Jay & Miles X-Plain the X-Men

Category: podcasts

24 – Ororo, Queen of the Galaxy

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Stormerella print
Art by David Wynne.

In which Professor X is (canonically!) a jerk, Miles has Sidrian Hunter feelings, Kitty Pryde is Clarissa Darling with a dragon, we introduce a drinking game, the X-Men do Barbarella, Rachel has a ‘shipper moment, Rogue joins the team, Storm gets a haircut, Mastermind is still the worst, and Madelyne Pryor is underrated.

X-Plained:

  • Lockheed
  • Uncanny X-Men #168-175
  • Reset issues
  • A one-sided rivalry
  • The lowest-drama X-romance
  • The Cream of Wheat box as a metaphor for infinity
  • Kitty’s Kostume Korner
  • Rachel’s questionably-canon ships
  • The Morlocks
  • Class privilege and the mutant metaphor
  • Callisto
  • Caliban
  • Sunder
  • Plague
  • Masque
  • A dubbing error
  • Gender dimorphism in superhero media
  • Storm’s first major character arc
  • Our single favorite superhero artist
  • Rogue
  • Rogue’s accent
  • A Charles Xavier we can believe in
  • Yukio
  • Punk Storm
  • Madelyne Pryor
  • Closure
  • Cyclops vs. formalwear

Art Challenge: Send us your Kitty Pryde costume redesigns–any era, any codename–to xplainthexmen(at)gmail(dot)com

Next Week: Claremont and Miller’s Wolverine!

You can find a visual companion to the episode – and links to recommended reading – on our blog.

Find us on iTunes or Stitcher!

Support us on Patreon!

23 – Meet the New Mutants

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Art by David Wynne.
Art by David Wynne.

In which Rachel and Miles return triumphant, the X-Men get a second ongoing series, we hit peak Moira MacTaggert, R-A-H-N-E is definitely pronounced “rain,” Sam Guthrie is the nicest henchman, Claremont is hit-and-miss on cultural diversity, and Bobby da Costa is the teenageriest teenager of them all.

X-Plained:

  • Nova Roma
  • The New Mutants and The New Mutants
  • Marvel Graphic Novels
  • Greenberg the Vampire
  • call-backs
  • Karma
  • Wolfsbane
  • Sunspot
  • Cannonball
  • Mirage
  • Whitewashing in superhero comics
  • The mercurial Guthrie family
  • Xi’an the Obscure
  • The Dr. Claw Effect (and why Dr. Doom and Arcade are exceptions)
  • Donald Pierce
  • Eras of New Mutants
  • Lila Cheney
  • The Hellions

Next Week: The X-Men do Barbarella

You can find a visual companion to the episode – and links to recommended reading – on our blog.

Find us on iTunes or Stitcher!

Support us on Patreon!

22 – Through Death and Through Life

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scottandjeanv3_cropped
Art by David Wynne

In which Rachel and Miles celebrate an anniversary with a retrospective of one of the great romances of the Marvel universe; the Summers/Grey family tree is more of a transdimensional strawberry patch; the X-Men play some football; Professor Xavier is not a jerk; and Scott Summers and Jean Grey are the power couple of existentialism.

X-Plained

  • Summers kids
  • Scott and Jean
  • Feelings
  • X-Men #32
  • The worst date ever
  • Madelyne Pryor
  • Plot-relevant prosopagnosia
  • Three proposals
  • X-Factor #53
  • Uncanny X-Men #308
  • “Fatal Attractions”
  • That one panel that gets us every time
  • X-Men vol. 2 #30
  • Some really excellent wedding vows
  • The best kiss in X-Men
  • Cats Laughing
  • Why “One” is actually a pretty decent first dance
  • Existential ramifications of fictional romance

Next week: Rachel and Miles take a much-needed vacation.

Week after next: The New Mutants!

You can find a visual companion to the episode – and links to recommended reading – on our blog.

Find us on iTunes or Stitcher!

Support us on Patreon!

