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57 - New Mutants #22-25 & MTU Annual #6 - Cloak and Dagger
117 Plays20 days ago
Hey, have you noticed anything strange about Bobby and Rahne lately? Like how they keep staring off at the Holy Ghost Church with a haunted look in their eyes? Or how they keep writing fairy tales and attacking Colossus? Well, it's time for Matt and Pat to dive into this mystery and figure out what the heck is goin' on! And we think it might involve a racially insensitive superhero duo created by Bill Mantlo who hate drugs and pimps SO MUCH. Plus, Magneto falls from space, gets ate by a shark, and hits a woman.
All that, plus the most unhinged Pat's Steals and Deals of all time (or at least since Matt bought the Winged Warrior Hat immediately upon learning of it.)
Topics Discussed:
Don't make me beat up drug dealers! A room of dead children. CATS horns up the New Mutants. Gangs of roving criminals. 2-FOR-ONE Glancing Blow/Rahne Head Injury. Is Spider-Man real? Classic mad scientist! "Yeah." A deceptive clown dance. Rahne Sinclair is a rescue dog. FRIEDRICH VON ROEHM! Rahne's Buddy The Elf moment. Not a good fairy tale. "Invulnerable while blastin'" #11. Emmanuel Da Costa doesn't wanna wear the Hellfire outfit. MIRAGE. HARRY MORRELL: NEW FAVORITE CHARACTER. "There's Bobby." Ultimate Fear, Desire, and Customer. Father Michael Bowen is back! Fear.com. Prayer works!
TIMESTAMPS
00:59 - Cloak and Dagger background
13:12 - New Mutants background
14:10 - Pat's Email Corner
26:57 - Did you do anything X-Men related?
34:02 - Marvel Team-Up Annual #6
49:55 - New Mutants #22
1:04:20 - Mew Newtons #23
1:24:36 - New Mutants #24
1:36:02 - New Mutants #25
1:59:46 - Pat's Steals and Deals
2:07:10 - Goodbye!
Join our Patreon! Free, or pay-what-you-want: patreon.com/mutantmenace
Write into Pat's Email Corner: mutantmenacepod@gmail.com
Join our Discord: https://discord.gg/fPv7hRgTeV
Instagram: @mutantmenacepod
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Transcript
Introduction and Mutant Menace Report
00:00:01
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.
00:00:35
Speaker
Hey,
Podcast Greeting and Theme
00:00:36
Speaker
everybody. I am Matt Aukamp. And I'm Pat Reber. And say it with us, Jason. Welcome to Mute Menace. and Patrick, how the H are you?
00:00:49
Speaker
Matt, I'm doing okay. I'm doing okay. I'm doing okay. That's good. I'm doing... um doing okay. i am ki We're doing okay.
Cloak and Dagger Origins Discussion
00:00:58
Speaker
Pat, what do you know about Cloak and Dagger?
00:01:00
Speaker
Not much. Honestly, my familiarity with them is mostly from Brian Michael Bendis working them into some new Avengers stuff on his run. And I guess Mark Millar's Civil War 2 involves them a good bit just because they're convenient. Yeah,
Tyrone and Tandy's Backstory
00:01:22
Speaker
absolutely. Teleportation device. Yeah, I have read so much Cloak and Dagger. And I mean, there is not that much, to be honest. I've read so much of what exists of Cloak and Dagger. Okay. and they are a
00:01:36
Speaker
Bill Mantlo creation. ah ah And they they have. All right. They have an interesting sort of origin. There's a ah young man named Tyrone Johnson, who was a black New York kid who had a he had a really bad stutter.
00:01:57
Speaker
And he and his friend, also black, were present for the robbing of a grocery store. Okay. Or a corner store. And the police showed up and Tyrone was like trying to say, hey, my friend didn't rob this store.
00:02:16
Speaker
Don't shoot my friend. and he couldn't say it fast enough because he had a stutter. And so because he couldn't say, don't shoot my friend, his friend got shot and killed. Fucking Bill Mantlo.
00:02:28
Speaker
I know. what It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter what the size of your disability. Yes. He's he's going to make it cause someone's death. Right. Right, right. make you miserable, make you feel like less of a person because you have a disability. In this case, something as simple as a stutter.
00:02:49
Speaker
And that story is absurd, right? When have the police ever wanted to shoot somebody and somebody else saying, wait, that guy's innocent. Especially stopped them from doing. Yeah. That person's friend. That's who was also on this at the scene of the crime and also, ah you know, a race that the police like to shoot.
00:03:07
Speaker
Right. When has a black man being innocent ever stopped the police from shooting them? Exactly. and Because another his other black friend said, don't do it. Clearly, clearly and concisely without a stutter.
00:03:21
Speaker
um So at the same time, Tandy Bowen was a a like a rich girl. Yeah. In the suburbs. And her and white. Yes. Very important. And her parents were like so rich that she she was like, you're not paying enough attention to me. I'm running away and ran away to New York City. You know, like all 16 year old. She was like, I want more attention from my parents.
00:03:47
Speaker
um Yeah, so she she ran away to the city. And when she got there, i think it's like she runs into Tyrone and they are almost like immediately there. Some like pimp tries to pick them up
Powers Awakening
00:04:04
Speaker
like, hey, you should come home with me. I have a place for that. I can house and feed you. And you just got to do some little favors for me. And then they Tyrone's like protects her.
00:04:16
Speaker
Okay. But then something happens where they get kidnapped by organized crime and taken to Ellis Island ah to a warehouse an empty warehouse on Ellis Island where a bunch of teenagers get taken. These criminals are trying to create a more addictive and cheaper version of heroin.
00:04:38
Speaker
Why Ellis Island? I know. I know. well maybe he was trying to do a metaphor, right? He's trying to make a statement on immigration and how it's killing this country.
00:04:51
Speaker
Or make a statement about like how like Ellis Island was a rite of passage that destroyed a lot of people's lives. And in this case, it's a rite of passage that destroyed and transformed cloak and dagger. Right. It doesn't. It's not a it.
00:05:05
Speaker
You can make it work, but ah it's not a good or clean metaphor. He just threw a dart at a map of New York. At a map of metaphors.
00:05:18
Speaker
So all these people get injected with this super drug that, again, is somehow both more addictive and cheaper than heroin, one of the cheapest and most addictive drugs ever ever created in history. they all
Comic Series and Racial Themes
00:05:32
Speaker
die except for...
00:05:33
Speaker
they all die except for Tyrone and Tandy, o um who escape. And when they are swimming back to New York, both of them feel these powers activate. Tyrone has this like darkness inside of him.
00:05:52
Speaker
Right. And Tandy has a bright a light inside of her. Right. Hmm. And they find. By the way, these debuted as Spider-Man characters where they stayed for a while. Like they they would they would appear only in Spider-Man comics until they got very shortly before what we're about to read. They got their own like mini series where their full origin was revealed.
00:06:22
Speaker
They're running away. They have these powers. And it it appears as if Daggers Light feeds... tyrone's darkness tyrone hungers and dagger provides an endless source of light is the only thing that can satisfy his hook yeah yes yes that's so fucked up the so that the yeah or if we're talking about him just picking metaphors at random it sounds like he stumbled his way onto an extremely racist one
00:06:53
Speaker
an anti-race mixing metaphor yeah well it it gets even worse with that by the way oh okay um so there on the street he finds just some like weird ah that he called it's called yards of discarded cloth he just finds it like on the ground wraps it around himself because he's cold and wet and his powers somehow merge with that and now within this cloak that he's wearing is this endless void. It's just trash. it's Yes, he's wearing trash.
00:07:29
Speaker
Yes, forever. got it Forever! He never, like, upgrades to have somebody, like, make him a nicer cloak. he just wears trash forever. And then Tandy, just, like, very suddenly, no explanation, she just suddenly has this, like, dancer's leotard with a big dagger cut out of its middle.
00:07:50
Speaker
Oh my god. So that, like, it's like a ah knife... Of flesh pointing downward at her crotch and yeah spread across so you can see the tops of her boobs.
00:08:00
Speaker
It opens down her abdomen. It it finally tapers off at the ah like the under her belly button. Yes, she is. It's insane. Why would you wear something like this? Exactly. Yeah. And how would it work? How would it stay on your body?
00:08:17
Speaker
Tape. I imagine that's tape. She tapes it on every morning. but So like, that's not convenient. I know. I know. So by the time and she's like a dancer, so she uses her dance skills and her. So yeah anyway, his power is he's got this darkness inside of him. He can suck people into it and they face like the their deepest, darkest fears and feelings. And um it kind of saps the life out of them. Okay.
00:08:48
Speaker
Tandy, meanwhile, she has light daggers, which like overload a person's system. if she chucks like she can She shoots beams from her hands that are she calls light daggers. And it'll like overload a person's system, but it'll also purify a person if they're on drugs. So if you're on drugs and Tandy Bowen walks by you, she can throw a light dagger at you and you're not on drugs anymore.
00:09:10
Speaker
What the fuck?
Cloak and Dagger's Role and Father Delgado
00:09:11
Speaker
I know. I spent money on those drugs, damn it.
00:09:17
Speaker
I'm an adult. I can make these choices. As because of this, their whole thing is we hate all drug people. We hate criminals, but we hate drug people most of all. And Tyrone. And so they take refuge in a church where they live. There's a guy. There's a ah like a Hispanic preacher called Father Delgado.
00:09:40
Speaker
with it who is very worried about Tandy and her health and safety and is very suspicious of Cloak and thinks he's a demon.
00:09:52
Speaker
And a lot of... Is he painted as a villain for doing so? No. A lot of... He's painted as a hero. He eventually becomes a villain. Oh. But a villain who is obsessed with Tandy.
00:10:06
Speaker
but So, like, somebody does find this plot thread disturbing at some point in the 80s. But... Bill Mantlo doesn't. He is very comfortable with having this man. Well,
Bill Mantlo's Impact and Controversy
00:10:19
Speaker
he's very comfortable with the plot line of Tyrone consistently manipulating Tandy because he's afraid. He knows that she's so much more beautiful and capable than he is and that she will leave him.
00:10:34
Speaker
So he does everything he can, including sometimes very immoral things to keep her by his side.
00:10:43
Speaker
What else is racist about this comic? Well, I think the only other thing is just this idea of Mantlo seems to, and we'll talk about this as we go through these issues, but Bill Mantlo seems to see New York and the world as a place full evil bad guys who want to kill you and don't mind if they kill kids. And if you deal drugs, you also like killing kids. And if you steal cars, you also deal drugs and like killing kids. And if you...
00:11:12
Speaker
ah If you are a if you're a person walking down the street, you probably want to rob everybody else. You say, right? Even if you're a child, if you're like a 14 year old walking down the street, you're likely carrying a knife for a gun.
00:11:29
Speaker
And if somebody if and if somebody ah ah sticks you up, they also want to rape and kill you and sell you drugs. Like everybody is – there's just a type of person in Bill Mantlo's mind called a criminal that is lurking behind every corner. It's like one in five people are like this type of person called a criminal and they do – they have no morals and they'll do anything to anybody and they don't care.
00:11:56
Speaker
It's typical Republican mindset. and Very like the MAGA tough guy that is shitting his pants every time he has to go into a city.
00:12:09
Speaker
If Bill Mantlo hadn't gone through the tragedy that he went through, i think he would have become MAGA. He was like, he was known as like a liberal guy. And he was known as like a progressive storyteller for even for putting...
00:12:23
Speaker
Racial issues in comics and such. But yeah. But so was Frank Miller. Exactly. Yeah. So I think. um We talk shit on Bill Mantlo here. Because oftentimes just because he's a way worse writer. Than Chris Claremont. And so when you're reading X-Men comics. And suddenly after reading Bill Mantlo comic. You're like Jesus fucking Christ.
00:12:44
Speaker
um But the other big thing about him. That we always complain about. Is that he's very. ah' Every comic book he writes. He some somehow attacks people with disabilities.
00:12:59
Speaker
Right. All across the spectrum of disabilities. Exactly. And i particularly hate him because I've read all of his cloak and dagger. And it's not only boring and bad, it's also very racist.
00:13:11
Speaker
Okay. New Mutants has been far less complicated, but also a little racist recently. That's
Listener Emails and Nickname Fun
00:13:18
Speaker
true. We find ourselves coming straight out of the demon bear saga. um I think the they' only go back and listen to that episode because it ruled. But also the notable carryover facts here are Danny's in a wheelchair from ah all that activity. And both Rain and Roberto have just been.
00:13:44
Speaker
Occasionally freezing and looking out over the city at a particular church. Right. And... Did not know why. Yeah, if you were a Marvel reader at the time and you read everything, you would know why. You would at least have a hint why. But we skipped that issue so that we could read it here today. Until today. Until until this moment. Strap on to your dongs and your big buttholes. And it's time for...
00:14:21
Speaker
Oh, take those dongs out of your buttholes, Matt. It is not time quite yet. That's not what I asked them to do, but we got to get through Patsy Mill Corner. Not everyone has a dong. Everybody has a butthole.
