Jay & Miles X-Plain the X-Men

Category: podcasts

458 – Quantum Stuff

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In which Tommy Lee Edwards draws a damned fine everything; death gods get taken a lot less seriously when their avatars are seagulls; warm and cool colors get in a fight; Domino has no time for this bullshit; Cable and Domino wait ’til the kids are asleep; Sunspot’s alibi is too complicated; X-Force forges a pouches path; Engines are nothing but trouble; and Ry’lor the Destroyer puts himself in time out.

X-PLAINED:

  • The Norse Pantheon of 2099
  • X-Force #91-93
  • One of the best X-covers ever
  • Our favorite Siryn story
  • Jesse Aaronson, penitent chef
  • Sean Cassidy, penitent dad
  • A realistically anticlimactic breakup
  • Cassidy/Rourke history
  • Bring Your Daughter to Crimes Day
  • Napoleon Sanders
  • An epistolary montage
  • The dusty pink word balloons of Tom Waits
  • A missed Manos-portunity
  • The Chaos Engine
  • Halloween Jack
  • Domino’s varied musical tastes
  • Ry’lor the Destroyer
  • Kodo the Komodo
  • Bedlam’s extremely situational powers
  • Astarte and Electryon
  • Horniness as a superpower
  • The Temple of the Dying Sun
  • Cable & Corsair’s (lack of) history
  • Hope, Hope, Hope, Hope, Hope, and Hope

NEXT EPISODE: Miles and guest host Devin talk X-Patrol, 1996’s X-Force / Doom Patrol mash-up!

Want to hire J&MXPtXM producer Matt Hunter to produce your podcast? Email him!

Check out the visual companion to this episode on our blog!

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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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457 – Stinking at the Moon

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In which the theme is too many inkers; Cecilia Reyes has no patience for your bullshit; Genosha’s going to be just fine (it’s not); we would watch a supercut of Fabian Cortez getting punched; we bid an abrupt farewell to Gaia; and comics are exhausting, yet captivating.

X-PLAINED:

  • Dazzler’s murder trial
  • X-Men Unlimited #24
  • The past and future of X-Men Unlimited
  • Doctor Cecilia Reyes
  • Ghost Pirate Cap’n Bloodscream
  • Wolverine and friends
  • Pushing your kid out of a plane as a basic first aid skill
  • Banter
  • The Silver Samurai (Keniuchio Harada)
  • Sunfire and the Big Hero Six
  • Projectile-based wordplay
  • Irene Adler, spoiler machine
  • Genosha (again)
  • The Cabinet of Doctor Lensherr
  • Magneto’s panties
  • Stupid metaphors
  • Football stars and their football cars
  • Magneto’s nuanced and baby-filled past
  • Generation X #51
  • Hunter & Tristan Brawn
  • Helicopter grandparents
  • Artie & Leech, perpetual moppets
  • Emma Frost, forever traumatized
  • Generation X’s new costumes
  • Gaia as the Bird Boy of Generation X
  • Peach Momoko’s Ultimate Armor
  • Sauron and the Lizard’s agendas and fashion
  • Comic book collecting preferences

NEXT EPISODE: Some damned fine X-Force.

Want to hire J&MXPtXM producer Matt Hunter to produce your podcast? Email him!

Check out the visual companion to this episode on our blog!

Find us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!

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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456 – Until/Unless

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In which there’s nothing inherently wrong with monster-of-the-week; Marrow’s makeover extends to her font; Red Skull gets a Power Glove; Marvel sets up a slate of spinoffs; and you should hire Matt Hunter to produce your podcast!

X-PLAINED:

  • What Danger’s been up to lately
  • Uncanny X-Men #371
  • X-Men #91
  • X-Men Annual 1999
  • Crossover cover design
  • Skrullverine
  • Machine Man
  • Dethlok vs. Dethklok
  • Jack Truman (Agent 18) (to some extent)
  • A nice dress
  • An awkward reunion
  • Gambit as a mentor
  • Billy G.
  • A daring but silly rescue
  • Several upcoming series
  • Marrow’s bone bikini and/or pubes
  • Whether Rogue can absorb animals

NEXT EPISODE: Cecilia Reyes returns from retirement!

Want to hire J&MXPtXM producer Matt Hunter to produce your podcast? Email him!

