Transcript
Speaker: I'm Trish Tobey with W.A.R.C. reporting to you live from Westchester, New York, where there appears to be some sort of mutant menace on the loose.
Speaker: Hey everybody, I'm Matt Allcamp. And I'm Pat Reber. Say it with us, Pete. Welcome to Mutant Menace. He was a little quick on the draw today.
Speaker: Pat. Pete. Yeah. This is a podcast called Mutant Menace. We talk about the X-Men and I want to talk to you about the X-Men today. You're absolutely right, Matt. This is a podcast. Just for if this is your first time listening.
Speaker: This is going to be a lot of people's first episode. A lot of people jump on on episode 73. They see ah issue 201 happening and they're like, that's a good place to start learning about the X-Men.
Speaker: That's right. I heard the first 200 issues are warm garbage. Mostly reprints. Same with like the, I mean, that's what they say about podcasts. First 72 episodes are warm up.
Speaker: Episode 73 is where it really comes together. hit our stride. We have been counting down behind the scenes to this episode because 73 is just the the gods bless you essentially with podcast talent. 74 is when things start going downhill though. Yeah, this will be our peak.
Speaker: do What do you remember about where we left the X? Because we're back to the X-Men this week. We are, Matt, and we are still stuck in the mire of secret wars 2 it'll never man we've been talking this has been like four months i know it's just what a nightmare uh but we are finally back to the x-men if you remember outside of secret wars 2 stuff the x-men was just doing a lot of like
Speaker: one-off stories either following a character or doing like a monster of the week thing yeah we surmised was probably one or both of two things right either having lived through secret wars one we're stalling everything so secret wars two doesn't interfere with these long threaded plot lines yes and or number two and or and or Very good.
Speaker: I never saw it. mean People say i should, though, right? like Like people say it's really good. It's like the I'm not I'm not off of Star Wars stuff. Like still watch it occasionally. But yeah, that is the one that if you're tired of new Star Wars stuff, you should still watch.
Speaker: People say it's like peak Star Wars. Yeah. OK, you were saying ah number two
Speaker: That we're building to something big. Where where there's a lot of... weve We've talked about mutant hysteria in the news. So we do complaints about the mutant menace. Mutant menace! So...
Speaker: ah Probably a combination of both, right? But it's just been, it's been these individualized stories, nothing really to affect the canon too much. I guess Storm still doesn't have her powers. Storm doesn't have her powers and she was off in Africa and she came back because she, along with everybody, all the other X-Men, got swept off to Asgard.
Speaker: That's right. And she came back. Yeah, she came back and they all landed in France where Magneto is having a trial. And then everybody just kind of overlooked the fact that she had already left.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah. Treated her like she never actually went to went went to Africa. That's right. well Wolverine and Nightcrawler and Colossus, they are just trucking along status quo. Same with Rogue, newest member, but she's, you know, no real character development in the last...
Speaker: five, 10 issues. Yeah. Yeah. She rules, but she's just been going through the motions like everyone else. I guess the other, the other important detail here is going to be that this this takes place before the start of X factor for the first one or two Yeah.
Speaker: OK, so that factors into all of this as well. Scott Summers was also brought to Asgard. He's been playing a part in Secret Wars, too, because Jim Stupid forgot that he wasn't on the X-Men. um Or this is his editorial way of bringing him back to the X-Men. But now what it wouldn't be, though, because he knows that he wanted to put him in Right. In X Factor by this in X Factor. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah. i Who knows? It doesn't. I don't know. i i'm Trying to understand the mind of Jim stupid. It's right there in the name. Futile effort.
Speaker: ah But so he is back with the X-Men, but not on the X-Men is in the company of the X-Men right now. Yes, correct. And Madeline Pryor is pregnant.
Speaker: I think we watched her go into labor, right? Yes. Yeah. While they were all ah off dealing with Secret Wars 2 shit. Yes. And we know that Phoenix is kind of slowly losing her mind ever since she met the Beyonder.
Speaker: We saw that in Secret Wars 2 that she was given and in the last our last X-Men episode. She's like she's maybe the most deeply affected by this Beyonder stuff.
Speaker: Maybe. Arguably. Kurt, too. Kurt was pretty freaked out by the fact that he met God. That's true. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a good point. So, I guess that's kind of where we were at. That brings us up to speed. This was an easy one.
Speaker: kit i Oh, Kitty. Kitty. Kitty Pryde. um kitty pride is still kind of like reconciling with all the stuff that happened in ah in Japan in the kitty pride Wolverine thing she's become shadow cat now and we're starting to see like little ways in which that grew her up but mostly she's just fucking kitty pride yeah she rules
Speaker: Oh, Matt, that raucous piano playing means that it's finally time for Patsy Mill Corner. Oh, Patsy Mill Corner. Finally. Only so long.
Speaker: Only a couple today, Matt, but we're going to read them. That's okay. It's okay when when when it's a little calmer. Yeah, yeah, that's fine. But keep in mind, things are calm right now. So if you've been thinking about emailing in mutantmenasepod at gmail.com. You'll likely get on.
Speaker: Anyway, up first, Ambitious Eric. Ambitious Eric. Welcome back, Ambitious Eric. He says, do you think Wolverine enjoys Ovaltine in the subject line here?
Speaker: Which, should point out, came to us before we talked about Nestle Quick on our last episode. Huh. I think it, is it a play on words?
Speaker: Wolver and Ovalt are both eens? Yeah, Wolver means like ah like a oblong circle. Okay, and Ovalt...
Speaker: An oval means an oblong circle with a T in the middle. So essentially the two words mean the same thing. They mean the same thing. And so that's what ambitious Eric's trying to say. I don't think that's correct. No, I think I made all of it up. Sorry. So the answer to your question that is no ambitious Eric.
Speaker: Okay. Hey, Pat, please, for the love of all that is revered, tell Matt I've been meaning to email you for like a month or something, but I've developed an addiction to drugs. I have not.
Speaker: It's whatever drugs you guys would judge me the most for snorting crushed up baby cremains or something. i don't know. It doesn't even get me high. It just keeps me from emailing you.
Speaker: Huh? So it couldn't. So if it doesn't get you high, then how is it a drug? I think it's just, i yeah, that's true. It's just the love of killing babies, I guess. The qualification of drug is just the the thick type of chemical change it creates, right? Yeah, the pharmac, yes. Yeah, it's like a it's like a classification of pharmacopoeia.
Speaker: Maybe, see, you went dark with cremains. Maybe that's just how he says Tylenol. It's a regional thing. Ha ha ha!
Speaker: Snorting crushed up baby Tylenol, I would judge you pretty harshly for that. You know. That's loser shit. If you eat some, if you eat like craisins or cranberry raisins, right?
Speaker: Cranberries that have been dried out. So maybe crumains are the remains of cranberries. So snorting up some baby cranberry leavings.
Speaker: That's going to hurt. Yeah, don't do that. Actually, yeah are but again we are disappointed in you. Anyhow, since we're being vulnerable with each other, thanks to your episode 69 coverage of Iceman's extended psychoactive journey, I realized the reason I don't like Iceman and Human Torch is because they remind me of a younger version of myself who was a douchebag. Do you guys have any characters that are hard for you to enjoy because they remind you of a problematic version of yourself or perhaps some other person you know?
Speaker: Ooh, that's a good question. I've always been pretty great. I definitely have one. i definitely have like characters that remind me of how I was as a romantic partner when I was younger. Ooh, okay.
Speaker: Scott Pilgrim. Scott Pilgrim is definitely, well... Scott Pilgrim reminds me of who I was as a person, not as a romantic. but I don't think he was as the same kind of boyfriend that I was. i think the boyfriend that I was is like, I can't think of one right now, but I know it pops up sometimes and and and fucks with my head. The character from the video game Braid.
Speaker: him this is the This is not save your game. but ah kid Omega definitely reminds me of a younger version of myself. Okay, yeah, yeah, sure. Very rebellious for rebellion's sake. But I don't dislike him. I love him. yeah I love my younger punk rock self. that I loved that guy. That guy rolled.
Speaker: i I will also say, like, Brian Lee O'Malley... I think just because of his age and maybe the type of people he hangs out with has always been one step ahead of whatever coming of age I'm going through. So as his comics come out and I read them, I'm like, oh, shit, this is a version of me that I no longer am. And ah I don't necessarily like. Snot girl.
Speaker: Not Snot Girl. Snot Girl is when he kind of stopped doing that. What was the... But but Seconds. Seconds. Seconds. That one kind of... intent After reading Scott Pilgrim, Seconds also struck me. But Scott Pilgrim brought me into... i don't think I was ready, but it it it primed me for growing through my 20s.
Speaker: Because I was like... Like, I really... took to heart the lessons he was learning. Yeah. Yeah. um By the end of that book. The book. Yeah. the The movie is a little, uh, yeah. Maybe interpreted a little differently. Uh, the other one, I think I'll say is not a character, but Alan Moore's the killing joke or like some of those other, like,
Speaker: dark fucked up Batman stories that when I was younger, I thought were very cool and edgy. And as time has gone on, have been it tough to reread.
Speaker: Okay. There's some Garth Ennis stuff in there too that I was like, oh why was i into this? This is just violent. Yeah, i'm I'm a little afraid to go back and read Garth Ennis' Punisher. I remember reading it at the time and being like, this is so fucking good. Sure, yeah, yeah. Same with Sin City. I'm a little afraid to go back and read that. I remember reading them and being like, these are the best comics ever.
Speaker: I did read a little bit of Preacher again, and that had that feeling. Doesn't quite hold up. Right. It has that feeling of like, oh, this is a iron I know why a younger me loved this.
Speaker: But and it's not bad comics. I don't I don't I also don't want to say they're bad comics. They're just man. They are so exactly what they are. You know what I mean? Yes. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker: Ambitious Eric goes on, but it's about penis stuff. And I'm drawing a line in the sand here, Matt. This is not... A penis podcast. that We do not. Turns out we're a penis podcast. No, we're we're done. So well I'm not going to repeat this.
Speaker: It just so happens, Pat. I think we might be a penis podcast now. Thank you, Ambitious Eric. We'll move on Mikey Two Males. I'm to say this about what Ambitious Eric wrote. I won't say it out loud, but there is a comic book resources article about it.
Speaker: Okay. One of their comic book rumors. Specifically for you, Ficious Eric. Narrow casting. i Say it in the Discord if you want. Up next, Mikey Two Mails with his episode 71 penis related email. Okay. More a penis podcast. ah yeah He says, hey, Pat, tell Matt, I said I don't have mutant powers, so I could not hear the fireworks, but I hope they stopped before Matt needed to sleep. Remember when you thought you were hearing fireworks? Yeah.
Speaker: So there is one segment where I stopped talking and ask you if you can hear fireworks. But I think ah it was a segment that and it was like a moment where we had fucked up anyway.
Speaker: And so the only time the fireworks were audible was during a ah section I needed to cut out. And i edited that one like a little late. So I didn't have time to like cut it and put it into the spot where I was asking you if you could hear it, which would have been fun.
Speaker: Sure. So just to just to reiterate, you're the only one that heard these fire.
Speaker: ah I'm not repeating the penis stuff. That's the rule now. Episode 71, non X-Men related email. Hey, Pat, tell Matt. I said that if he wants a good Pokemon related podcast, he should check out the Roaring Trainers. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker: Other than that, hope you all are doing well. The Discord has been a fun place to hang out. So shout out, shoot out. So shoot out. Shoot out. No, won't. I won't. I refuse.
Speaker: And all the awesome people there. i Thank you, Mikey, two males. And thanks for plugging the Discord. Get in there. It is. It is fun. So I'll say this about the Roaring Trainers. It is a ah actual play Pokemon TTRPG podcast. Okay. and what I'm looking for, which I don't think exists, is like a podcast with cool, funny people that talk about the games.
Speaker: That just talk about the games. That just talk about them. Or like, hey, here's some cool stuff about game. have like cultural discussions that sort of surround. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. You want a culture podcast that uses Pokemon as a gimmick.
Speaker: not no No, we did that. I want a podcast that talks about Pokemon. So when I'm at work and not playing Pokemon, I can go. Yeah, I do like that Pokemon a lot, but it needs to be cool and funny because almost all of them aren't.
Speaker: Well, keep coming, folks. If you want us to shit on a podcast, you like. I'm not saying Roaring Trainers. I'm just saying Roaring Trainers doesn't fit the bill. I'm not saying it's bad. yeah
Speaker: That's it. Oh, ah okay. I guess that's it.
Speaker: Well, Pat, I guess that just leaves... One question remaining in my mind that didn't get addressed during Pat's email corner, nor the intro.
Speaker: Interesting. Pat. Yeah. Did you friggin' do anything X-Men related this week? You know, Matt, there's been some news. Official casting news, I think, over this past week about ah the X-Men. They've announced the official cast of, I think it's Gene, Scott, Rogue. Rogue.
Speaker: Emma. Somebody I'm missing there. Anyway, they didn't listen to any of my suggestions. How fucking... the Do they even listen to this podcast?
Speaker: I'm not sure. i Reach out a lot and ask and. And they haven't let me know. They haven't responded. It's weird. That's well what it is. It's weird. It's weird. They've said they didn't. What I'm having trouble with. They so they said we're not interested, which isn't which isn't. I haven't listened. That's not a no. We're not going to buy your podcast, which isn't what you're asking.
Speaker: or wait is that what you were asking? I'm always trying to sell. ah So so how anyway, feel about the casting news. I say they haven't cast they haven't cast Wolverine or Nightcrawler or Professor X. So Drew Carey, Bowen Yang and Timothy Chalamet are all still on the table there.
