In which there’s nothing inherently wrong with monster-of-the-week; Marrow’s makeover extends to her font; Red Skull gets a Power Glove; Marvel sets up a slate of spinoffs; and you should hire Matt Hunter to produce your podcast!

X-PLAINED:

• What Danger’s been up to lately
• Uncanny X-Men #371
• X-Men #91
• X-Men Annual 1999
• Crossover cover design
• Skrullverine
• Machine Man
• Dethlok vs. Dethklok
• Jack Truman (Agent 18) (to some extent)
• A nice dress
• An awkward reunion
• Gambit as a mentor
• Billy G.
• A daring but silly rescue
• Several upcoming series
• Marrow’s bone bikini and/or pubes
• Whether Rogue can absorb animals

NEXT EPISODE: Cecilia Reyes returns from retirement!

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In which Roadhouse is basically a Wolverine story; Spider-Man does crimes; space names are derivative; there are lots of good reasons to yell at Professor Xavier; the X-Men do Doctor Who; Galactus is not interested in your puny human feelings; Marrow gets a new look; the Skrulls need a crash course in UI; and we overthink bones.

X-PLAINED:

• The time the Skrulls did “A Piece of the Action”
• The trouble with benevolent dictatorships
• X-Men #89-90
• Uncanny X-Men #370
• A New York City that is not in fact New York City
• “Spider-Man”
• A ruse
• Faces
• Skrull problems
• Mar-Vell
• Adam Warlock
• Sass vs. joviality
• Skrull Cop City
• Disguises
• Nova (Frankie Raye)
• How Galactus eats planets
• Condiments
• Several melees
• Bone pubes
• Skrull UI
• Whether Moopsy could drink Wolverine’s bones
• X-Musicals

NEXT EPISODE: The return of Douglock!

The Roald Dahl short story whose title Jay couldn’t recall is “Beware of the Dog.”

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SPOILER WARNING: ALL OF THEM, NONSTOP

In which Barry Windsor-Smith is too sexy for television; we know what happens when unstable molecules get struck by lightning; X-Men gets political and does it spectacularly; this Captain America would not sew the cape; Magneto continues to throw things into space; and they kissed and we missed it.

X-PLAINED:

• Fabian Cortez’s name
• X-Men ’97 episodes 6-10
• Lifedeath I & II: a surprising adaptation
• Varying levels of going in blind
• A somewhat different and possibly better Forge
• The Adversary vs. the Owl Queen
• Stormiest and least-Stormy costumes
• Professor Charles Xavier, Official Space Boyfriend
• Colonialism vs. Identity
• Delayed catharsis
• The narrative power of altered opening credits
• What makes allyship effective (and not)
• Justified mutant anger
• The worst version of Nina DaCosta
• What makes Prime Sentinels scary
• Summers family feels
• The best damned fight scenes out there
• Bastion, robo-avatar of conservative white patriarchy
• Simultaneous crossovers
• A psychic gay bar
• A last boss arena
• Acolyte equivalencies
• Phoenix Ex Machina
• Crying
• Whether Magneto was right
• Apoca-futures and Apoca-pasts
• A bulletin board and our hopes for its contents
• Soft Serve
• Kitty Pryde’s coffee shop AU
• X-Men ’97 as the perfect gateway

NEXT EPISODE: Skrulls!

LINKS AND FURTHER READING:

• The Judgment of Magneto by Asher Elbein

No visual companion this week!

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SPOILER WARNING: ALL OF THEM, NONSTOP

In which we put the comics on hold to take a look at X-Men ’97; it is still always Inferno in here; Wolverine is best used sparingly; a Marvel show finally embraces politics; Wolverine is best in small doses; Madeylne Pryor still always deserves better; Jubilee grows up; and we are all in on this series.

X-PLAINED:

• “Beyond Good and Evil”
• X-Men: The Animated Series and our respective feelings about it
• X-Men ’97, episodes 1-5
• Watching X-Men ’97 with and without context
• Making animated Cyclops work
• The Magneto’s-hair-length morality index
• Politics
• Voices
• Adaptation pacing
• Agency
• Abcissa
• Foreshadowing
• Time compression
• Horniest Rogue
• Death in cartoons
• A metaphor
• Nonbinary identity in 1997
• Character evolution

NEXT EPISODE: Episodes 6-10

No visual companion this week!

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In which Magneto is not full of mirth; nobody real or fictional likes Fabian Cortez; when you’re a speedster, every problem is a metaphorical nail; The Zealot makes some valid points; and when Quicksilver declares himself your conscience, it’s time to examine your life.

X-PLAINED:

• How Magneto got his powers back
• Morally ambiguous hair
• Genosha (more) (again)
• Magneto Rex #1-3
• Magneto vs. Conan
• Trish Tilby
• Omniscient narrative condemnation
• Magneto’s true archfoe
• Magistrates (more) (again)
• Mutates (more) (again)
• Dr. Alda Huxley
• Phillip Moreau (more) (again)
• Jenny Ransome (more) (again)
• Pipeline (Cormac Grimshaw)
• Teleportational nudity
• The Zealot
• Fabian Cortez (more) (again)
• Amelia Voght (more) (again)
• Several of Magneto’s on-again-off-again children
• The Bastille (but not that one)
• Mutant numbering
• When to use full frontal nudity in your comic
• The X-books we’re not covering
• The Amulet of Right vs the Sword of Might

NEXT EPISODE: X-Men ’97!