00:14:38
Speaker
Everybody. All right. You're right. No, you're right. i I stand here with my butthole privilege and I've been corrected. That guy from the movie Seven.
00:14:53
Speaker
We have a stacked inbox today, Matt. So we're goingnna we're going to breeze through. But we have a few folks who deserve a nickname at this point. going to start with Vio, who is writing in for, i want to say, the third time. Letting us know, dear Pat, please tell Matt that yesterday I completed my first ever game of Marvel Crisis Protocol.
00:15:15
Speaker
and thought you would appreciate my team lineup of Warlock, Nightcrawler, Charles x Xavier, and Gladiator. Oh, wow. So this is not a game I'm familiar with, but it looks to be like a i like a Warhammer style miniature map strategy. OK.
00:15:36
Speaker
Game. I never played it, but I did play Hero Clicks. Yes. Looks very Hero Clicks-esque. And these mini figurines. Vio sent us some pictures are fucking rad.
00:15:48
Speaker
And I love the candy cane pajamas in the background, by the way. Yeah. Great picks. Thank you My boyfriend also playing his first game fielded Abomination, The Wrecking Crew and Immortal Hulk.
00:16:01
Speaker
Ultimately, Charles was the first killed. And by the end, the two remaining alive were Nightcrawler for my side and Hulk for his side. With me winning as Hulk while strong could not chase the teleporting German man who's making all the game objectives. Yes! That is what a situational matchup.
00:16:18
Speaker
Like, di the Hulk versus Nightcrawler, depending on what each one of them wants to do, is going to change...
00:16:30
Speaker
change that matchup it seems like it seems like vo really thought about utility here ah how can i create a team that has all the abilities covered while vo's boyfriend was just like i like i want strong strong but muscle i want strong muscle yeah yeah if i get if i get in trouble i'll throw a rock That's how I play games.
00:16:54
Speaker
Yeah, it's just strong, strong man's strong man. But we got playing with a smart person. I like the view as a gamer. View the gamer. View the gamer. View the gamer.
00:17:12
Speaker
OK, view view crisis. Marvel Crisis Protocol. ah marv Marvio.
00:17:23
Speaker
ah Like Marvel VO. I don't think that's beating VO
Art, Storylines, and Philosophy
00:17:29
Speaker
to gamer. VO, please write back in. Give us some facts about yourself because we need we need some more ammo here, I think.
00:17:38
Speaker
Right? VO to gamer is what you can do. VO to gamer is good.
00:17:46
Speaker
Alright, let's... Vio de Gamer. Vio de Gamer. Okay. ah Tentative... ah We can't be so precious with these. we because i I know. It does sound like a um French character.
00:18:03
Speaker
so ah i we'll have to we'll have to play with that. Like Vasco da Gama? The Portuguese mariner? Vasco da Gama? Yes. Yeah, yeah. What? Univindicators, Vasco da Gama. There it is.
00:18:21
Speaker
ah You know, and just so you know, you guys don't like the nicknames. You don't have to sign them with your nicknames, but... Vasco da Gama. Boy.
00:18:34
Speaker
Up next, someone who needs no nickname because he already has one. Weapon Jason sent us two emails. The first one was just providing his name, letting us know that he would like to be included in our intro. And Weapon Jason, you damn well better have said it along.
00:18:50
Speaker
You better have. You better have or you're fired. And then we did also in a separate email. We was mad if you remember we challenged his punk bona fides when he said that punks are scary. Oops. So he provides his, he says around 85, I was introduced to dead Kennedy's bad religion, Ramones, black flag, social distortion, the clash, myth, misfits, circle jerks, et cetera.
00:19:12
Speaker
By the small punk scene in my high school side note, saw bad religion at a work tour. And the mosh pit was full of folks my age. All the youngs had drifted away. So.
00:19:23
Speaker
Totally get the punks weren't as dangerous or scary as they were being portrayed in things like surf Nazis must die or class of 1984 or the Terminator, etc. Definitely by the 90s, the attitude had shifted, likely because by the late 80s, the gangster rap had overtaken punk as the what about the children music and influence.
00:19:40
Speaker
Okay, you know, weapon Jason, as the person we shouldn't have done this, right? Because as the person with the punkist nickname of all our emailers.
00:19:51
Speaker
Yeah, we should have known. it not It wasn't necessarily you being afraid of punks, and it seems like you are into some sick jams, as the punks like to call them. But instead, you were saying that the public perception. so Is class of 1984 the one where it's like the teacher, that the kids take over the school, and the teacher has to go beat them all up and kill them and stuff. And then it ends with like one of the one of the students hanging...
00:20:18
Speaker
Off like the roof. And the teacher's like let me help you up. And he reaches his hand down. And the the kid hanging off the roof. Like pulls out a switchblade. And stabs him in the hand. And then falls to his death.
00:20:33
Speaker
No Matt. think you're thinking of Lean on Me. What? That would be funny. If you've seen Lean on Me. Okay yeah. It's who it's Morgan Frieden. As the new principal. In a a tough urban high school.
00:20:48
Speaker
Okay. But he doesn't kill them all. Weapon Jason continues. Al Milgram art is workmanlike, he says. Layouts are interesting, but the line art doesn't live up to it.
00:21:02
Speaker
So it's an inking problem, not an Al Milgram problem, I think is the ah the the perspective here. And then finally, super glad that Pat enjoyed this story since while I side with Matt on the art not being quite there, the tale it tells is pretty great. That is episode 55, Kitty Pryde and Wolverine, of course, that he's referring to. Yeah, it's just um ah Al Milgram is a bad artist and that's okay.
00:21:25
Speaker
Some people are bad at things professionally. We have another nickname that we want to best that we need to bestow here today, Matt, upon David, who's written us two more emails since we about calling him Live Dave last episode.
00:21:43
Speaker
Now, the first one. is just a bunch of stuff he forgot to tell us in the first email. He's a big fan of magic, but wasn't into the origin of her story. Loves that we always stay on top of how nude everyone is. And then
00:22:02
Speaker
in his follow-up, he lets us know he's all caught up. He has finally yes gotten up to current. So while he's sad that he can't listen to... new episodes every single day.
00:22:15
Speaker
He's finally with us. He says, Hey, Pat, tell Matt to plug his ears and not listen for the first minute ish because I'm going to talk about baseball. I love the X-Men playing baseball scenes we get from time to time. as a Mets fan, I forgive you for being a Phillies fan and can definitely respect your choice in team.
00:22:33
Speaker
little Sorry, David, but I cannot return that respect to you as a Mets fan. um like i I cannot, however, give Sam Guthrie a pass on being a Yankees fan. Rubik's Cube for a little bit.
00:22:45
Speaker
Matt, I believe he said plug your ears, not talk. Sorry, I can't hear you. That's right. We're done playing ah baseball. Oh, OK. All right.
00:22:56
Speaker
I didn't get And then you Rubik's cube. you Also, you should check this out, Matt. he drew a picture of Magneto a quick he calls it a quick Google of Magneto, but he did it on his electric bill. So now he's calling him Electric Bill, Magneto's weird twin brother.
00:23:17
Speaker
Pretty good drawing. Ink Master. The Ink Master writes in saying, Hey, Pat, tell Matt that I'm honest honestly surprised the demon bear was something actually magical and not just a manifestation of Dany's powers. I really thought that was where they were going with that, especially with the stuff about Dany being the only one capable of destroying it.
00:23:35
Speaker
figured that was going to be a metaphor for needing to conquer her own fears in order to gain control over her powers, but nope. Apparently it was literal. It was literal, yeah. Well, I think we can forgive that. Like, comic books, it's always literal, right?
00:23:49
Speaker
That's kind of the thing, is that all your metaphorical struggles turn into actual demons and villains that attack you and you have to punch... It's an actual bear that is a demon. You have to eventually punch them, yeah. which It is... dis And it is... I think that's the way that the New Mutants movie goes...
00:24:10
Speaker
Two is that eventually it's her that's been creating the demon bear all this time, which also means that she murdered her parents. So I don't know if that ah makes it better, but it it would have been a little more complex for sure.
00:24:24
Speaker
Sure. ah Mikey two males lets us know that ah he hasn't written in in a few episodes, not because the pilk killed him, but because he was just very busy. he Yeah. Really enjoyed Kitty Pryde and Wolverine. He's going to actually try to track them down and read them as well as an untraditional third email. What?
00:24:49
Speaker
My three emails friend didn't X-Men cover as a tattoo for someone. He goes by sick tats nerd in Dallas. It looks like he did a cover of Wolverine hand to hand combat with some nerd.
00:25:03
Speaker
so that's headband wearing man bun nerd and so he's he's fighting omega red and i literally just read this issue for the first time last night hippie was what i meant to say matt the headband and the man bun yeah i just read i just read that i just read that issue two nights ago isn't that wild It's X-Men number five. Let's keep moving. Email Michael, also in reference to episode 55, Kitty, Pride and Wolverine, says tell Matt that in response to your discussion about if Yu-Gi-Oh was saying to enjoy falling because either you know you're not going to die, so you may as well enjoy it, Pat's stance, or that you're only going to fall to your death once, so you might as well enjoy it, Matt's stance. I'm afraid I have to lean very slightly towards Matt's position on that subject.
00:25:53
Speaker
Pat's makes more sense logically, but Matt's aligns more with the Japanese philosophy of one life, one meeting where one is encouraged to treat moments of their life as unique and valuable. That's a super short short version. You can look it up if you're interested and I'm not an educated anthropologist who's qualified to explain it. So I want Pat to be right, but in my heart, Matt's explanation makes sense too.
00:26:14
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I'm just right about that one is the thing. Yeah, I'll be honest. As soon as you said it, I was like, oh damn, that is that does make more sense. I i think, yeah, because that's i I mean, that's her whole thing. She's like, I don't give a fuck if I die. like I think you're right, though, that she knows she's not going to die there. But she's like, but that's not the the actual philosophy behind what she's saying. Yeah,
X-Men Experiences and New Discussions
00:26:35
Speaker
that's not the that's not the point. She would feel this way even if she did know she was going to die.
00:26:39
Speaker
Yeah, you're right, but it's not going to stop me from arguing with you. Yeah, that that's it. Never has before. i Let's keep, keep going. oh no, that's it.
00:26:53
Speaker
All
00:26:57
Speaker
all right, Pat, is your are your is your butthole ready now? Not yet, Matt. OK, well, then tell me, did you do anything X-Men related ah this week?
00:27:07
Speaker
I did, in fact, or I should say something X-Men related happened to me this week. Oh, God. Okay. Paid subscribers to the Patreon will know from our side podcast, Puffy Faffin, that... i I have a young cousin-in-law.
00:27:28
Speaker
Oh, this should be a recurring segment. The stuff your young cousin-in-law says. So she, over Christmas, came by and we have this little toy that's like a like a squishy jelly animal.
00:27:47
Speaker
it's okay It's a little whale that like... I don't know, just it's it's like the the size of your thumb. okay it's extremely squishy and sticky. It's like one of those things you can throw at the wall and watch it kind of tumble down. OK, she ah came over around Christmas, was playing with that, and we were tossing it up as high as it could go when we got it to stick to the ceiling.
00:28:11
Speaker
Nice. And it just stayed there. This is this is where it's X-Men related. It sticks to the ceiling, much like Nightcrawler or Toad. Can Toad do that yet?
00:28:21
Speaker
Can Toad stick to the ceiling? No, he just bounces. he I think his only power is just jumping. is jumping so far. Yeah. At some point he can stick to things like he's. And he has like at some point he's got a crazy tongue, right? Yeah, yeah.
00:28:36
Speaker
And in the movies, he phlegms people up. He wraps them up in phlegm. Oh, my God. You got me a toad action. figure Well, a Ray Park as toad action figure. Yes. That comes with a plastic like a phlegm, a plastic foldable phlegm that you can wrap around your other action figures.
00:28:57
Speaker
So picture that in the shape of a whale stuck to my ceiling for four months until it just fell off today. This morning, I came downstairs and I found it on the ground. We took a picture. We texted it to the parents of this young lady.
00:29:16
Speaker
Did you ever have a balloon that did that? Do you ever have a have a balloon? Like when you were a kid, I feel like most people when they were a kid have a balloon that's just won't. fall and it's just like in the corner of your living room for like right like a mylar balloon one of those three to five months yeah never leaks until it just finally does and it's just like god how is it still up there Yeah, my wife got me a huge inflatable Spider-Man. Like it is three feet tall and it's one of the like big bobblehead sort of shaped. So it's it's got a giant head and a little ah little body and it stands on its own. Really good.
00:30:00
Speaker
And it's still inflated. This was years ago. um just sits. We had to put it in a storage space. It's still inflated back there. Wow. Yeah. It's great gift.
00:30:11
Speaker
That's a pretty good X-Men related event. Thank you, Matt. Yeah. Did you do anything X-Men related this week? You know how X-Men go on road trips and stuff?
00:30:22
Speaker
Yeah. I'm going to go on a road trip. Whoa. You know, november Jet? No, no. On the road in the car. Oh, OK. But is still still still? they They haven't really done that yet. It's more something they do later on in the X-Men.