Speaker: h I am a little disappointed because I'll tell you, because they officially canceled Wonder Man. Which is our first step to decanonizing that show, which, if you remember, is what we need to be able to muscle Yahya Abdul-Mateen into that Cyclops role that he's just great at.
Speaker: Okay. So you you all already cast a Cyclops. So now yeah we have to kill Kit Conner. ah Right. And then we would need to age down Yahya Abdul-Mateen too, because I think they're they're going for like a younger cast. But yes, movies can do that now.
Speaker: So do you want to do you want to say any of the casting or or no free, no free publicity? I don't I I'm a bit out of touch, Matt. So none of these names rung any bells for me except for ah the one that I guess would probably spoil a movie. Right.
Speaker: Yeah, so there's one that would spoil a movie, but it's now now it's like just public news, so I feel like we could. I haven't seen it yet, but I guess I i i know, so yeah it's public enough. Because everyone knows she's in the movie. Yeah, let's do this again, and then we'll we'll edit it cleverly.
Speaker: you just Skip ahead 15 seconds if you don't want Spider-Man spoiled in even the minorest fashion. Yeah. All right. Sadie Sink from Stranger Thing is Jean Grey.
Speaker: Right. And now we've got to kill like 10 more seconds just so we can, whoever skipped forward can listen to the rest of the, yeah do you have anything? No. All right.
Speaker: Keep going. It's 15 seconds. Oh, it's done. Okay. Samara weaving. As Emma Frost. As Emma Frost, yeah. I know her.
Speaker: i don't know who that What was she in? do i do Have I seen her in anything? Or do I just know her as, like, pretty lady around the internet? um Oh, she was in she was the ah she was in three billboards outside of Missouri. Oh, okay.
Speaker: And Indy Navarrete, who is in Obsession. She's rogue. Oh, that's the the obsessed girl from Obsession. That's the girlfriend. Yes.
Speaker: Okay. All right. yeah that's a That's solid. i do i These are two people that I know. Her face still... I mean, her face in that... When you see pictures of her in that movie, it's still like legitimately scary.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah. She's... She was terrifying. Yes. ah The way that she could contort her face to make a smile or a frown look like a look like like a monster was and otherworldly. What a cool choice for Rogue to like let's. Yeah. Mind the well of horror movies for a for a rogue. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. yeah Um, yeah. And I don't know who Christopher Abbott, Kit Connor, or Maya Boyd are.
Speaker: Yeah. Uh, if you're into any of them, mutantmenaspod at gmail.com. Let us know who the fuck these kids are. This is a Hollywood cast now. Uh, Adam Driver as Mr. Sinister, who I assume is one of the X-Men. I, I, I haven't met that guy yet.
Speaker: uh yeah yeah he joins the x-men um sounds like a cool dude next episode you'll yes no we will meet a man named mr sinister very well very soon-ish oh no uh it's complicated anyway that's that's my thing what hashtag bow and yang for wolverine hashtag bow yang for wolverine As we've always said, Matt, did you do anything X-Men related this week?
Speaker: Um, I did a lot of healing like Wolverine. I helped my friend move and I got all fucking torn up.
Speaker: Okay. I did for two days. I helped my friend pack up and move in a, in a kind of a stressful situation. So there was, there was ah some hurrying going on and some, and some like, you know,
Speaker: thoughts lost in other things so bumping into stuff so i got all fucked up yeah yeah some good bruises and it's uh tuesday now and i'm mostly healed so i'm uh i'm wolverine also last time i talked to you i think you were hung over ah so ah you also healed from that i healed from a hangover that's true yeah pat yo are you ready
Speaker: chin okay all right you tell me no no no finish it finish your sentence okay well i'll i'll finish but like in the meantime think about it if you yeah yeah are you ready to tell me about a little comic book called x-men number 201 oh duel yes yeah of course i'm ready for that okay uncanny x-men number 201 duel oh fuck Yeah.
Speaker: Chris Claremont, writer Rick Leonardi, guest penciler. Ooh, new. wilce portachio guest in Wils inker. Wils Portascio is here. Who's Wils Portascio, Matt? He's just going to have a big impact. We we should talk about him later because he's going to a big impact on the X-Men in the ninety early 90s. So we will have plenty of time to talk about Wils Portascio.
Speaker: All right. Tom Orzikowski, of course, letterer, Glynis Oliver, colorist and no centi editor and bun gumper editor in chief release date, October 1985 date, January,
Speaker: mat yeah nineteen eighty six oh my god Scott Summers is a father. Scott Summers is a father. He and Madeline Pryor return to the X-Mansion to show off their beautiful new baby boy who they never mention the name of. There's a lot of different emotions flying around.
Speaker: They never mention his name. No, they don't. I think we mentioned him by name like last episode or something. We don't know his name. They never said his name. I don't know when they're going to say his name.
Speaker: At some point, they'll name this baby, but... They didn't name him in X Factor either, right? Yeah, I think you're right. It was just the baby. What are they doing? What are you doing, guys? Did you not name your baby, Scott?
Speaker: You can go... How long, legally, can you go without naming a newborn child? I think before you leave the hospital, you have to put a name on the birth certificate. What? Before you leave the hospital?
Speaker: Did your AI just answer? o oh is was that my phone? Did I accidentally activate? I think your phone's AI heard you say that. I was like, I've got this.
Speaker: ah Madeline is angry. She confides in Storm that she was upset that she had to follow Scott back to New York, then frustrated when he went to Asgard while she was pregnant.
Speaker: hate when your husband goes off to Asgard with all his friends while you're just at home pregnant. Fucking deadbeat stuff, you know? Yeah. But she was angry that when Scott came home, he went off to France instead of coming back to her. And she had to give birth on the kitchen floor.
Speaker: She's having doubts about Scott's commitment to her. what ah What an underreaction to that. Like, I'm just having a few doubts after you after you knew was. After you made me fly across the country nine months pregnant.
Speaker: You knew I. Abandoned me and then let me give birth in a stranger's home. By myself. yeah Well, maybe not by inspire yourself. I guess ah Tom Corsi and Sharon Freeland. Yeah.
Speaker: Or were they all fucking? Oh, my God. Because this would happen at the same time. You're right. They would have been. I think was somebody helped her deliver the baby. it Yeah, it was probably. Maybe this. Kitty, maybe?
Speaker: No, no. I think it it must have been Sharon or Tom, right? They're the only one who could have been there.
Speaker: Rachel and Kitty are passing the baby back and forth. And Rachel silenced the three together. Huh. The beauty of a baby's thoughts moves them both to tears.
Speaker: Are you, should you do this? I i guess is the question on my mind. Like, ethically, should you do this? Because what if the baby gets some of your thoughts in its head and then it what then it just like, it knows something now. Right. The brain's in like, to know anything very rapid development. It's not supposed to know anything. so much Also, if you, how could the thoughts of a baby be beautiful?
Speaker: It's literally just like, it's probably just like the feeling of shitting. yeah Like the the feeling of being hungry. Yeah, yeah. It's a lot of, what the fuck is that? fuck like the look If you ever look at ah a baby's face, they're saying, what the fuck is that?
Speaker: um like there's There's no, there's not like joy there. There's just, there's either confusion or like, There's like proto confusion or just like physical sensation.
Speaker: I'm being touched. I'm warm. I'm shitting. It's like the it's the purity that they're trying to pass along. Right. The idea that this with this baby doesn't know what an email
Speaker: To be fair, neither they. That's true, but it's still something that would be very refreshing to me. what if But what if that's the one thought that slipped through?
Speaker: Now you have a baby who all it knows is the sensation of shitting and what an email is.
Speaker: This little boy's going to grow up to be a customer service associate. Okay. ah
Speaker: Kitty in this moment presses Rachel. She must tell Scott the truth soon. That he's her father in a different reality. Yeah, yeah. He's a double father now. Of course. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Scott is upset about Professor Xavier not being here and wonders if he can truly trust Magneto. Are we are we finally moving past? Everybody thinks Magneto is doing something diabolical here.
Speaker: I don't. Yeah. I don't know. Last domino to fall. Maybe. Will we? Will? Will we ever? Oh, I just mean among the good guys. Meanwhile, in space, Professor X is all better. The Star Jammer is making repairs from the rescue mission. But unfortunately, their ultralight superstar drive is totaled.
Speaker: No, Pat, not their ultralight superstar drive. Superstar drive. Those are so tough to replace. They're tough to replace. And you can't. They don't make them. They make them custom. They only fit into the model that they were made for.
Speaker: um Why does Hepzibah look like a person here? She's just drawn like a person. It's just a lady. ah I don't.
Speaker: I mean, it's Rick Leonardi's first time drawing the X-Men. And Chris Claremont's like, I need you to draw all the X-Men and some of the new mutants and a baby and all the star jammers. And the star jammers.
Speaker: I mean, even fucking cha odd looks like a gremlin here. Yeah, yeah. he looks He looks a lot more human than ah than he did before. He's not as just big sphere. He's kind of like a mupp he's kind of got a muppety face. Yes. But yeah here's the thing that I do think Leonardi does does well here.
Speaker: He makes Corsair look kind of like Cyclops. Oh, that's interesting. Yeah, it's more of a resemblance than then you usually see between them.
Speaker: Yeah. I think Leonardi's art style is interesting here because it is so, it it's it it it feels so um's what's what's the word? Like in its infancy.
Speaker: it feels because I think that's a great word for it. it's not It's not great, but it really portends the art style of like the mid ninety s Yes. Yeah, it's got a very like ah almost like a I think i see where you're going. It's got like almost like a basic feel to it. There's like just like the way characters are drawn. It's like, oh, this is somebody that is following all the rules. Well, it's ah also a lot of like cartoonish angular lines.
Speaker: That you see in. Well, maybe you see it just maybe, who knows, maybe Rick Leonardo drew a lot of that. But it's like it's reminiscent of Joe Maggiore.
Speaker: Sure.
Speaker: Who we we will meet, you know, in the mid 90s, early 90s. So all of this is to say that they cannot now or maybe ever make it back to Earth.
Speaker: Yeah. Okay. There is there's a really interesting moment here because we haven't gotten this before where we get ah Xavier's inner monologue about like, oh, shit, I left the school in the hands of Magneto.
Speaker: And when I did that, I actually wasn't sure if he would succeed or not. This was like it was done as like, ah I believe in you. I know you can do this, which is why I'm giving you this responsibility. But when we actually see him alone with his thoughts, he's like, God, I hope that wasn't a huge fuck up.
Speaker: It's it's like ah like making a huge gesture because you're feeling emotional. Like you have to sleep with somebody telling them you love them. And then next one, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. Oh, no. Damn it.
Speaker: I gave her a key now. I gave her a key Damn it. Back at school, life goes on. Cannonball struggles with trying to write his term paper while the X-Men play baseball outside. They're playing superpower baseball. ah It's been so long. i I love when they play baseball. ah Kitty, by the way, is apparently has a naturally great fastball.
Speaker: Oh, they're like, like, she doesn't have powers to augment that. But they're all like, oh, shit, she can pitch. Is that a normal? ah I mean, is that ah an abnormal thing? Most people can't throw fastballs.
Speaker: I mean, most people can throw fastballs, but they're the implication here is that they're extra fast. They're like a step above the average person's fastball. Movies have told me that if you just like if you separate your two knuckles a little bit when you're holding the ball.
Speaker: that that means you can throw a super fasts fast fastball. Are you sure in that movie, the little boy didn't also have his arm broken and then reconstructed to be super extra fast?
Speaker: Huh. Maybe I didn't pay a lot of attention. Reagan watch. Ooh. Rogue ah flies up to catch a ball that Colossus has hit with super strength and she finds Air Force One and kisses the window and Ronald Reagan's like, yeah yeah ah why don't we keep this little incident between us? the
Speaker: Kurt, in the midst of all this baseball, is worried about Scott and Maddie, but Logan tells him to leave it alone. Kurt worries this will affect Scott's ability to lead the X-Men, but Logan asks who says he's going to.
Speaker: Yeah. Later, Aurora and Kitty hear Maddie and Scott in the attic fighting. Oh, always awkward. um that's rough. And it all this is in in Aurora's room, too. She's like.
Speaker: I gave them my room and now they're there. won't Can I use your bathroom? as why
Speaker: Scott wants to stay and leave the X-Men, but Maddie needs him at home. After all, she's the earner in the family. But Scott insists that Magneto can't be trusted and Storm would be a liability in combat without her powers. Scott, stop being a dipshit.
Speaker: He's this is the this is the start of it. See, i I'll get to this in a second. Maddie can't believe that Scott has so fragile an ego to think he can't exist without the X-Men and vice versa.
Speaker: What about his commitments to her and their life together? There's a devastating line there. in this argument where Maddie says, i have skills. I can earn a living. Can you say the same?
Speaker: god damn it dude because what fucking employable skill does scott summers yeah have spatial geometry news broadcaster i guess so yeah he could yeah that's right he was a news broadcaster um what else but he had another age of live news he was that was back in the age of he was doing recorded segments um he he can sail i guess he can fly a little Yeah, he's a... You need licenses for me. Yeah, he doesn't have those. He's just been using his girlfriends.
Speaker: Not only do you need licenses, you need either a plane or a boat. It's not like you can just go, like... You don't just go down and you're like, hey, I'll take one of these boats. Here's my license. I'll take one of these boats.
Speaker: Essentially, anytime he's left the X-Men, he has just joined some crew and done, like, the grunt work while he learns his way up. Yeah, but he was really good at talking to passengers on the airplane. Remember?
Speaker: That's true. They did like him a lot. He could get into customer service. He could be a customer service guy he Listen, mister. I don't know why you think you deserve this refund, but but it stops here.
Speaker: At that moment, Storm interrupts. She agrees that someone must lead the X-Men. And she challenges Cyclops to a duel for the privilege.
