Jay & Miles X-Plain the X-Men

443 – X-Retail (feat. Katie Pryde of Books With Pictures)

In which we walk down X-Plain Memory Lane; everyone needs Bitch Planet; HoX/PoX wouldn’t stay on shelves; we learn how to make sure a comic doesn’t get canceled; Marvel should have kept publishing those Krakoa-era anthology TPBs; X-Men is indeed a soap opera; and you can jump in here ’cause we’re all confused.

X-PLAINED:

  • The most crowded X-year
  • Books With Pictures, official best comics shop in the world
  • Our upcoming 10th birthday party
  • Katie Pryde’s X-history
  • Prioritizing marginalized nerd identities
  • Lapsed X-readers
  • X-sprawl
  • The Dawn of X books that worked (and the one that didn’t)
  • The frustration of discontinued collection formats
  • The perfect number of X-books (again)
  • Drama and kissing
  • What we want after Fall of X
  • Readers’ single issue vs collection preferences
  • The power of the preorder
  • Katie’s (naming) origin story
  • Readers versus speculators
  • How to organize a comic book store
  • Non-X recommendations for X-fans
  • The glory of Judge Dredd
  • X-Men who can be trusted to watch a comic book store

NEXT EPISODE: Deviants, Christmas ghosts, and Magneto!


LINKS AND FURTHER READING:


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442 – MimeQuest 64

In which Marrow remains a connoisseur of dead rats; Jay has opinions about the NYC Subway system; U.L.T.I.M.A.T.U.M. are snazzy dressers; Doctor Doom gets excited about Onslaught; Magneto can have a rocket pack if he wants; villainous game recognizes villainous game; weird retcons are the best retcons; and you should totally come to our birthday party.

X-PLAINED:

  • A peculiar side effect of Wolverine’s healing factor
  • Jay & Miles on Bluesky (and other social media)
  • Our upcoming 10th birthday party and live show (and related announcements)
  • X-Men Unlimited #22
  • X-Men/Doctor Doom Annual 1998
  • An unpleasant way to wake up
  • That’s so Kraven
  • Avengers and transit cops
  • U.L.T.I.M.A.T.U.M.
  • Flag Smasher
  • Some miscellaneous New York Subway trivia
  • Audience stand-ins (and how the reading experience changes when the audience stand-in isn’t human-passing)
  • Additional New York Subway trivia
  • Premonitions of Onslaught
  • An X-Men highlight reel
  • A delightful little retcon
  • One way to ruin X-Men #137
  • Healing factor preferences

NEXT EPISODE: Miles and Katie Pryde X-Plain Comics Retail!


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441 – Dracu-tastic

In which Banshee should eat the rich; the real Monet is way more of a jerk than the fake one; the Marvel Universe is the world inside your brain-case; Maggott joins and quits Generation X at almost the speed of Sunfire; Dracula gives Chamber the D; and if Jay and Miles die in this episode, they die in real life.

X-PLAINED:

  • Dracula as a universal standard
  • Earth-441
  • Generation X #48-49
  • The missed potential of 13,000-year-old teenager Gaia
  • The Jay Faerber run of Generation X
  • Emma and Banshee’s forgotten X-friendship
  • That time that Moira ripped off Banshee’s skin and wore it like a Halloween costume (again)
  • Cordelia Frost, Emma’s younger sister
  • Adrienne Frost, Emma’s older sister
  • Interpersonal arguments by way of Asgardian combat scenarios
  • Jubilee, fox; versus M, scorpion
  • Alaska, moping capital of the Marvel Universe
  • Clever scene transitions
  • Constantine Francis Slaughter IV and his mustache
  • Puberty as body horror
  • Husk’s breakup haircut
  • Slug emulation
  • Generation X / Dracula Annual 1998
  • The Council of Cross-Time Draculas
  • Chamber’s goofy face
  • Vampire fonts
  • Jubilee’s bunny slippers
  • Charlie Brown in Snow Valley
  • Count von Count (again)
  • Monsters as class metaphor
  • What would happen if Synch synced with Legion
  • Who would pronounce Cable like Britta Perry pronounces bagel

NEXT EPISODE: Victor Von Doom X-Plains the X-Men.