00:30:38
Speaker
They've been flying all over the place. Yeah, but they don't really they don't drive anywhere. I'm not. Oh, I'm not going in a jet, Pat. yeah I just said I'm not doing a jet jet thing. It's all I can picture it now. yeah You flying a blackbird down the road. states Down the road because I said road trip.
00:31:00
Speaker
Yeah, you're you're you're not flying. ah You got the landing gear out and you're just steering it down the highway. Well, you know, with everybody with their big Ford F-150s and their Hummers and stuff these days, like the only way to be safe on the road is to have an even bigger vehicle. So I drive.
00:31:21
Speaker
That's why I drive. combat jet. That's why I drive the Honda jet. It's a real jet. Would that work? Could you how fast can you go in a plane before it starts making you fly?
00:31:35
Speaker
Could you i get a jet and drive it at highway speeds down the highway? Oh, I mean, at highway speeds for sure. I think you have to go faster than that. But also, I imagine that's something to do with the wings.
00:31:50
Speaker
You don't have part of the wings like kind of have a hinge on them. That's for steering, I thought. Oh. I thought that also helped the lift. Okay. The last thing I want is for people to start writing in explaining how planes work because we get enough of that in chrisla out of Chris Claremont. We do this too much. Yeah. we're not we Clearly, we're not paying enough attention. um Look...
00:32:15
Speaker
I'm going to take a road trip. I'm going to the look. I'm going to this. I'm going to the Smoky Mountains. I'm going to Nashville. I'm going to New Orleans. I'm going to ah the Texas, the San Antonio Missions.
00:32:27
Speaker
I'm going to ah Grand Canyon, Mesa Verde and Denver. That is a lot of driving that. Yeah, it's going to be a lot of driving. And who knows? I might hate it. But, i you know, i I just I haven't seen so much of the country.
00:32:46
Speaker
And yeah, I don't know. i You know, I just downloaded things. You've got some beautiful sites on your list. And yes, we've pre-recorded a bunch of episodes of Mutant Menace so that you don't have to try to force yourself to record from the road.
00:33:04
Speaker
fucking christ that's you know that's not true actually and i'm gonna be recording from the road probably it's gonna be fun it's gonna be i hope in the era of the podcast that matt's road trip era where he's so tired but ah and hey remember that remember remember those three episodes of the podcast where matt was so tired and he didn't read any of the comics he didn't and he also didn't know what time it was ah All right, Pat. So do you want to just get into these fucking comic books and talk about yeah Cloak and Dagger and Spider-Man and the new mutants and shit?
00:33:44
Speaker
Yes, we are coming off of one of the best comic book runs I've ever read. So I am very excited to dive into whatever, whatever might follow that up.
00:33:58
Speaker
It's gotta be great. Right. All right. So, but first we're going to jump back in time a little bit. Oh yeah. Way back to imagine this. put but Take a second, close your eyes and imagine July 1983. Ooh. Yeah.
00:34:17
Speaker
Very soothing. the cover The cover date is October 1983, so think about that, too. Ooh. We're talking about Marvel Team Up Annual number six, The Hunters and the Hunted. know when open our eyes. so You should probably open your eyes. You have notes to read. Oh, okay. ah Written by Bill Mantlo.
00:34:40
Speaker
but oh Artist Ron Friends and Kevin Zuban. Letters, Rick Parker. Colors, Bob Sharon. Editor, Tom DeFalco. Chief is Jeff Stormer.
00:34:57
Speaker
Oh, no. He'll hate that. i Bob Sharon sounds like a tertiary Coen Brothers character. Sounds like one of the main character's friends.
00:35:11
Speaker
ah Oh, yeah. I just got to talk to Bob Sharon. That's a really good observation. Thank you. All right. Spider-Man swings above the warehouse district of Manhattan. Remember, Marvel team up is Spider-Man and another. Primarily Spider-Man. Yeah.
00:35:27
Speaker
He's swinging above the warehouse district of Manhattan, complaining about how he always has to save Cloak and Dagger these days. And this is true. Like i was saying earlier, their first few appearances were all in Spider-Man comics.
00:35:39
Speaker
Yeah. and And it's him. Yeah. coming in to help them because they get in over their heads right yes because they're mostly fighting drug dealers and spider-man sometimes fights drug dealers god do you remember in the spider-man video game i've i've complained about this probably on this podcast but there's like a mission that's like beat up 12 drug dealers and every single time i play that game and see that mission i'm like i don't want to fucking subscribe these guys are just trying to get by it's just some people and i have to like break their jaws
00:36:12
Speaker
A non-violent crime. So wouldn't you know it, Pat? He fights cloak and dagger. fighting some drug dealers actually they're fighting some carjackers but turns out they're child kidnappers disguised as carjackers there's a bunch of children dead in the back room a result of experiments with the same drug that gave cloak and dagger their powers oh they disappear and i assume spidey tells somebody about the they just kind of there's that gets taken care of off paddle oh
00:36:50
Speaker
They find a room of dead children. This is like page three. God, again, I've complained about this already, this Bill Mantlo stuff, but it's like yeah in the in every city, basements are full of dead children, dead children. It's like weapons out here. This is literally the theory behind Pizzagate. Exactly. my God. Exactly. It's like if there is a criminal, that criminal also kills children and doesn't care.
00:37:18
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. um Across town, Bobby, Rain, Sam and Danny are are just getting out of a Broadway showing of cats. Bobby fucking loved it. Bobby loved it. Rain has a lot of questions about their clothing and dancing, but I can't tell if she's happy or upset about the clothing and dancing. We should keep it up. Yeah. Right.
00:37:45
Speaker
Because she's like she's like she's talking about how it's definitely against her church and the way that she was raised. But she's slowly being disillusioned to that. And you can either choose to read this in a disgusted voice or in a curious voice. I think she's horned up. I think she watched Cats and it seems like God. And then it's like it's it's against my teachings. But.
00:38:12
Speaker
God, the way their body moves. Those moves, the tight leotards. Exactly. They wander over to a nearby arcade when an older kid crudely hits on rain.
00:38:25
Speaker
Roberto steps in and calls the kid a creep, so he pulls out a switchblade.
00:38:32
Speaker
ah it's such a He is such a funny looking kid. like you He looks like ah and ah a chubby faced old man with five o'clock shadow.
00:38:46
Speaker
Yeah, and they're they're trying to make it clear that like this is an older kid. We have a group of kids here. We need another group of kids that are distinctly older. So they give him jowls and a five o'clock shadow. Yeah, he looks like Jason Lee on his very worst day.
00:39:02
Speaker
The skateboarder or the... The actor. The actor skateboarder. The skate actor skateboarder. actor skateboarder. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because there's also... a There's just a... There's a lot of Jason Lees. There's a lot of... you that's ah It's an... You know...
00:39:15
Speaker
Sam clears a path through the kids' friends, and the New Mutants hightail it for the bus station. In a panic, though, they get lost, and I guess the teen gang has been tailing them because they find themselves on a rail yard overpass surrounded. Huh? So many another Bill Mays. Like there's just armies and armies of gift criminals everywhere you go.
00:39:40
Speaker
A dozen gang members on either side. They're trapped on a bridge. And because they've been running through the city and the older kids called their gang friends, it's they all it.
00:39:54
Speaker
It looks like Dark Knight Returns, the Frank Miller comic book, the way that he portrays those futuristic punks. Punks.
00:40:06
Speaker
They all look like that. ah Another thing we should mention here is that they're all the New Mutants costumes magically appear on their bodies. Yeah, they do that. They do that now. yeah They don't. They don't. They don't ever, except for in this comic where like Sunspot, and this was years ago, right? Sunspots up and then suddenly he's wearing his costume. when and Whenever somebody wears uses their powers in this issue, when they depower, they're wearing their costume.
00:40:33
Speaker
Yes. Which is not how it works. And oftentimes there are plotter there are plot points about how that's not how it works in New Mutants. Anyway, they do their best to fight their way out of the situation. But when Roberto gets stabbed and Rain gets shot in the fucking head. Shot in the fucking It's a glancing blow. Glancing blow.
00:40:54
Speaker
Head injury. it too Two New Mutants tropes in one. Glancing blow. And ah head injury for rain sustaining. yeah Head trauma. i Yeah.
00:41:09
Speaker
These are tropes. ah We can call them tropes, but they're specific to one run of comic books. That's how often this is happening.
00:41:23
Speaker
what Wasn't it was it Donald Trump who said who said the thing about like, oh, maybe cop cops should stop shooting people. Maybe they should just shoot them in the leg or something. Like a like a like a like it sounds like something he'd say arguing with a elementary school kid about politics when you're when you're 11 or something. Yeah. Yeah. um Cops should be allowed to just shoot him in the. like but So imagine if what he said was they should just do glancing blows off of everybody's head.
00:41:50
Speaker
not much gun When the police shoot innocent people, why don't they just do glancing blows off the side of their head? Why don't they just do glancing blows? They're really easy. Everybody does them all the time.
00:42:03
Speaker
And safe. Safe. So she they both of them are now unconscious under the bridge and they get taken away by two shadowy figures. By the time Danny and Sam notice they're missing, the police are on their way and they run for cover.
00:42:20
Speaker
Right into Holy Ghost Church on 42nd. Whoa. Spider-Man, meanwhile, has followed his Spidey Sense to locate Cloak and Dagger. At Holy Ghost Church on 42nd. Whoa. With a fucking lily white ah Father Francis Delgado, by the way. he is a Oh, my God. ya Yeah, yeah.
00:42:42
Speaker
He looks like um it's like Prince Charming. say he looks like Jimmy Stewart he's and he's got like and it's just like fluffy blonde brown hair and it's like this isn't what I've seen father Delgado this is not what he looks like inside the Holy Ghost Church on 42nd Cloak and Dagger are reluctantly granted sanctuary for the night by father Xavier Delgado wait Xavier Delgado yeah they give us a first name and it's ex Xavier Francis Delgado oh
00:43:18
Speaker
I have to look this up um because I know. Oh, it's his name is Francis Xavier Delgado. And it's me because this, I imagine it's because they made a mistake in this. Because they accidentally called him Xavier. Excellent. So when Cloak notices Danny and Sam because they're they're talking too loud, he teleports them, scaring Danny into projecting his greatest fear, his power raging out of control.
00:43:46
Speaker
Before they can fight though, Spider-Man enters the front door and asks, what's going on around here? They, this is ridiculous. They.
00:43:57
Speaker
I don't see how. Danny and Sam turn to each other and they're like, is that Spider-Man? I didn't think he was real. That's cool, though. You didn't think Spider-Man was real? i love that.
00:44:10
Speaker
I love that, Patrick. Pick would pick any other hero and you can insert into that lore. Spider-Man is famously real. He's a menace. Yeah. I love the fact that some people hear about superheroes and they're like, those aren't real.
00:44:26
Speaker
That one's not. That couldn't be. Yeah. There's not a Spider-Man. Come on. What, did he shoot webs out of his butt? Yeah.
00:44:38
Speaker
And what do they smell like? So same explains about yeah Sam explains his missing friends in Cloak, Dagger, and Spider-Man all assume it's the same gang that's been experimenting on folks. They're looking for powerful children, more resistant than average to the drug's effects since it kills most children.
00:44:56
Speaker
Cloak and Dagger just disappear again, but Spidey, Sam, and Danny rush off to find Bobby and Rain. Oh boy. We find Bobby and Rain in a meatpacking plant strapped to a butcher's block while an evil doctor explains that he's injecting them with the Cloak and Dagger drug as a bunch of pharmaceutical henchmen stand nearby. These are reps of a pharmaceutical company, but also very much generic mobsters. Oh my God. Yeah. And this scientist, this scientist looks like every mad scientist. He looks like, um, Kane from the DC's house of secrets. He looks like Jeremiah Arkham.
00:45:37
Speaker
Oh yeah. Yeah. He just, he just got, uh, he's got Albert Einstein hair, but like all curved upwards. Yes. and little face His face kind of comes to like a, like he's got this like narrow face and he's got half glasses on.
00:45:50
Speaker
Classic mad scientist. well Yeah, exactly. Rain bites a man and Bobby tries to power up, but neither of them are able to escape before they're injected with the drug. at that moment, Sam, Danny, Spidey, Cloak, and Dagger all burst through the wall and beat the shit out of everyone. How did they find them?
00:46:07
Speaker
How? How? How did they fucking find them? They skip over that part of the story. They just burst into this meatpacking plant. We can we can assume...
00:46:19
Speaker
since this is Bill Mantlo's understanding of Spider-Man's Spidey sense, that he used to that to I guess, warehouse to warehouse, sensing which ones had dangerous. Is this one dangerous? No. Is this one dangerous? No.
00:46:37
Speaker
Yes, but for a different reason. Rain and Bobby, however, have gone mad. Rain stands in a hulking werewolf form, towering over everyone and light crackling out of her eyes, while Bobby takes his sunspot form, baring fangs in an evil shape.