Speaker: Whoa. This is an iconic moment, Matt, right? I didn't realize that we were coming, that we that this is what we were reading to start this issue, was the the showdown between the two of them that I think I know because it gets referenced a thousand times moving forward. Yes.
Speaker: I think so. I think so. I mean, also just like the panels from this fight are... intense and they're they they show up all over the place if you ever had one of those like x-men encyclopedias as a kid or whatever yes yeah you saw these panels you've seen this it's it's like the um when professor x xavier defeated amal farouk right the when we got to those panels when he was telling that story and it was like oh shit this is what i've seen recounted
Speaker: in perpetuity right and you might not even remember where you saw it but it's so well told yeah storytelling like visual it's such well done visual storytelling that you remember it forever i liked the first way you said it it's just such really good storytelling I'm a literary critic, you see. i So they quickly shunt the new mutants and Magneto out of the danger room, and the entire X family crowds into the observation booth to watch a Scott and Aurora square off. They're just all on top of each other, like... Yeah, like ah like little rascals trying to get a peek over the fence at a baseball game. Yeah, exactly.
Speaker: Cypher loads up a danger room program of a bombed out city and the game is on. Do you Pretty intense, Doug. It's strange to me that Cyclops even knows Cypher's name.
Speaker: I'm sure there was a sit down at some point. You need to learn these kids names. You can't just keep calling them little, little guy sport without the powers. No, no. He's got a power.
Speaker: But it's just like Cypher is the wimpiest little and newest new mutant. And Scott is the oldest, most, is you know, senior and least wimpy X-Man. And longest absent.
Speaker: That's true. Yes. Yes. so He hasn't even been here. So he says, excuse me, Cypher. And, you know, I fucking love the stupidest little things like little moments like that bring the sense of like continuity to the X-Men and like the the idea that it's often about legacy.
Speaker: And like that stuff really gets me pumped. what i see yeah yeah When I see Cyclops say Cypher's name, I'm like, oh my god! He knows who's Cypher! There must have been a conversation off panel. It's like a it's like it's watching a celebrity, like a big-time celebrity, know like a... ah occult favorite of yours yeah yeah like uh lin-manuel miranda referencing my brother my brother and me back in like 2013 or whatever yeah whenever we all loved him
Speaker: um there's also there's another really good moment here because scott and aurora run into the danger they're like all right let's fight and uh now's the best time for me and so They run into the danger room where Magneto is training the new mutants and they're like, we need the space. And Magneto says something to the effect of like, if they're asking us to leave, they've got a good reason for it. And we don't want to get in the way.
Speaker: Like, let's respect this because there's something in their eyes. We, me and this kid have tried to kill each other for 10 years. You do not, you you don't want to I know when he's gearing up for a fight. I know that voice.
Speaker: Cyclops fires a blast and Storm nimbly dodges it hiding around a corner. She quickly undoes her belt as Cyclops cautiously tiptoes after her. As he looks around, suddenly the belt is wrapped around his legs and Storm hops out of the rubble, blocking Scott's beams with his own arm.
Speaker: He judo throws her off of him, but she lands on her feet and takes off running. In the booth, Wolverine explains Storm has the upper hand. Scott's heart just isn't in this and it's throwing off his instincts.
Speaker: In the past, he'd never have been taken off guard by that trick. It's also worth pointing out that like Storm knows that she has this too, right? She she's like, oh thanks, Doug, for putting me in a burned out city because now I can use all the thief skills that I picked up as a child to just like, yeah, outsmart him.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, definitely. She kind of says like it's evening the playing field, but there's no point in which she, I guess they both feel confident the whole time though. They're both so scared they're going to kick the other one's ass.
Speaker: ah To Wolverine's point, we get into Scott's thoughts as he makes his way through an abandoned building. He's not thinking of the fight. He's only thinking of Madeline and x Xavier. He's so lost in thought, he almost misses some rubble dropping into his head, dropping onto his head, but blasts it at the last minute as Storm sneaks down, hiding behind him in the dark.
Speaker: Fuck. What a good panel. Yeah. Maddie is upstairs holding the baby. She's booked tickets home and she hopes Scott comes with them. She's torn because she knows it'll break his heart, but she wishes the truth were the other way around.
Speaker: Outside, suddenly starts to rain. Whoa, okay. Back in the danger room, Storm makes her move. She leaps, alerting Scott to her presence, but he's a step behind, missing her with an optic blast.
Speaker: As her leap arcs over his head, she grabs his visor and lands behind him. He collapses, holding his eyes closed. Our duel, she says, is over.
Speaker: legit fucking goose bumps right like it's so good it's so good he fucks up ah like ah she's got him off guard anyway because she's been dominating this thing since the beginning sure but in this moment it is there's one sec there's one move that would cause either of them to win or lose right it is one blast from cyclops one leap from storm it's fucking done Yes.
Speaker: Also, Storm doesn't lay a finger on him. That's not true. at At one point, she grabs his arm and like holds it over his eyes. But yeah she does this all without taking any offensive action. Most of what she does is to trip him up or surprise him, all for the ultimate goal of just taking his visor off. Because yeah she knows how to take him down without without hurting him at all.
Speaker: She's one of the smartest of the X-Men. And one of the other smartest is Cyclops, at least in terms of... Tactically. Tactics. But... It's Cyclops, but she outclasses him here. She's got the itch.
Speaker: She's doing this to a a guy who is so proud of his judo skills. Yes. Right. Which are just about disarming, ah gaining control of the other person's body movements. Yeah. Yeah. It's not about throwing punches and kicks and stuff.
Speaker: And that's how she takes him out. It's just like the same theory of martial arts, but way better than he ever, ever. Yeah. Insane. So such a statement.
Speaker: Mm hmm. Cyclops shakes her hand and congratulates her as he walks out without even looking in her direction. The best X-Man one, he says, but inside he's in turmoil. Does he really no longer have a place with the X-Men?
Speaker: And did he already fuck things up with Maddie?
Speaker: Epilogue. oh Oh, Rachel Summers returns to the home of John and Elaine Gray carrying a glowing orb. It's the hollow empathic crystal.
Speaker: It's back, Matt. This is what? Three, four episodes in a row. We know she has used her power to restore it. yeah and She's added something to it. Her own essence. All right.
Speaker: We didn't know this.
Speaker: We didn't know this. And this. No, that's true. This fucks up. What happens in Fantastic Four, right? Oh, because they're like, this is purely Jean Grey's essence.
Speaker: Yes, and like they use it to remind her, to teach her of the things that Phoenix did when she wasn't there.
Speaker: When she was at the bottom of Jamaica Bay. Oh, yeah, yeah. um Because she honestly have gotten some of Rachel in there if John Byrne knew what he was doing.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And she'd be like, wait, who's this fucking my daughter? What? What? The Watcher, Matt. Watu, the Watcher. Yeah.
Speaker: Remember this guy? Yeah, I remember him. Observes from the moon as Phoenix places the crystal beside her sleeping with the grandparents. You don't say. He's watching from the moon. Wow.
Speaker: this is it It means this is very important. I love when the watcher shows up. this It's a cheap trick that like gets my juices flowing every time. What a cool thing. But what is what's the important thing here? Just that...
Speaker: We don't know yet. Something's going to happen. i I, I still don't know. I don't know. as I don't know that we get to it in this episode.
Speaker: ah right. Okay. Let me say. No. Oh, let me say.
Speaker: Okay. No, you say. Okay. Listen. Listen. You've argued with me tooth and nail you and weapon Jason. and I think Ink Master told me that there's no way that Scott Summers written by anyone competent would ever make the decision to leave Maddie and the child in the in the way that he did.
Speaker: Right. All of the foundation is laid right here. This is the, they have this long argument about how Scott's like, listen, I love you. i love our marriage, but I don't feel whole without the X-Men. I need to be in the action and in charge of this team in order to feel any sort of fulfillment in my life.
Speaker: And yeah, Then he fights for that after explaining all that to Maddie loses is humiliated and clearly returns back to Alaska with Maddie.
Speaker: I didn't know. I knew that he was a broken man just from like not really wanting to do the family and fatherhood thing. I had no idea. that that all immediately followed what happened right here.
Speaker: it is insane to me that anybody thinks he's not capable of just upending his entire life after these events. So it's not that... Okay, number one, i think he There's a difference. He wants Maddie to stay with him.
Speaker: He wants Maddie and the baby to stay there with him while he does this. and To the point where they're fighting and fighting and fighting, right? They're not fighting because she's like, come with me. And he's like, no, they're fighting because he's like, you stay here. And she's like, no, we have to go there. And he's like, you no, I want you to stay here. Like he wants them with him well that's his compromise right he's like hey I could have the best of both worlds I could have the thing I really want and the thing that I know that I my responsibilities are calling me to but he didn't know Maddie was going to leave if he stayed Maddie was going to leave I think had he found that out I don't think he would have stayed and then I'm also not saying he might not make a rash decision
Speaker: I'm saying he wouldn't then stay away from his newborn baby and newlywed wife for months.
Speaker: Why not? he's He's deeply ashamed of his behavior. we We don't have to. we don't We can let the listeners decide for themselves. I'm just saying all of that groundwork is laid out right here.
Speaker: He's a man of responsibility. Like that's his whole thing. He's a man of professional responsibility. Matt, can you tell you me, can you please, please just tell me about Uncanny X-Men number 202?
Speaker: X-Men, I've gone to kill the Beyonder. Whoa. Chris Claremont, the writer. John Romita Jr., the penciler. Al Williamson is the guest inker. Tom Worsakowski is the letterer. Glynis Oliver is the colorist. Anusenti is the editor. And... ah but but but but but but but but by robert Trimble, to is the editor in chief are these with my best guess is these are congressional terms
Speaker: these are some sort of congressperson and the
Speaker: The years that they served. Release date, November 5th, 1985. Cover date, February 1986.
Speaker: Rachel screams the titular X-Men, I've gone to kill the Beyonder! And Rogue threw a holographic projection, having already left to face him alone.
Speaker: Rogue wakes the rest of the X-Men up, and they debate whether to interfere or not. Colossus ruins pajamas again. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. He meddles up and bursts right through. yeah We don't, we don't even see it this time. all we see is him stomping into the attic with his pajamas already. knows yeah It's like, dude, stop, stop. You know, what's going to happen. no one even said we have an emergency. We say, she said we have to talk in the loft.
Speaker: hu this recording is fun because she is saying like don't follow me i have left to take out the beyonder if any anyone has the power to do so it will be me by ah i think it's i think it's supposed to be just trailing off as she like yeah we will wait from the camera or whatever but that's very much how it comes up bye I must kill him.
Speaker: I must. Goodbye. ah um Okay. So ultimately they opt to stop her before she gets wrecked by the beyonder finding that she's flown to San Francisco to confront him.
Speaker: I don't know if this is when he was but trying to bone down on Dazzler or when he was just sitting on an island. i mean, we find him sitting on an island, but it's a very specific island.
Speaker: Right. Magneto is using Cerebro, by the way. That's how they track her down to San Francisco. He just puts on the helmet. And I guess because of his small psychic ability, his minor psychic power that we saw back in the 60s, he's able to use it.
Speaker: i I guess so. They haven't they they haven't let go of this. we We keep getting these little snippets of like Magneto still has some psychic powers. He has some psychic abilities. he's He's psychically sensitive or whatever. And it's just kind I think it's just going to fade more and more and more over time.
Speaker: But it's stood for right now, it's still there. Yeah. There's also a moment where Claremont is still trying to reckon with... Oh my God. Wolverine being a jerk at the beginning because he's being...
Speaker: He's being his like original jerk self to Magneto. Yeah. He's like, you want to try something with me, bub? Right. And Shadowcat is like, I know this is just his way of taking a man's measure.
Speaker: because Because if you remember, he did this years ago. he did this years ago. And that was, you know, he wasn't actually, that wasn't his real part personality. He was doing that intentionally because he was trying to take it a man's measure. Yeah.
Speaker: So good. Thank you. Thank you, Chris Claremont, for remembering that. He's got to explain fucking everything, dude. He can't let anything go. So meanwhile, the beyonder, he sits on Alcatraz Island, just, you know, thinking about flowers and stuff like you do, like we all do.
Speaker: yeah When was the last time you sat on Alcatraz Island thinking about flowers and stuff? I mean, if I found a flower on Alcatraz Island, I'd sit there and think about it for a minute. Yeah, because you'd be like, look at how free this flower is. But how beauty. But how how not free all these people in Alcatraz are.
Speaker: You know, it's not. Open, right? That's not what I heard.
Speaker: But Beyonder's interrupted when a bird of fire appears in the sky and bombs the island in a huge flash of power. ah it's Honestly, it's a cool image. It is a mushroom cloud coming off this island, but with ah Phoenix as the, like...
Speaker: the top of the mushroom yes it's a full page yeah it's a full page it's full silent for once page um and right before she's like uh there you are on alcatraz a feeding place butcher of worlds ravager of souls for your execution like okay right man yeah she's going full king lear yeah she's she's got she's got bit by the claremont bug um but beyonder doesn't seem to mind fucking any of this he's been expecting rachel and he wants to understand her you don't you don't fucking say the watchers on the moon watching people in the beyonders trying to understand something
Speaker: at least it's not shitting again He transports her back to her future, replaying every moment that her friends died, trying trying to get through to her how powerful she is, the sole survivor of her timeline.
Speaker: there' just We do learn something new here. So we knew in the past that in the future, Kate Pride sends Rachel back again.
Speaker: And then goes off to face Nimrod by herself. And that's as far as Rachel knows, because that's when she got sent back to the present timeline. Right. The Beyonder...
Speaker: takes her just past that moment and shows Nimrod killing Kitty Pryde. She's like vaporizing her. Yeah. Yeah. yeah So she, I mean, it was assumed that she wouldn't, but she did not survive that encounter. She not survive. She did not beat Nimrod.