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440 – Fightin’ and Ballin’

From organic steel to organic… whatever that is. (X-Men #83)

In which the Hunt for Xavier remains vaguely disappointing; Gambit is good with kids; nanomachines are the new unstable molecules; Marrow is a walking armory; and we recommend comics for babies.

X-PLAINED:

  • The Hunt for Xavier, Part 2
  • Babies and/or ghosts
  • Chekhov’s repowering
  • X-Men #83-84
  • Uncanny X-Men #364
  • Cerebro / Cerebro Prime
  • Cerebrite Alpha
  • Cerebrite Beta
  • X-Men serial numbers
  • What Gambit’s friends call him
  • How Miles stopped worrying and learned to love Gambit
  • Evil robot sperm
  • Mary Purcell
  • Multiple-monitor displays
  • A computer with a computer
  • AI
  • The Florida facility
  • Post
  • Pile-Driver X
  • A glimpse into the butt of all humanity
  • Comics for babies
  • Name-based powers

NEXT EPISODE: Generation X has Dracula problems!


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439 – Fishfic

In which we reach the beginning of an end; Jay totally forgot Gambit was there; we’re all living in the Mary Purcelliverse; the X-Men split the party; and we explore The Bay Area’s Bohemian Hotbed of Student Anarchy.

X-PLAINED:

  • Mary Purcell (sort of)
  • The re-defaulting of the X-Men
  • Uncanny X-Men #362-323
  • X-Men #82
  • Nebraska
  • Pyro (Saint John Allerdyce) and his endless illness
  • Legacy Virus variations
  • Going home again
  • Running back and forth in quarries
  • Marrow, who’s come a long way
  • The two forms of fire: skeleton monsters and sexy ladies
  • Cerebro (the evil one)
  • San Francisco and Tajikinistan
  • Asphalt ball pits
  • A topsy-turvy nonsensical impossible hell
  • Nina the Mannite
  • Desire, love, loss, and fear
  • Skulls and spines
  • The New (New) Brotherhood of Mutants
  • Cerebrites Alpha and Beta
  • A lost, smelly fish
  • Ambiguous art
  • Blood, sweat, and fears
  • Which mutants would cause the most chaos at holiday gatherings
  • Hopes for post-Fall society

NEXT EPISODE: 2 Hunt 2 Xavier


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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!

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438 – The Man of Harsh Business

In which Gambit knows how to make an entrance; Rogue and Gambit only have relationship conversations during superhero fights; Wolverine fights a shark; and we have opinions on how to handle certain aspects of backstory.

X-PLAINED:

  • One way to take over Madripoor
  • Uncanny X-Men #361
  • X-Men #81
  • Wolverine: Black Rio
  • The X-Men’s rapid slide back to the status quo
  • Steve Comicraft
  • The fork of loneliness
  • Cyttorak (again)
  • Black Tom Cassidy (again)
  • Peacocks
  • Sarasota Jungle Gardens
  • What’s sticking out of Juggernaut’s pants
  • Favorite versions of the Danger Room
  • Floriography
  • Kali (kind of)
  • Mary Purcell (a bit)
  • Rio Carnival
  • An outfit
  • Detective Antonio Vargas and his mustache
  • Saint Cyrus Leviticus
  • Ezra
  • Comparing mutant and Inhuman culture
  • Demonic homage

NEXT EPISODE: The Hunt for Xavier begins!


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437 – Dismember the Titans

“Hot Topic Rennfaire” was a somewhat controversial choice for X-Force’s prom theme. (X-Force #85)

In which the overlap between Rocky Horror and ‘90s X-Force fans is probably pretty significant; Pandemonia has priorities; the warehouse gets an evil, sexy glowup; swears are great; Johnny Blaze’s motorcycle probably shouldn’t still be on fire; and there is no single definitive X-Men experience.

