Jay & Miles X-Plain the X-Men

50 – The People Vs. Erik Lehnsherr

Art by David Wynne. Prints and cards available until 4/5/2015 in the shop, or contact David for the original.
Art by David Wynne. Prints and cards available until 3/29/2015 in the shop, or contact David for the original.

In which Magneto makes an official alignment shift; Claremont does a court drama; Professor Xavier makes poor choices; Rachel Summers comes by her communication skills honest; the Strucker kids are the evil Wonder Twins; and the podcast hits a major milestone!

X-PLAINED:

  • Xorn
  • Uncanny X-Men #196, 199, and 200
  • The X-Men status quo circa 1985
  • Magneto’s alignment shift
  • Beyonder-related existential crises
  • A hypothetical murder mystery
  • Minor vandalism as a harbinger of dark futures
  • Psi-scream
  • Brood classified ads
  • A thematic parallel
  • The tipping point in Scott and Madelyne’s relationship
  • The new, improved Magneto
  • The Professor Who Cried Wolf
  • Phoenix II
  • Earth-811/Earth-616 disambiguation
  • Freedom Force
  • The Trial of Magneto
  • NPR-616
  • James Jaspers
  • The best editor’s note
  • The mystery of Magneto’s age
  • Andrea & Andreas Strucker
  • What not to wear to court
  • A super icky sword
  • Phoenix morality
  • Sponsorship & conflict of interest

NEXT WEEK: Emerald City Comicon special with Kris Anka, Marguerite Bennett, Kieron Gillen, and Peter Nguyen!


You can find a visual companion to this episode on our blog!

Find us on iTunes or Stitcher!

Support us on Patreon!

Buy prints of this week’s illustration at our shop, or contact David Wynne for the original!

Rachel Recaps X-Men: Evolution
S1E1: Strategy X

I was a little too old to catch X-Men: Evolution the first time around. It debuted my freshman year of college, corresponding with the peak of my nerd pretension—that larval-geek phase where you insist on calling all comics graphic novels—and like the arch little fucker I was, I dismissed it sight-unseen as X-Men dumbed down.

A few years ago, I finally sat down and watched my way through X-Men: Evolution and came away with two conclusions: teenage Rachel was kind of a dolt; and X-Men: Evolution is delightful.

Not only is Evolution not X-Men dumbed down, it’s a really clever, appealing reinvention. In fact, Evolution accomplishes what the Ultimate universe never quite could: shaking off years of continuity and attracting an entirely new audience with a distilled version of one of Marvel’s most convoluted lines.

groupshotIf you’re not familiar with X-Men: Evolution, the premise is roughly thus: The Xavier Institute is an extracurricular boarding school of sorts, whose students are mainstreamed into their district school—Bayville High—for academics. Some of the characters—Storm, Wolverine, and Professor Xavier on the side of the angels; Mystique, Magneto, and a few others on the other end of the moral spectrum—stay adults; everyone else is aged down to teenagers. Evolution draws characters and some story hooks from the comics, but for the most part, it occupies its own discrete continuity.

And as continuities go, it’s a good one. It’s clever and fun, it’s got a ton of heart, and it stays true to the core themes and characters of the source material without becoming overly beholden to the letter of the text. By the end, it’ll become a really, really good show; but even when it’s bad, X-Men: Evolution is bad in really entertaining ways.

Which is important, because X-Men: Evolution gets off to a pretty rocky start.

Continue reading

As Mentioned in Episode 39 – Forever Alone Together

Listen to the podcast here!



Links and Further Reading:

  • Information and links to donate toward Bill Mantlo’s ongoing care
    (You can also send physical donations–and cards and letters–addressed as follows:
    Mike Mantlo
    26364 East Pintail Road
    Long Neck, DE 19966
    Please make out any checks to “Michael Mantlo” — Bill’s legal guardian.)
  • The Hero Initiative
  • Waiting for the T is absolutely delightful, and if you’re not already reading it, we acutely envy you the experience of going back through the archives for the first time.
    • (Specifically apropos of the Maximoffs: 1, 2)

39 – Forever Alone Together

Art by David Wynne. Prints and travel mugs available until 1/11/2015 in the shop, or contact David for the original.
Art by David Wynne. Prints and travel mugs available until 1/11/2015 in the shop, or contact David for the original.

In which Miles and his Doom voice return triumphant; we reach an understanding regarding Lila Cheney; Mob science is pretty shoddy; Magneto has fancy hair; New Mutants Xavier is Best Xavier; no one is more goth than Cloak and Dagger; and you can have Rachel’s Speed Racer references when you pry them from her cold, dead hands.

X-Plained:

  • Spider-Man crossovers
  • Cats
  • Marvel Team-Up Annual #6
  • New Mutants #22-25
  • Phone calls with bears
  • Glam day at the Hellfire Club
  • Rahne’s fairytale
  • Cloak & Dagger
  • Drugs
  • Eldritch curtains
  • A seriously flawed evil plan
  • Harry’s Hideaway
  • The Sam and Dani Show
  • Magneto’s hair
  • Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch’s parentage
  • Waiting for the T
  • Whether Cloak and Dagger are mutants
  • How to buy original art

NEXT WEEK: G. Willow Wilson!


You can find a visual companion to this episode on our blog!

Find us on iTunes or Stitcher!

Support us on Patreon!

Buy prints of this week’s illustration at our shop, or contact David Wynne for the original!

As Mentioned in Episode 37 – Giant-Size Special #1

Listen to the episode here!



