Jay & Miles X-plain The X-men

In which one letter can make a big difference; it’s just not Arcade without giant pinballs; Colossus is nobody’s fool; Margali Szardos is not a relative you want to stay in touch with; Nightcrawler turns to the jerk side; and Jay and Miles pitch an X-Men kids’ show.

In which Jay sits down with scholar Christopher Michael Roman to discuss his recent book, Queering Wolverine in Comics and Fanfiction: A Fastball Special; alongside queer theory, porous bodies, and nontraditional mentorship.

Run, Penance! The retcons are coming for you! (Generation X #40) In which the St. Croix family is constructed largely of retcons; Generation X adjusts surprisingly quickly to a massive status quo shift; Psi-War is coming soon to a podcast near you; Snow White - I mean, Bianca LaNeige - has an intriguing but exceptionally minimal backstory; and if you die in this podcast episode, you die in real life. X-PLAINED: Hellfire Club history Generation X #40-43 MillXnials Mercy General Hospital vs Our Mother of Mercy Hospital Ambiguous psionic overlap Nicole & Claudette & Monet & Marius St. Croix The Downtown Stomp Synch, agreeable and bland (for now) Vincent Adultman The nature of Penance A glacial but effective pace Bianca LaNeige, evil Snow White from space Warpy, Stinky, Spiky, Windy, Greasy, Brainy, and Blurry The Enchanted Forest of Oregon Claremont:Body Swaps::Hama:Getting Stuck In Other Dimensions Jay vs. Accents Terminal Dream Syndrome A surprisingly gruesome fill-in A

Jay & Miles X-Plain the X-Men, Episode 418 - Reignfirefighters: In which S.H.I.E.L.D. agents are scarier in suits; Reignfire is the new Erik the Red; “background assets” would be a very funny euphemism; it’s always either time travel or clones; and you should probably not get a corporate logo tattooed on the side of your head.

In which you, too, can use Cerebro; Jubilee is here, for some reason; the Xavier School should absolutely not be accredited; Hulk Hands would solve many of Rogue’s problems; Sauron gets a gun; Psylocke pulls a Lois Lane maneuver; you really shouldn’t spring a Phoenix costume on anybody; Joseph has (another) identity crisis; and Canada has problems.

In which we are incapable of X-Plaining the Great Lakes Avengers; Pete Wisdom evolves; Douglock hacks the island; Nightcrawler cosplays Nightcrawler; and we find ourselves bafflingly defensive of the Bamfs.

In which Gambit does Stardust; Wilbur Weston holds no one’s redemption; Gambit is unequivocally bisexual; Lucifer is kinda goofy; and we still don’t know what’s in the box.

In which Wild Child makes an unlikely Santa Claus; Sabretooth champions continuity; Random’s last name should’a been Violence; Forge doesn’t have to like you; and Mackie’s X-Factor run gets interesting—right before its untimely end.

In which X-Force goes to Exploding Colossal Man; Douglas Wolk may or may not have superpowers; Karma gets girlfriends; we are already tired of Reignfire; Meltdown and Sunspot initiate a love triangle; and Jay is writing some more X-Men.

In which Kelly and Seagle's X-runs begin with immense promise; dark psychic residue gets just everywhere; Storm's past is literally buried; Wolverine is just saying is all; Cecilia Reyes's job doesn't deserve her, and Cyclops and Phoenix are the worst at being normal. X-PLAINED: The Grey family reunion X-Men #71-72 What counts as an Uncanny X-Men #138 cover reference Baggage and also suitcases Steve Seagle’s (scuttled) Phoenix plans Bone whiskers Telemarketer power moves Cecilia Reyes Marrow (Sarah) Sam Guthrie's tiny ponytail The ol’ wall-of-televisions trope The cost of one banana Sebastian Shaw vs the IRS (maybe) A mostly empty attic Wolverine’s etiquette lessons The dessert claw vs the salad claw The physicality of Carlos Pacheco’s art Cannonball, the grown-up in the room Magneto’s increasingly complicated past Magnus, Erik, and Max (again) Uncanny X-Men #351-352 Cecilia Reyes’s return-to-office Intersectionality Pyro, forever dying of the Legacy Virus D

In which we actually kind of like a Sabretooth story; we’re not asking for viscera, here; all pants on Earth-616 are tearaway pants; we’d like to see more Wolverine stories about bodily autonomy; Gambit’s hallucinations have hallucinations; and there are probably too many X-books.

