Illustration by David Wynne

In which we remain frustrated with Morrison’s Magneto; Esme Cuckoo’s hat game is lacking; and the status quo dies with Jean Grey.

X-PLAINED:

• Dubious X-relationships
• Some excellent songs from an excellent show
• New X-Men #149-150
• Various atrocities and catastrophes
• The resistance, such as it is
• Magneto’s limits
• A rebirth
• Neutron warheads
• The cavalry
• Yet another death of Magneto
• Yet another death of Jean Grey
• A peculiar epilogue
• A legacy of retcons
• A miasma of bleakness and futility
• The Xorn retcon
• Disability in “Planet X”
• Miracles of Magnetism

NEXT EPISODE: The future!

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Illustration by David Wynne

In which many plot threads come together; Charles Xavier is a catastrophically bad listener; you should probably not live in the Marvel Universe; bridges are really important; there’s nothing sexy about dying of heat exhaustion; and we judge Morrison’s Magneto and find him wanting.

X-PLAINED:

• What Xorn did after dying
• The story so far
• New X-Men #146-148
• Beast’s typing gloves
• Several innovative ways to type loudly
• Doomed plans
• A manufactured confrontation
• A trap
• Magneto reimagined
• Visual depictions of sweat
• “New Genosha”
• Death and rebirth
• Whether Magneto has a place in New X-Men; and if so, what
• A name for an era

NEXT EPISODE: Yet another death of Magneto

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Illustration by David Wynne

In which friends don’t let friends drink sparkling wine at the Hellfire Club; Cyclops is a Silent Hill protagonist; Fantomex is a cool dude; John Sublime has his grubby little fingers in everything; and three men do a lot of things to avoid going to therapy.

X-PLAINED:

• What happened to the World
• Weapon XVI
• New X-Men #142-145
• Fantomex (more) (again)
• The Weapon Plus program
• A large number of things men will do instead of going to therapy
• How to murder a nice, romantic mood
• The Hellfire Club, the rest of the time
• Jake Danials Whisky
• A drinking contest
• The Mysteries of Harris Burdick
• The World
• Weapon XV
• A series of B&Es
• Advanced Idea Mechanics (A.I.M.)
• Car cops
• Weapon XV’s feelings
• Weapon Plus’s secret space headquarters
• Education at the Xavier School
• Gender-swapped superheroes and heirs to superheroes

NEXT EPISODE: Magneto, unmasked!

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Illustration by David Wynne

In which Jean Grey crosses several lines; Emma Frost is killed; Bishop and Sage visit from X-Treme X-Men; mutants are weird; the plot thickens; Emma Frost is resurrected; and we learn several secrets of fly reproduction.

X-PLAINED:

• The brothers Xorn
• A question of reading order
• New X-Men #139-141
• Cosmic force problems
• A showdown
• A brief tour through the mind of Emma Frost
• A murder most foul
• Bishop (briefly) (again)
• Sage (briefly) (again)
• Many suspects
• One way to get drugs, I guess?
• A mysterious shack and its mysterious contents
• Perils and advantages of being a living computer
• A murder weapon
• Angel and Beak’s excellent babies
• A resurrection
• A subtly remarkable taxicab
• The advent of mixed-case lettering in Marvel comics
• How Angel and Beak’s reproductive cycle corresponds to actual fly reproduction

NEXT EPISODE: Assault on Weapon Plus

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Illustration by David Wynne

In which you should use drugs only with caution; a famous shirt makes its debut; Wolverine is the new Mary Worth; and you were never Quentin Quire’s age (unless you were).

X-PLAINED:

• What Quentin Quire’s been up to since discorporating
• New X-Men #135-138
• The Special Class
• Basilisk
• Ernst
• Dummy
• No Girl
• Whether the Xavier School should admit human students
• Quentin’s new look
• Kick (more) (again)
• The Omega Gang
• That one t-shirt
• How to punch up your Power Point presentation
• A somewhat fraught camping trip
• The Special Class vs. U-Men
• A secret
• Some kind of weird affair
• A riot, of sorts
• Wolverine’s unfortunate soul patch
• What actually happened to Jumbo Carnation
• Telepathic deconstruction
• The Cuckoos vs. Emma Frost
• A somewhat mysterious secondary mutation
• Denouement
• The subsequent evolution of Quentin Quire
• What’s happening to xplainthexmen.com when the show ends
• The telepathy-telekinesis overlap

NEXT EPISODE: Murder!

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Illustration by David Wynne

In which Warren Kenneth Worthington III is a terrible teacher; we are all Magneto’s children; Sooraya Qadir deserves a better origin story; teenagers have a lot of feelings; and we meet one of the modern age’s most controversial mutants.