00:46:54
Speaker
Rain bites Dagger, which causes her to go mad with power while Rain returns to normal. Oh, okay, cool. While Cloak has to absorb Bobby to evade his attack. He spits Bobby back out, also seemingly back to normal. But Cloak has gone nuts now.
00:47:09
Speaker
That's how this works? Crazy Cloak and Crazy Dagger engage with each other, but they're not killing each other. They're saving each other. Problem solved. Spider-Man offers Cloak and Dagger a place in the New Mutants, and the New Mutants agree, but they decline and disappear again.
00:47:24
Speaker
Okay. Cool. At some point, Danny pulls one of the criminals' greatest fears out of their heads, and it's literally just the thing. spidered Like, Spider-Man says in a panel, you're about to be dead meat.
00:47:36
Speaker
And then Danny pulls their greatest fear out of their heads, which is being dead being meat. on Him as dead meat. Yeah. In this kind of packing plant. I was never afraid of anything, and now suddenly my greatest fear...
00:47:51
Speaker
Thanks a lot, Spider-Man. I'm going to have nightmares.
00:47:58
Speaker
There's this whole, thes the whole ah ending here from the point that they bust into the wall yeah ah to the end of the comic doesn't make any sense. Like there's no reason for them to have been here.
00:48:09
Speaker
Crazy Cloak and Crazy Dagger go at each other. And we learn that they're not actually fighting. They are saving each other. Spider-Man, Danny, and Sam don't know that. that they They stand back. They're like, ooh, let's let them in figure this out.
00:48:28
Speaker
It really underlines how how sexual... The cloak and dagger thing really is right because it is dagger and cloak embrace and dagger gives all her light while cloak absorbs all her light. Right. And yeah they both they're both like they're embracing each other and both of their heads are flung back like they're mid orgasm.
00:48:53
Speaker
It looks like they're fucking and it's covered by the clock. Yeah, it's not subtle. Yes. And then they collapse on the ground holding each other um and like with their foreheads touching. It's it's very.
00:49:05
Speaker
Yeah. I love the last panel. The very end of this comic is ah Spider-Man just standing, looking a little dejected and going,
00:49:17
Speaker
Yeah. yeah
00:49:21
Speaker
bang tell yeah ending issue That's how you end an issue. That's a comic book. they that Now that's a comic book.
00:49:30
Speaker
ah So that was a that was a trip back in time. Since then, we've seen them stare at that Holy Ghost Church on 42nd. Yeah, that was literally two years before the next issue that we're going to read.
00:49:44
Speaker
Oh, my God. That's not true. That was literally one year before. yeah like
00:49:54
Speaker
All right. So flash forward a year and we arrive at new mutants. Number 22, the shadow within. What could I, I don't know what this could be about, but okay.
00:50:08
Speaker
Uh, Stan Lee presents a Claremont Sienkiewicz production. i assume that's writing and artisting respectively. Glynis Ween, colorist, Tom Orszakowski, letterer, and no centi editor and little Jimmy Jumper, editor in chief. Release date, August 1984. Cover date December,
00:50:31
Speaker
We start in the danger room as some of the X-Men train the new mutants in how to better use their powers. Nightcrawler, a circus orphan through and through, tries to teach Cannonball a new trick, cutting his blast in midair, somersaulting 180 degrees, and then kicking his blast back on in the opposite direction.
00:50:50
Speaker
Fucking cool. Fucking cool sequence. This fucking rules. Yeah, yeah. Nightcrawler just being like, okay, just watch this. And then we get to see him, well illustrated by Bill Sienkiewicz, do a bunch of yeah fancy acrobat moves across the danger room. It starts with just him, like, spitting in his hands and, like, preparing to do, yeah, it, fucking Kurt Rupert, this rules.
00:51:15
Speaker
This fucking rules. This fucks. Sam, however, lacks the confidence and the skill and fucks it up. Yeah, he's not good at this. And i like this.
00:51:26
Speaker
I like Cannonball being like. He's like always talking about it, and it's true that he's falling behind all the other kids. he's He's always falling behind all the other kids.
00:51:37
Speaker
Yeah, he's there all yeah getting better and better, and he's not. Yeah, yeah. Poor guy. Boy, gay. He's still very brave and pure. That's his thing.
00:51:48
Speaker
Oh, we love him. We love him deeply. Yes. Yeah, yeah. And he's a great leader is the other thing about him. he's That is just natural to him. He is, but he's a great secondary leader on the team. That's true. He's a great he's also a great follower. He's like a great tactician. He's like a great, like, he wouldn't be a great general, but he'd be a great what's right below a general. i Colonel. Okay.
00:52:15
Speaker
Rain Sinclair watches from the ground when all of a sudden the scene shifts. She's wearing a silly clown outfit and another clown approaches her asking her to dance. ah She's happy and having fun until Kurt flips off the danger room's illusion, revealing that it's him she's dancing with.
00:52:32
Speaker
Rain freaks out. She thought it was Sam. And she still thinks Kurt is some kind of evil demon. She runs off crying. she's Why is she still racist? How could you?
00:52:45
Speaker
It's okay. It is racist. It is her literally seeing his skin color and saying so. But at the same time, this is so goofy. He is...
00:52:56
Speaker
How could you think he's a demon at this point? You turn yourself into a wolf. and And she watches him save. Yeah. So this is the thing. She's like, if this isn't, if he's not a demon, then everything I've been taught is wrong. First of all, there's a thing in the Bible that, well, yeah, first of all, yes. But Second of all, there's a thing in the Bible that says if it looks like a demon, it's definitely a demon or this whole book is wrong. Third of all, if that's true, if it's just things are what they look like, Rain, are you a fucking dog? You're a dog sometimes.
00:53:31
Speaker
do you think Do you think, oh, if I'm not actually a dog, then everything I've ever believed is wrong. She is a dog sometimes. Yeah, she's a dog sometimes. I mean that like it makes sense.
00:53:47
Speaker
The way that a dog would look at the situation, right? I've seen something that looks like this before and it's evil. So I'm seeing it again and I'm going to bark at it. rather than her not not Rather than it being a contradiction, her not realizing that just because she is a werewolf, she's not actually a fucking dog. You're saying she is a fucking dog. So some so she has the brain of a dog.
00:54:08
Speaker
Sometimes. Yeah, her canine instincts are kicking in here. They're overwhelming her common sense. She just can't stop barking at Nightcrawler. That's right. And she wants to love him, right? Like she'll walk up to him and she'll be like when he's like, come on, let me pet you. And she'll walk up. She wants to get petted so bad, but she can't help it. When his hand gets close, she jumps back and starts barking again. Yeah, yeah, exactly. She's an adopted dog.
00:54:33
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah. She's a she's a rescue. right yeah clare Man, wow. Wow. In every way, Raines and Claire is a rescue dog. All right. What a great grounding perspective for us moving forward.
00:54:50
Speaker
No more being the rain sinclair on the ground. Colossus prepares to spar with Sunspot using training staffs. But when he whaps a distracted Roberto, Sunspot loses his temper and attacks with his bare hands.
00:55:06
Speaker
so Unexpectedly, Colossus howls out in pain as Bobby for just a moment thinks he sees his own hands turn into giant claws. Though it must just be a hallucination because they're instantly back to normal.
00:55:21
Speaker
That's a fucking fucked up hallucination, man. Seeking solace from her clown dance, Rain runs to the lab where Moira McTaggart and Charles x Xavier are examining the strange creature that is Warlock. Moira McTaggart is back. Moira!
00:55:37
Speaker
when she's turned This is different than she's ever looked before, though. ah Sienkiewicz draws her a lot prettier, but in a very different... Maybe not prettier, just it a more... She looks just like a standard movie star beautiful, where everybody else that's drawn her has drawn her like a... I hate to say it this way, but like girl next door beautiful.
00:55:59
Speaker
Sure, yeah, yeah. She's also given red hair here, which... worried me for a second yeah about the idea that they were trying to imply yeah a relation between moira and rain because they both have red hair but luckily they didn't go down that path i think she's always had red hair just like red brown hair ah yeah i mean this is like this is more stunning red like yeah yeah right yeah yeah but rain when she's turned away
00:56:32
Speaker
runs to Danny, who is busy talking with her parents on the phone. She runs off again. Cut to a fashionable jewelry store on Park Avenue, Manhattan.
00:56:42
Speaker
Friedrich von Röhm, the owner. Friedrich von Röhm is here, Pat. Friedrich von Röhm is here. He's interrupted by the lady Selene.
00:56:54
Speaker
ah hu As her high priest, he is shocked to see her returned after 2000 years. What? Yeah. So how old is. And has the ideal solution to bring her closer to power.
00:57:07
Speaker
The Hellfire Club. a Hellfire Club, we find out that is currently readying itself for Emmanuel DaCosta's initiation. oh remember that guy?
00:57:18
Speaker
Now, keen listeners. We'll remember that in episode 55. Okay. We also saw Selene. Oh. Auditioning to be queen or black queen of the Hellfire Club. Right. So this is pre that. This is. Yes. This. That takes place immediately after this issue. I think. The same month or the month after. Yeah.
00:57:41
Speaker
Anyway, back at the mansion, Rain engages in some creative writing. She writes a fairy tale about an enchanted princess named Alistrea who is friends with a bunch of cute animals.
00:57:52
Speaker
One day, a wounded prince, Prince Duncan, appears on her doorstep. He tells her he was attacked by a silver sorceress and is now possessed by a shadow that has claimed his soul and will eat up the entire world.
00:58:06
Speaker
Princess Alestria transforms into a wolf and makes her way to the dreaded city where where a talking taxi tells her where to go. Okay. what what What part of the metaphor is that, by the way? So this is her being afraid of taxi cabs. Oh, okay. So the metaphor is very thin here, but... So she barks the cars. Do you know the... ya I'm going to reference the movie elf here when buddy, the elf arrives in New York and he keeps getting hit by yellow taxi cabs. Oh, right. point He's like, look out for the yellow ones or whatever. I'm butchering the quote, which anyway, that's what's happening here. This is rain was raised in the country. She came to New York.
00:58:49
Speaker
the most aggressive and possibly life threatening vehicle as a pedestrian is a New York taxi cab. They are right.
00:59:03
Speaker
Not concerned about you. So I think this was just a joke about her, like arriving in the big city and learning that taxi cab drivers don't care about you.
00:59:13
Speaker
Yeah, but it does. He does give her the direction she needs. That's true. Yeah. um Because you can if you get in the taxi cab, they're very you there's you're a you're a patron now.
00:59:26
Speaker
OK. All right. I'm all right. I follow the whole metaphor and it all makes sense. i shouldn't have made fun of it in the park. Still still within the ah the creative writing exercise here in the park.
00:59:40
Speaker
She finds the beautiful silver sorceress dancing, her radiant gold medallion swaying as she moves. Beside her stands a giant armored knight covered in black armor with a blue cloak over her shoulders.
00:59:54
Speaker
these These are pretty cool renderings here. Yeah. She attacks them, knocking over the Black Baron and cornering the Silver Sorceress. She appears ready to kill the woman who begs for mercy when we pull back and see Rain sleeping.
01:00:08
Speaker
That golden medallion draped from her hand. Whoa. To be continued. What the fuck?
01:00:19
Speaker
What was the end of the story here? Yeah. I mean, i guess there's has always been a thing with Rain Sinclair where she likes to see herself as a princess. Right. um Sure. And she will see you. She tries to think of the world in these fairy tale forms, but we've never seen her sit down and write a fairy tale like this. is We never had to read one of the fairy tales she read for four pages. She needs to keep practicing.
01:00:46
Speaker
This is not an interesting story. The plot is a guy got hurt. I went and found the guy who hurt him and i killed them. Yes.
01:00:58
Speaker
There's an invulnerable by ball blasting. Number 11. Number 11. If we're keeping count, ah cannonball is shirtless, which will be important. soon like just for absolutely no reason he's just always walking around shirtless and now it feels like we should count cannibal shirtless moments because he's always fucking shirtless he is i will say there's a there's a lot of uh nudity in this one and pretty gratuitous it's it's really there's they're not even given a story reason to be yeah it's just high it's it's just yeah everybody's but yeah
01:01:32
Speaker
Bill Sienkiewicz is showing off his anatomy skills. He is like, he is drawing muscle groupings. He's identifying what each character's body would look like based on their activity. Like it's not just generic muscly man or hot woman ah naked over and over again. It is people with distinct bodies and like a very intense study on how muscles work.
01:01:58
Speaker
Yeah, that's true. That's true. it's pretty cool Good job, Bill Sienkiewicz. You've done another good issue. The other thing I can't move past, i Roberto's dad, Emmanuel, getting inducted into the Hellfire Club, the inner circle, and being like, do I fucking have to wear this outfit? This is ridiculous. And Sebastian Shaw being like, yes, yes.
01:02:26
Speaker
yeah yeah i it's i'm just glad somebody acknowledged it somebody was like do we have to do this why this is strange right with i'll also point out something weird here there are like character profiles at the end of this issue oh yeah yeah that was strange danny moonstar is not called psyche Is she called? Wait, don't tell me because I i skipped those parts. But is she called Mirage?
