In which the Twelve should really be twelve chapters long; Archangel has issues; we continue to bemoan the absence of captions; the X-Men ditch their crossover event for a side quest; Magneto is Genosha’s official chaperone; and we would absolutely elect Emma Frost to a school board.
X-PLAINED:
What Cable does next
The event so far
Wolverine #146-147
Uncanny X-Men Annual 1999
Whether the Shadow King is moist
Why tiny cavemen can’t have nice things
Numerous flashbacks and allusions
Archangel’s third-stage evolution
The Philharmonic Gets Dressed
Abraham Kieros (again)
Apocalypse as a self-help guru
Fully nude Wolverine
X-51 #8 (briefly)
Fabian Cortez (more) (again)
A miracle of magnetism
Scomp linking
A big fancy machine
Exodus (more) (again)
Mutants we’d like to see in public office
The (theoretical) Essex administration
NEXT EPISODE: The Twelve concludes!
Check out the visual companion to this episode on our blog.
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!
In which we have had an eventful year; Longshot is a classic folk hero; writer Kieron Gillen makes a triumphant and mildly terrifying return to the show; and you remain the best listeners of any podcast, ever.
X-PLAINED:
Our tenth birthday party!
2023
Longshot vol. 2 #1
Longshot as a folkloric archetype
Longshot (more) (again)
Dismal Nitch, Washington
The Thingee
Baum, Kansas
Corn
Betty
Barrie, Kansas
The Albony Avenue Sanitarium and several of its residents
Innocence, broadly
The Wuggly Ump, by Edward Gorey
Love
Immortal X-Men
Nathaniel Essex and several significant clones thereof
Defining Mister Sinister
Making Charles Xavier sympathetic
Reset phrases
Eternals
The 10th Annual Super Doctor Astronaut Peter Corbeau Awards for Excellence at X-Cellence
Many people to whom we are grateful
NEXT EPISODE: X-Men: Liberators
NOTE: If you want to avoid Immortal X-Men spoilers in our interview with Kieron Gillen, you can skip to 01:38:50 for the Corbeau Awards!
Special thanks to:
Matt Hunter
Dylan Higgins
Al Kennedy
Max Carleton
Kieron Gillen
Tea Fougner
Anna Stokes
All of our patrons
All of you listening, always <3
“Sinister Is Cloning This Town” performed by Steve and Erin Pence
Check out the visual companion to this episode on our blog!
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!
In which the first Magneto miniseries is actually a Joseph miniseries; Magneto lost a lot of nuance in the ‘90s; Fabian Cortez is friend to neither man nor bird; Joseph finds his inner supervillain; Marvel’s United Nations is unusually heavily armed; and bears are much cooler than guns.
X-PLAINED:
Magneto (again)
The Acolytes (again)
Joseph (again)
Magneto #1-4
Amelia Voght (again)
Religious statuary
Razors
New Avalon
Magneto’s voice
How not to make a point
Armstrong
A Trask who may or may not be Simon
Weird torture
Peonies
A big, silly fight
Happy X-Men comics featuring Wolverine
The many nexuses of reality
NEXT EPISODE: Assassination!
Check out the visual companion to this episode on our blog.
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!
This is in fact an ENTIRELY REASONABLE position under the circumstances. (X-Men Prime #1)
Dennis is his own disparaging narrator. (X-Men Prime #1)
I don’t know why John Constantine is here to question Trish Tilby’s ethics, but SOMEONE needs to. (X-Men Prime #1)
Why is Val here? WHO KNOWS? (X-Men Prime #1)
Pretty sure this is supposed to be Onslaught, but it’s not going to be confirmed, so… (X-Men Prime #1)
“I repurposed all the brain parts that would normally go to fashion sense. On one hand, I can keep track of every team in play. On the other hand, this is how I dress myself.” (X-Men Prime #1)
Mondays, amirite? (X-Men Prime #1)
That’s… exactly what a chaperone is, though. (X-Men Prime #1)
GUYS SOMETIMES PEOPLE ARE JUST IN A HURRY (X-Men Prime #1)
Just wait ’til Age of X-Man. (X-Men Prime #1)
Emplate: still exceptionally creepy. (X-Men Prime #1)
nopenopenopenopenope (X-Men Prime #1)
I’ve seen at least three horror movies that basically start this way. (X-Men Prime #1)
NEXT EPISODE: The fall of Avalon, and some related situation comedy.