Speaker: Yeah. An old shadow cat didn't beat Nimrod all by herself. Would have been cool if she had, she could have hacked him. Aha, but you didn't reckon with my hacking power. te hemp tap tap napa No, my one weakness.
Speaker: So Beyonder shares his power with Phoenix, letting her know he's given her enough to kill him if she wants But... but There's a catch. yeah He's also put every X-Man in mortal danger in different locations across the country and brought the Sentinels from her future back to finish them. She's got to choose between using her power to kill him or save the X-Men.
Speaker: Classic supervillain stuff. yeah ah A very important binary decision, too. Yeah, yeah. if If she could do both, this issue wouldn't make any sense.
Speaker: It'd be a lot easier to sum up.
Speaker: She does both. The end. Yeah.
Speaker: She sincerely debates it, but ultimately chooses to save her team. oh Storm is first, having been teleported here in a nose-diving Blackbird with a sentinel in pursuit. Really, really good scenario building.
Speaker: Imagine... like That's that's ah that's some like uncharted three level ah ah set piece. ah Yeah, yeah. ah First test, there is a plane falling from the sky and a sentinel chasing it.
Speaker: Rachel helps write the jet, tell Storm the situation and they get to work. Storm loses her pursuing Sentinel by flying into space and jettisoning it out of the atmosphere.
Speaker: While Rachel flies to downtown San Francisco where Magneto is tied up. they got him in a They got Magneto in a catch web, Matt. Not the catch web. No!
Speaker: A catch web? Pat, this is serious. Do you remember this catch web? No. This is my favorite. like This pops up every...
Speaker: I don't know, three years in the X-Men, one of the Sentinels has a weapon that they always call a catch web, and it's like a ribbon that wraps around you. And the the trick of it is the more you struggle, the tighter it gets.
Speaker: I'm glad you have a memory for this stuff. I never remembered the catch web. It is extremely silver age comics. It's very, it's like it predates Roy Thomas, even with a name like catch web. Catch web.
Speaker: um Rogue accidentally touched a bunch of people and is going crazy. Right. First thought, best thought. I mean, you're Chris Claremont. You're writing this first thought, best thought. rogue And Rogue, she'll touch everybody.
Speaker: What if her costume gets destroyed? Again. Again, so that her bare skin touches everything. Yeah. Yeah. She gets blasted by a sentinel and just falls onto a crowd. And she's just like her. her It looks like she's wearing string.
Speaker: Like she's she's not wearing clothes. She's caught in a ball of string. Yes. Yeah. That's what her clothes look like. And Wolverine is knocked unconscious in the middle of a fight with another sentinel.
Speaker: ah Somebody in the crowd goes, the robot's going to kill that guy.
Speaker: Somebody else goes, this must be a George Lucas production. I just love the idea of calling Wolverine that guy. Yeah. And a Sentinel, the robot. That guy is the best he is at what best there is at what he does. You know that guy?
Speaker: um Rachel puts up a force field and supercharges Wolverine's healing factor so he can cut Magneto loose and then restores rogue sanity and they all work together to smash the Sentinel to pieces.
Speaker: Nice.
Speaker: Uptown, Colossus and Kitty are going toe-to-toe with a Sentinel of their own when Rachel blasts through and knocks him over. This gives Peter enough time to stab a lamppost through the Sentinel's torso, his one weakness. Rachel, with all her newfound power, grabs a main electrical cable with one hand, the lamppost with the other, and sends the electrical power of an urban neighborhood surging through it, blowing it the fuck up.
Speaker: everybody's okay everybody's okay where's nightcrawler where's nightcrawler where's nightcrawler yeah where is nightcrawler where wait where's nightcrawler he also wasn't in secret wars 2 room remember huh remember that guy there's where's nightcrawler guys marvel marvel where's nightcrawler why isn't he here what did you do with him Rachel returns to the Beyonder on Alcatraz to yell at him.
Speaker: But he thought she'd be happy. He gave her the means to alleviate her trauma by setting her up to save everyone. it's like um exposure therapy, right? Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: He's got the most shit-eating grin here, too he's drawn like He's drawn like Guy Smiley from The Muppets. it is just Yes, he's very much like, aren't you happy you went through that?
Speaker: Are we friends now? ah But she tells him as she slaps him across the face. Hell yeah. It's not that easy. I saved nothing. Being whole is something that has to be earned. The Beyonder hangs his head in shame. The end.
Speaker: The end. Another case of everyone just leaving the Beyonder where he is to think about what he's done. Um, we get, oh, we get a next here. It says next, the X-Men's final showdown with the Beyonder.
Speaker: Uh, no, no, thanks. No, thanks. Hey, we're good. I don't need that. This could be their final showdown. Of the things I need, that is the lowest on the list.
Speaker: So I'll, I see your where's Nightcrawler and I will raise you. Where's Storm? At the end of whole adventure with her, with the Sentinel, where she jettisons it out into space, she's plummeting back to Earth, and she's like, the Blackbird isn't built for this, for reentry at this angle. I'm surely going to die.
Speaker: And then we cut. Cut. And it will never come back. She's fine. She's fine. She shook off the Sentinel. Thus, everything's okay. Thank God.
Speaker: She's an X-Man. like if Look, if there's ever a time you don't have – if there's ever a – anyone in the world you don't have to worry about when they're in in the midst of a plane crash, it's an X-Man.
Speaker: That's true, especially if they're without their powers. yeah right They're going to extra fine. Right. They'll be they'll be absolutely fine. or maybe We don't even need to show it. And look, if there's more to say about this, we will get an issue that starts with somebody plummeting in through the air.
Speaker: That's the best kind of issue. That's our favorite kind of issue. So, okay. Still, I would still say, just dialogue-wise, vibes-wise,
Speaker: ah ah Chris Claremont writes a far better beyonder than Jim stupid. Yeah. Every time, but similar to Jim stupid. And I don't know that this is Claremont's fault, but similar to Jim stupid, there's just no motivation to be doing any of this.
Speaker: Right. Like that is like the one thing missing here. And I like Claremont would have had to change the character to a different guy in order to give him motivation. Like it's this is not Claremont's fault, but he's just like doing stuff. Very scary, menacing stuff.
Speaker: But there's not like a reason behind it. It's just like, yeah, I just thought I'd do some stuff. yeah i was I wanted to see what would happen is like whole of it, right? it's It seems to me like he had just the general notes of the Beyonder from Jim Stupid and was like, all right, i I guess this is what I have to work with. He's essentially God. He's kind of obsessed with the concept of death right now because this is parallel with the the issues where he decides that he's going to be the avatar of life and then death itself.
Speaker: i And also that we're trying to teach him in the end that humanity has to be earned, which is, far as I can tell, the only lesson here, the only point of all of this. Right. It's like it's just that like, yeah.
Speaker: You can't just – so, of course, Chris Claremont was like, humanity, okay. If we're going to symbolize humanity, let's say trauma, right? Like overcoming trauma has to be hurt. Whereas Jim Stupid is like, why would we symbolize it? was it's It's humanity.
Speaker: He wants humanity. Yeah. But yeah, it doesn't it doesn't give reason it doesn't yeah it doesn't lend itself to having a reason to exist no yeah it yeah one interesting moment for me from this issue okay Beyonders talking to Rachel about how much she values her friends and refers to Kitty as Ariel. Oh, and Rachel is like, aha, you idiot. Dumb piece of shit.
Speaker: She's Ariel in another timeline, a timeline that doesn't exist. She never went by Ariel in this timeline, which is confirmation of the mutant menace rule.
Speaker: If her name's Ariel, she's not in your carry-all of canon X-Men stories. Yes. They could have just said that. They didn't just say that.
Speaker: Why didn't Rachel say that to the Beyonders? She should have said... Hey, Beyonder! If her name is Ariel, it's not in your carry-all of canon X-Men. And the Beyonder's like, damn, that's why the Beyonder looks so sad. That was the original line. That's why the Beyonder That's why he's hanging his head in shame. She's like, She got me.
Speaker: Damn it. It's not in my carry-all of canon How did i forget that?
Speaker: All right, Pat. Matt. How about what if we never talk about the Beyonder again? I'm sorry. I can't do that. Damn it. instead will talk am required ah to read you uncanny X-Men number two Oh three crossroads crossroads just like that.
Speaker: Britney Spears movie. Oh, do you ever see that one? Is that what that movie was about? No, I never saw it. Yeah, me neither. So yeah, maybe it's a, it's in and the marble cinematic universe. Yeah.
Speaker: Chris Claremont, writer, John Romita Jr., penciler, Al Williamson, guest inker, Tom Orzakowski, letterer, Gwyneth Oliver, colorist, and no centi editor, and
Speaker: big shitter editor. Released December 10th, 1985. released meet december tenth nineteen eighty five Cover date March
Speaker: Rogue is having a tough time being in San Francisco. This is where she absorbed Carol Danvers powers and memories and went crazy. She's ruminating on all this as she tells us that since the beyonder transported them here, oh boy, the X-Men have been repairing the damage that was done.
Speaker: San Fran has welcomed the X-Men, a shocking change of pace for how they're normally received. Then she spots Shadowcat on the lawn. So there's a moment here where Rogue says something about not believing in God.
Speaker: Right. So is OK. I'm not sure. i never took Rogue to be an atheist. And if you look at there is a I don't know if you've seen this. There is a website called comic book religion dot com.
Speaker: Right. um And it tells you, yeah, like you could just type in any comic book character and it will tell you their religion and what issues it is drawing on for that. And it says Rogue is a Southern Baptist.
Speaker: Yeah, it's this is in no way comprehensive, by the way. There are there. You're missing your there's characters you can't find. Yeah, yeah. But there are some that I take like issue with, though. um But anyway, so is that is that is rogue?
Speaker: Yeah, yeah. An atheist or is Carol Danvers? Or is that an atheist? Because she's having an especially unclear moment right now. The website says Carol Danvers is a Protestant.
Speaker: But i don't know. Yeah. So the conclusion we can draw from this is either Rogue or Carol Danvers is an atheist. Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Real riveting stuff you get here on mutant menace podcast where we really give you a deep dive on the characters that you know and love. We should do this more often.
Speaker: One of these two characters believes something.
Speaker: Kitty is covered in magic soul armor and wielding her soul sword. But Rogue has a no idea what the fuck she's talking about. Who is Ileana Rasputin?
Speaker: Who are the new mutants? Kitty is sure that the Beyonders snapped them from existence. hu Remember? ah do you remember. Remember that? Since they have some kind of soul bond, Kitty is the only one who remembers.
Speaker: Oh. This is running parallel with the issue where the Beyonder just killed the new mutants. Killed all of the new mutants. So it's like, it's I think they're probably... i I'm not going to go back and look, but I think they're probably the same month because yes the idea is that during this issue, magic dies.
Speaker: yeah Yes. it It also, this is not the first time we saw in the new mutants that if something happens to Ilyana, Kitty takes possession of her soul sword.
Speaker: Right. which Seems intense. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, i think maybe is this maybe this is where people get that idea that there is a um romantic relationship between the two. If they're soul bonded, does that not mean in love?
Speaker: i i don't know. Supposedly, there's a lot of hints woven throughout this, but I still like I'm not. You've never picked up on it. not seeing them, and we are so sensitive to queer subtext in this fucking whatever. I don't know. I don't know what i don't know what we're missing.
Speaker: Phoenix tells them that the Beyonder never took his power back. She still may have the power to kill him, but it will mean destroying the entire universe. And she will need Rogue and Katie's life forces to do it.
Speaker: They agree. Wouldn't do that. What? Wait, what? They agree. They agree. Since they exist only at his whims and he could wipe them out at any second, the reason it's better to wipe everyone out before he can.
Speaker: Hold on. I don't know that. Hold on. Let's say let's let's examine that logically. Does that make any fucking sense? It's so the the way they sum it up at the end is let's go out on our terms, not his terms.
Speaker: We're all going to die anyway. But you don't they don't know that they just know a guy can kill them. this It's like if my neighbor buys a gun, I'm like, I better shoot myself. Yeah,
Speaker: yeah I guess. I guess it is kind of like that. I better shoot myself while standing in front of him so that it goes through him too. is so to come To really complete that. and Because he would this is what he was going to do with it. I know. yeah yeah So hold on.
Speaker: Beyonder never took the power back. So you're telling me she could have saved the X-Men and killed the Beyonder? Yeah. At that moment, it seems like she still had the power and I guess just took pity on, or as she's saying here, realized it would destroy the entire game. Okay. Everybody forget issue 202. It didn't mean, it didn't matter. it didn't It didn't matter. Sorry, we did that to you. Just forget it.
Speaker: Forget this one too. Right.
Speaker: But not the funny jokes we make during. Yeah. Yeah. Remember us.
Speaker: Jessica drew spider woman. What is is also there and gives her life force to. uh this is her only appearance of the comic why did you hear wait no she shows up again at the end at the very end you're right it's just i have jessica drew it's like well okay we what so why are you here why are you in the mansion at night but it's no that's not what's happening they are insane read this next sentence
Speaker: Apparently, oh apparently the X-Men are staying in her giant mansion that she has in San Francisco. So we know. OK, Claremont wrote Spider Woman for a while, put her in San Francisco as like a as like a like a private detective. Yeah, it was like her retirement. Right. Once they canceled the comic.
Speaker: But. what Why does she own a giant mansion? What the fuck? I also just love that the X-Men are just talking to each other in the dark in the middle of the night at chic. Hey guys, what are you doing? Hey guys, I'm Jessica Drew. Remember that I'm also here.