01:02:55
Speaker
It's called Mirage here. good Okay, because there is a point in the future where mid battle someone shouts Mirage over there. And i i it took me a little while to figure out they were trying, they were naming a person and not referring to a Mirage that appeared on the battle. I don't it doesn't have like ah here's another thing. There's we no acknowledgement. When you go to the Marvel Marvel dot com.
01:03:21
Speaker
Yeah. About Danny Moonstar. It says that she changed her name back in like issue 20 issue 19. issue nineteen And when you go to the Mirage. Yeah. Which she didn't.
01:03:32
Speaker
Because the thing is, here's the thing. Here's the thing that made me so mad about it. When I went to like, I was trying to find this. Like, when did she become Mirage? And I was, I was, I was looking and I looked at the Marvel website and it said, she, uh, she's changing her name to Mirage in issue 19. She was unconscious for all of issue 19. She did not. Yeah. Great point.
01:03:56
Speaker
Yeah. ah then the Marvel or the, yeah, the Marvel wiki, like the Marvel fan wiki ah says she changed it in 22, which I guess is technically true.
01:04:09
Speaker
Because Bill Sienkiewicz changed it. It's packed into the back of the issue. Yeah, it's but nope it never happens in the text.
01:04:19
Speaker
But anyway, Pat, do you want me to tell you about Mew Newtons number 23? Mew Newtons? Big Newtons number 23? Exactly. yeah It's called Shadow Man.
01:04:32
Speaker
Whoa. All one word. Chris Claremont, writer and Bill Sienkiewicz, artist. Shadow Man. Bill Shadow Man. Tom Orszakowski is the letterer. Glynnis Ween is the colorist. Innocenti is the editor. and Jack the Ripper is editor-in-chief. Release date. Jesus Christ. September 20. I don't know why they let him in ah Release date September 25th 1984 Cover date January Orwellian i you that how orwellian
01:05:04
Speaker
Emmanuel DaCosta stands before the Hellfire Club's inner circle, as does Selene, as they complete their initiations. Sebastian Shaw worries about Selene's plays for power, but is delighted by Emmanuel's induction and tells him he hopes Roberto will join him in the near future.
01:05:22
Speaker
you This actually, i think they're retroactively trying to clarify some of Emmanuel's goals here because this is what he's like. Yeah, robert I plan on bringing my son Roberto in very soon. I'm doing this for my son.
01:05:39
Speaker
Yeah, rather than I'm trying to kill my son. Just down the street from the Xavier Mansion, Peter Rasputin plays chess and exchanges banter with the local saloon owner, Harry Morrell.
01:05:53
Speaker
Harry Morales is my immediate favorite guy. There's a there's a saloon, an old, like, greasy spoon diner-style saloon right down the street from the mansion that the X-Men hang out with. And there's a big, plump old man that's been running it for years. and He likes to play chess with the X-Men, and he keeps all their secrets. Yeah. Yeah, he looks like one of the background characters in Beauty and the Beast. He's just like this. Yeah, yeah. Or like somebody you would see at the bar in Cheers.
01:06:24
Speaker
He's got big Paul F. Tompkins mustache and he's got suspenders and he's just like, he's super top heavy. He's great. Coolest guy. New favorite character. Do you think he was supposed to be a subplot that they never, that just never got around to?
01:06:40
Speaker
does Do they not come back to this? Oh, no, no. so No, is that this is Harry Morell's only appearance? No, no, he comes back. Like, Harry Morell is now, like, a part of Marvel canon, like, a very background-y thing. But they say here, in his they're, like, describing him, and they say, he showed up 12 years ago, and nobody knows where he came from. And then oh at some point he speaks to Colossus in Russian and Colossus and Peter says, why do I have a feeling, Harry, that you speak my native language better than I? And he gives him like a blow off answer. He's just like, yeah, yeah. um Cheeky about it.
01:07:19
Speaker
Yeah. He's just like, ah, you even plan for so long. I must have just picked it up. Yeah. And then he says lead to change the subject. He says, let me teach you some curse words in Yiddish. ah Do you think Harry Morell was supposed to be like secretly something?
01:07:36
Speaker
Like, oh he's the shadow king or something. I think they do this with Marvel movies now, too. I think that Chris Claremont is just spreading seeds everywhere oh waiting to see yeah what grows. Like this is, hey if he needs some weird subplot. Yeah. uh you can always run for a year and then eventually develop into a story he can always pull that harry right here that harry morale thread yeah so they're interrupted by one of harry's employees molly asking for peter specifically to come help deal with a surly patron roberto da costa has been sitting for hours not eating or drinking or even talking and refuses to leave
01:08:21
Speaker
Peter tries to escort him out, but Bobby turns around and punches him, turns to sunspot form and dives in for a second attack. Stop hitting Colossus, Bobby. Yeah, dude.
01:08:34
Speaker
Two issues in a row. So ah Peter steals up just in time, but the impact sends him flying into Harry and Molly, knocking them both unconscious. Suddenly, Bobby starts to change. His sunspot form starts spreading out of him, creating a wave of darkness around him as he rants about being better than everyone.
01:08:54
Speaker
Well, that last part isn't abnormal. That's pretty. Yeah, that's Peter calls out psychically to the professor, but it's cut off before he can communicate the situation. The X-Men being out, x Xavier summons a sleeping saint Danny and Sam, sending them onto the scene. Now... Yeah?
01:09:13
Speaker
He wakes them up. Mm-hmm. Which makes sense. it's It's sort of late at night, but... they make a point of showing us Danny getting dressed when Sam walks in to get her and her having like her shirt half off and Sam going like, Oh, I'm sorry, ma'am. Like I didn't mean to, the they show the side of her breasts here. There's, there's, she's a child for this whole thing to happen. There's no end. Like granted, listen, the thing
01:09:47
Speaker
that we always have to accept is they're selling this to teenagers, right? So right of the of course they need to consider the fact that their audience is very appropriately gonna see a 16 year old as a sexual being. right And that's also why they're throwing this in because 16 year olds are going to buy the shit out of this to see the side of Danny Moonstar's boob. but They create a scene just to do this, to show her mostly undressed, like what in the process of taking her pajama shirt off.
01:10:22
Speaker
Also, here's something I never noticed before. Yeah. If you look at that panel, she is the her bottom half is draped in shadow. She's pantsless, too.
01:10:35
Speaker
Oh, I hadn't noticed that. Me neither until just now. guess you're looking a little closer at that illustration than I am. I just happened to notice. i was like, wait, those aren't pants. Holy shit.
01:10:46
Speaker
I mean, this is Chris Claremont, right? And a non-white woman is asleep. So she's nude. Oh, right. non-white women sleep nude, according to Chris Claremont. Yeah, yeah.
01:10:59
Speaker
So back at Harry's, Peter does his best to restrain Bobby, not wanting to hurt him. But he's overpowered by the shadow who runs in ah because the shadow is evil in men's hearts. No, he's over overpowered by the shadow spreading out from Bobby's body, almost completely engulfed. Peter uses his last burst of strength to punch Bobby off of him through the wall.
01:11:23
Speaker
This is where Sam and Danny find him, but from the impact, Bobby is unconscious and back to his regular human form. They start looking around for what could have possibly caused this.
01:11:35
Speaker
There's... there's They say, there's Bobby. He's just flying through the air. that they must That must be all the time, right?
01:11:45
Speaker
It's like, oh, we got to go look for Bobby. And then Bobby goes. There he is. He's flying through the air. Oh, somebody punched Bobby again. Yeah.
01:11:57
Speaker
Also, there's a ah fortunately, whenever he's blasting, both Sam and anyone he carries are protected by an impenetrable and energy field. Does that count as number 12? No, because it's the narrator that says it, not Sam himself. So okay cool call we'll we'll we'll give him a pass.
01:12:13
Speaker
Cut, Pat, to the Bermuda Triangle. Whoa. Big shift. Where Lee Forrester is taking Magneto back to her home.
01:12:24
Speaker
That giant... Lovecraftian island that Magneto raised years ago. She's been living there? Yeah, and she's trying to figure out the origins of the island.
01:12:38
Speaker
Don't you have a home? i I guess I saw her father's home destroyed, but like, yeah what were you doing before you found this island? Why would she figure?
01:12:49
Speaker
And how is she researching this? How did she go shopping? ah ah As far as she can tell, these people that lived here, they weren't human. Magneto agrees and attempts to use his power to show her what he's discovered.
01:13:05
Speaker
But still, but he's still too injured from his fall from space and the subsequent shark attack. Yeah, that's fair. Bad week for Magneto. ah My house got blown up and then I fell all the way from space to earth and then a shark got me.
01:13:24
Speaker
Lee tries to help him, but Magneto strikes her. He doesn't need help from a human. If we don't keep that in mind, like ah the first time I read this, I was like, this is unforgivable. He just randomly strikes this woman.
01:13:40
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. But now that we're talking about it, he did just fall from space and get eaten by a shark. He's under a lot of stress. Yeah. like i Like if look, there is no time where it is acceptable to just randomly strike another person, especially if you are a big, muscular adult man and you're striking a young woman. Right. Right. Absolutely not ah acceptable.
01:14:07
Speaker
But if there were, if somebody were to come up with the only situation where it was acceptable, and you fell from space and they got eaten by a shark.
01:14:18
Speaker
And discovered this woman living in your home. Yeah, exactly. So back at the mansion, Xavier and Moira look over Peter and Bobby's unconscious, nude, sexy bodies. Both are in a coma, despite not seeming to have anything physically wrong with them.
01:14:36
Speaker
As Danny and Sam wait for news outside, the phone rings. Rain's in trouble! She's not here! They take off immediately, not even notifying the professor. Why? How do we feel about Sam constantly calling Danny chief?
01:14:51
Speaker
Okay, I have thought about this. Because, i would like, chief isn't... He doesn't call other people chief. A word that is...
01:15:04
Speaker
but necessarily Native American, right? It is a word that was applied to them because there was... Because they they didn't... When they first discovered indigenous people here, they didn't want to give them, like, actual military order or anything like that. They labeled them, right like, chief, the guy in charge, which is Right. And so And think da there's Danny is in charge.
01:15:35
Speaker
There are a lot of valid uses for it. But as you said, Sam does not call any anyone else chief. and Yes. And I think so. There's something and the and the Danny naked scene also has some of this, too.
01:15:52
Speaker
There is a very cute dynamic developing between Sam and Danny. They clearly have this ah deep, deep respect for each other. They tease each other. They're they're they're close becoming closer and closer as friends. Yeah, they're like a little flirty without without getting too heavy about it. Right. Like they they don't really like they're not going to date, but they both think each other are cute. And like they know that each other are cute, kind of that kind of thing. Like it's almost like a brother. It's almost like a in all ways. But the flirting, it's almost like a brother sister dynamic.
01:16:26
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They have a lot of like it's professional respect. It's like ah almost like a work wife. Yes, and they're really like they're clearly becoming really, really close. So Danny does not mind when Sam calls her chief. um She makes fun of him for seeing her naked. Right. Like she's not mad. She's just like she's just like making him blush more about it. She's like, yeah, yeah.
01:16:49
Speaker
Next time you'd better not knock. But you're awful cute when you blush. You're awful cute, period. Right. like yeah yeah They're just goofing with each other. so But there is something weird about a British American man writing a a British American white man writing a white Kentucky boy calling ah the only Native American character in like all of comics chief.
01:17:11
Speaker
yeah Anyway, they arrive at a swanky hotel in the middle of the day and Danny uses a new trick to disguise her and Sam as rich adults.
01:17:22
Speaker
She can not only just like pull people's ultimate ah fear and ultimate desire, she can also pull their ultimate customer. this is I think this is an evolution of her power yeah being able to manifest like more specific ideals on either side of the spectrum. But hundred it is funny that are that the first use we see is her being like, I'll be a perfect customer.
01:17:48
Speaker
yeah I can pull out three ultimates. Fear, desire, customer. As well as she picks up the memory of a beautiful, bright red haired woman checking in the evening before. The woman and the hotel both seem strangely familiar to Danny, but you can't pinpoint why.
01:18:06
Speaker
Worth noting that the, you probably should have noted this, Matt, that the beautiful woman looks just like the princess from Rain's story last issue. Oh, you're right. She does. Except in modern clothing.
01:18:20
Speaker
she's wearing like april o'neill clothing a white belt and a yellow yellow shirt and pants maybe this is where they got that she can't pinpoint why until she get to gets until they get to the room that this beautiful woman checked into as rain answers the door in tears talking about how afraid and alone she's been like um uh home alone too she's in a hotel alone Oh, yeah, yeah. donald I was trying to think of the emotional moment where it's just... Shut up, Trump is there, and ah ah ah Tim Curry is trying to spy on her in the shower.
01:18:54
Speaker
Donald Trump is there and still in generally good favor with people. Do you remember that there's a fucking scene in Home Alone where Tim Curry is trying to catch...
01:19:07
Speaker
Kevin McAllister.
