In which nobody but Stryfe’s diary understands him; Apocalypse is the best at what he does (and what he does is remarkably versatile); Scott and Jean weaponize their clichés; Jae Lee does his best Patrick Nagel; Apocalypse is poisonous; Cable goes full T-800; nothing good ever happens to Cyclops on the moon; Stryfe dies as passive-aggressively as he lived; and X-Cutioner’s Song finally concludes.
X-PLAINED:
How Cable dies
The Story So Far
Still more trading-card taxonomy
Uncanny X-Men #296
X-Factor #86
X-Men #16
X-Force #18
An AU we’d like to read
The not-Stüssy S
How to effectively reference X-Men #137
A decoy baby
An abortive escape
Moon gravity
Revelatory vandalism
A trip to the moon
A probably excessive number of hawk facts
Various daring rescues
How to kill time in space
Cathexes
A very fancy moon base
The cavalry, kind of
Stryfe vs. Cable
An X-Cellent epilogue
Several Silent Hill 2 references
Stryfe’s Legacy
Pawnee, Indiana vs. Marvel
Sexy high-security prisons of the future
NEXT EPISODE: Live from FlameCon, featuring Sina Grace, Magdalene Visaggio, and Leah Williams!
Special thanks to Matt for the subject of this episode’s cold open; and to the Protomen for use of their cover of “Total Eclipse of the Heart.”
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!
We’re in the process of migrating our official shop to TeePublic! Click over to check it out! (You can still find the designs we haven’t moved yet at Redbubble.)
In which Jubilee is underwhelmed by X-Force; Havok and Gambit make weirdly good buddy cops; Department K is a hot vacation destination; Cable is secretly a Coen Brothers protagonist; you can cancel Community but you can never take away Jay’s gratuitous Community references; Rusty goes full cultist; nobody is Stryfe’s real dad; smoking on a space station is a REALLY bad idea; Apocalypse is here to help; and Miles lies at length about music.
X-PLAINED:
Kuurth
Various Juggernauts
The Story So Far
More trading-card taxonomy
Uncanny X-Men #295
X-Factor #85
X-Men #15
X-Force #17
Varyingly hilarious misunderstandings
Wire Mothers: Harry Harlow and the Science of Love
What happened
Good Cop / Sleazy Cop
A deal
A tragic absence of Draculas
The Coen Brothers’ X-Cutioner’s Song
Thanksgiving with Cable
Miles’s summer camp hijinks
Murderbots in space (again)
A dubious strategy
MLF Redshirts
The second time someone force-fed superheroes baby food in space
A dropped plot thread
Things you shouldn’t do on space stations
Additional awkward reunions
Whether Stryfe is a Summers
The X-Cutioner’s signature karaoke song
NEXT EPISODE: Dang, this event is long.
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!
We’re in the process of migrating our official shop to TeePublic! Click over to check it out! (You can still find the designs we haven’t moved yet at Redbubble.)
In which you may or may not have your own Black Bug Room; FlameCon was in fact every bit as wonderful as we projected (and more); Caliban hates true love; no one will ever be as extra as Mister Sinister; X-Cutioner’s Song is secretly a farce; we achieve Peak Cable; and the quintessential ’90s crossover event begins!
X-PLAINED:
The Black Bug Room
A good deal of pre-event status quo
Uncanny X-Men #294
X-Factor #84
X-Men #14
X-Force #16
Trading card taxonomy
The opening strains of a crossover event
A concert that worked out better in theory than in practice
An abduction
Several attempted murders
A large number of awkward reunions
An even larger number of inter-team brawls
Two villains pretending to be other villains
Cape logistics
Peak Cable
Many pouches
Many guns
The origin of Hope Summers
Our hopes for mutants in the MCU
NEXT EPISODE: Aw, Stryfe, no.
NOTE: At one point in this episode, Miles said “X-Force” when he actually meant “X-Factor.” If you can tell us where, you win the prize of eternal smugness (not as much smugness as Sinister, but still a lot).
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!
We’re in the process of migrating our official shop to TeePublic! Click over to check it out! (You can still find the designs we haven’t moved yet at Redbubble.)
One of my very favorite humans and authors–as well as a long-time friend of the show–Seanan McGuire was just announced as the writer of the upcoming X-Men: Gold Annual #2 (cover above). I caught up with Seanan on Discord for an x-clusive chat about her history with the X-Men and what it’s like to write your childhood favorites.
Keep going for the full interview, as well as the cover to X-Men: Gold Annual #2 (WITH BUNNIES)!
Jay and Miles X-Plain the X-Men is 100% ad-free and listener supported. These video reviews–and everything else here–are made possible by the support of our Patreon subscribers. If you want to help support the podcast–and unlock more cool stuff–you can do that right here!