Speaker: but there's There's no setup to this. This wasn't even in Secret Wars 2. And I don't think there's a Spider Woman comic happening at this time. No, she doesn't have her powers right now. So it is just... Hi, Jessica Drew. here I'm here.
Speaker: Two panels. Gone. Hey, ah you can have my life force too. Bye. Phoenix then goes around stealing the light forces of all the other X-Men while they sleep.
Speaker: This is worse than anything that Dark Phoenix ever did. This is pretty bad, yeah. Don't get to see it, but but Pat is wagging his finger cautioningly.
Speaker: like that can't do that bad girl this does with this does confirm for us that both wolverine and magneto i think we already knew wolverine uh sleep in the nude i okay hold on i i'm looking at this page i saw you write that note and i was looking at the page i don't i don't see how we know magneto sleeps nude because he's because he's nude yeah His head and his shoulders.
Speaker: Well, he's not wearing a shirt. He's shirtless. He sleeps shirtless. He's short. He could just wear boxers to bed. I'm just saying, like, he's a man of authority. That's the kind of guy that Magneto strikes me as. yeah Well, they also, John Romita Jr. also draws Colossus' as sleeping shirtless.
Speaker: That's not canonical. Well, unless. Oh, unless. he's made He's for the last time torn his pajamas. I don't think that's the last time he tears his pajamas in this episode. But but but he he wouldn't have a second pair of pajamas in San Francisco.
Speaker: So actually, I'm wrong. And JRJR is paying a lot more attention than i was um we do learn interestingly storm does sleep with underpants on i don't think that's maybe that's just a san francisco thing too because as we spider woman was like please please please just put okay you don't have to put a shirt on but please don't sleep in my bed without your underpants and wolverine and magneto were both like fuck that yeah
Speaker: Because Wolverine, we do see like straight up butt. Like there's, he is fully nude. So Rachel steals the life forces of all the other X-Men except Aurora, who somehow instantly intuits what Rachel is going to do and tries to protest. ah I know what you're up to. You're about to destroy the whole universe using all of our life forces, aren't you?
Speaker: ah But Phoenix takes her life force on anyway. This is worse than anything that Dark Phoenix ever did. This part's fucked up because Storm specifically...
Speaker: willingly gave her life force to Jean. yeah When she was trying to save the universe, she was like, this is noble enough of a cause that I will give you my life force. And here's...
Speaker: Gene, too. And this is like very specifically like a a a non-consensual violation. Storm says no. Yeah. And Phoenix is like, too bad.
Speaker: And she's going to destroy the universe. Yeah. This is like it's the right thing to do. She's she feels she thinks she's acting righteously. Makes her very dangerous. Worse. Worse. the worse Worse than Dark Phoenix. She's worse than Dark phonix Phoenix. Phoenix.
Speaker: Phoenix takes off through space, a giant flaming bird shooting out of the solar system past the watcher and past the star jammer with Professor x Xavier on board. Chubby watcher, by the way, we don't be watcher. This is he's not just like round headed. He's got a big old double chin. Why did why did they do this?
Speaker: I've never seen it like this. I i want it to come back. Give us some fat watchers. The Watcher is all powerful, right? So maybe just sometimes to amuse himself, he makes himself fat and unfats himself. He's just like, hey, what if this? That's enough of that.
Speaker: ah Xavier senses her and reaches out telepathically to try to get her to stop, but she just snatches up his life form and all the star jammers, too, for good measure. good she descends on the Imkran crystal. Remember the Imkran crystal, Matt?
Speaker: I do remember the Imkron crystal, but what about Joff and Mott? Instantly neutralizing its eternal guardian, Joff. No! is low Joff is back.
Speaker: That's sorry He's been neutralized before. he Yeah, he has his one job he comes to protect the Imkron crystal. We've seen him try to do it twice and fail twice. And both times he's failed. He just can't.
Speaker: He has no ah plan for the X-Men. Like you think after this, he'd be like, all right, next time those freaking X-Men come by. Maybe he did. And this is just too different of an X-Men. That would have been so good if they had cut to Joff.
Speaker: ah two panels are open and joff is like like and just fucking ready for those x-men those x-men ever the hell they show back those x-men ever show up again you know what i'm gonna do i've got the right and just like slomp what x-men is this
Speaker: so suddenly all the x-men and the star jammers are inside the crystal with phoenix again She expands her power from within the crystal, touching every living being in the universe.
Speaker: And suddenly Aurora begins speaking again. She reminds Rachel that by destroying everything, she will be snuffing out all these unique thoughts and lives. The choices in Rachel's hands.
Speaker: Wow. ah Just pausing for a moment here. The art is fucking cool. It's like this isn't our first time seeing a cosmic space stuff in this scale, but...
Speaker: JR, JR is going off. This guy, go ahead and describe it to us, Matt. Yeah, it's kind of like, it's it's not like as um psychedelic as we've seen moments like this before, but it is effective. You've got like a giant, we've got a two-page spread of a fiery phoenix entirely filled in with like space and stars and yeah yeah stuff and because she's touching every being in the universe you have all these like tiny little panels scattered throughout this of just like little alien heads have yes little funny guys yeah just little funny guys and then you cut to the next page and it is instead of a fiery phoenix it is rachel
Speaker: And it's like her silhouette and one side of her like screaming in agony to the to the left and then sprouting from the same silhouette is her clenching her hand and smiling like a villain.
Speaker: And again, the same thing, just like a silhouette filled with space and not, it's not just now alien heads in it. It's the X-Men's heads and panels and storm multiple times as storm.
Speaker: The implication here being that storm and, her friends the x-men are ripping her conviction about this in two yeah and she's basically splitting into two powerful cosmic forces that are at war with each other um and you don't know which way it's gonna go it's very it feels i'll say reminiscent but in like a of
Speaker: of the Dark Phoenix stuff, right? When they were in the Imkron crystal, it feels like somebody saying, here's another way you could portray that. Like, it feels like it has the same signatures. it It's clearly John Romita Jr. did his research here, but also, yeah ah i don't know, he puts his own spin on it. And and this whole run, this whole episode, he's kind of, when we see him, coming into his own yeah a bit more into that style that we've talked about like that sketchier sort of yeah blocky figures and yeah yeah starting to really pop so what's she gonna is she gonna destroy the universe or well back in San Francisco Matt what Aurora holds Rachel on the dark lawn of spider woman's big big house the rest of the X-Men come outside wondering how they got back home
Speaker: Storm explains that Phoenix did it and gave all the life forces back at the same time. The X-Men are shaken. Wolverine feels used. Magneto feels the certainty of his former ends justify the means rationale slipping further away.
Speaker: And the Beyonder is disappointed. whoa What? What? The Beyonders here? Yes. Yes. And he's telling the X-Men that their time in existence is done. oh Their thoughts show that they've given up hope, but not the fight, as Logan pops his claws and Peter destroys some more pajamas.
Speaker: yeah Same issue! Wait, he wasn't wearing pajamas! That's the same issue? What? And Wolverine is wearing pajamas in this scene. What happening?
Speaker: Maybe just for decency's sake, Rachel put pajamas on them when she brought everybody back. Yeah, Kitty's wearing a giant, like, potato sack of a shirt that says Hawaii on it. No pants, sneakers, no pants, and just a big, big, big square shirt with sleeves. Sleeping in her sneakers.
Speaker: It's just like, it's that thing we talked about before, right? Where if you were, like when we were talking about mask or we were talking about like a person putting somebody's thoughts back together, like if they erase, they alter your memories. So this is Phoenix putting this piece of reality back together, but just fucking up little details. Like, yeah, and then Wolverine was wearing pajamas and Colossus was wearing pajamas and... Kitty was wearing potato sack that says Hawaii and sneakers.
Speaker: I think I'm remembering this all right. I think I got it.
Speaker: Beyonder explains who he is to a baffled Jessica Drew and tells her the world sucks. She hasn't been part of Secret War. She wasn't part of Secret Wars one either. She is like, who the fuck is this guy?
Speaker: i hate being a superhero. i but So he tells her the world sucks. Wolverine's like, not to us, dipshit. Shadowcat gives a big speech about how the Beyonder is a bully.
Speaker: It's the first time she gives a speech about bullies where she doesn't use the N-word. Oh, yeah. Yeah. she's She's showing some restraint here. Good good good good job, Kitty. Keep it up. she We shouldn't need to congratulate you for this. I'm glad that it's it's showing that she knows how to do it. So if she ever does it again,
Speaker: now Now we know she's capable of giving an inspirational speech without saying the N-word. But chooses not to. But chooses not to, yeah. Hopefully that does that's not an issue we come Oh, I hope not. She's only done it twice so far. Hopefully she won't do it a third time. Oh, boy.
Speaker: Phoenix tells him he stands for death while she stands for life like her mother before her. Eh. She realizes now that the Beyonder set her up, trying to goad her into destroying the universe so he didn't have to make the decision himself.
Speaker: Now that she's failed, he wants his power back. So she gives it to him. All of her borrowed power comes flooding back into the Beyonder, including all the life forces of the universe that she touched.
Speaker: He's crippled by the beauty of life and falls to the ground in tears. either Phoenix or Storm, hard to tell, explains that he's been looking so hard at the big picture, he didn't consider what it meant to each individual person affected.
Speaker: He can't truly understand what life and existence means when he wields the power to control them.
Speaker: It's then that the Beyonder realizes he must no longer exist and he goes off to be a baby from a mommy machine and kill himself in Secret Wars number nine. The end.
Speaker: very inauspicious ending it's like we know what we know what this leads to becomes a baby from a mommy machine and kills himself like we know he does that's that is what Jim stupid takes away from this is like wow Claremont really wrote me a good lead into secret wars number nine so I have to i have to follow it up with something equally as good he'll make himself a baby from a mommy machine and kill himself
Speaker: it's so there's okay there's a lot going on here number one yeah yes this is clearly what inspired jim stupid to end this all the way that he did right everything he's saying here gets repeated back to the beyonder through other heroes mouths in secret wars 2 also Even the idea of him, my conclusion, that he's like a baby universe waiting to be born on the other side of this dimensional rift is kind of stolen from the issue before this, because that's exactly what ah what Phoenix is doing through all this. You do the issue before this and this one that it feels like Jim stupid was just like, this is really good. I did this. I'm a baby universe waiting to explode as soon as I leave Marvel.
Speaker: Yeah, man, there's some there's some really great moments here, especially when the X-Men first get back. um And Magneto's remind reminding us of the the adventure with Gabrielle Hall, the gold stealing Hitler's gold adventure. Yeah. how Xavier asked him, would you kill Hitler as a baby? Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker: Magneto's like, yeah. And then and then ex Xavier's like, would you kill Hitler's grandparents to prevent him from ever being born? And Magneto's like, yeah. And he's like, but now like that just happened? I'm second fucking guessing. yeah Maybe he was right.
Speaker: And Wolverine, so that when they all come back out onto the lawn, here's what we know about Wolverine, right? He was really shaken by watching Jean Grey die. Yeah. And by how powerful the Phoenix was. Right.
Speaker: He stood his he stood firm when it was happening. And then later he's like that. You can kind of tell that was the scariest thing he's ever encountered in his life. Right.
Speaker: And the other thing we know about Wolverine is the other thing that scares him the most is losing control of himself. Right. and Like he's not only is he afraid of becoming an animal or whatever, and not making his own decisions in that way. He's also his people's personal liberty, their freedom to choose their own actions is like his number one. Paramount to him. Yeah.
Speaker: Ethos. Right. So he walks back out of Jessica Drew's big, big, big, big house. And he's talking to Phoenix. He's, she just did something unforgivable to him. Something both terrifying and unforgivable to him. Yeah.
Speaker: Um, it's him especially. And he's like, you know, I've got the right to choose and I've got the right to decide when, when I die and when I kill, like that is my choice. You don't get to do that. Plus we are X-Men. We're not executioners. Um, And while he's saying this in the panel, he's lighting a cigarette and his fucking hand is shaking. Yeah, yeah. He's actually like shook up. he's It's just a small detail. You could easily miss it when you're reading it because it's not in the dialogue at all. And there's a lot of, they're doing a lot of weird visual effects to show that it's dark outside and certain lights are lighting. So it's like you could
Speaker: You could mistake it for a lighting effect. But then you look closely and it's like, no, it's the it's there's wobbles in every direction and they's the shape of his hand like he is. Yeah, he is shaking.
Speaker: And, you know, whether it's with anger or fear or both like that's such a fucking good detail.
Speaker: Interesting detail about the beyonder. He says flubbed. He says I flubbed it.
Speaker: <unk> what God says. Interesting detail about Storm. She, while she's talking to Rachel, she casually uses the word behold. Behold each individual.
Speaker: What? Behold each Behold each individual. Don't say. oh you know, behold each individual is their own. i do want to mention one other cool thing that I happen to notice when she's in the M. Crane Crystal. She talks about how like this place is full of her friends and dot, dot dot family.
Speaker: Yeah. And I was like, what the fuck? What does she mean? Family. Corsair's there. She's she picked up the star jammers. Corsair's her grandpapa.
Speaker: That's true. For like, I was so confused for a minute, but it was like, yeah, that's her grandpapa. She's making destroy the universe. I just thought like some of the X-Men, she's like, oh, that's my friend. And then some of the X-Men, she says, that's my family. I yeah really like Kitty.
Speaker: that's what That's what I thought for a second. But then I was like, wait, her actual family is in here. And that's why probably the ellipses.
Speaker: I do want to talk about these two back to back monologues of Kitty and then Rachel just yelling at the Beyonder because I think this is so the timing kind of works out here. If you look at release dates and everything.
Speaker: I think this is Chris Claremont writing a letter to Jim Stupid about the decision to bring back Gene and start X Factor with somebody else writing it.
Speaker: Because... ok First, Kitty... is like, hey, you're a bully and you might not even realize it, but you have all this power. You can control everything in front of you.