Kevin McAllister Suspicion and Psychic Links
01:19:09
Speaker
Yeah. He's like suspicious that, that Kevin McAllister is there alone. So he sneaks into the room and he notices that the shower's running and he's like, this time I got him and sneaks up to the bathroom. And this is a little boy. And he knows that he's yeah yeah like trying to prove it's a little boy. And he goes up to the bathroom door and he flings it open and he goes, ah, because he thinks what he's going to do is catch a nude boy.
01:19:38
Speaker
Should had Donald Trump do that part? but Oh, God. and would None of us questioned that scene. Okay, so. Danny dreamt she was this woman last night checking into this hotel, only it wasn't a dream. It was her psychic link to Rain. Rain must have some new aspect of her power that allows her to transform into this beautiful woman.
01:20:01
Speaker
They bring her back to the mansion and tuck her in and then set off to find the two they're sure were responsible for this. Tom and Sharon. No, a cloak and dagger.
01:20:12
Speaker
But they find them powerless in a hospital. Danny and Sam beg for them to come back to the mansion and let x Xavier study them. But they worry it would mean their cloak and dagger powers, which they considered a curse, would return Meanwhile, as Moira and Charlie Love take a short break.
01:20:29
Speaker
That's what she calls him. Charlie Love. Charlie Love. ah the shadow Yeah. Sorry. Just before you get into the action here, they're talking about Tom Corsi and Sharon Friedlander's ultimate fates. the The cop and the nurse that the white cop and white nurse that got turned into Native American people. Which, again, over the course of the demon bear so you can't get turned into a Native American person. They just have darker skin and hair than they used to. That is fucking all.
01:20:59
Speaker
It's also very inappropriate. Don't don't do that. Don't do that. Don't do this, Scott. Listeners, don't do this. The shadow begins ah to spread out of Bobby's unconscious body. it It envelops Peter on the table next to him, then moves on to Xavier. In response, Xavier fires off a psychic bolt, but finds it reflected back at him with amplified power, knocking him to the ground. Moira is next.
01:21:26
Speaker
To be continued. No. Sorry. i don't have the resolution for you here.
Magneto's Storyline and Continuity Issues
01:21:32
Speaker
Moira's going to die, I guess. Really interesting to have the Magneto story...
01:21:41
Speaker
jump from like two panels in new mutants to two or three pages in the X-Men and then back to four to five pages in new mutants. Is that true? It was in the X-Men. It was because we haven't really found him being eaten by a shark.
01:21:59
Speaker
You're right. I'm going to, I was remembering this all as in New Mutants. And I was like, okay, it makes sense because there is a bridge from, like Magneto will soon be important to the New Mutants in a particular way. And Warlock was the one who knocked him down. But you're absolutely right. It happened in X-Men too.
01:22:19
Speaker
Yeah. Now, there is another detail that you missed in your recap here, Matt. Oh, sorry. Probably because you didn't actually understand it until I just read through the recap from the last issue. Okay. But Rain, in her fantasy story, talks about ah being a woman that – being this beautiful red-haired woman –
01:22:47
Speaker
uh goes out turns into a dog attacks a knight in black and a woman in white and then then sam and danny read in the newspaper that cloak that tandy bowen and tyrone johnson had been attacked right and it turns so and they claim that they were attacked by a wolf and then They also, i'm not this woman in her story finds a gold medallion. They also find rain clutching that gold medallion in real life. And it turns out it was daggers necklace.
01:23:27
Speaker
Yes. The gold medallion is daggers necklace. So it seems like you might've missed that. Uh, But hope that my explanation issue 22 helped you come to bit more of an understanding.
Debate on Story Purpose and Comic Style
01:23:43
Speaker
If you had been the one to recap issue 22, would have included those details. And so. no, no. Oh, if you been the one to got the logic all wrong here. If you would have recapped 23, you know, I'm just getting confused. I guess I'm just much stupider than I ever thought. This story has a purpose is despite any questions I had after I read issue 22.
01:24:06
Speaker
Yes. This story very much had a purpose. So if I make it into your recap, of if I in my future recap. Had included those details, you would have never been riffing on why the hell did we just read that?
01:24:23
Speaker
After the last issue. right yeah if you had realized that i wouldn't have met later
01:24:35
Speaker
all right matt should we move on to new mutants number 24 the hollow heart absolutely we should we're getting away from the shadow stuff moving into heart stuff By Chris Claremont, writer, Bill Sienkiewicz, artist, Glynis Ween, colorist, Orzakowski, and Buchalis, letterers. You can see the lettering changes. You can see that clearly they had to have somebody come in and rewrite a few panels and Orzakowski wasn't available. And the lettering style just like what suddenly there are serifs on the eyes.
01:25:12
Speaker
Well, this is also... A so this is also one of these situations where so there's so much dialogue. That it's it would it yeah it be possible to pack it all in Yeah.
01:25:28
Speaker
I end the center editor and the little Timmy toothpaste editor in chief release date October 1984 cover date February Matt we creep ever closer to what pat a Sunspot has entirely lost his form, a black swirling mass screaming about in an endless hunger inside him to Moira McTaggart as she kneels over Xavier's unconscious body. This is.
01:25:58
Speaker
there are not nearly as many opportunities for Bill Sinkovich to go nuts here. i He gets a little freedom in these. Yeah. Shadow expanding from Roberto. It's really cool. Yeah, it's pretty good.
01:26:14
Speaker
I x Xavier warns Moira to run, even as the black void of his body begins to wrap around her when suddenly rain Sinclair enters the room. She's transformed into the tall, beautiful, redheaded lady again. And the light radiating from her body calms Roberto.
01:26:32
Speaker
His body reforms and the two cling to each other on the ground. When Sam and Danny come in the room, they panic and disappear in a puff of smoke. That sounds familiar.
01:26:43
Speaker
Sam is shirtless know for no reason. He just runs in without a shirt on. He had a shirt the last time we saw him.
Cloak and Dagger's Origins Revealed
01:26:53
Speaker
And shes he's even he's like he wasn't woken up out of his sleep. He's got his uniform on but no shirt. Yeah.
01:27:02
Speaker
Professor x Xavier pulls the origins of Cloak and Dagger and the events of Marvel Team Up Annual number six from Sam's head, plus the story he just read in the newspaper. On the streets of New York, Tyrone and Tandy are fleeing the hospital into the subway.
01:27:18
Speaker
Tandy is worried for her friends in the New Mutants, while Tyrone, afraid of losing her, insists that they have to run and hide. They take refuge in a bus terminal, and Tyrone, his stutter back in full effect, begins to realize that their lack of powers may threaten to tear them apart.
01:27:36
Speaker
A pimp interrupts their conversation trying to recruit Tandy, but Tyrone chases him off and they mourn his next victims, powerless to help. Now, we don't know that this man is a pimp. we but How do we not know this?
01:27:53
Speaker
Because he's just he's just offering, he's like, hey, you guys look hungry. Do you need some food? He's not even focusing on her specifically. He's like, hey, you can come along. There's room for everybody. i don't like people in my neighborhood going hungry.
01:28:08
Speaker
And then he says, ah and then in the next issue, he's telling a guy to wear crotchless, ashless chaps if he wants them to If he wants to look cool for his lady. if he wants If he wants food and shelter, he has to earn his keep by wearing crotchless and assless chaps.
01:28:29
Speaker
No, Matt, he is telling them that if they want to be stylish, if they're going to be seen with him, they need to be stylish. If they're going to be stylish, here's what they should wear.
01:28:42
Speaker
hmm. Mm hmm. We'll get to it. We'll get to that. We'll get to it. This guy is definitely 100 percent a pimp and he's trying to. work it But yes. Also, Tyrone says muties. Tyrone!
01:28:53
Speaker
Yeah, he calls the new mutants muties. Come on, man. He's like, these muties. and he And he gets more racist than that. He's like, these muties, they're no better than the mob. They won't take no for an answer. They'll keep coming after us.
01:29:06
Speaker
Yeah, it's, it's he's miseducated on this topic, it seems. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you're right. In the Bermuda Triangle, Magneto approaches lee Forrester to apologize for hitting her.
01:29:21
Speaker
She had been musing about the... Oh, it's all okay. Yeah, he apologized. She had been musing about the origins of this weird island, and now she's struck by how Magneto is changing, acting more decent and humble.
01:29:34
Speaker
In St. Anne's church, Father Michael Bowen, remember him? Remember him? Is tidying up the church with Long and Nyaman when suddenly Roberto and Rain in pretty lady form appear begging for help.
01:29:48
Speaker
Just Rain is in pretty la lady form, not Roberto. Yeah, they're not both. and But also, had you wondered what happened to Leong and Nyaman? Kind of. Yeah, these are Shan's niece and nephew, right?
01:30:02
Speaker
Or brother and sister. It's hard to remember. We don't. Yeah. But yes, yes.
Sunspot's Struggle and Magic's Intervention
01:30:06
Speaker
ah Roberto is sure that he's becoming a demon and sure that he killed Peter Rasputin.
01:30:12
Speaker
But Rain tells him she sensed Peter deep in the void of Roberto's shadow of Roberto's shadow form when they teleported here. They both transform, Sunspot into a shapeless black void and reign into a silver wolf, and she leaps into him.
01:30:29
Speaker
She finds Peter at a vast desert, trapped in a nightmare hallucination. He runs across the sand to Kitty Pride when Zaji appears, pulling him away. Kitty's heart shatters, and seconds later, so does Peter's as Zaji turns to dust in his arms.
01:30:46
Speaker
Kitty decays and collapses as well, leaving Peter alone in the void with only his grief and regret. Again, not subtle. This is right. Exactly what happened to Peter.
01:30:58
Speaker
Right. Yeah, exactly. Pretty lady form. Rain lifts up his body and carries him back out of the void into St. Anne's church where Xavier, Sam, Danny, Rogue and Illyana are waiting. Rogue's here now. Rogue's here.
01:31:11
Speaker
ah Rain and Bobby revert to the normal selves and run to x Xavier for help. ah Cut back to Tandy and Tyrone, who are feeling themselves at odds. Tandy regrets abandoning the new mutants, but Tyrone is incredibly conflicted. On one hand, without their cloak and dagger powers, there's nothing binding them together. Tandy will leave him.
01:31:34
Speaker
but he's afraid to have his powers back. They scare him. Cloak is like a deep hunger inside him, always desiring more and always growing harder to control. The more he uses his power, the more he wants it like an addict. It's a curse.
01:31:49
Speaker
But Tandy reminds him that it will be the same for Roberto. And if they do nothing but push their problems off onto him and Rain, they're no worse than the villains they fight. o I would argue that they are still better, but they're doing the right thing. Back at Anne's, Peter, Rain, and Bobby are all fucking conked out.
01:32:14
Speaker
x Xavier is trying to figure out how to help them, but the situation is so unique. He's out of ideas. Danny, however, has one. She can use her powers to tap into her teammates emotions and she see if she can have any effect.
01:32:27
Speaker
She does, and Sunspot's shadow envelops the entire room. Luckily, magic is there to shift into her armor and cut through the darkness with her soul sword.
01:32:38
Speaker
Fucking cool. Once again, her entrance is just stellar. She is always cool. She is, man, just the coolest new character.
01:32:52
Speaker
Now, struck with an idea, she takes Rain and Bobby back to Limbo to try and exercise whatever's gotten hold of them, but the spell backfires. The light and the darkness flee from the kids only to find purchase in Ileana herself.
01:33:07
Speaker
The experience taxes her, but through immense effort, she restores herself, seeing that now about 80% of her body is covered in in that mysterious silver armor. Yeah, I don't know if we've mentioned this before, but she keeps being concerned that when she gets injured, the silver armor appears on her body to protect her, and she doesn't know where it is what it is, and she doesn't know where it's from, and now it's growing.
01:33:31
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. And Xavier even acknowledges, like, I don't know what that is, and I'm pretty sure she doesn't know what that is Right, right. i She returns back home. All three of them reverted to how they were when they left.
01:33:47
Speaker
x Xavier yells at her until he's interrupted by Dandy and Tyrone. They're willing to help. Listen, like Xavier, if you're going to bring Ileana into a situation without instruction. Yeah.
01:34:00
Speaker
She's going to take action. Just assume this about Ileana. Yeah. She's going to take them to limbo and try to fix them. She does this to everybody. She says this every appearance she's ever had now.
01:34:11
Speaker
And it's this is why you like her. This is why you bring her along. Don't yell at her. It's like when a dog barks at somebody. A of dog barking. Yeah. is yeah Yeah. But so stay with me on this one. Okay. Well, like, you know how you, uh, uh, you want your dog to bark if there's an intruder, but you don't want, you don't want your dog to bark at like your friends when they come over. But if one of your friends plays a prank and like,
01:34:38
Speaker
shows up somewhere he's not supposed to and your dog barks at him. Yeah. Let your dog bark. Your bug your dog spotted an intruder. Yeah. Yeah. You follow me? Does that, does that make sense? Yeah. Let Ileana bite your friends. Yes, exactly. God. so To be concluded, by the way. This issue is... This issue took like a fucking hour to read. this There are just paragraphs and paragraphs and paragraphs of people explaining the technical aspects of what's going Oh god. there's There's a full page of x Xavier monologuing.