21 – Kurt Busiek at the Coffee-a-Go-Go

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Famous Five
Art by David Wynne

In which special guest Kurt Busiek is the J. Robert Oppenheimer of X-Men, Rachel and Miles learn to love the Silver Age, Cyclops gets a job, Bernard the Poet falls from grace, we really wish X-Men: The Secret Years was a real book, everyone recites poetry, and we still don’t get around to Marvels.

X-Plained:

  • METOXO, the Lava Man
  • The true, secret purpose of Rachel and Miles X-Plain the X-Men
  • The Phoenix retcon
  • Archival pocket dimensions
  • Enid Blyton’s X-Men
  • Early-to-mid-20th Century American Jewish Socialism
  • Why the X-Men are terrible mutant P.R.
  • Band names of the Silver Age
  • An X-Men series that might have been.
  • Why Cyclops should be the Rachel Maddow of Marvel
  • Quicksilver’s childhood dreams
  • The Coffee-a-Go-Go
  • Bernard the Poet
  • Zelda Kurtzberg
  • The Barefoot Beats

Next week: The wedding of Scott Summers and Jean Grey!

You can find a visual companion to the episode – and links to recommended reading – on our blog.

Find us on iTunes or Stitcher!

Support us on Patreon!

20 – The Brood They Carried

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In which Claremont levels up; the Brood are legitimately scary; Colossus is an ethical dude; Nightcrawler and Wolverine share beers in the face of certain death; Storm turns into a space whale; we are Carol Corps for life; New Mutants are really into Magnum, P.I.; Kitty meets a dragon; and Xavier dies (again).

X-Plained:

  • Broo
  • The Brood Saga (X-Men #161-167)
  • Paul Smith
  • Space fashion
  • A really terrible awards ceremony
  • Tim O’Brien’s X-Men
  • The Brood
  • How to tell a good Wolverine story
  • Rocket sharks
  • The single most badass magical-girl transformation sequence of all time
  • Binary
  • The X-Men’s Kobayashi Maru
  • Friendship (more) (again)
  • The Acanti
  • Whether Cyclops watches Star Trek
  • The New Mutants
  • Cloning
  • Our secret cold-open formula
  • Cosmic crossovers

Next Week: Kurt Busiek! We would have words with thee!

You can find a visual companion to the episode – and links to recommended reading – on our blog.

Find us on iTunes or Stitcher!

Support us on Patreon!

19 – Acorns and Swords

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In which we continue our delve into the eldritch end of the X-Universe, Illyana Rasputin has a rough childhood even by X-Men standards, Kitty Pryde is a Niven fan, Limbo is way metal, Vincent Price is our Belasco, and Rachel and Miles have feelings about female friendships in Claremont’s X-Men.

X-Plained:

  • Mikhail Rasputin
  • Hell dimensions, including but not limited to
    • The Void
    • The Dark Zone
    • The Hill
    • Limbo
    • The other Limbo
    • Yet a third Limbo
  • Reincarnation
  • Illyana Rasputin
  • Magic vs. Magik
  • Uncanny X-Men #160
  • Octopusheim
  • Stepping Disks
  • Otherplace
  • Belasco
  • Emergo
  • S’ym
  • Storm and Illyana: Magik #1-4
  • Bloodstones
  • Yet another set of alternate X-Men
  • Friendship
  • The Soulsword
  • Podcasting

You can find a visual companion to the episode – and links to recommended reading – on our blog.

Find us on iTunes or Stitcher!

Support us on Patreon!

 

Next week: In space, no one can hear you snikt.

18 – You’ve Got a Dracula Problem

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In which Dr. Nemesis is delightful, Bill Sienkiewicz foreshadows himself, Dracula hits on absolutely everyone, Blade Godwins a crossover event, Jubilee get a jet ski, the X-Men do Castlevania 2, Rachel and Miles pick a vacation destination, and Cyclops wants you to follow your heart.

X-Plained:

  • Dr. Nemesis
  • A very good page of a very good comic
  • Dracula variations
  • X-Men #159
  • Appropriate use of holy symbols
  • “The D”
  • Tomb of Dracula
  • Bloodstorm
  • Carrotstorm
  • Curse of the Mutants
  • Jubilee
  • Crossover events
  • Why we can’t have nice things
  • Some really sweet weaponry
  • The Dracula Reassembly Machine
  • Phone sex with Gambit
  • The point of being Lord of the Vampires
  • X-Club
  • Authorial voice in comics
  • Why there probably won’t be a Starjammers movie

Next Episode: Rachel and Miles go to Hell (kind of)!

