Something we’ve talked about a lot on the show is how much we like stories and series with deliberate endings. Endings are important: They provide closure and meaning. They give narratives shape. And it’s with that in mind that we want to let you know that Jay & Miles X-Plain the X-Men will be ending later this year.
We never meant for this to be a forever podcast. That it has lasted for going on twelve years is amazing–a gift we never could have imagined when we started out–and it’s important to us to finish it right, to go out deliberately instead of fading off or hitting an abrupt wall.
Don’t worry–we’re not going away next week, or even next month. We’re going to hit a few bucket-list episodes, and then go into one last series: Grant Morrison’s seminal run on New X-Men.
There are a few reasons we’ve decided to wrap with the Morrison run. It’s an incredible high note, one of the most groundbreaking single runs in the history of the franchise. Moreover, it’s a beginning. Morrison’s run on New X-Men signals a sea change in the X-books and their readers’ relationships to them, and feels like the right time to pass the torch to our listeners.
We hope that over the last nearly-twelve years–more than twelve by the time we end–we’ve not only taught you about X-Men continuity and the perils of time travel, but helped you build the tools that’ll let you engage critically with the stories you love and find joy even in the ones you don’t.
You’ve got this.
We believe in you.
(We’ll also be around for the next five-or-so months, so, there’s that.)
Love,
Jay & Miles
Wow I knew it was coming eventually but this is a little sad. Honestly I’ve checked out for a bit but was excited to jump back in seeing how close we were getting to the “modern era “ ( well there’s in which I was actively collecting) at least there were still he new X-men episodes. Thank you for it all.
Thanks for everything.
Cue “One Last Time* from Hamilton then cue my tears!
That being said, you have both earned this and should feel extremely proud.
Long time listener, first (second?) time commenter. This was the second ever podcast that I listened to and, after working my way through the backlog, one that I have looked forward to every week for eight years now. It’s been a constant through some very tumultuous times in my life and I am of course sad to say good bye. But I understand letting this be the final chapter. Thank you for all the good times and I look forward to any future projects from you amazing people. I think I’ll have to re-read New X-Men along with the podcast now.
I distinctly remember driving home from a camping trip 12 years ago with a friend and wondering if we’d be able to fill the time or if it’d be awkward – I said “hey do you know about this one podcast” and boom, two hours of X-Men talk. You have bonded people!
Morrison’s run is a perfect capper, and you two should be really proud of all this (but also yeah you can stretch out New X-Men as looooong as you want – wanna throw in some Chuck Austin? I’ll be here for some Chuck Austin)
Oh I forgot, I got to sing in a Les Mis parody song!
What a ride it’s been
Jay and Miles…ugh, I’m so saddened to hear this news. I’m sure it’s for the best and I truly do wish you both the best.
I’ll be very honest, you have both meant so much to me all these years. You have opened my eyes to ideas, entertained me, provided me with some stability and routine, and most of all, given me hope and light that there are amazing people out there. I’ve been listening since episode 4 in real-time, finding your pod original on YouTube (of all places) and have been glued since.
Love you both for your work and your care for others (including each other).
I will continue to listen until the end, but I hope I get to meet either of you sometime in the future to tell you this in person.
-Tony (he/him)
Farewell – and THANK YOU for all you have done, for every episode you have recorded and for every piece of happiness you have given us!
I just discovered this podcast two years ago and starting listening during the early sleepless nights of fatherhood. It’s been an absolute blast going through the backlog, but a little bittersweet that I’ll never catch up and get to listen live! Fantastic show though, and New X-Men is such a perfect stopping point if it has to end. Thank you for everything!
I fell off from listening around the end of Age of Apocalypse (not all that far off from when I stopped reading/getting X-men comics – a little earlier than that) with plans to jump back in when you got to the Morrison run (which I when I jumped back in to the comics temporarily) and now I learn that it’s the last thing you’ll be covering – so even if I wasn’t gonna come back for the finale regardless, you definitely roped me back for it.
Thanks so much for a fantastic podcast. It was a entertaining and a big inspiration for my own comic book reading and scholarship. Best of luck with whatever you go on to do next – and if you ever want to go comics shopping in Pittsburgh, shoot me a message!
Peace!
I agree it seems like a fitting end to the podcast. Y’all are in such different places in your lives now than you were 12 years ago when you started this journey. That being said, thank you both so much (and by extension all the producers, your spouses and families, and other creators who contributed over the years) for everything you’ve done and for helping build this amazing community around your podcast. I was overjoyed to discover Jay & Miles back in the summer of 2015 with the Giant-Size Summer Special and have been hooked ever since. This podcast was what helped me to get into podcasts in the first place. I’ll miss having your voices keeping me company at work every Monday morning after uploads. Wishing you all the best!
Hey Jay and Miles! I’ve been listening since 2015, and I can’t quite put into words what your podcast means to me. Taking time to process the end, but I wanted to start by helping a little. I am a rabbi, so I can tell you about the cover to X-Men #111!