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In which we remain fascinated by Magneto’s robot butler; murder is Logan’s love language; the Juggernaut punches a hole in reality; Professor Xavier makes it weird; and Storm lectures several gods.

X-PLAINED:

• Silly mutant powers
• Uncanny X-Men #368-369
• X-Men #88
• Alan Davis’s X-Men run
• Magneto’s robot butler
• Joseph’s funeral
• Nun-sense
• A voyage to another dimension
• Eyebrow power
• Ejulp
• The Trion
• The other Gem of Cyttorak that’s like the first one but somehow worse
• Several comas
• Juggernaut vs. Juggernaut
• Evil, kind of
• Vacationing with X-Men characters
• Illyana Rasputin and Rachel Summers

NEXT EPISODE: Magneto Rex

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In which we celebrate our tenth anniversary by X-Plaining what may be the most reviled X-arc; you should not try this at home; Mystique is so much better than this story; Azazel is a really boring devil; Nightcrawler should probably be missing a hand; the Xavier School definitely does not have an HR department; and we would prefer that you not pee on Iceman.

X-PLAINED:

• Nightcrawler’s (most recent) parentage
• Uncanny X-Men #428-434
• X-Men Blue: Origins #1
• The X-Men, like, in general
• Nightcrawler (Kurt Wagner)
• Some narrative choices
• Mystique
• Baron Christian Wagner
• Marvel Europe
• Azazel
• Church sex
• Nightstreaker
• Isla des Demonas
• Foibles of Warren Kenneth Worthington III
• Annie and Carter Ghazikhanian
• Abyss
• Kiwi Black
• The Cheyarafim and Neyaphem
• Bad times with psychic therapy
• Post-traumatic supervillainy
• Uncool Hell
• A miracle of magnetism
• The only cool thing in Uncool Hell
• A very elegant retcon
• X-Muppets
• Characters who deserve more page space
• Miles’s favorite X-Person
• What the Worthington Corporation does
• A character who could reasonably be Azazel’s kid

NEXT EPISODE: Back to X-business as usual!

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In which artist Russell Dauterman joins us to discuss super-powered costume design!

X-PLAINED:

• Why it’s important to get a professional to design your superhero costume
• Why Miles doesn’t trust the government
• Russell’s history at Marvel
• Designing for the Hellfire Gala
• Mutant fashion
• The word “fashionize”
• Iconic looks
• Modernizing superhero costumes
• Powers vs. personality
• Punk goddess Storm
• Designing for drawability
• Magic hair
• Russell’s influences
• Definitive Rogue costumes
• X-Men ‘97
• Best X-team costumes
• Jay’s holy grail cosplay
• Magic hair, cosplayed
• Costume retrospectives
• Where to find Russell online
• Evil twin trends of the 1990s
• Fuck You Pink

NEXT EPISODE: Jay & Miles Live at the Clinton Street Theater!

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Feral’s back – just in time to wreck Jay’s voice again! (And Siryn’s, but we’ll get to that later.) (X-Force #88)

In which timeline math is almost never worth it; Tarot comes back from the dead (kind of) (maybe); Magma makes a heel turn; “King Bedlam” would be a great name for a ska band; not every nude man can turn into a bear; and you don’t have to talk to your supervillain relatives.

X-PLAINED:

• The Triune Understanding
• Birthday party follow-up
• X-Force #87-90
• Legacy and continuity
• Bedlam (Jesse Aaronson)
• Tarot (Marie-Ange Colbert)
• Goat Simulator
• King Bedlam (Christopher Aaronson)
• The New Hellions
• Perils of body-swapping
• Linear time
• Science
• Armageddon Man
• Paradigm
• Senator Owen Danville
• Family
• A fancy hat
• Madame Web
• Many natural disasters
• Early Genoshan history
• Longshot as a villain

NEXT EPISODE: Dressing the X-Men with Russell Dauterman!

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In which everything is an event these days; Skin may or may not have a skeleton; everyone has a crush on Synch; we are intrigued by Integer; and it’s hard to be Emma Frost.

X-PLAINED:

• War of the Mutants
• Generation X #50
• X-Man #50
• Nate Grey (again)
• Adrienne Frost
• Science
• Dark Beast (again)
• Gene Nation
• Vessel
• Hemingway
• Membrain
• Fever Pitch
• Dark Opsidian
• Iron Maiden
• Wynter
• Tattoos
• More science
• Integer
• Trauma
• Multiversal designations
• The Morlock Tunnels

NEXT EPISODE: X-Force vs the New Hellions

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Ah, the age-old question: would you scissor your clone while yelling? (Uncanny X-Men #367) In which the Magneto War comes to a close. X-PLAINED: X-Men #86-87 Uncanny X-Men #367 Quite a few other things, which we'll add to this post tomorrow! NEXT EPISODE: Nate Grey meets Generation X! Check out the visual companion to this episode on our blog! Find us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify! 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!