You can find a visual companion to the episode – and links to recommended reading – on our blog.

Find us on iTunes or Stitcher!

Support us on Patreon!

17 – The Island of Dr. Corbeau

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In which we make our Comics Alliance debut, Cyclops makes a startling discovery, Carol Danvers joins the team (sort of), Chris Claremont calls out some bullshit, Havok still has terrible taste in hats, and Peter Corbeau gets his own theme music

Content note: In this episode, we spend a lot of time talking about a rape that occurs in a previous Avengers arc, the community and narrative response thereto, and the larger landscape and ethics of portrayals of sexual violence in superhero comics.

X-Plained

  • Mystique’s mercurial alliances
  • Rachel and Miles X-Plain the X-Men
  • Uncanny X-Men #154-158
  • Avengers Annual #10
  • Bollywood Starjammers
  • The dread Psi-Scream
  • Shi’ar Fashion Technology
  • Dr. Peter Corbeau (more) (again)
  • Rogue
  • Carol Danvers
  • The Whole Marcus Thing
  • Chris Claremont vs. rape culture
  • Computers
  • Gender politics of the Dark Phoenix Saga

Next week: Dracula!

Clarification, since we neglected to specify in the episode: Avengers #200 was written by James Shooter, George Pérez, Bob Layton, and David Michelinie; Avengers Annual #10 was written by Chris Claremont.

You can find a visual companion to the episode – and links to recommended reading – on our blog.

Find us on iTunes or Stitcher!

Support us on Patreon!

16 – The Official Unofficial Not-at-SDCC (Rachel and Miles X-Plain the) X-Men Panel

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In which we correct a startling omission, explore the current state of the X-Universe, and speculate wildly; Quentin Quire has excellent fashion sense; Rachel gets a new accessory; Miles goes off-brand; the X-Men are somewhat complicated; Iron Man has poor decision-making skills; Charles Xavier dies for real; Beast might be a supervillain; we briefly forget Marc Guggenheim’s first name; and the future remains a relative mystery.

For purposes of continuity, it’s probably worth noting that this episode was recorded before the SDCC Marvel panel.

X-Plained:

  • Quentin Quire
  • Patreon
  • A startling omission from the official SDCC lineup
  • The current state of the X-Men
  • Decimation
  • Dark Reign
  • Utopia
  • Schism
  • Avengers vs. X-Men
  • Mutant politics
  • Hope Summers
  • The Phoenix/P.E.N.I.S. five (again)
  • The (real) (this time) (we think) death of Charles Xavier
  • Teenager hijinks
  • Crossover events
  • Battle of the Atom
  • Semantics of supervillainy
  • How Wolverine is 100% definitely going to die
  • Jumping-on points
  • Current X-books
  • Jubilee

You can find a visual companion to the episode – and links to recommended reading – on our blog.

Find us on iTunes or Stitcher!

Support us on Patreon!

 

15 – The Ballad of Harvey and Janet

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In which we announce exciting new developments, the ASPCA should probably have a word with Emma Frost, Kitty Pryde gets a new costume, Lee Forrester is still the best, Cyclops has an octopus on his chest, Magneto has a change of heart, and Wolverine embraces transhumanism.

X-Plained:

  • The Thomas Hardy novel of superhero comics
  • Friendship
  • X-Men #148-152
  • Unstable Denim
  • Disco Dinner Clubs
  • Caliban (a little)
  • Kitty Pryde’s amazing fashion sense
  • Garokk the Unremarkable
  • Atlantean couture
  • Why Magneto is Interesting
  • The Massachusetts Academy
  • The Persona Exchange Gun
  • Harvey and Janet
  • How to win $2500 in 1980
  • Editorial Outsourcing

You can find a visual companion to the episode – and links to recommended reading – on our blog.

Find us on iTunes or Stitcher!

Support us on Patreon!