THE 2014 SUPER DOCTOR ASTRONAUT PETER CORBEAU AWARDS FOR EXCELLENCE IN X-CELLENCE

corbeau

  • Best X-Writer – Brian Michael Bendis, for Uncanny X-MenAll-New X-Men, and general line architecture
  • Best X-Artist – Kris Anka, for Uncanny X-Men and general visual and costuming impact
  • Best X-Colorist – Chris Sotomayor, for Cyclops
  • Best X-Letterer (Now and Forever) – Tom Orzechowski, for everything ever forever
  • Jean Grey Award for Creative Resurrection – Nightcrawler (Amazing X-Men)
  • Best New Character – Forget-Me-Not (X-Men Legacy #300)
  • Best Complete ArcCyclops #1-5, by Greg Rucka, Russell Dauterman, Chris Sotomayor, Carmen Carnero, et. al.
  • Best Soap OperaAll-New X-Men, by Brian Michael Bendis et. al.
  • Silver Lining Award – Death of Wolverine: The Logan Legacy #4, by Marguerite Bennett, Juan Doe, et. al.
  • Golden Retcon – X-Men: Days of Future Past
  • Irene Adler Award for Most Anticipated Future Run – G. Willow Wilson on X-Men
  • About Damn Time – Storm, by Greg Pak et. al.
  • Cyclops Has a Good Day AwardWolverine and the X-Men #40, by Jason Aaron, Pepe Larraz, et. al.
  • Best Listeners of Any Podcast Ever – YOU*

*Details of the Corbeau Coloring Contest will go up on Monday, because Rachel’s parents are visiting this weekend. We appreciate your patience.

 

CLASSIC CORBEAUS (for older X-material covered in the podcast during 2014)

  • Harvey and Janet Award for Best Walk-On – The staff and guests of the Heartbreak Hotel
  • Lost Treasure – Beauty and the Beast, by Ann Nocenti, Don Perlin, et. al.
  • Sure, Why Not? – The Leprechauns of Cassidy Keep
  • Still the Best Issue After All These YearsUncanny X-Men vol. 1 #137

LINKS AND ADDITIONAL READING

37 – Giant-Size Special #1

Art by David Wynne. Prints available until 1/15 in the shop, or contact David for the original.
Art by David Wynne. Prints available until 1/15 in the shop, or contact David for the original.

In which we launch our first-ever giant-size special; God Loves, Man Kills is the definitive X-Men story; Bobby makes his R&MXtXM on-air debut; we repopulate the world with X-writers; Rachel is really excited about x-plaining X-Cutioner’s Song; Miles takes a strong stance on Wolverine’s mask; we award some awards; and it’s all your fault.

 

X-Plained

  • God Loves, Man Kills (Marvel Graphic Novel #5)
  • William Stryker
  • An inappropriate analogy
  • Keeping it interesting
  • Favorite episodes
  • Bridging the fan/critic divide
  • Our ongoing obsession with bit characters
  • The challenge of keeping Charles Xavier relevant
  • X-Planation Curation
  • Several stories we’re really looking forward to covering
  • X-Writers on a desert island
  • Internet fights
  • Favorite stories vs. best stories
  • Stupid hats of the Marvel Universe
  • Dr. Doom as Tim Gunn
  • Havok vs. ceiling fans
  • Educational standards of the Marvel Universe
  • The First Annual Super Doctor Astronaut Peter Corbeau Awards for Excellence in X-Cellence

NEXT WEEK: Rachel and Chris Sims X-Plain Arcade

CORRECTION: In this episode, Rachel claims that there is only one Super Doctor Astronaut Peter Corbeau in the Marvel Multiverse. This is patently untrue. There are numerous versions of Super Doctor Astronaut Peter Corbeau in the Marvel Multiverse, who may or may not be able to combine Voltron-style into a giant Corbeau Singularity.


You can find a visual companion to this episode on our blog!

Find us on iTunes or Stitcher!

Support us on Patreon!

Buy prints of this week’s illustration at our shop, or contact David Wynne for the original!

6 – Days of Future Whatever

In which we more or less prepare you for the upcoming feature film; Rachel Summers is a black hole of continuity; Kitty Pryde breaks the Danger Room; Earth 200500 is clearly the best earth; even the X-Men have no idea what’s going on; First Class Emma Frost is so boring that we forget she exists; wolverines are definitely not wolves; and you can have Rachel’s Community references when you pry them from her cold, dead hands.

X-Plained:

  • Rachel Summers
  • “Days of Future Past”
  • Gravestone engraving standards of 2013
  • The Mostly-New, Mostly-Different Brotherhood of Evil Mutants
  • Another unfortunate hat
  • Causality in the Marvel Multiverse
  • Earths 811, 1191, 295, 311, and 200500
  • Hall monitors with laser rifles
  • How to fix a broken timeline
  • The X-Men cinematic universe, and points of divergence from the comics
  • The one thing X-Men: The Last Stand does right
  • The Xavier Index of Cinematic Continuity
  • The difference between Canis lupus and Gulo gulo
  • Days of Future Past cinematic cram course
  • Fix-it fic
  • Blink, Bishop, and dark-future mash-ups
  • The enduring appeal of Earth-811
  • The significantly less enduring appeal of Earth-242
  • The Nazi Excalibur of Earth-597

You can find a visual companion to the episode – and links to recommended reading – on our blog.

Find us on iTunes or Stitcher!

Next week: Greg Rucka, Cyclops, and Starjammers!