Speaker: Every decision that you make is super consequential. right You need to understand that because you're making these decisions ends It's ruining the people under you.
Speaker: And it seems like you're only doing it for your own sick, twisted pleasure. And that is the behavior of a bully. And I will not tolerate bullies. That's Kitty's whole speech. It's it's it's yeah extremely Kitty, but it's also extremely don't fuck with my book.
Speaker: And not only that, he's she's also saying like you, you are looking at this whole universe. This is about like, you're not when you're doing all these crazy beyonder ass things, you're looking at a whole universe. You're not thinking about the individuals, right? So it's like, it could be him saying like, yeah, okay, you want to do this for your big like picture of the Marvel universe or whatever.
Speaker: But I, I'm trying to write a book. These are people with actual creative ideas that are right. Working on things that matter to them. And you're, Yes, you're you think it's more important because you're working at a universal level. Yeah. And it's not. It's all equally important. It's making you lose perspective. Right.
Speaker: And then mean and Rachel follows it up ju read by throwing a lot of insults at him, essentially by being like. You're bringing death to this place. You are destroying everything around you. You are just a cancer to all of the living things here. Right. Please leave.
Speaker: And we do know, and this was said in a CompuServe message, so there's a good chance that there is an actual record of this, and it's not just hearsay. We know when Jim Stupid gets fired, Claremont says, ding-dong, the witch is dead. He's not happy with Jim Stupid at this point.
Speaker: Yeah, and why would he be? but and that's only a year from now, yeah, or less, maybe less. Yeah. Can't wait. Can't wait. Pat, I want to tell you about Uncanny X-Men number 204. This is going to be a big tone shift, which actually think is intentional.
Speaker: Because there's a big question lurking in our brains right now. i We just asked. Yeah. And what is it? Well, you you get the honor of saying it. think we should say it same time.
Speaker: What happened to Nightcrawler? Chris Claremont, writer June Brigman. Yay! Guest penciler. Wilts Portacio, guest inker. Glynis Oliver, colorist Tom Orszakowski, letter. Ann Nocenti, editor. And ah john McLean, 1785-1861, editor-in-chief. From
Speaker: Released date January 7th, 1986. Cover date April 1986. eighty six
Speaker: We open.
Speaker: On Nightcrawler brooding in the rain on the balcony of Amanda Sefton's Manhattan apartment. Amanda calls him inside when she wakes up in the morning and he immediately pours himself a drink.
Speaker: She's worried about him. The X-Men called. They're worried too. Oh, Kurt Rupert. He dries off like a dog. He does. He teleports into the bathtub and then. so
Speaker: Kurt is having an existential crisis after his Nightcrawler miniseries adventure. Remember that? Yeah. Everything the X-Men do seems so bleak and hopeless.
Speaker: And meeting the Beyonder certainly didn't help with that. He feels purposeless, especially after not being invited to fight the Beyonder with the rest of the X-Men and Secret Wars 2. He's also a little glad he didn't go and he feels like a coward for it.
Speaker: So this is, in as far as I can understand, Kurt having a midlife crisis. Right. And its there's a lot of factors that bring it on, but it's it's essentially that same. Right. Like, who even am I? Have I already peaked in my life? Like, and do I like the way that that went?
Speaker: What what am I even here for? It's very just I can relate.
Speaker: i I also wonder, i wonder if this is clear. I wonder, i was reading this part and I was wondering what Claremont is trying to say. is he trying to say something about like the X-Men?
Speaker: about something that he feels about the X-Men getting too dark and he's like missing the time when it was fun to write or when they were like more lighthearted or is he just or is he just observing that and pointing out that Nightcrawler doesn't seem to fit anymore right is it not necessarily that Chris Clannermont is saying Nightcrawler is not his mouthpiece He's just explaining this. I'm going in a new direction with the X-Men.
Speaker: And I just want to say Nightcrawler doesn't... I'm not sure ah how Nightcrawler fits in there. Right. To me it's more that we So we saw this with the New Mutants in the last episode, too. There is a period here where Chris Claremont is trying to write himself out of a depression and he's just writing his characters as depressed so he can kind of see how they work their way out of it.
Speaker: And timing wise, it lines up with him. finding out that there's an X book that he's not writing. Right. I think this is all him. Just like, he's putting it out on the page here. he's You think this is him saying like, dude where do I belong? Should I be doing this anymore? yeah Yes, exactly. You always wanted to be an actor.
Speaker: Yeah. Yeah. And a political scientist. Yeah. and I think that was his degree. Right. So he, well, yeah, I mean, And I do i do want to state, you know, this is the hardest part about analyzing art and literature, right? It's like, yes, not everything is metaphorical, but also, yes, everything is metaphorical because it's written by the people, right? So you can't... it's w written Anything you write is from your perspective, so it's going to have at least the metaphor of how you view the world shining through But...
Speaker: but Sometimes, you know, like I just said, maybe, you know, sometimes somebody is not the mouthpiece of the guy and he's just trying to say like, yeah, Nightcrawler doesn't belong here anymore.
Speaker: So there your know there's a really good story. ah You know, what Edward Albee, the playwright. Yeah, I think. What is it? ah Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf is his big famous one. But he also he wrote a play called Zoo Story, which is absurdist. There's no point in me trying to explain it to you. It is almost entirely just symbolism of like with the absurdity of human life.
Speaker: i And at the end, it's mostly two characters. And at the end, the one character stabs the other and... obviously him murdering this character yeah is a big symbol in itself, but apparently he was at a high school talking about ah his work doing like an assembly. And one of the kids said, well, what is the, we know what the murder symbolizes. What does the knife symbolize? And Edward Albee said, it's a fucking knife. What are you teaching these kids? ah
Speaker: It's just a fun little anecdote. It's, it's the same as that. Ernest Hemingway thing when people asked him about old man in the sea and he's like it's not a metaphor it's just a guy fishing right yeah yeah and it's like well okay that's not true that's not entirely true even you writing a story about a guy fishing is gonna be about more than a guy fishing because you wrote it and you have thoughts and those thoughts go into one of the most opinionated men on earth yeah yeah exactly so and
Speaker: I'll say, as we're talking about literary critique, I think there's ah I think this also speaks to that discussion we were having, was it last episode, about whether certain things are, quote, in character or not.
Speaker: Sure, yeah, yeah. Right, you can be practical about your criticism, But you're that's doing kind of a disservice because ah there's more than just the practical in the text.
Speaker: But anyway. what were were Where were we in the midst? Oh, you wrote here in the midst of his rant. Ironically. He wonders if his and Amanda's love for each other is even real.
Speaker: And she walks out. and don't Don't go there, man. Yeah, man. she's He's like, you're a magician. You could have made me love you. Yeah. ro ah Bro. And it's clear that just everything. It's with honestly as a character moment, I think it's brilliant because everything he says up to that moment leads is leading to him not believing in himself. Yeah. So clearly what he wants to say is like,
Speaker: Am I even worth it? But it comes out accusatory instead. and Yeah, yeah. Down the street a bit, a trash truck kidnaps some lady jogger.
Speaker: Some lady. Just some lady. jogging.
Speaker: Nightcrawler, having returned to the balcony to brood some more, sees it and recognizes the driver as Chambers' chief assistant to our gade. no. And this is so funny. Claremont does did this in like Marvel Team Up also, that people keep recognizing the sound, schlang.
Speaker: that's the on writing that's arcade's slang i know arcade slang when i hear it follow that slang this is just what he needs a little swashbuckling action to clear his head he follows the trash truck to murder world and sneaks in using the knowledge he picked up from kitty and peter tu i Remember they got these they ah helped him, but it turned out just to be like a birthday party or something. I guess they ah they debrief.
Speaker: Huh. I have to imagine most of the technology he picked up here is from Kitty and not Peter. ah Man, also, fucking, didn't we see this story already? I swear we saw this exact setup before.
Speaker: Sort of. It was. So we saw Nightcrawler do this exactly, i think, in that Marvel team up story you're mentioning, because he saw Arcade's limo at the airport. Yeah. And he teleported onto it and was like, oh, Arcade was going to kill Spider-Man, but now somebody else is going to kill Spider-Man. I need to go ward Spider-Man. Every fucking Arcade story is the goddamn same.
Speaker: he it really is hey ate it I it. I like reading a fun Nightcrawler tale, but this midsection of this issue, I was just... i was dying. I was like, stop. Please, just get out of Murder World. I hate this. Please don't Don't go!
Speaker: you don't need to... You've done this before. You don't need to take on Arcade by yourself. As soon as i saw... the well he disguises himself from the building sensors. And meanwhile, the random lady is stuck in a classic pinball death machine. As soon as I saw the pinball, I was like, please, no, stop it. No, no, no.
Speaker: Here's the thing. So she's stuck in this glass pinball being bounced around and he is broadcasting to her the whole time and just being like, somebody hired me to kill you. So that's why you're here. Yeah, it's not personal, but,
Speaker: I guess my problem is if I hired oh yeah an assassin, I wouldn't want them to build a giant pinball-themed death trap. I want them to to kill the person. That part is personal, Arcade.
Speaker: that part is personal. I guess you like assuming you hire him knowing that this what is what is doing because maybe he's not representing himself. yeahly that can be what you're doing Yeah, exactly. You could just show up with it with the proof of of the kill or whatever. But I assume if they know what he's doing, then they're into it for the psychological torture before they die, like that part of it. But knowing...
Speaker: What we'll find out at the end of this issue yeah doesn't seem like a person they would want to psychologically torture before they kill. It seems like a person they just need to get out of the way there's just a hit out. Yeah. Okay. like Right? This random lady.
Speaker: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. we we'll We'll get to it. But put a pin in that. But it doesn't seem like this is personal in the sense of we hate her. It seems like I need her gone for my own whatever. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker: All right. She's eventually dumped out into a forest where she's pursued by nineteenth century fox hunters and their hounds on one side. it's it's like one of those, yeah, like ah British fox hunts, right? Yeah, yeah. yeah And they've got like old timey handmade hats on and they're carrying muskets. It's ridiculous.
Speaker: on the On the other side of her, there's 19th century hussars. Hussars, Matt, a light cavalry unit from Eastern Europe. She runs from the cavalry straight into a river where she's attacked by a freshwater shark.
Speaker: There's some real thematic inconsistency here. I think Arcade got a little lazy with this one. Pinball to the woods to a battlefield to a shark in a river.
Speaker: Maybe it's a 19th century far shark. Yeah, who knows? ah Before it can eat her, though, Kurt bamps in and saves the day, teleporting her back to shore. Yay.
Speaker: um They engage in a Mad Max style car chase through the desert for a little bit until World War One biplanes start chasing them instead. guys yeah Kurt teleports. Now we're in the twenty s Takes one over flying in the way and wishing the lady good luck getting out. Arcade cackles watching from his office having scared Nightcrawler enough to abandon this poor girl. So she's alone in Martyr world now and Nightcrawler just flies off. that Doesn't seem very like Nightcrawler. Maybe he's got a plan. Who knows? She arrives meanwhile in a rough part of a city surrounded by weirdos as she walks along looking for death traps. She's pretty shocked to find a robot version of herself in the window of a brothel.
Speaker: o and it seems like they're trying to convince her to stop running and just be a sex worker and when she says no they're like all right well then we will go with the original plan and kill you ah yes yeah there's there's a robot woman who i think is supposed to be a robot version of miss lock his other assistant and she is like You could take her place. Yes, that's that's robot you, but it could be real you if you want to be a ah sex worker down here in in murder world. Spend your days giving and receiving pleasure without care or responsibility or fear, she says. And listen...
Speaker: She's in a city like she's surrounded by people. Are all of these people robots or are there other people who have been given this offer before to be like, hey, what if you just live down here is like a weirdo
Speaker: instead of dying? Right. This is a sincere offer that if she had been like, yeah, I'll just be a prostitute ah down here for the robots and other people who have replaced their robots. Right.
Speaker: she just Yeah, they just keep bringing victims in and showing them different jobs in windows. And they're like, you could be a cashier. We need one of those.
Speaker: it People get hungry. Somebody's got to make them a burger.
Speaker: All right. um She refuses, obviously. Yeah. All of the people. I guess not obviously. i think probably I would say yeah okay. If it were me and it was like oh do do I die or do I get laid all the time for money. i yeah You know what?
Speaker: All the people in the street pull out knives and start creeping towards her. But that's when Nightcrawler swings in kicking robot ass and mocking Arcade's holographic projections. Because the mislocked Arcade's face just appears on it for some reason. Yeah, he's he's been doing this. with with i guess you didn't mention it, but he just like he projects his face holographically on top of the robot instead of The actual face. Yes. And so far in this issue, it's all been ladies.
Speaker: Yeah. Yeah. Which is good for him. Maybe he's learning. Yeah. self viz yeah They're trying to say something. Arcade gets ready to push his big kill everyone button or whatever. But at that moment, the X-Men burst the X-Men. Pat.
Speaker: why What? What? They burst through his office wall and kick his little ass. Even Storm gets in on the action, hurling lightning bolts at him. What?
Speaker: But how? If they were available, why didn't they show up earlier to help? And how'd they get in Oh, he realizes these are his own robot versions of the X-Men. Oh, idiot. He just bought himself enough time to reprogram them to attack Arcade. Exactly like the fucking last time we saw fucking Arcade in a fucking comic book.
Speaker: Yes. Yeah, this is... i' pretty reminiscent of There is arcade one an arcade story. And even, even the very, the small variations on it are getting repeated by the same guy We've only ever seen Claremont write these stories.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Arcade finds this really clever and opts to let Nightcrawler and the girl escape. So, if we're talking about every arcade story being the same, yeah I, I don't think we can exclude the endings, right? Number one, they outsmart arcade and arcades like, ah, you technically, this was a game and you won. So I have to let you leave. i can't fulfill my million dollar contract.
