In which we hear from two generations of Stokeses for the price of one, buying comics for your son is a great way to rationalize reading them yourself, you should probably be reading The Immortal Hulk, and a 30-year comics hiatus ain’t stopping Steve.
X-PLAINED:
A well-loved copy of Fantastic Four #1
Marvel vs. DC in the Silver Age
Requirements for an acceptable Doctor Doom
The perils of competitive newsstand shopping
Comics conventions: the days before Hall H
The Long Game
Bill Sienkiewicz: best of the best
The Worst Comic Book Guy
What makes the X-books special
The experimental storytelling of New Mutants
The Original Five
The Long Box (and the Easter basket)
Contagious enthusiasm
Returning to the Marvel Universe as a lapsed reader
Art styles over the years
Tragic tales of mail-order chameleons
The joys of the mainstreaming of nerddom
Superhero movies as message pill pockets
Fin Fang Foom
HoX/PoX freakouts as father/son bonding
Acid in vampires’ faces and other childhood traumas
NEXT EPISODE: The Phalanx Covenant (finally) begins!
Check out the visual companion to this episode on our blog!
Jay and Miles X-Plain the X-Men is 100% ad-free and listener supported. If you want to help support the podcast–and unlock more cool stuff–you can do that right here!
We have no idea how accurate this depiction of Kamehameha Day is; but from what we’ve read, it sounds like a really cool holiday. (Wolverine: Bloody Choices)
Our villains. (Wolverine: Bloody Choices)
Also a villain. (The doctor, not the kid. The kid is just super doomed.) (Wolverine: Bloody Choices)
Nick Fury writes like a twelve-year-old girl, and that makes me so happy. (Wolverine: Bloody Choices)
Wolverine rising from bodies of water: never not rad. (Wolverine: Bloody Choices)
Meanwhile in a history that might have been… (Wolverine: Bloody Choices)
“Turtleneck Dracula” doesn’t quite have the same ring to it, bro. (Wolverine: Bloody Choices)
I really legitimately love this dude’s design. (Wolverine: Bloody Choices)
Seriously. Wolverine. Moonlight. Bodies of water. It’s a thing. (Wolverine: Bloody Choices)
Despite evidence to the contrary, Shiv’s head is neither exploding nor severed in this panel. (Wolverine: Bloody Choices)
It’s hard to be a grown-up, Wolverine. (Wolverine: Bloody Choices)
“I’m ALSO sorry that S.H.I.E.L.D. never figured out a less passive-aggressive way to apologize.” (Wolverine: Bloody Choices)
The second-best time Wolverine blew up a helicopter. (Wolverine: Bloody Choices)
And they all lived happily ever after. (Wolverine: Bloody Choices)
Damn, Fury, get some better mementos. (Wolverine: The Jungle Adventure)
Dude sneaking up behind Wolverine is about to have the most anticlimactic day of his life. (Wolverine: The Jungle Adventure)
Gahck is awesome. In other news, I’m really upset about the vertical spacing in that third balloon. (Wolverine: The Jungle Adventure)
SPINY HONKER (Wolverine: The Jungle Adventure)
Once more for the back row: THE HONKER OF DOOM! (Wolverine: The Jungle Adventure)
I’m really just including this panel for the phrase “great rogue honker.” (Wolverine: The Jungle Adventure)
THE HONKER OF DOOM! (Wolverine: The Jungle Adventure)
Gahck has no time for your nonsense. (Wolverine: The Jungle Adventure)
He looks so happy! (Wolverine: The Jungle Adventure)
Probably feasible? Maybe? Ehh, it’s Wolverine, we’ll allow it. (Wolverine: The Jungle Adventure)
I feel you, Robopocalypse. (Wolverine: The Jungle Adventure)
“Once you’re one of my horsemen, of course, you’ll have access to an excellent Employee Assistance Program, as well as paid time off!” (Wolverine: The Jungle Adventure)
Wolverine has a LOT of semicanonical kids floating around the Marvel Universe. (Wolverine: The Jungle Adventure)
In which Wolverine is an eternal teenager; most of what Jay knows about Hawaii comes from Lilo and Stitch; Shiv is a complicated fellow; Nightcrawler represents an unattainable beauty standard; the Easter Bunny flies at dawn; Wolverine: The Jungle Adventure is delightful; Logan inadvertently starts a cult; Gahk does as she pleases; Jay and Miles are going to FlameCon; and we are all now Honkers forever.
X-PLAINED:
What Bloodscream and Roughouse have been up to
Albert and Elsie Dee
An unorthodox vocal warm-up
Wolverine: Bloody Choices
Wolverine: The Jungle Adventure
The Wolverine formula
Kamehameha Day (which Jay mispronounced; sorry!)
Mr. Bullfinch
Mr. Kapeland
Shiv
Doc Corbel
Nick Fury’s penmanship
How retail works
Secret agents, maybe
A stimulating combination
Karate pants
A darker, grittier version of the Easter bunny
Wolverine’s apocryphal childhood
Characters who can pull off the Wolverine hairstyle
Don Adams as Wolverine
Win/win murder scenarios
Two adult men discussing their feelings
Honkers
Cargo cults
The Tribe of Fire
Gahck
Some romance
A Spiny Honker
The Honker of Doom
Pit traps, with and without shallow holes
A dastardly but ineffectual plot
Apocalypse, kind of
One of Wolverine’s many kids (who may or may not be Erista)
Jay & Miles at FlameCon 2018
How to get us at your local convention
Reading comics with Miles’s dad
Seriously, though: honkers
NEXT EPISODE: Even more Excaliburs
Check out the visual companion to this episode on our blog!
Jay and Miles X-Plain the X-Men is 100% ad-free and listener supported. If you want to help support the podcast–and unlock more cool stuff–you can do that right here!
We’re in the process of migrating our official shop to TeePublic! Click over to check it out! (You can still find the designs we haven’t moved yet at Redbubble.)
