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Tag Archive for Amara Aquilla
263 – The Oldest Teens of Them All

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Art by David Wynne. Wanna buy the original? Drop him a line!
In which Cable and Domino may or may not be very old teenagers; disguises are not Dani Moonstar’s strong suit; Empath remains awful; Shatterstar probably talks exactly like a telenovela; X-Force needs an office manager; Mothra is larger than most things; and if you get to choose between being an External or a Guthrie, always be a Guthrie.
X-PLAINED:
- Bastion, to some extent
- X-Force #34-37
- Optical disambiguation
- Moonstar
- Face tentacle semantics
- Sandwiches (again)
- The Richter family
- An entirely avoidable fight
- Some time-travel bullshit
- Hannigan Electronics
- An insecurity system
- Nimrods
- Things neural networks would probably do instead of murdering you
- Defining traits of the Externals
- Adoption, X-Factor style
- Wolverine: The Long Night
NEXT EPISODE: Douglock!
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As Mentioned in Episode 255 – Rules of the Game

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LINKS & FURTHER LISTENING
- Miles was on Unpacking the Power of the Power Pack, which you can listen to right here!
- We were both all over the Internet in June.
255 – Rules of the Game

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Art by David Wynne. Wanna buy the original? Drop him a line!
In which the Upstarts are the worst at Calvinball; Moonstar remains a non-mystery; Speedball gets a new costume; Shinobi Shaw never gets to finish a bath; Gamesmaster comes perilously close to getting context; Cable gets a new superpower; and Rahne Sinclair is too good for your crossover.
X-PLAINED:
- The time Husk went evil
- An anniversary
- A guest appearance
- X-Force #32-33
- New Warriors #45-46
- A crossover
- A game
- Younghunt
- The semi-debut of Paige Guthrie
- Deeply uncomfortable bathing-suit choices
- A toy that never actually existed
- The New Warriors
- Justice (Vance Astrovik)
- Night Thrasher (Dwayne Taylor)
- Nova (Rich Rider)
- Silhouette (Sil Chord)
- Kymaera
- Speedball (Robbie Baldwin)
- Rage (Elvin Haliday)
- Firestar (Angelica Jones) (more) (again)
- A plan
- Bantam
- A lot of mind control
- A very ambiguous game and its potential implications
- Favorite ads
- The narrative economy of resurrection
NEXT EPISODE: Mullets of time & space!
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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!
Buy rad swag at our TeePublic shop!
As Mentioned in Episode 225 – Class Reunion (feat. Austin Gorton)
Listen to the episode here.
LINKS & FURTHER READING
- We talked all about Firestar in Episode 42 – A Firestar Is Born
- Check out Austin Gorton’s X-Aminations – writeups of every X-issue from 1963 on!
- Listen to Austin on his podcast, A Very Special Episode!
225 – Class Reunion (feat. Austin Gorton)

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Art by David Wynne. Wanna buy the original? Drop him a line!
In which we check in on Firestar and the New Warriors; superheroes often celebrate Bring Your Mom To The Amazon Day; Fabian Nicieza employs only the finest of lampshades; and Emma Frost still doesn’t apologize for blowing up that pony.
X-PLAINED:
- Vance Astro(vik)
- Penance (but not that one)
- Austin Gorton’s X-Aminations
- New Warriors #10
- Firestar (Angelica Jones)
- The New Warriors
- Visual representations of invisible mutant powers
- The Hellions (more) (again)
- Tarot and her Morrisonian powers
- Bevatrons
- Oxy-cution
- The inevitably increasing complexity of superhero origins
- The Miracle of Microwaves
- New Warriors #31
- Nova Roma
- Magma (Amara Aquilla) (or Allison Crestmere, I guess)
- A brief and futile attempt at Roman soldier disambiguation
- Empath and his large collection of red flags
- Gender-based intuition
- A massive, stupid, and quickly undone retcon
- Super-nature versus super-nurture
- The hypothetical psychological roots of Emma Frost’s fashion phases
NEXT EPISODE: X-Factor finally makes it to Genosha!
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 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.)
As Mentioned in Episode 136 – Fill-In Frenzy!
Listen to the episode here.


LINKS & FURTHER READING
136 – Fill-In Frenzy

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Art by David Wynne. Prints, cards, and coffee mugs available at the shop, or contact David to purchase the original.
In which we find the idea of Jack Kirby as G-d deeply comforting; “Jercules” is our new favorite insult; the difference between camp and divinity is good backlighting; Zeus does not have the moral high ground; Ron Lim’s Captain Britain is the definitive cad; the Demon Druid is the saddest supervillain; Archangel broods like it’s his day job; and Jay gets to do all the fun voices for once.
X-PLAINED:
- The Upstarts
- An inflatable Batman
- New Mutants #81
- Excalibur #20
- X-Factor #47
- Our favorite Magma story
- The best insult
- Pugilistic impunity
- A context-inappropriate oath
- The worst film festival
- Fighting fire with Magma
- The Demon Druid
- A Satanic pirate tavern
- Reactorhenge
- The depths of fuchsia
- Archangel’s deeply weird comfort mechanisms
- Some dude named Greg
- Publishing delays
NEXT WEEK: Lady Mandarin, feat. Sarah Kuhn
You can find 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 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.)
Buy prints (or mugs) of this week’s illustration at our shop, or contact David Wynne for the original!
119 – Red Night of the Soul (feat. Elisabeth Allie)

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Art by David Wynne. Prints and cards available at the shop, or contact David to purchase the original.
In which Elisabeth hacks the Matrix; Magneto is the worst at small talk; Hela overreaches; parents just don’t understand human speech; everything is better with super-rings; Selene has a Xena moment; almost anything can be solved with a kiss; and even if you transform Doug Ramsey into a giant red murder monster, he’ll still be a huge nerd.
X-PLAINED:
- The S-Men
- New Mutants Forever #1-5
- Magma’s revised family tree
- Updating the New Mutants
- The delicate balance of the Forever line
- The web
- Idiom confusion
- A flawed cultural analogy
- Tiberius the Generic
- Several profoundly dubious costumes
- Family resemblance
- Skull v. Skull
- The dearth of canonically asexual X-characters
NEXT EPISODE: Different Nazis
Miles here – in one of the questions for this episode, I conflated asexuality and aromanticness. Those are totally two different things. Apologies – I’m still learning!
You can find a visual companion to this episode on our blog!
Find us on iTunes, Google Play, or Stitcher!
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!
Buy prints of this week’s illustration at our shop, or contact David Wynne for the original!
As Mentioned in Episode 96 – Horsemen of the Playground
Listen to the episode here.