In which we enter our fourth century of podcasting with brand new theme music; we have both Wolverine questions and wolverine questions; it is extremely rough to be Bishop; the creator of Garfield may or may not live in a sewer on Earth-616; Rogue needs better coping mechanisms; bigotry is depressingly timeless; and everything is Onslaught now.
X-PLAINED:
Joseph’s Brotherhood of Evil Mutants
Our new theme music
X-Men Prime #1
A genuinely cool cover gimmick
What happened after the end of the world
Boundaries
War crimes vs. fashion crimes
Destruction of real landmarks in fiction
A mysterious assailant
Actual embodied chaos god Jim Davis and his Earth-616 namesake
Several memorable Garfield stories
Marrow (Sarah Rushman)
The secret origin of the Morlocks
A friendship we miss
Unhealthy coping mechanisms
The perennially dubious journalistic ethics of Trish Tilby
Dennis
The death of Dennis
Flaws of the mutant metaphor (more) (again)
Several refugees from Earth-295
Mr. Summers and Mr. Summers
The secret origin of the Genoshan mutates
The Acolytes
The continuing relevance of the mutant metaphor (more) (again)
Cross-universe characterization
NEXT EPISODE: The fall of Avalon!
NOTE: The Garfield strips Jay mentions appeared in newspapers, on purpose, in October 1989.
Check out the visual companion to this episode on our blog.
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!
One of those images that has really, really stuck with us over the years. (Uncanny X-Men #314)
It took a lot of self restraint not to post every single drawing of Emma in Bobby’s body from this issue. (Uncanny X-Men #314)
Those Sienkiewicz inks! (Uncanny X-Men #314)
DAMN, Emma. (Uncanny X-Men #314)
You can almost see Generation X forming between the panels. (Uncanny X-Men #314)
Programming a hologram of his dead sister to harangue him in the Danger Room may be the most Bishop move yet. (Uncanny X-Men #314)
He sewed that cape out of SO MANY cheap vinyl Catwoman costumes. (X-Men Annual #18)
Never take teenagers hostage; they’ll just judge you ’til you let them go out of sheer insecurity. (X-Men Annual #18)
[Insert Jude the Obscure joke here.] (X-Men Annual #18)
Don’t fuck with Jean Grey. (X-Men Annual #18)
WHY IS THERE A GIANT SQUID HERE (X-Men Annual #18)
Aw, Bishop. (X-Men Annual #18)
For more of this beautiful friendship, we’d recommend giving canon a miss and going straight to fellow X-Podling Adam Reck’s delightful Bish & Jubes–and, while you’re at it, supporting the collected edition on Kickstarter!
On Fridays, we wear fuchsia. (Uncanny X-Men #315)
That is one sweet coma beard. (Uncanny X-Men #315)
Yes, this is a good speech; but also, I just realized that given that the whole trial happens in space, it definitely falls under maritime law, AND I FORGOT TO MAKE ANY JOKES ABOUT IT IN THE EPISODE. (Uncanny X-Men #315)
NEXT EPISODE: We’re so close to nearly reaching what’s almost the Phalanx Covenant!
LINKS & FURTHER ACTION POINTS
Here’s where to send your strongly worded letter about why Marvel should give us Earth-441:
Marvel Entertainment, LLC
135 W. 50th Street
New York, NY 10020
You can also tweet at them with the hashtag #EarthXPlain!
In which Emma Frost is a better Iceman than Bobby Drake; Generation X is aggressively foreshadowed; Malcolm and Randall are the Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to Bishop’s Hamlet; and we launch a campaign for our own Multiversal designation.
X-PLAINED:
The first time the X-Men met Emma Frost
Uncanny X-Men 314-315
X-Men Annual #18
A game show nobody should ever under any circumstances actually make
Emma Frost’s recruitment tactics
Previously unexplored ice powers
The direct prelude to Generation X
Caliban (more) (again)
SoftPaws(TM)
The giant squids of New York
The neophyte
A trial, kind of
X-Men power fantasies
Earth-X-Plain
NEXT EPISODE: We’re so close to nearly reaching what’s almost the Phalanx Covenant!
Game show music by MusicManiac301; used with permission.
Check out the visual companion to this episode on our blog!
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!