01:35:16
Speaker
it's It's exhausting. There's so many... where This is like John Byrne level word count. They have to like tuck... the characters pictures of the characters into like the corners of panels because the entire rest of the panel is just dialogue.
01:35:35
Speaker
Somebody somebody had to like pull Claremont aside and be like, look, there has to be pictures, dude. This is a comic book. And they're they're sacrificing Bill Sienkiewicz's art for this. Yeah, yeah. God damn it. it's It's absolutely wild.
Dense Storytelling and Personal Struggles
01:35:52
Speaker
The...
01:35:53
Speaker
This has <unk>s five times the words of a normal of any other comic book we've read. Yeah, yeah. But do you want to get to do you want to rush to the end and see what happens to our heroes and cloak and dagger?
01:36:10
Speaker
yes Yeah, and cloak and dagger. In New Mutants number 25, the only thing to fear Oh, like thought I thought you were going to finish that sentence. Nope, that's the end nope that's the end of the... ah I can't wait to find out what it is. That's the end of the end of the title. This is by Chris Claremont and Bill Sienkiewicz with Orzakowski and Buchalis as the letterers, Glynis Ween as the colorist, Dan Nesenti as the editor, and... ah come on, you got a third one in you.
01:36:41
Speaker
Joshy Shamrock as the editor-in-chief.
01:36:47
Speaker
Release date November 27th, 1984. Cover date March 1985. The art is different here. Did you notice this? Less lines, less sketchy figure work and more like big black inky blobs. of ah More impressionistic.
01:37:04
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, definitely. it's a is It feels, and i I said this a little bit already, but it feels like they weren't letting Bill Sienkiewicz have much of a turn.
01:37:17
Speaker
In all of this, except for in some very small concentrated parts. Right. So he gets to go a little experimental here. Do you think maybe that's what was happening here is he was just like he had been given three issues in a row that were almost entirely people in rooms talking to each other.
01:37:35
Speaker
And so for the third one, he was like, you know what I'm just going to fucking try some other shit. I'm going to nuts. I think it's still going to be people standing around talking to each other, but I'm just going to do some different shit. I think also maybe he didn't have as much time to ink this one as he has in the past ones. I think that's where some of our detail went. Yeah, maybe. So Tyrone and Tandy, a.k.a. Cloak and Daggers, stand at the entrance of St. Anne's, ready to do whatever it takes to help save Rain and Roberto.
01:38:03
Speaker
Tyrone's having a lot of anxiety all around this, though, and storms off when Tandy tries to introduce him to her uncle, Father Michael Bowen. They're related. They're related.
01:38:14
Speaker
oh also, hey, Father Michael Bowen is back. Father Michael Bowen's here, and he's her uncle, Unky. He's her uncle. And she's like, I can't believe you're here, Unky. And he's like, I can't believe you're Dagger. Yeah.
01:38:31
Speaker
Tyrone sits in the corner, seemingly not noticing the eldritch shadow that starts to form around it. Xavier does, though, and connects with him psychically to talk him through it. Xavier relates a story about growing up with his psychic powers and how he's afraid of losing control at the time, just like Tyrone. It's kind of cool x Xavier lore. It's about how... It is. Yeah, yeah. The very first time you read in Mind, it was um his brother, Cain Marcos.
01:38:57
Speaker
And it was like bad, scary thoughts. Yeah. Cain Marcos had just been beaten up by his father, Charles' his stepfather. Yeah. And... ah was just like racing through all the emotions you would expect out of a ah a troublesome 12-year-old boy getting beaten up.
01:39:20
Speaker
Yeah, and it's cool. And Xavier's sitting here all ghostly because he is... Yeah, yeah. Because he this is an astral projection. I mean, they're confusing psychic connection, astral projection a little bit, but we're going to let him play with it.
01:39:36
Speaker
um I think the truth of it is that Bill Sienkiewicz representing a psychic conversation by drawing a transparent outline of x Xavier in the chair. And Chris Claremont is like, well, we've got to call this an astral form. That's what this is.
01:39:56
Speaker
i don't know if it's here or later in the issue, but there's one point where the word balloons get a little messed up and they they don't put There's no... they there's no separation between Xavier's word balloon and Tyrone's. So it seems like Xavier is mocking Tyrone's
01:40:24
Speaker
For all we know, he is. Yeah, yeah. So... ah Xavier saw his power as a curse too until he mastered it by releasing his fear of it. Fear is what gives the dark force an edge. Because, Pat, I don't know if you know this, but fear leads to anger. but Anger to hate.
01:40:43
Speaker
And hate, it it leads to suffering. I heard that fear is the mind killer. Yeah, I heard that a fear is actually a drug. hu Tyrone hates drugs. Yeah.
01:40:59
Speaker
Do we know any other sayings about fear? No, I i was I heard fear and loathing in Las Vegas. i i I. am out of them. I don't have any more.
01:41:13
Speaker
but Fear dot com. Remember that movie? Fear.com. Oh, is that what was that one of those? Oh, yeah. It's like, is the ring, but you go to a website. Yes. Yeah.
01:41:24
Speaker
Weren't there a bunch of those? There was like a one where it's like a cell phone. if you call If you get called on the cell phone, it kills you. Yeah, yeah. There were several. Fear.com is the one that I remember. you get an email, it kills. Like, it's just like every time there's a new technology, people are like, what if this thing can kill you? Yeah.
01:41:45
Speaker
They all came out within six months of the ring to remember. And remember the one where if you watched ah this vine, it would kill you. But then was if you watched this. um Oh, fuck. What was the name of that short lived?
01:42:03
Speaker
Hello. No, no. The one where it was it wasn't social media. It was supposed to be like, yeah. It was like Vine, only ah with paid programming.
01:42:17
Speaker
Oh, yeah. It got taken over by teens when TikTok got banned. And they the company pivoted to... I don't remember the name. But they pivoted to trying to be TikTok. And then TikTok came back. I thought they just died. no That one where it was like... There was some people that had like good there was like good talent there.
01:42:39
Speaker
yeah and it was just it was short They were like TV series.
Humor and Cultural Reflections
01:42:43
Speaker
there's like There were like a seasons of TV series. are you talking about Quibi? Oh, yeah, Quibi. Yeah, there's that one where if you watch a Quibi, you die.
01:42:49
Speaker
That was where was trying to say. If I'd been able to pull it, it would have been funny. Leave the leave all of that in. Turns out, Pat, Xavier was also letting Tandy listen in on this whole psychic conversation. So they all agreed.
01:43:07
Speaker
Seems like a violation, right? He's just this. He's doing like the mean girls three way call. like Oh, by the way, Tandy's been on the line this whole time. Tandy, what do you think about all this?
01:43:19
Speaker
Well, it works out because they all agree together to keep moving forward with the exact same plan they were going to do anyway. Yeah, good. Good. And this is one of those Chris Claremont, everybody's powers working together. This is one of those like, and if you touch her and she uses her power in this way while she does this and this person then does this, then it's one of those ones. It's one of those Krakoa things.
01:43:46
Speaker
ah gig Yeah, yeah. This is going to be, although i I will say there's a little more thought behind it. It's not just like everybody shoot at my back and then ah become more powerful. It's so funny because, so Len Wein wrote Giant Size X-Men number one, but Chris Claremont is always the one bragging about how he gave Len Wein the solution to Britain. to like ending that issue and then it's like well yeah it's the dumbest thing that you do which is that sometimes you have all the characters shoot each other and that solves the problem it's not just unoriginal it's stupid
01:44:25
Speaker
ah So anyway, um Xavier has an idea how to make all this work. He asks Illyana to teleport them to Limbo where her spells are much more effective and then asks Rogue, who's here now too, to link psychically with him. He will guide her as she absorbs Rain's power so that she only absorbs the dagger energy coursing through her.
01:44:48
Speaker
He can do that. He's always been able to this. no one asked No one asked him. No one asked before. i Yeah. This is where he's he has instructions for somebody named Mirage.
01:45:03
Speaker
and you And you went, ah, and threw your comic across the room. Yeah, yeah. No, no! You had to buy a new one. yeah Her name is Psych! You called me, and I was like, Pat, it's okay. It's just Danny Moonstar's new name. And then you then you went and bought a new issue.
01:45:21
Speaker
It's hard to fight, too. i there's there's And some friggin' kids cut all the dang ads out of it! There is a really good moment here where Rain is like, I don't want to go to limbo. That's an evil place. And Danny mocking her says, yeah, I heard it's a wretched hive of scum and villainy.
01:45:42
Speaker
Nice, dude. Nice, dude. very nice Why do they bring Michael Bowen along, by the way? ah He's like, why? He's like, what? Where am I? Yeah, there's no reason you need to be here.
01:45:57
Speaker
I'll tell you exactly why, Matt, because as they go into limbo and start going through all this, Danny and Sam, who don't have actual steps to take in this process, are like, Father Bowen, what can we do? Father Bowen says,
01:46:13
Speaker
pray And then everything works out. Sorry to spoil the ending here, but as we always say on this podcast, that prayer works. Prayer works. Canonically in the Marvel Universe, prayer works. All
Confrontation and Intentions Debate
01:46:26
Speaker
right. So Ileana starts casting the same spell, drawing the light and power from but Rain and Bobby. But Bobby breaks free in a burst of dark power. And Ileana has to summon her soul sword just to keep from being engulfed. Bobby goes right for Tyrone, playing on his fear. But Tyrone's bravery or whatever stalls it long enough for a sure
01:46:45
Speaker
Light-powered rogue to hop in and start sapping Bobby's dark energy. Guys, you do that are you guys confused? Because... ah Number one, so was I, and number two, it doesn't matter. Through her psychic link with Xavier, the two of them are able to just barely contain the power until Rogue touches Tandy and Tyrone and Ileana recasts her exorcism spell, transferring all the Darken Lake power back to Cloak and Dagger respectively. Duh! Hey, they're back. Duh!
01:47:12
Speaker
Problem solved. There's, listen, when Dagger returns, she, in, Automatically, they're both back in their traditional cloak and dagger costumes. But the dagger shaped slit in daggers onesie is extending way lower right now.
01:47:34
Speaker
Like it looks like you see This is an area where pubic hair would be. And she doesn't have any. But yes. Yes. as She's an adult, just to be clear. I do i don't think that's. Is she?
01:47:49
Speaker
Isn't she? I think she's 16. Okay. Well, then I'm sorry to be talking about her pubic care. No, but no. that is area that's exposed. You don't need to be sorry. They need to be sorry. Exactly. This is a Bill Sienkiewicz, jump-jumpy Chris Claremont problem.
01:48:08
Speaker
because It's so low. It's so low. it It almost looks in this inch image of her returning that... Now it extends fully all the way down.
01:48:21
Speaker
And it's the panel cuts off where you would see vagina. Like it is it is below because it's extremely tight. You can see exactly where her legs meet her hips. And it is the the dagger extends below that line.
01:48:36
Speaker
Yes. Yes. It's the it's great. That's crazy. It's crazy. It's crazy. Yeah. Also, again, you can't keep this. day This wouldn't work. You couldn't wear something like this. it would be flopping all over. How would it stay where it anyway?
01:48:51
Speaker
Tape. I guess it's tape. Everyone offers cloak and dagger a spot on the new mutants again, but they decline and and they disappear again, choosing instead to go beat up some guy that insulted them earlier. No, Patrick.
01:49:03
Speaker
They are beating up the pimp to save the couple. I still haven't seen any evidence that he is a pimp. He says, shoot, where you been spit fo brains? This is the city you in the big time. You don't wear no outfit like that over pants. Trump, you wear leathers alone. Nothing else. Don't look so spooked.
01:49:24
Speaker
You're taking that out of context immediately before that. He's like, I'm going to tell you how to impress your little girlfriend here. Granted, they're both children, and maybe that should be my red flag. Oh, and then and then he offers them both drugs. The reason that I know he's a pimp is because this... He offers them a joint.
01:49:43
Speaker
Oh, is that a joint? I thought that was like a vial of cocaine. Oh. No, that'd be crazy. he call ah He calls it a stiff toot, and that's not actual drug slang, so I don't know what that's supposed to be. That's what I call it ah ah So it could be literally anything. But, oh, and they call him a they call him a chicken hawk.
01:50:07
Speaker
So. Okay. Let's look. like the Like the Looney Tune character. I'm a chicken hawk. Remember that guy? Remember that guy? Oh, okay. It is a very specific type. Of crime?
01:50:22
Speaker
It is pimpery. It is specifically pimping young boys. Oh, okay. Well, asked and answered, I guess. Oops. Okay. Change that ending to they go beat up. They go beat up a chicken hawk. Anyway, for whatever reason, I didn't include this.
01:50:38
Speaker
anyway for whatever reason i didn't include this I didn't include this at the end of the issue. It's probably not important then.
01:50:49
Speaker
But there is a there is like a second epilogue that looks I mean that is styled like these. So at the end of each of these issues there have been these um character profiles of all the new mutants and at the end of this one is Lila Chaney.