The Hebrew letters are ‘pay’ and ‘nun’, which make the “P” and “N” sounds. The little flourishes to the left of each letter are called ‘chupchiks,’ and they indicate common abbreviations in the Hebrew language. Pay-Nun (‘פ’ נ) is short for “po niftar,” which means “here is the deceased.” All in all, a fitting way to mark the grave as a Jewish one!
Also, I love that Jay’s MLF roster starts out as half of the X-Ternals from Age of Apocalypse: Strong Guy, Jubilee, and Sunspot!
Wow, truly the end of an era. I’m not 100% certain when I started, but I know it was during your first year and I’ve been listening ever since. If it wasn’t for this podcast, I don’t know if I would have ventured into New Mutants, for example.
For a while, I was actually reading along to X-Men in parallel to what you were doing. When I ended up outpacing it, I started thinking “I can’t wait to hear Jay and Miles’ thoughts on this thing.” But, in retrospect, I think X-books were outpacing the pace of the podcast at parts, so it was a never ending project. That being said, I don’t suppose you want to give your thoughts on Lifeguard?
Looking forward to your final run. Even if it isn’t a winter special (i.e., you finish early), can you please finish with one final awards episode?
I applaud your decision to finish with grace and intention rather than succumb to burnout and podfade. It’s been quite a ride. Thank you for your years of effort on this project, and thank you even more for the next several months.
…sure you don’t want to go out on a nice even 13 years? 😁
Awwww I was really looking forward to hearing y’all talk about the upcoming MCU X-Men. But I can’t really complain about 12 years of great content. Thank y’all for everything!!
You started this podcast when I desperately needed something on the horizon to look forward to. And quickly filled that need for me, week after week, for years. I will always cherish the memories of meeting you both at Rose City, and of attending your live shows and parties at that convention. You’re leaving quite a legacy with 12 years of podcasts. Thank you.
I have to say I was wondering if we might be reaching a point like this sometime soon. You’re efforts have been superhuman, if not downright Omega Level, but life swirls and changes around us, and I can see where looking forward and thinking “Wow! Only another… quarter century of material to go!” might lead to thinking about an ending.
The Morrison run is a good choice to close out on your own terms, for the reasons you outline, though I am deeply disappointed we won’t hear your commentary on Extreme X-Men, or the Chuck Austen run because I suspect that would have been a hoot. Ah well, what might have been…. and maybe someone else will cover those stories.
Now is not the time to say goodbye yet, of course, so I won’t, but it will be bittersweet knowing we are reaching a countdown, of sorts.
Jay and Miles,
Thank you. Thank you for the amazing fun times you have provided and the perspectives and the journey you’ve let your audience be a part of. I have been mulling this over all day and will echo the sentiments of so many others to say that I am sad and it feels like learning a friend is moving impossibly far away. I found your pod by way of Connor at cerebro and devoured everything. It always feels like your two pods provide two sides of a coin and I love that for the audience. You also taught me a lot about life in how you’ve shared your personal journeys and even perspectives on matters like disability politics. You opened minds and eyes to a wider world while making it fun. So thank you. Thank you for the education, the laughs and helping in some small way to being a better human. I will miss you and hope to hear from you in the future still. Oh, and as a P. S. Hearing my name for a zz105 closing will forever be a moment of joy for me. I felt like a giddy kid hearing my name on the pod. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
So long and thanks for all the flechettes!
A podcast I’ll have listened to every episode-though I’m not the type to remember every detail, I’ll always have an inordinate appreciation of Peter Corbeau now. I would love to see you skip forward in time and cover just a few of your all-time favorites before you go (Mike Carey Legacy vote). And I’ll forever wish you’d made it to Krakoa.
Thank you for all the wonderful hours of fun, and insights, but also just being a lovely couple of folks to spend an hour-ish a week with and chat about comics. I really hope that all the projects you will have extra time for without having to focus on the podcast are fulfilling and possibly even profitable. And if they’re the kind of thing we can support please let us know so we can help. ^_^
Thank you so much for all of the insight and enjoyment you’ve provided. While I would be happy to have this podcast continue forever, I totally appreciate that you are choosing to end deliberately and on a high note. Looking forward to the last few months of episodes.
Jay & Miles decide to no longer X-Plain the X-Men because Slipstream is just that terrible.
Kidding aside, thank you for the amazing twelve years. I’d been listening week-to-week since, I think, between Dark Phoenix and the Mutant Massacre (or maybe getting all caught up by the Mutant Massacre; I distinctly remember breaks between all three episodes and later weekly Infernowatch, and the Australian Outback roleplay session as the latest episode for a little while), and having fan euphoria seeing a TIME article listing yours as one of the 50 best podcasts to listen to (2015? 2016?) I will continue to thoroughly enjoy what you put out, and continue to go back and re-listen to sooo much. I love how much surprise enthusiasm you got from X-Force, I adored the Mutant X trilogy (or was it a quad) of episodes, I deeply appreciate trying to explain and untangle pretty much everything between The Hunt For Xavier and now (when did Skrull time travel come in? What happened to Joseph? Why a Psimitar? Who are the Neo? What was with Delgado? Gambit’s gassy green ghost girl???). I look forward to the final year and what stops you make along the way.