X-PLAINED:

• The destiny of Quentin Quire
• New X-Men #131-134
• An underattended funeral
• How to fly? Kinda? I guess?
• A kiss
• A friendship
• Another bit of ruby quartz marginalia that will never be mentioned again
• A somewhat ill-founded psychic metaphor
• Emma Frost’s Dark Phoenix costume
• Some kind of weird affair
• Echoes of 9/11/2001
• Genosha, a year later
• Ghosts
• Polaris’s paternity
• Shocker (the mutant one)
• The last words of Genosha
• Islamophobia post 9/11
• Sooraya Qadir (Dust)
• An attempted hijacking and the aftermath thereof
• Some Shi’ar nonsense
• X-Corporation Mumbai
• Jumbo Carnation
• Telepathy class
• An artist’s interpretation of the fate of mankind if mutants are not driven out, as predicted by Bolivar Trask
• Accountability
• Professor X’s weird little paintings
• X-adjectives
• Best and worst X-Men with whom to share a psychic rapport

NEXT EPISODE: Quentin Quire’s teen angst bullshit gets a body count!

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Illustration by David Wynne

In which Xorn goes out on the town; silverware is morally neutral; Cyclops pursues dubious counsel; the X means ten; and Fantomex is eminently enjoyable.

X-PLAINED:

• The parentage of Hope Summers
• New X-Men #127-130
• Mutant Town
• A monster who is not a monster but is, perhaps, a metaphor
• X-Corporation Paris
• The whole Phoenix situation
• Fantomex
• Weapon XII
• A gene-hazard
• Corporal Animal
• E.V.A.
• The Weapon Plus program (somewhat)
• The World (somewhat)
• The Shi’ar Empire vs. Earth
• Xorn variations

NEXT EPISODE: A Memorial of Magnetism

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Illustration by David Wynne

In which Wolverine learns to fly; pants are a basic human right; we decide to cherry-pick our Xorn retcons; Xavier’s eyebrows follow his mind; and the first year of New X-Men ends with a bang.

X-PLAINED:

• The origin of the Shi’ar Imperial Guard
• New X-Men #124-126
• The current state of Charles Xavier’s body
• G-Type
• Neosaurus
• Plutonia
• Schism
• Oracle
• Stuf
• Gladiator (more) (again)
• Angel disambiguation
• Several plans
• Mutant justice
• Several miracles of magnetism
• Mummudrai
• Horror movie shit
• Subtle visual foreshadowing
• A ruse
• Education
• Long-lost family members
• What may or may not come after this

NEXT EPISODE: Fantomex!

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Illustration by David Wynne

In which Marvel goes wordless; Cassandra Nova breaks space; none of the X-Men have media training; and Gus was the best dog ever.

X-PLAINED:

• Erik the Red (more) (again)
• Kin Crimson
• A big messy bag of mutant glory
• New X-Men #121-123
• ‘Nuff Said
• A journey into Charles Xavier’s mind
• What Emma is drinking
• A fetus fight
• The criminal culpability of a fetus
• Space problems
• A cosplay challenge
• Space
• Charles Xavier’s weird last wish
• A press conference
• Teen romance
• The Stepford Cuckoos
• Gus
• Charles Xavier’s age
• Nanosentinels
• Stuf
• Pre-ride safety announcements from the X-Men
• Whether Cassandra Nova should’ve been a component of Onslaught

NEXT EPISODE: Cassandra Nova vs. the X-Men (Round 2)!

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Illustration by David Wynne

In which John Sublime sucks; Angel Salvatore rules; trauma does not justify evil; and you should never, ever, ever mess with Jean Grey.

X-PLAINED:

• A horrifying revelation
• The universe where Jay and Miles work for Cassandra Nova
• New X-Men #118-120
• John Sublime (more) (again)
• The U-Men
• Psychic energy, gender-reveal party-style
• The Stepford Cuckoos
• One way to disperse a mob
• An uncivil conversation
• The death and/or discomfort of many U-Men
• An awakening of sorts
• Squaring the phoenix
• Hank McCoy’s “coming out”

NEXT EPISODE: The Shi’ar invade!

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Illustration by David Wynne

In which several individuals are not what they seem; John Sublime sucks; Cyclops talks Xorn down from a cosmic ledge; we meet the inimitable Beak; and Cassandra Nova makes herself (limitedly) known.

X-PLAINED:

• John Sublime
• Marvelscope™
• New X-Men 2001 Annual
• New X-Men #117
• Xorn
• X-Corporation
• The U-Men
• Ao Jun (and his super gross mutant power)
• Synchronized heists
• Psychometry vs. telepathy
• A big eventual twist
• Beak (Barnell Bohusk)
• A kiss
• Some really fucked up use of telepathy
• Some Moira MacTaggert continuity nonsense

NEXT EPISODE: U-Men vs. X-Men

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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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