Check out the visual companion to this episode on our blog!

Find us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!

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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455 – Space, Geeks, and Galactus

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In which Roadhouse is basically a Wolverine story; Spider-Man does crimes; space names are derivative; there are lots of good reasons to yell at Professor Xavier; the X-Men do Doctor Who; Galactus is not interested in your puny human feelings; Marrow gets a new look; the Skrulls need a crash course in UI; and we overthink bones.

X-PLAINED:

  • The time the Skrulls did “A Piece of the Action”
  • The trouble with benevolent dictatorships
  • X-Men #89-90
  • Uncanny X-Men #370
  • A New York City that is not in fact New York City
  • “Spider-Man”
  • A ruse
  • Faces
  • Skrull problems
  • Mar-Vell
  • Adam Warlock
  • Sass vs. joviality
  • Skrull Cop City
  • Disguises
  • Nova (Frankie Raye)
  • How Galactus eats planets
  • Condiments
  • Several melees
  • Bone pubes
  • Skrull UI
  • Whether Moopsy could drink Wolverine’s bones
  • X-Musicals

NEXT EPISODE: The return of Douglock!

The Roald Dahl short story whose title Jay couldn’t recall is “Beware of the Dog.”

Check out the visual companion to this episode on our blog.

Find us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!

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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454 – X-Men ’97, Part 2

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SPOILER WARNING: ALL OF THEM, NONSTOP

In which Barry Windsor-Smith is too sexy for television; we know what happens when unstable molecules get struck by lightning; X-Men gets political and does it spectacularly; this Captain America would not sew the cape; Magneto continues to throw things into space; and they kissed and we missed it.

X-PLAINED:

  • Fabian Cortez’s name
  • X-Men ’97 episodes 6-10
  • Lifedeath I & II: a surprising adaptation
  • Varying levels of going in blind
  • A somewhat different and possibly better Forge
  • The Adversary vs. the Owl Queen
  • Stormiest and least-Stormy costumes
  • Professor Charles Xavier, Official Space Boyfriend
  • Colonialism vs. Identity
  • Delayed catharsis
  • The narrative power of altered opening credits
  • What makes allyship effective (and not)
  • Justified mutant anger
  • The worst version of Nina DaCosta
  • What makes Prime Sentinels scary
  • Summers family feels
  • The best damned fight scenes out there
  • Bastion, robo-avatar of conservative white patriarchy
  • Simultaneous crossovers
  • A psychic gay bar
  • A last boss arena
  • Acolyte equivalencies
  • Phoenix Ex Machina
  • Crying
  • Whether Magneto was right
  • Apoca-futures and Apoca-pasts
  • A bulletin board and our hopes for its contents
  • Soft Serve
  • Kitty Pryde’s coffee shop AU
  • X-Men ’97 as the perfect gateway

NEXT EPISODE: Skrulls!

LINKS AND FURTHER READING:

No visual companion this week!

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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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453 – X-Men ’97, Part 1

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SPOILER WARNING: ALL OF THEM, NONSTOP

In which we put the comics on hold to take a look at X-Men ’97; it is still always Inferno in here; Wolverine is best used sparingly; a Marvel show finally embraces politics; Wolverine is best in small doses; Madeylne Pryor still always deserves better; Jubilee grows up; and we are all in on this series.

X-PLAINED:

  • “Beyond Good and Evil”
  • X-Men: The Animated Series and our respective feelings about it
  • X-Men ’97, episodes 1-5
  • Watching X-Men ’97 with and without context
  • Making animated Cyclops work
  • The Magneto’s-hair-length morality index
  • Politics
  • Voices
  • Adaptation pacing
  • Agency
  • Abcissa
  • Foreshadowing
  • Time compression
  • Horniest Rogue
  • Death in cartoons
  • A metaphor
  • Nonbinary identity in 1997
  • Character evolution

NEXT EPISODE: Episodes 6-10

No visual companion this week!

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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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452 – Hot Nothing

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In which Magneto is not full of mirth; nobody real or fictional likes Fabian Cortez; when you’re a speedster, every problem is a metaphorical nail; The Zealot makes some valid points; and when Quicksilver declares himself your conscience, it’s time to examine your life.