In which the M-Plate Saga continues; Jay gets into the spirit of the day; we briefly give up on our primary mission; the story is coordinated if not coherent; Miles is not allowed to continuity-shame about Tolkein; Gaia is extra chill; Dirt Nap discovers altruism; and Jubilee should absolutely not have eaten that.

In which nobody is sure what Emplate actually eats; airport food is not a good peace offering; Larry Hama writes a good Jubilee; the St. Croix siblings merge; and we honestly have no idea what a token is.

In which Bishop gets another miniseries; splinter timelines make fun narrative sandboxes; the X.S.E. goes detecting; the Statue of Liberty never fares well in dystopian futures; “Booger” is not a name you give yourself; and we can’t believe it’s taken us this long to make a hanky code joke about Bishop.

This would usually be a skip week, but thanks to some generous donors to Equality Florida, Hawk Talk is back! This week: independent comics! X-PLAINED What makes a comic independent Superbutch Little Garden 44 Presidents and a Letter to a Cat Finder Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (again) Elfquest Nexus Prince of Persia Love & Rockets Jim Ottaviani's science comics Wet Moon

In which X-Factor bounces from one rock-bottom to another; Sabretooth gets his (murderous) groove back; Dark Beast embraces the iMac aesthetic; the tip was righteous; Mystique multitasks like a pro; and Shard Bishop has come unstuck in time.

In which we disagree about the value of Stan Lee intros; everybody wants Wolverine; Mister Sinister lurks; Haley Blanding deserves better; Thunderbird fights a tiger; and Xavier and Magneto do their usual thing.

In which Jay returns; babies are bad at pretty much everything; continuity flies straight out the window; Cable should speak English with a Scottish accent; Harry Leland knows how to dress; Tanya Trask makes the same time travel mistake everyone makes; and we love Al Kennedy forever.

And now for something completely different. (Death's Head II #1) In which Death's Head gets around universes; AIM fails to recognize closed narrative loops; we need more huscarls in comics; time travel occasionally solves the problems it creates; and we bid a fond farewell (for now) to Al Kennedy. X-PLAINED: Death's Head Death's Head II #1-4 Marvel UK Death's Head I Minion Earth-8410 The far future of 2020 Dr. Evelyn Necker How to dress for time travel Reed Richards's mother's name Earth-12892 Robin Hood of Future Past Heavily armed nuns Tuck Spratt The Lord High Protector Huscarls Baron Strucker V Charnel A large number of deaths A deft solution to a complex problem Essential Marvel UK Marvel UK vs. Marvel US NEXT WEEK: Go outside and touch some grass! NEXT EPISODE: The return of Jay! Check out the visual companion to this episode on our blog! Find us on iTunes or Stitcher! Jay and Miles X-Plain the X-Men is 100% ad-free and listener supported. If y

Did the Astral Plane used to be this cramped? (Kitty Pryde: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. #3) In which Shadowcat gets a new miniseries; people don't talk that way (but probably should); holograms are magic; the Helicarrier gets possessed; Wolverine fights a computer; and Miles and Al pitch live-action X-series. X-PLAINED: Possession Shadowcat (Kitty Pryde) (more) (again) Kitty Pryde: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. #1-3 A surprising helicopter Frictionless bed sheets S.H.I.E.L.D. vs. S.H.I.E.L.D. vs. S.H.I.E.L.D. The word "obstreperous" The nefarious doings of nasty transom peekers, envelope steamers, and door kickers Larry Hama dialogue Rigby Fallon Yet another return of Ogūn One way to get from the Brooklyn Bridge to a Helicarrier Yet another fight on the astral plane Wolverine vs. technology The intrinsic power of life, I guess Visibility of psychic powers Live-action X pitches NEXT EPISODE: Death's Head II! Check out the visual companion to this episode on our blog! Find us on iT