Speaker: And two, The X-Men are like, okay, cool. I'm going to get out of here then. i Are you good? You don't need anything else from me?
Speaker: Do you mind so do mind not doing this anymore? oh you're going to keep doing it. All right. That's fine. I i would i thought I'd ask. Next time I see you in public, I'll probably be pretty upset about it. So.
Speaker: ah Can't wait to chase you back here sometime randomly and do all the exact same traps over again, buddy. That's the thing. It's not even like yeah i could see it.
Speaker: If it was every time we go back to arcade, it's a whole bunch of different traps that we've never seen before and different things. Like if it was just like, okay, there are these breath catching arcade issues where an artist is just allowed to go nuts and And come up with a bunch of cool things. Complex scenarios. And Claremont's like, hey, you just go crazy and I'll follow your lead, right? Like you can draw whatever you want in these panels and I'll follow your lead.
Speaker: No, it's the same fucking thing every time. It's a pinball machine. It's fighter jets. It's race cars. It's it's just it's a the a theme park. It's the same rides every time go every time and it's indoors. So it's the like there's only a certain level of excitement available. I never in my whole life need another arcade story.
Speaker: I love the X-Men. I will read a thousand X-Men stories, a million. I will read infinite X-Men stories. I never, ever, ever, like ever need another arcade story.
Speaker: Maybe this is last one. Okay, good. Good. Maybe. Kurt explains the plan to the random lady as he walks her back into the into her West Side apartment, and she chastises him for having too much fun in a life-threatening situation.
Speaker: No time for that now. She says she's he's just like Arcade, which, oof. i Yeah, that's a little... This guy just saved your life. Don't compare him to your killer.
Speaker: No time for that now, though. As Kurt senses there's people in her apartment from outside the door, he busts the door down, ready to fight, but is greeted by this lady's royal envoy. What?
Speaker: Well, Pat, turns out she's Queen Judith Rossendil of Ruritania. What? And he saved her. The end. What the fuck? What? She's Queen Judith Rossendel of Ritania.
Speaker: Oh. Oh. Last of the Elfbirds, Pat. Turns out she's the queen.
Speaker: She seems as confused as Nightcrawler is, so I'm guessing that's the where the story's going. Like... She just inherited a queenship. I would say yeah if there were more to the story, then that could be where this is going. But this is how it ends. They just look at each other confusing, confusedly. I have to assume she knows she's the queen. Also, I don't.
Speaker: She seems confused. I'll say that. she's She's the queen of Ruritania, Matt. do you know Do you know where Ruritania is?
Speaker: It's rural. sure The rural parts of Tania. I'll tell you where it is. It isn't. ah It is a fictional...
Speaker: European city, and I mean fictional as in it's used as a placeholder for so for small European countries when you're discussing hypotheticals in academia. like oh or Or a legal situation, right? You would say... Political scientist. So if Ruritania...
Speaker: ah takes this action then we would need to respond interesting so somebody with a political science degree would know that and just if they included it in a story like this would just be showing it off it's a Yes. Oh, it also I mean, it could be that were the term itself originated in I've never read this, but Anthony hopes the prisoner of Zenda in 1894, just sort of political hat.
Speaker: just sort of a political pet thriller about some sort of chancellor who doesn't show up to his coronation so they get a lookalike to come in and that guy ends up serving is it follows a lot of the same plot points of the movie dave if you've ever seen that with kevin you've never read the prisoner of zenda by anthony hope from 1894 i've played the legend of zenda oh the value is that is that what it's based on Probably based on the novel, the prisoner of Zenda from 1988. Sorry. 1894. Yeah.
Speaker: yeah That's my favorite year for thriller novels.
Speaker: Oh, Matt. Yeah. Let's keep going, buddy. Let me tell you about our last issue today. it is called uncanny X-Men number two Oh five.
Speaker: Wounded Wolf. o this is a classic one. gat this was nuts. I was not ready for this. I think there's something to the fact that we get all these really intense, um dark, deep issues.
Speaker: And then, ah fun little romp with Nightcrawler and Arcade. And then immediately back to like one of the darkest issues we've seen. Yeah, insane tone shift here. Reading these back-to-back kind of hurt. And I think, i think again, i i i have to imagine, even if it's not an intentional statement by Claremont,
Speaker: as like Nightcrawler doesn't fit in the world that I'm building now. It's at the very least... a moment that Claremont notices that Nightcrawler doesn't fit in the world that he's building now.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah. i present Yeah, we'll see where it goes. i I don't want to see Nightcrawler go anywhere. you still They need somebody to lighten things up, and to be like the swashbuckler. But, you know, that's what... i mean, yeah.
Speaker: I mean, Claremont, that's kind of where he's going, right? It's like... What if we start carving the heart out of the X-Men and see what what happens? Like, that's what he did. He took Professor X out and he's like, how do people react without Professor X?
Speaker: Yeah. And so the next logical step is now how do they react without Cyclops? The next logical steps, how do they react without Nightcrawler? These people that have guided the team through like helped them keep on x Xavier's path.
Speaker: Just a thought. Well, just a thought.
Speaker: I don't like it. Well, I'm sorry. I'll try to think differently, I guess. Chris Claremont story script, Barry Windsor Smith story art and color.
Speaker: Tom Orzikowski letterer and no senti editor and child eater editor in chief. Release date February 11th, 1986 cover date. May 1986. May 1986.
Speaker: My first birthday. Oh, we open in a strange place called the body shop. where a woman's thoughts slowly coalesce from chaos and pain into order.
Speaker: Spiral. Remember her? ah yeah ah Yeah, but I guess we barely remember her at this point. Yeah, yeah, we saw her once. Spiral watches as a woman named Oyama Yoriko's body transforms into a cybernetic killing machine, her fingers able to extend into long claws.
Speaker: She assures Yuriko by her new name, Lady Deathstrike, that once her mission of vengeance is complete, she will restore her back to humans. What stupid fucking name. I'm Lady Deathstrike. Stop calling me Oyama. Can you call me Deathstrike?
Speaker: Death. Strike. I strike death into the hearts of my enemies.
Speaker: Also watching are three men also imbued with cybernetic enhancements. Murray Reese, Wade Cole, and Angelo Macon, who have similar dreams of vengeances against the same man.
Speaker: It's Reese Cole and Macon. It's Reese Cole and Macon, Matt. Way back when you told me to remember these guys and I did. you? Okay. And it paid off when I saw their names here. Tell me what you remember about them.
Speaker: ah These are ex-Hellfire goons that got wrecked, like ripped to shreds by Wolverine in uh that first issue where we were like holy shit wolverine is here like he had been part of the team but then this is when he solo takes out like the entire hellfire club x-men 133 wolverine alone there there you go the title actually sums it up pretty nicely yeah
Speaker: ah But so he tore them up. They got cybernetic enhancements so that they could rejoin the Hellfire Goon squad. that wasn't That was the story where um Storm and Emma Frost switched bodies. Right. But then I believe Wolverine just tore them up again.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah. and And then we saw them one more time in ah the new Mutants graphic novel. Oh, right. Where, yeah, where they are goons of Donald Pierce.
Speaker: Right. Yeah, so that's interesting. Reese, Cole, and Macon. It's fun. if you've been paying attention, you've kind of followed these guys on a journey. If you haven't, it doesn't matter. They're just cyborg men.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's all that, that's the role, is if you don't know who they are, it's just, oh, some cyborg men are trying to kill Wolverine today. Yeah, yeah. Makes sense. He probably... Fought some cyborg men. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Cut to a snowy Manhattan where Katie Power from the Power Pack is on her way to sing some Christmas carols with her preschool class. Little pal, little pal Katie Power.
Speaker: She gets separated from her teacher, though, when a gunfight breaks out in the street. Jesus Christ, what? Running through the snow to find Miss Randolph, she runs into a shirtless, bloody, confused Wolverine. Huh?
Speaker: I love. got Yeah. you Barry Windsor Smith was like, hey, can we can we make some kids see some fucked up stuff? It's it's just it's kind of yeah man. That panel really captures it, too.
Speaker: It's like how scary how just deeply viscerally scary would it be to just see to run into Wolverine? yeah that like the Like nearly feral.
Speaker: And yeah, beating the shit. He's larger than life. And she is so small in the panel. And it's like, fuck, I'm going to die now. Now I'm going right now. I'm going to die.
Speaker: Logan grabs Katie and takes her hostage as Reese Cole and Lady Deathstrike bear down on him. Katie begins to realize that Logan is severely hurt and needs help. He doesn't even recognize her.
Speaker: She shoots off an energy ball to free herself and tries to get him to the hospital, but they can't shake the cyborgs. It's very sweet of her to be like, it' it's a it's a good moment. It's a good hero moment for Katie where she's like, I'm terrified.
Speaker: I need to get away from this man. no wait, this is Wolverine. Mm-hmm. He is an acquaintance. He told me a secret once.
Speaker: i should I should stay and help him, even if he's scary. yeah Like, it's really... it's Kitty went through the same thing when when they first debuted her, right? It's like... right It's that... ah It's okay to be scared as long as you still do the right thing.
Speaker: Wolverine with kids is just a fucking winning combination every time. Always. And man, as much as we don't like reading Power Pack... I really love the kids from power pack, especially Katie, like Katie, number one amongst them.
Speaker: Great characters. Yeah. Eventually in some sort of construction yard, Wolverine begins to speak first only in Japanese as he recognizes Katie, but not himself next in English as his healing factor slowly restores his body and mind.
Speaker: can also restore his mind man that's why he's so not crazy um i we i cut out a lot of like them getting stopped by the police and them getting getting in a taxi cab and stuff but there is one moment where they get in a taxi cab and uh she's like we got to get to a hospital and he's like looks like it poor devil and she's like he is not a devil you shut your mouth
Speaker: He's Wolverine, my best friend. Katie wants to help his energizer, but Wolverine demands she not. Besides, she's helped enough by buying him time to heal a bit.
Speaker: He asks her to stay put as he carves into Cole and Reese, leaving only he and Lady Deathstrike to face off one-on-one. of This is a... it's We've got to condense these, right? But it's such a good series of panels where like Lady Deathstrike and her people are regrouping, and one by one Wolverine is tracking them down, picking them off, and they just keep being like...
Speaker: He's close. My censors say he's close. I don't know where he is. And they've done they've been through this exact thing before. Yes. Right? Like, this is exactly how he did it the first time. But, man, that page, it's such a brilliant page because the top half of the page is traditional, traditional...
Speaker: page grid um and wolverine is talking to katie and he's like like what you've done is very brave and i thank you for it you can't help me with this i need you to do one specific thing like this is gonna be the bravest thing you've ever done i need you to trust me and then the bottom half these pages page are all these cluttered vertical chaotic violent panels of him carving through these fucking guys yeah yeah it's the like nine panels in the space where you'd usually see two to four yeah and the just the dichotomy of it is so it tells you most of what you need to know about Wolverine in one page du Barry Windsor Smith is so fucking good at this like there's so far it's what two or three iconic issues where
Speaker: stupidly i was like how does he keep getting all the good ones why does he keep getting all that that's not what's happening he's making these iconic issues well on top of that he's also he also wins the mutant menace award for most improved because remember when he remember when we saw him back in uh in he went by Barry Smith yeah yeah in ah early X-Men.
Speaker: I have to look up what issue that was. I know we've done this before. i Okay, X-Men number 53. Oh my god, Pat, it's the Blastar issue. Our least favorite issue of X-Men. Like, literally our least favorite comic we've ever read for this podcast. It's the one we consider the worst, the actual worst comic. Not just the most unenjoyable.
Speaker: But the worst, objectively the worst comic in the history of comic books. In the history of X-Men at the very least. and yet Yeah, I'm sure there's some... And also he did life death. And then he did... And then his next issue was life death!
Speaker: Oh, God. We and we we have more Barry Wintersmith ahead of us, so I, was like, man, just stay hype for him, but fuck. It's just so funny.
Speaker: Okay. Deathstrike.
Speaker: ah She and Wolverine are fighting. Remember, Deathstrike is fierce, carving into Logan, telling him that she must finish her father's work and avenge his dream. Pat, what is she talking about here?
Speaker: This is super unclear to me, and I know it's going to get a little deeper as we see Lady Deathstrike in the future, but. Or.
Speaker: In the past. uh right sure i assume it'll be through flashback well no i'm saying um time travel we we missed a lady death strike we missed her for uh yuriko sorry this is lady death strike's first appearance we missed yuriko oyama's first appearance oh we will get to it i think in two episodes from now in an issue of alpha flight a Okay. Interesting.
Speaker: I'm wrong. Her first appearance is daredevil. Even more interesting. Oh, we talked about these. Okay, so we talked about these back in um Me and You, off off air. Talked about these a long time, like mid last year, where there was three issues of Daredevil, where Yoriko Oyama first appears.
Speaker: Right. And in the second issue and some of the third issue, there's a little bit of Wolverine. And we were like, should we cover these? Right. And we were just like, no, i don't think so. There's so little X-Men here. Okay.
Speaker: But it would tie the strings for us understanding why There's this ah death vendetta. um You know, i i honest I honestly don't know. These are three issues I've never read. but i don't know. We're not following Daredevil. um But I believe there will be plenty of context in our last, the last episode that we cover Alpha Flight, which is... Oh, thank God.
Speaker: in a few episodes i But what we do know is that her father was a failed kamikaze pilot. He meant to kamikaze in World War two but instead returned home in shame.
Speaker: Yeah. Strange. So this obviously gives her a lot to fight for, but Logan is tougher, obviously, and and tears her to shreds.