The 12th Annual Super Doctor Astronaut Peter Corbeau Awards for Excellence in X-Cellence will be so bittersweet
Whenever they would fall in love with something they had no plans to fall in love with (X-Force easily being the best example) was such a high high for the show. And it’s also such a great lesson for readers of old comics to not avoid something purely due to vaguer expectations of what it should be.
So much of what has made the show great comes back to the decision to read, if not EVERY X-Men comic (limited by the definition of “X-Men comic”) then as much of them as humanly possible. When you’re not leaving things out because they’re not important to overall continuity, or because “everyone knows” they’re bad, that’s how you discover forgotten gems like Wolverine: Killing, or The Jungle Adventure (I still think about “The Honker of Doom” at least once a month), or road trip era X-Force.
Man, I remember seeing my friend post on Facebook about an episode of a podcast talking about Psylocke turning Asian with Sarah Kuhn (whose book I just read). That initial cold open just really got me. It was late 2016 and everything kinda sucked both world-wise and also my own life and I remember the first couple of months of 2017 just BINGEING those first hundred or so episodes (basically catching up only to find out the podcast was going on hiatus…but then at least we had The Lightning and the Storm) and reading the Claremont run right alongside it (starting a business that required a lot of driving in LA helped with that).
I love this podcast for not only introducing me to some amazing people virtually and IRL, getting me into the glory that was Teen Titan Wasteland and Titan Up the Defense, and having me check out comics I’d never have looked at (oh Wolverine/Havok: Meltdown), but also just being a nice constant throughout some rough times personally and in the world (literally, when driving to meet my less-than-stellar in-laws, I might’ve told my husband “Yeah, I flew out to Indiana. We’re listening to Storm and Forge drama for teh drive.”
I’m going to echo what others said: I’ll miss this, but damn, you two have had a stellar run and this is a perfect ending.
I started listening when you were on ep 6? and it already seemed like a mountain. Once in a while I’d get distracted for a few months, and then come back delighted by a pleasant long weekend of listens.
I get that you’re done with x-plaining the X-men. For now. And you totally deserve to retreat into being private citizens, if that’s what you want. But I enjoy listening to each of you talk about things you’re passionate about. If there’s another Pete and Pete thing, or Hawk Talk, or a Venture Brothers pod, count me eager to listen. (I listened to a wrestling podcast for years because I liked the hosts. 0 interest in watching wrestling.)
Trying to simply be thankful for all we’ve gotten. And willing to be won over to a run I didn’t actually like all that much.
Thanks for the warning. And everything.
Congratulations to both of you on a terrific, prodigious podcast. And at 12+ years, has ANYBODY — besides Claremont himself — had a longer continuous run generating X-content? Pretty rare air you’re in.
I admit to wanting to hear stuff about the post-Whedon era, since I dropped off again after than and really don’t know much about the period, or hear your thoughts about how the Krakoa concept evolved. But you’re correct that Morrison’s run is a terrific jumping-off point.
Oh this week’s stuff: It seems to highlight some of Lobdell’s best qualities (small-scale, personal scenes) and his not-so-good (Big Events That Don’t Seem Planned Out.) How did Forge manage to come up with a better ad-hoc All-New X-Men than Jean Grey?
Again, thanks again for a great run, and glad to have you guys around for a bit longer.
Thank you both, so much. You’ve been my constant weekly companion on many long drives to work.
I’ve appreciated your humour and your insight. But above all I’ve appreciated your decency to each other and to us, which I can see reflected in the community you’ve built.
I guess I can take some solace knowing that I’ve still got some episodes to catch up on, though at this point I may just jump ahead to join you for the final run. I’ll be sad when the show is over, but I’m glad you’re giving it the ending it deserves.
Dear Jay and Miles,
I’m sorry to hear about the show’s eventual ending. It makes me somewhat sad. I learned of your podcast from a Facebook X-Men page. I listened to many of your older shows before becoming a subscriber. Every Monday morning, I would listen to your show. I usually begin work after 12 and my job is quite stressful. Your show helped ease me into the upcoming day. I loved your insight and your humor. It was so gratifying to discover a podcast that loved the Claremont X-Men as much as I did and that dealt with the team with seriousness and also levity.
You are the second cherished podcast that I follow that will be ending soon. With the other pod there is a possibility the host might return. But with you this good-bye will be final. I’ll be sad to no longer hear your cold open. (WHAT!) This reminds me of the time I made a really good friend at work and then he found a better job in another state. I knew I’d probably never see him again and if I did the relationship would be different.
I would like to end by saying that you can not measure how much enjoyment I received from your podcast. I wish both of you great success in your future endeavors.
Thank you for so many excellent episodes and so much crazy X-Men lore. 12+ years of podcasting and community building (and just being righteous people) is an extraordinary feat you should be fiercely proud of.