01:51:08
Speaker
Rogues gallery. But right before it is somebody we've never heard of. charles David Charles Holler. Oh, yeah. I skipped i never heard of that guy i skipped him.
01:51:21
Speaker
remember the ah Remember the... Remember the last name Holler? Yeah, vividly. It's ah the woman that... under questionable circumstances had charles x xavier's child that we haven't met yeah she had the she had the mind of a child but the body of a a grown woman and like xavier was helping her through her severe deep trauma but then ended up in a sexual relationship with her yeah yeah um so have to do with this guy his mom is gabrielle holler
01:51:57
Speaker
and Hey, look, everything worked out for Gabrielle Haller. She became Israel's ambassador to Great Britain. And his it says here, his father is Charles x Xavier.
01:52:09
Speaker
life's yeah For half his life, he's been completely withdrawn from reality. First catatonic, now autistic is what it says. ah Charles doesn't know. not that.
01:52:22
Speaker
Charles doesn't know. Gabby insisted I not tell him, but now I fear of no alternative. David's manifesting immensely strong psi powers directed, I believe, by his subconscious. I've noted three primary abilities so far. Telepathy, telekinesis, and pyrotic talent.
01:52:39
Speaker
to psychically set objects afire. But what thoughts or needs or feelings trigger their use? That's the devil's own guess. This is Moira McTaggart's journal, by the way. Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah. If I could somehow reach the lad, there's at least be hope of bringing these powers under control. But my every attempt has failed. His mind's a closed book in a language I do not know. David's condition worsens by the day. Charles is the strongest telepath on the planet. If anyone can help, it's he.
01:53:05
Speaker
in our time both Gabby and I have loved him now we must hurt him terribly and then ask of him all that he can give and he will too bless his bless his lion's heart for the boy what I only hope he won't hate us too much and um so it is a it is a picture of this kid and his The picture of him is fractured into a bunch of pieces. um And the let the number three is floating next to him. And a a handwritten note is to the left of his head that says there's three of us in here.
01:53:44
Speaker
Hmm. So. i still don't see why it's relevant. Anyway, that's New Mutants. What do you think of this little arc here?
01:53:57
Speaker
Oh, boy. I i can't tell it if this was
01:54:05
Speaker
just like a bit of a letdown from the high that was the last few yeah New Mutants issues we read, or if that was just not an enjoyable run of comics. But I just didn't find it interesting. It seems like I don't find Cloak and Dagger that interesting.
01:54:25
Speaker
ah Largely because they are just an uninteresting Bill Mantlo creation. An uninspired Bill Mantlo creation. And everything here was so slow moving. This is a story you could have told in one to two issues. It's extremely low stakes. It's just... It moves slowly. it's fairly low stakes as far as just like...
01:54:50
Speaker
what we know could happen, what could spin out of this. there's no There's no perspective for me to be like, well, it would be better if they fix the situation. And through it all, we don't really further any story or character elements. It's just we we return to the status quo at the end of it.
01:55:11
Speaker
We get some cool stuff like the rivalry between Sunspot and Colossus, right? I don't know that that develops into anything, but it's a cool little character trait where it's kind of a one-sided rivalry. But clearly this is bringing out something that was already in Sunspot about and feeling weird about not being as strong as Colossus. Yeah, yeah.
01:55:32
Speaker
Especially because Colossus got some new tricks. i Rain apparently has a new trick. What? She does? ah Yeah, they kept talking about her turning into that beautiful woman is like a manifestation of her wolf power.
01:55:48
Speaker
Weird. Yeah, no, it's she this isn't something she can do. This is just. When she had the dagger powers. that was That was a dagger power. Dagger doesn't have that power either. So like I don't know what the fuck. I don't know why that was there. It really seems like they were trying to say, hey her powers go way beyond just transforming into world. That might be.
01:56:11
Speaker
Like she can do that, but she'll never figure out how to do that in the in the next 50 years. Okay. But... The Dan Danny and Sam relationship was really cool in this. I liked that.
01:56:25
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There's some good character moments. It just doesn't feel like it's advancing their characters much. Yeah. I agree well, yeah again, I would just I would argue only in the Danny and Sam sense. I think we are we are getting a bit of a deeper understanding of the connection that's growing between Danny and Sam.
01:56:45
Speaker
I think as the two de facto leaders. And I don't think we had fully seen this as being their dynamic before. Like we knew that all of them were friends. We didn't know there was this sort of special friendship brewing between the two leaders, the emotional and tactical leader. um So I think ah that is probably maybe maybe the only thing I liked about these issues.
01:57:09
Speaker
If these I'll say this, if these issues were a little quicker to read through, if this was two issues instead of four issues, if this was a little less wordy, yeah either one of those two things or both of those two things, I think we would have regarded this as a
Art Critique and Comic Length
01:57:26
Speaker
fun little story. If this was two issues that were quick to read.
01:57:31
Speaker
Yes, it's very you ah Breaking Bad in that way. ah Exactly. Exactly. But if, you know, with um with it being four whole issues and the most dialogue we've ever read in a comic, it's pretty, pretty bad. And I think that first issue, issue 22. Sure.
01:57:51
Speaker
If it had kept up like that, like that issue was not tough to read at all. No. And it really piques your interest for the rest of the series. It's just it doesn't pay off as interestingly.
01:58:03
Speaker
Agreed. I will give credit to the art here. Like I said, it's it's a little more muted than what we saw previously out of Sienkiewicz, but he of takes what he has and he focuses very hard on it. So like, again, the the bodies we see, just the human form that he's putting together is really nice. When he gets to go nuts, he goes nuts. He also. So if you remember, Matt, when we record or immediately before we recorded the Demon Bear episode,
01:58:34
Speaker
you looked at my notes and said, why did you write Calvin and Hobbes on here? And I said, you'll see. And then I never actually got to it but its here again. So I can say the thing. One of the things I love about Bill Sienkiewicz's landscapes are like the sort of sketchy, a quick sketch, but still extremely engaging backgrounds and landscapes. And it's it's very reminiscent of, I think, not reminiscent, this happened to be before, but Calvin and Hobbes and thee like space desert landscapes you get there um or some of the like more foresty landscapes, the way that he draws tree, Bill Watterson draws trees. He attributes his landscapes to Crazy Cat, which is like a comic from the 19 teens.
01:59:26
Speaker
Okay. Strip by George Harriman, which also features like quickly sketched but really engaging landscapes. And I just think it's like a it's a cartoony style that I just absolutely love.
01:59:41
Speaker
Here's my thing. Bilsenkevich rules. Yeah. He's got an eye out of stuff that you could buy out. If you had time machine that you would to try out.
01:59:53
Speaker
It's Pat Steals and Steals. Ooh, Matt. Pat Steals and Deals again. It's coming nowhere. Now. We're reading New Mutants. And as I've mentioned in past New Mutants episodes, while I bought all of the original X-Men titles using my vast fortune, I... Well, we just talked about it, Matt.
02:00:15
Speaker
Whenever I read a New Mutants issue, I get a little scared or mad and I throw it away. Yeah. And then I have to run out and buy a new issue to be able to to read it. And by the time I can...
02:00:27
Speaker
ads are gone. Yeah, that's it's it's I don't know why this keeps happening, but it's it's because I get scared or mad very easily. Well, yeah, but I i guess I don't know why everybody keeps taking these ads. They're they're a hot commodity. if this This is hit segment.
02:00:44
Speaker
It's kind of like when my brother, my brother and me became a hit podcast and then people started making fake filling Yahoo answers with fake things hoping they would hear themselves on my brother, my brother and me.
02:00:56
Speaker
Oh, is that what they do that show? They used to do, they used to do, they took, they would do advice questions, and back when Yahoo's answers existed, they would get weird questions off of Yahoo Answers and try to answer them. And very quickly, they had to start contending with the fact that their show was popular enough, people started making Yahoo Answers questions specifically specifically to bait them. Yeah.
02:01:18
Speaker
Ooh. That's what's happening here. Our podcast is so popular that people are like, oh, I want to do a Pat Steals and Deals. Well, I'll sue the shit out of them. Unless they are the Today Show, they stole my title.
02:01:36
Speaker
Anyway, Pat Steals and Deals this week is taken from a another comic around the same time. Matt, 40 brand new towels, $1.75. $1.75.
02:01:50
Speaker
Okay, okay no, tell me about these towels. Unwoven cotton or rayon. Assorted beautiful pastel colors. Brand new. They are not seconds, which I guess was a problem when you were trying to buy towels back then. Damn it! These towels are seconds again! Every time I buy a towel, it's a second. it's Somebody already used it. I assume that's what they mean.
02:02:18
Speaker
40 towels for $1.75 or 80 for only $3.35. 120 for just $4.95. They are super quality. Please include 50 cents extra for postage and handling with each set of 40 towels you buy. How big are these towels?
02:02:36
Speaker
It doesn't say. But you listen to this, Matt. We know towels. We've sold 70 million already.
02:02:45
Speaker
that doesn't How does that convince me that you know towels? They've sold 70 million. How many people are there in the world? Like, okay, I could sell 70 million... don't know. Any... Screws. But I've never screwed a screw in my life.
02:03:04
Speaker
i mean, I have and I haven't, but... 70 million is 1% of 7 billion, right? And at this point, there's only... There's only like three or four billion people in the world. I was going to say five, but you might be right.
02:03:20
Speaker
I think we hit five when we were in like elementary school. Right. And by now we were supposed to be up to like 20 and we're only at eight. This is if we're assuming this is one person.
02:03:34
Speaker
sure It is interesting. Do you remember? that the What was the... Was it Mark... It was a Markovian thing? was that Was that who it was? Markov?
02:03:45
Speaker
It might be somebody else. I don't know what the thing is. The idea is... The idea was like by 2010, we'll have 10 million people on Earth. And then by And then that'll just keep exponentially growing.
02:03:59
Speaker
Like this was such a this was such a thing in the 70s and the 80s and the ninety s Everybody being like this is a massive problem. Every projection was like the amount of people on Earth is going to double and then triple and then quadruple. It's going to be insane. And the world is going to have no living space by 2050 or whatever.
02:04:23
Speaker
And even i think we were even hearing that up in the 2010s, right? People still being like, oh, population is going to double in the next 10 years. But lately, everybody stopped saying that because two to a so ah prediction, every – 100% of, not not one prediction about the population of the world has been correct.
02:04:47
Speaker
it Right? Like, everybody was wrong. We are at 8 billion now. There was also, it's always... There was an overpopulation ah discussion going on that seemed to be a little genocidal or maybe eugenic in New York. Eugenic-y, yeah. And then, ah more recently, it's been an underpopulation discussion, which is also, coincidentally enough, also leaning pretty eugenically.
02:05:17
Speaker
Yes. Yeah. Yes. So it's just like this... Man, so now when you look it up, apparently the population estimates are supposed to be like, oh, well, we'll reach 11 billion by 2100. Like, that's so fucking wild. We were supposed to be at 11 billion by now. Basically, every expert said this.
02:05:45
Speaker
And they were all wrong. And it's just like... I won't ever believe it. Like, you can't, like, humans are unpredictable. They stopped they noticed and they stopped breeding. Right? Like, we're people. We react to things. We're not, like, mindless, a mindless force on the earth.
02:06:04
Speaker
There's so much space out there. Right. For people. It's not... a concern and and this is my fully uneducated opinion but yeah you don't need to worry about overpopulation we you need to worry about overpopulation in specific areas and that's not to say those areas shouldn't keep having babies that's to say that we should be sharing fucking resources and sharing fucking space
02:06:36
Speaker
I mean, think about how many – think about the densely populated areas of New York City and then the areas of New York City that you go that they're ah that are just chock-a-block abandoned houses. Homes on – yeah, yeah. Or – Homes on these quarter-acre lots. Exactly. ah A home that that is a block large.
02:07:00
Speaker
Anyway, we got towels for all of them, Matt. $1.75. That was our most unhinged bad steals and deals ever.
02:07:17
Speaker
All right, folks, thanks for tuning in to this episode. it's been a It's been a wild ride and a little wilder for me and Pat than you guys even know. um Yes, recording has been an adventure. Thank you. All for tuning get ah You can rate, review, join our Discord. There's a link in the show notes. You can follow us on Instagram, Mutant Menace Pod. You can follow us on YouTube.
02:07:43
Speaker
Just search Mutant Menace Podcast. Join the Patreon. There's paid and unpaid levels. It's pay what you want if you want to pay. If you pay us, you get so much cool bonus content. We do little side podcasts. We do early bonus episodes. We do outtake reels. Sometimes we just... ah chat you'll just you'll get more and more you'll get more and more so uh what else do we have to tell people oh if you want to be on pat's email corner and you can email mutant menace pod at gmail.com that's right big thanks as always to krills wilson for the music and julia selly for providing the voice of trish tilby agree with that
02:08:27
Speaker
Well, you're going to agree with this too, Matt. We just have to close it out with our famous catchphrase, our sign off. Yeah, I think that's true. ah Remember, as always, that's the point, you dopes.
02:08:42
Speaker
And folks, as always, I feel foolish dressed like this.