Speaker: As he stands over his work, he realizes the things Yuriko did to her body just for vengeance. He didn't have a choice. She did. Her father would be proud, he says in disgust.
Speaker: Further, he's disappointed in himself that her attack brought out his animal side yet again, side he'd hoped he'd buried forever. She begs him to kill her and let her be free, but he tells her she has to earn her own freedom.
Speaker: Wolverine walks back through the snowy construction yard to where he left Katie Power, still covering her eyes and ears. on He tells her that the way he fights, the things he has to do, isn't nice or pretty, but he works hard to be a different and better man than that.
Speaker: What if he had said, what if when he was doing that, he's like, the things I do aren't very nice, but I'm the best there is. Stop bragging. Stop bragging to the little kid about how good you are at killing.
Speaker: But no, doesn't. ah But he works hard to be a different and better man than that. Some people can't do the same. Like the lady in her creeps, adds Katie.
Speaker: Logan tells Katie that even if he scares her a little, she'll always have a friend in him. And he grabs her hand. The storm lets up and he begins to walk her back home.
Speaker: The Man. Man.
Speaker: they it's so touching when he gets back to Katie and she's sitting where he left her and her and her hands are over her face yeah yeah so he was like look just don't watch or listen to anything that's about to happen yeah she's like I did what you said I didn't see or hear anything it's like fuck man good kid good kid good kid man Knows to listen to Wolverine. All good kids listen to Wolverine.
Speaker: Man, we keep meeting such good kids. I know. There's a lot of them recently. Maybe they'll form a little team. The good kids team. The good kids. Katie Power.
Speaker: Leech. Artie.
Speaker: That's it. Yeah. No one else has them now. Uh...
Speaker: Very funny moment when Wolverine's like, I'm to have to take care of business. I need you to go hide somewhere and cover your eyes and ears. She runs off and as she's running off, she says, i bet I missed the carol singing.
Speaker: I bet that hurt his heart. You know, like that's the thing. He's running off to try and kill men. And I bet if he hurt any wood, cause he's got super senses. He heard her say, I bet I missed the Carol singing. And he I bet he's like, Oh damn it.
Speaker: Now I really got to kill these guys. fuck Mr. Carol singing, man. You ruined this little girl's Carol singing. ah ah It's just, again, it's the two sides of him. And they they they and of the thing, they he's got a life philosophy where these two sides square.
Speaker: They square each other, right? Where he's like, i care about the innocence of a little kid. i will be caring towards a little kid, but I will kill a thousand human beings is he's like, yeah I have to be this monster to make the world safer for these other people. Like, I don't want, I don't want somebody like, like, that's why he tells her not to fight. Not just because he doesn't want her to get hurt, but like, he doesn't want her to be part of the things that he has to do to have to live that life. That's his whole thing. He's like, I don't want anyone else to do the shit I have to do. I can do it.
Speaker: But the rest of the world should be untouched by this dark shit. Yeah. I'm here to make sure of that. I chose it. I'm choosing it. They didn't. So they shouldn't have to deal with it.
Speaker: Fucking Wolverine, man. Love this guy. Hey, and we should pay more attention to this character. You know? I can't say yeah enough about the art here either. Like we're pointing out a few panels. I feel like I've said iconic a thousand times this episode, but it's, tweeted I don't know what else what other words, mutant menace pod at gmail.com. If you have synonyms for iconic, but every panel here is perfect. And it's, it's, it's not just panel by panel. It's the story itself. It's the visual storytelling and the fact that
Speaker: for one of the maybe four or five times we've seen it Chris Claremont is able to shut his mouth for a little while and let the let the art do the talking yeah yeah there's a there's a completely silent fight scene page page page whole page of panels of fight scene yeah yeah um and there's this really there's when he's walking away and leaving lady death strike alive there's this really good moment where he retracts his claws like he's standing over her yeah and he turns around starts walking away and he's like you gotta earn it and then retracts his claws holy shit yeah i i
Speaker: man i'm i'm like flipping through it right now the next panel he's walking through this construction yeah also i love how marvel comics seem to believe that there are big abandoned construction yards all over new york just every day that take up like five blocks uh He's just walking through the snow and like Claremont lets it be silent. Like there's a lot of panels here. Claremont just lets be either silent or have one small line of dialogue.
Speaker: He does this more, first of all, with artists that he trusts, but he also does it more with ah Wolverine than anybody else. Yeah, yeah. Because he's the strong silent type.
Speaker: It seems to think that Wolverine's actions speak louder than um one billion Shakespearean captions. He's backed off the Shakespearean captions. I do want to give him credit for that, too. He has. Yeah, so it's a little more normal. And I know that's not going to last forever.
Speaker: ah Well, yeah, it's... Yeah, it's like for now, it's pretty grounded to get better. He's going to take a break from the X-Men. Then he's going to come back and you're going to be like what the fuck?
Speaker: Why are you doing this? um But we're going to have to talk a lot about the body shop because I there's I don't understand it So what i don't know I don't know who this spiral is I assume we'll meet her sometime soon.
Speaker: Or we've met her. I assume we'll get some more information about her. yeah it seems to me like she has something to do with the body shop because she's there running running the operation.
Speaker: And that it turns people... into cyborgs okay yes so far that's what it seems but we pretty plainly spelled out we haven't read the long shot miniseries yet which has which is where it spiral comes from um and already happened again we just we have keep having to make decisions about where to put things yeah and yeah so we we're gonna meet mojo pretty soon
Speaker: But we're going to see that the body shop does more than just cyborgs. Like, we'll talk about it when we get there. But I find the body shop very confusing.
Speaker: Okay. The impression that I got was that it is just like a human enhancement factory. Yeah. So... Nevermind. I was going to do that thing. And I don't know anything beyond that. That's i's got do that in the context we got here. Where I spoil stuff in the in the way that I say things like, this couldn't possibly happen, could it? Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to take the bait, Pat. You're baiting me and I'm not going to take that bait. How did you feel about this arc? I really enjoyed it. I thought some of like, again, we're we're going just sort of issue to issue here. There's not a thread that runs through this stuff. It is the same stuff that we've been getting of like a little bit of character development, but a lot of...
Speaker: just dealing with a single problem for that issue in that issue alone uh the beyonders interference doesn't help but i like the beyonder in these x-men and mutants comics just because he seems so much more he he's unmotivated he he doesn't have a reason to be but He's so much more menacing Claremont's hands than in stupids.
Speaker: Yes. Yeah. You can kind of just pretend like you just don't know his motivation yet. Maybe maybe it's coming. Right. Someday when I read Secret Wars 2.
Speaker: ah But no, i' like as far as one off issues goes, we get to be under things. Fine. Whatever. Let's. let's wrap all that up but then we get solo nightcrawler solo wolverine it's some real introspection like i think feels like we're turning a corner even though we're still getting just single issue stories yeah pat i think this might be i really think this might be our last secret wars 2 issues see
Speaker: If you hadn't said that, I would believe that it is. But now that you've said it, I have to believe we're going to see the Beyonder at least one more time. i I don't think so. Because i think i I think we are past it chronologically in every title that we're reading.
Speaker: Yeah, I think we're done. i hope so. I hope we're done. i There's a chance. I don't know. Maybe... Maybe our, oh, it's our next episode is Alpha Flight. Maybe our next episode we'll get like a touch of it. I don't know. I don't remember.
Speaker: ah touch of it. it i don't think. I don't think so. I think we're done with it. touch of this Secret Wars 2 consumption. um I do think there is a through line to these stories, though. I mean, all these stories were, I mean, not only are they just about the X-Men getting a little darker um and and more serious, they are also about just like people, broken people, people with reasons to be broken, overcoming that brokenness to do something fantastic or amazing or heroic right yeah yeah stories we have like we have storm overcoming her lack of powers and the subsequent shaken confidence
Speaker: That she had in Life Death 2. We have her overcoming that to defeat Cyclops and become leader of the team again. In the Phoenix stories, we have Phoenix being completely broken by the Beyonder.
Speaker: And to the point where she's like, I'm going to destroy the universe. But overcoming that. um You have... Nightcrawler, completely depressed. Like, I should give up superheroics overcoming that to save a queen. And then you have Wolverine, the wounded wolf, overcoming his animal side ah to save a little girl.
Speaker: And I guess there's an interesting parallel. To save a little girl, I wonder if that is intentional, right? Like, he's he's ushering a little girl through that story, Katie Power.
Speaker: And then as Yuriko on the ground, she reveals herself to just be a little girl in need of help.
Speaker: Oh, yeah. Right? Like, internally, she is just... She says, like, I i can't be a full person until I've fulfilled my duty to duty to kill Wolverine.
Speaker: Yeah, because ah it might because of her responsibility to her dad or whatever. But like Wolverine's like, you haven't earned it. you're still You're being a little child right now. You have to grow up.
Speaker: um While at the same time, he's telling Katie, like don't grow up yet. Be a little child. Really, i don't know. i hadn't I hadn't quite put that together just now.
Speaker: He's got an eye out,
Speaker: Ooh, Matt, it's happening more and more, we're getting a little solemn before we pop into Steals and Deals. Which is fine. You know, I'm i'm a a fountain of unlimited.
Speaker: solemnleity oh I don't I don't need the the lead in. I don't need the warm up. That's why we work as comedy partners is because I'm nothing but depressing and you're nothing but hype.
Speaker: That's right. Neither of us have substance, but yeah no, no, no. For those vapid humans on Earth.
Speaker: Matt. Yeah. This is a real easy one to read. Also, the page is very colorful. This is a full page ad. It says challenge of the go bots.
Speaker: They're awesome.
Speaker: Check local TV listings for time and station. All right. I got to say, when you tell me if you have to tell me they're awesome, I got a hunch about their awesomeness.
Speaker: They're awesome. There, I cannot tell you reading through with the original issues that I purchased, how many GoBots ads I'm getting.
Speaker: They are on cereal boxes. They are in cartoons. They are, of course, toys. I think there's a comic about them. They are bumping the hell out of GoBots in X-Men Comics. They just really wanted to make these GoBots happen.
Speaker: Do you think? I don't know the answer to this. But did Marvel lose the Transformers license around this time? Is this like a petty like... Oh.
Speaker: Like, they lost Transformers, so they're like, ah we are all in on GoBots. We will do these ads free yeah advertising to GoBots.
Speaker: Do you... I don't know the first thing about GoBots other than... They're transformers. Um, no, I know nothing about go bots. I know that they are transformers, but worse.
Speaker: Yeah. And you could tell that just by looking at this ad, you look at this ad and you go, Oh, that's worse transformers. Yeah. A transformer would also turn into a car, but it wouldn't be this obvious that they turn into a car. It wouldn't be this fucking ugly. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker: Transformers would tell me when the local listing or when, what time. Yeah, Transformers would write some damn ad copy. They would have a They would have a block they would have a national block that would have.
Speaker: affiliate station puts them on. They'd be like Saturday morning at 10 a.m. m all across the country. GoBots doesn't make the national Saturday morning cut. They're probably on it like, you know, when yeah cartoons would end at like 11 a.m. and then the stations would try to run their own kids programming.
Speaker: And sometimes it was like Power Rangers, but other times it was like a local clown or an old episode. I remember episodes of Bozo from the 60s.
Speaker: I remember that replay that there was a puppet named Sherbert. So puppet named Sherbert, a puppet named Sherbert. ah it Sounds like a. hurt great album title it's a uh it's a um uh it's an earnest hemingway novel it's one of his later ones not very popular um challenge of the go bots they're awesome that's the challenge well that's what i'm reading from this at what would this cost in uh today's money
Speaker: ah The cost of a television antenna, Matt, unless this was on cable. It doesn't say say here. It could have been. It could have required a cable subscription. They're awesome. Yeah. He's got an eye out.
Speaker: Stuff that you could buy out. If you had time machine that you would like to try out. It can't deal. It's sealed. Hey, everybody. Thank you for listening. my yeah goodness.
Speaker: You did it. We appreciate you. we we need you. Don't go. no keep listening. We just we usually just babble here because we haven't written ourselves a script for the end of the episodes. We got to go. We got to go, everybody. But ah what you should know is that if you like the show,
Speaker: what the thing we would appreciate most like you could join our patreon and give us money if you want but the thing we would patreon.com slash minute the most is if you just share like subscribe tell a friend tell anybody tell anybody hey i really loved this episode of mutant menace on your social media just you know do a little do a little post on blue sky on twitter on threads on whatever and just be like Fuck, I love this episode of Mutant Menace. And then share to the episode.
Speaker: Yeah. Doesn't have to be this episode. Doesn't have to. It could be any episode. Well, we do. Don't don't send them to a bad episode. We want to we want to leave a good first impression. Yeah. OK. Send us a message asking us what. No, pick what. Pick one of your favorite episodes or this episode. Whatever. Do whatever the fuck you want. Just tell people that we exist.
Speaker: um the next thing What else can they do, Matt? The next thing i want to tell you to you guys is you can follow us on ah Instagram at MutantMenacePod. You can email us if you want to be on Pat's email corner at MutantMenacePod at gmail.com.
Speaker: And I'll tell you, Matt, I said it a few weeks ago. I said, hey, if you don't want us to read the email, tell us. You have to tell us. We'll read it if you don't tell us. But if you say, hey don't read this. This is just for you.
Speaker: Uh, we won't read it. And then we got some emails that are, that are just for us. Have you seen them? No, but I will do you please do. Okay. A huge thanks as always to Krils Wilson for providing all the music and to Julia Selle for providing the voice of Trish Tilby.
Speaker: And that just leaves us with ah one thing to say. Pat, do you want to do you want to give them our patented catchphrase? Yeah, folks, like we say at the end of every episode.
Speaker: Why did I say that? What a fool. And remember, eat dust, creeps.