X-PLAINED:

  • How Magneto got his powers back
  • Morally ambiguous hair
  • Genosha (more) (again)
  • Magneto Rex #1-3
  • Magneto vs. Conan
  • Trish Tilby
  • Omniscient narrative condemnation
  • Magneto’s true archfoe
  • Magistrates (more) (again)
  • Mutates (more) (again)
  • Dr. Alda Huxley
  • Phillip Moreau (more) (again)
  • Jenny Ransome (more) (again)
  • Pipeline (Cormac Grimshaw)
  • Teleportational nudity
  • The Zealot
  • Fabian Cortez (more) (again)
  • Amelia Voght (more) (again)
  • Several of Magneto’s on-again-off-again children
  • The Bastille (but not that one)
  • Mutant numbering
  • When to use full frontal nudity in your comic
  • The X-books we’re not covering
  • The Amulet of Right vs the Sword of Might

NEXT EPISODE: X-Men ’97!

Check out the visual companion to this episode on our blog!

Find us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!

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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451 – Meanwhile in Another Dimension

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In which we remain fascinated by Magneto’s robot butler; murder is Logan’s love language; the Juggernaut punches a hole in reality; Professor Xavier makes it weird; and Storm lectures several gods.

X-PLAINED:

  • Silly mutant powers
  • Uncanny X-Men #368-369
  • X-Men #88
  • Alan Davis’s X-Men run
  • Magneto’s robot butler
  • Joseph’s funeral
  • Nun-sense
  • A voyage to another dimension
  • Eyebrow power
  • Ejulp
  • The Trion
  • The other Gem of Cyttorak that’s like the first one but somehow worse
  • Several comas
  • Juggernaut vs. Juggernaut
  • Evil, kind of
  • Vacationing with X-Men characters
  • Illyana Rasputin and Rachel Summers

NEXT EPISODE: Magneto Rex

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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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450 – Live at the Clinton Street Theater

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In which we celebrate our tenth anniversary by X-Plaining what may be the most reviled X-arc; you should not try this at home; Mystique is so much better than this story; Azazel is a really boring devil; Nightcrawler should probably be missing a hand; the Xavier School definitely does not have an HR department; and we would prefer that you not pee on Iceman.

X-PLAINED:

  • Nightcrawler’s (most recent) parentage
  • Uncanny X-Men #428-434
  • X-Men Blue: Origins #1
  • The X-Men, like, in general
  • Nightcrawler (Kurt Wagner)
  • Some narrative choices
  • Mystique
  • Baron Christian Wagner
  • Marvel Europe
  • Azazel
  • Church sex
  • Nightstreaker
  • Isla des Demonas
  • Foibles of Warren Kenneth Worthington III
  • Annie and Carter Ghazikhanian
  • Abyss
  • Kiwi Black
  • The Cheyarafim and Neyaphem
  • Bad times with psychic therapy
  • Post-traumatic supervillainy
  • Uncool Hell
  • A miracle of magnetism
  • The only cool thing in Uncool Hell
  • A very elegant retcon
  • X-Muppets
  • Characters who deserve more page space
  • Miles’s favorite X-Person
  • What the Worthington Corporation does
  • A character who could reasonably be Azazel’s kid

NEXT EPISODE: Back to X-business as usual!

Check out the visual companion to this episode on our blog!

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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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449 – Dressing the X-Men, with Russell Dauterman

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In which artist Russell Dauterman joins us to discuss super-powered costume design!

X-PLAINED:

  • Why it’s important to get a professional to design your superhero costume
  • Why Miles doesn’t trust the government
  • Russell’s history at Marvel
  • Designing for the Hellfire Gala
  • Mutant fashion
  • The word “fashionize”
  • Iconic looks
  • Modernizing superhero costumes
  • Powers vs. personality
  • Punk goddess Storm
  • Designing for drawability
  • Magic hair
  • Russell’s influences
  • Definitive Rogue costumes
  • X-Men ‘97
  • Best X-team costumes
  • Jay’s holy grail cosplay
  • Magic hair, cosplayed
  • Costume retrospectives
  • Where to find Russell online
  • Evil twin trends of the 1990s
  • Fuck You Pink

NEXT EPISODE: Jay & Miles Live at the Clinton Street Theater!

Check out the visual companion to this episode on our blog!

Find us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!

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!