X-PLAINED:

  • Master Pandemonium
  • X-Force #85
  • X-Force/Champions Annual 1998
  • What X-Force has been up to lately
  • The regrettable absence of Doctor Doom
  • Possession
  • Community
  • Cougars (euphemistic)
  • The thrift cycle
  • Rusty Collins on Krakoa
  • Fashion
  • An eons-old accord between the Houses of Chaos and the Lord of Valhalla
  • Jennifer Kale
  • The list
  • Swears
  • A statue of Hades
  • Various appendages sticking out of the earth
  • Hercules
  • The mystic power of sarcasm
  • The greatest fear of a Titan
  • Monet St. Croix vs. the Count of Monte Cristo
  • Good X-books for your fifteen-year-old niece

NEXT EPISODE: Wolverine vs. Vampires (again)!


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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!

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436 – The Feel-Good Movie of the Summer

In which Colossus has had a rough time of it; the X-Men are at their best in bar fights; Bronze-age Wolverine was a jerk; Ursa Major deserves more page space; kids dig Nightcrawler; and we imagine an X-Men newspaper comic strip.

X-PLAINED:

  • Notable incidents in Iceman’s romantic history
  • X-Men: Liberators #1-4
  • Nostalgia
  • Friendship
  • A bar fight
  • Province 13
  • General Sergei
  • Several dead deer
  • Gregor and Valeri
  • Nikolas
  • Zener cards
  • Several children
  • Omega Red (more) (again)
  • Ariana
  • Ideal formats
  • Beast vs. Dark Beast
  • A theoretical X-Men newspaper comic

NEXT EPISODE: X-Force gets possessed!


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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!

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435 – Giant-Size Special #12 (feat. Kieron Gillen)

 

Illustration by David Wynne

In which we have had an eventful year; Longshot is a classic folk hero; writer Kieron Gillen makes a triumphant and mildly terrifying return to the show; and you remain the best listeners of any podcast, ever.

X-PLAINED:

  • Our tenth birthday party!
  • 2023
  • Longshot vol. 2 #1
  • Longshot as a folkloric archetype
  • Longshot (more) (again)
  • Dismal Nitch, Washington
  • The Thingee
  • Baum, Kansas
  • Corn
  • Betty
  • Barrie, Kansas
  • The Albony Avenue Sanitarium and several of its residents
  • Innocence, broadly
  • The Wuggly Ump, by Edward Gorey
  • Love
  • Immortal X-Men
  • Nathaniel Essex and several significant clones thereof
  • Defining Mister Sinister
  • Making Charles Xavier sympathetic
  • Reset phrases
  • Eternals
  • The 10th Annual Super Doctor Astronaut Peter Corbeau Awards for Excellence at X-Cellence
  • Many people to whom we are grateful

NEXT EPISODE: X-Men: Liberators


NOTE: If you want to avoid Immortal X-Men spoilers in our interview with Kieron Gillen, you can skip to 01:38:50 for the Corbeau Awards!

Special thanks to:

  • Matt Hunter
  • Dylan Higgins
  • Al Kennedy
  • Max Carleton
  • Kieron Gillen
  • Tea Fougner
  • Anna Stokes
  • All of our patrons
  • All of you listening, always <3

“Sinister Is Cloning This Town” performed by Steve and Erin Pence


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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!

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434 – Return to Cape Citadel

In which the X-Men turn 35; we pause to celebrate the death of Henry Kissinger; Jay is a space nerd; Marrow hang-dries her delicates; space shuttles are not rockets; the band gets back together; and the Danger Room isn’t the first piece of X-tech to get sentience and a robot body.

X-PLAINED

  • How Excalibur got a Blackbird
  • Uncanny X-Men #360
  • X-Men #80
  • Many callbacks
  • The Benassi Rocket
  • The Cassini Probe
  • The All-New, Slightly Off X-Men
  • The Grey King (Addison Falk)
  • Chaos and/or Xhaos (Dan Dash)
  • Mercury
  • Rapture (Sister Joy)
  • Crux (Cristal Lemiuex)
  • Landslide (Lee Broder)
  • The Founder
  • Super Doctor Astronaut Peter Corbeau (again)
  • The Mutant Defense Net
  • Heroic narration
  • Lack of spacefaring continuity
  • Friendship
  • Technology
  • Costumes
  • All-New All-Different Dungeons & Dragons

NEXT EPISODE: GIANT-SIZE WINTER SPECIAL #10


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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!

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