and there are a lot of ways to appreciate a comic.

X-PLAINED:

  • Several colors of Beast
  • X-Men #48-49
  • X-Men Unlimited #10
  • The Floating Super Hero Poker Game
  • Large hands
  • Various refugees from the Age of Apocalypse
  • Surge(TM)
  • Pam Greenwood (Fatale)
  • Many gratuitous murders
  • Iconic runs we’re not into
  • Generations of teen X-Men

NEXT WEEK: Hawk talk!

NEXT EPISODE: Nate Grey vs. Excalibur!


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Jay and Miles X-Plain the X-Men is 100% ad-free and listener supported. If you want to help support the podcast–and unlock more cool stuff–you can do that right here!

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327 – The Sounds of Gravity

Art by David Wynne. Wanna buy the original? Drop him a line!

In which nobody’s ages ever make sense; Sebastian Shaw catches up on villain speeches; nobody puts Louise Simonson in a corner; Tabitha Smith has a bad day; Gambit and Bat Manuel have a lot in common; and Warpath outruns Adam X.

X-PLAINED:

  • X-Force #49-51
  • Haircuts
  • The return off Sebastian Shaw
  • Stansfield
  • A series of kidnappings
  • Solar-powered superpowers
  • Attempted murder
  • Memories
  • Cable as an audience surrogate
  • Tabitha’s new codename
  • The first Tick live-action series
  • Warpath’s running speed
  • Risqué
  • What gravity sounds like
  • X-leisure activities
  • Magneto’s human name/s

NEXT EPISODE: A Tale of Two Beasts


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326 – Son of a Gun

Art by David Wynne. Wanna buy the original? Drop him a line!

In which it’s hard to be a hologram; the Internet is terrible and you should probably avoid it; we have no idea how Naze is still alive; this is not your mom’s Adversary (if your mom is Fall of the Mutants); Forge is an order muppet; and Sabretooth is not a great addition to most teams.

X-PLAINED:

  • Skrulls in American history
  • X-Factor’s attrition rate
  • The spirit spell (again)
  • The Adversary (again)
  • X-Factor #119-121
  • Hypercolor(TM) t-shirts
  • Oblivion vs. masturbation
  • Mark Trail (more) (again)
  • Forge’s complicated relationship with magic
  • The death of X-Factor
  • Several retcons
  • The resurrection of X-Factor
  • (Mis)representation of indigenous cultures in X-books
  • Jim Jaspers vs. the Adversary
  • The spirit spell (YET AGAIN)
  • The Feron of X-Factor
  • Val ‘n’ Victor
  • Dubious use of technology
  • A red herring
  • The lingering spectre of Days of Future Past
  • Our tech issues
  • Reasonable accommodations at the Xavier School

NEXT EPISODE: Cable vs. X-Force


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Jay and Miles X-Plain the X-Men is 100% ad-free and listener supported. If you want to help support the podcast–and unlock more cool stuff–you can do that right here!

Buy rad swag at our TeePublic shop!