X-Men '97 w/ Elana Levin

[00:00:00] To me, my Seshmen. On today's episode of Struggle Session, we're joined by Elana Levin, host of Graphic Policy Radio, to discuss X-Men 97, the action, the drama, the love triangles, politics, all that and more on today's Struggle Session.

[00:00:32] Don't you understand?

[00:00:34] Sting!

[00:01:24] Admiration for those who fought despite the odds. But you know what the oddest thing was? No one seemed shocked or surprised. Not even me. Yes, I'm scared, but really, I just had the most profound sense of déjà vu. As if past, present, and future didn't matter and never had. Because we always end up in the same ugly place.

[00:01:49] The thing is, Magneto knows us better than Charles ever did. Knows we know better. That most of us experience tragedies like Genosha as a bit of déjà vu before getting on with our day.

[00:02:03] But the scariest thing about Genosha wasn't the death or the chaos. It was a thought. The only sane thought you can have when being chased by giant robots that were built to crush you. Magneto was right.

[00:02:21] Yes, Magneto was right. Welcome to Struggle Session. I'm your host, Leslie Lee III. Thank you so much for joining us today. Whether it's on Spreaker, on Spotify, or if you're one of our subscribers on patreon.com slash struggle session or struggle session dot substech dot com, where you're getting every episode ad free along with hundreds of bonus episodes, commentaries, miniseries,

[00:02:51] all sorts of great stuff. I thank you all for listening. Love getting your feedback and got some great feedback on our last bonus episode, our crossover with Party Girls, where Jamie Peck and I talked about two absolute classic zombie films from George Romero.

[00:03:13] Make sure you check out those flicks and that episode if you haven't. As always, you can get the bonus feed at patreon.com slash struggle session.

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[00:04:03] Speaking of things cooking, we got a couple of great episodes coming up with some fantastic guests, Matt Bores and Ben Clarkson.

[00:04:12] Of the Justice Warriors comic will be back on the sesh talking political thrillers and the new volume of their hit comic book, Justice Warriors Vote Harder.

[00:04:23] Sam of Liberation Martial Arts will join us to talk about some MMA and the recent bizarre spectacle of UFC heavyweight champion John Bones Jones celebrating his title victory with President-elect Donald Trump.

[00:04:42] All that and more coming to Struggle Session.

[00:04:46] Sesh.show is the website.

[00:04:48] Patreon, Substack.

[00:04:50] That's enough preamble.

[00:04:52] On with the show with our very special guest, Ilana Levin.

[00:04:57] So, Ilana, you're an X-Men expert.

[00:05:00] When did you get your start with the X-Men?

[00:05:01] So, I began – the X-Men were kind of my first comic, I think.

[00:05:08] I began reading comics when my brother began reading comics.

[00:05:11] I'm the oldest, which meant that he was seven and I was in junior high.

[00:05:15] And that was sort of like right at the coming of the Jim Lee sort of era of X-Men.

[00:05:25] And, you know, Claremont was gone.

[00:05:27] It was all the new generation Fabian Nietzscheza was writing and stuff like that.

[00:05:33] And I loved them immediately because I have been political and pretentious my entire life.

[00:05:41] And as a junior high kid, I was like, oh, these are comics.

[00:05:44] It's something to say.

[00:05:45] So, this is the shit.

[00:05:47] And my favorite X-Men series was X Factor.

[00:05:51] Peter David wrote the whole damn thing with a number of different artists working on it.

[00:05:57] But I grew up in the D.C. area and I was like, oh, my God, here's the one where the superhero team is a government agency, which makes sense.

[00:06:04] It's realistic.

[00:06:05] This is how my brain worked as a child.

[00:06:07] So, that was really my book.

[00:06:10] And so, I was beginning to read comics right before the show basically came out.

[00:06:19] Yeah.

[00:06:19] I got my start a little bit earlier.

[00:06:21] I remember my first comic book was actually a Wolverine comic that my mom bought me from the stands.

[00:06:28] It was very confusing because it was one of the ones where he was called Patches.

[00:06:33] Oh.

[00:06:33] And I was just like, so it was like he's undercover.

[00:06:36] I was like, who is this guy?

[00:06:37] What is his name?

[00:06:38] Why does he have three different names?

[00:06:40] But he had claws for hands, even though he barely used them in that issue.

[00:06:44] But I was like, oh, my God, this dude is the coolest dude in the world.

[00:06:48] And I've been a big Wolverine fan since.

[00:06:51] And I remember when that Jim Lee X-Men came out.

[00:06:56] The X-Men number one is when I really got hardcore into comics collecting.

[00:07:03] And, of course, like a few issues later, Jim Lee is quitting to form Image Comics,

[00:07:09] which was a pretty cool labor action that happened very early on.

[00:07:17] It kind of impressed me at a young age.

[00:07:19] And I was thinking back, like the comic books for the X-Men got really kind of,

[00:07:24] I really fell off of reading Marvel after that because I knew that something had been lost losing all these, you know, creators.

[00:07:34] So I always felt like it was a good time for that to happen because I was not loyal to the brand or the character.

[00:07:40] I was more interested in the art and the artist.

[00:07:44] So you became an image reader at that point, basically?

[00:07:46] Yeah.

[00:07:48] It actually coincided.

[00:07:50] And this will tie in with the cartoon a bit.

[00:07:54] There was an X-Men crossover called Executioner's Song.

[00:07:59] Did you ever hear about that or read that?

[00:08:01] Yeah.

[00:08:03] But I haven't read it.

[00:08:04] It's just notorious.

[00:08:06] Okay.

[00:08:06] It's notorious because they went through all the little, first of all, they had like holographic covers.

[00:08:12] So they jacked up the price on a lot of the comics, right?

[00:08:15] So you're already, you're fighting with mom because the comics cost more.

[00:08:18] And then you got to get all the parts.

[00:08:20] You got to get X-Factor.

[00:08:21] You got to get X-Men.

[00:08:22] You got to get Uncanny X-Men.

[00:08:24] You got to get X-Force, which I love, you know?

[00:08:27] But you had this big long crossover.

[00:08:30] You're buying 13 issues.

[00:08:31] I think even a couple of annuals are mixed in.

[00:08:34] And it's just like the crappiest, most boring ending story that you can imagine.

[00:08:41] Like it really.

[00:08:42] And when we, all my friends, we were all collecting these comics and trying to get them all together.

[00:08:47] And that was like our first big time getting screwed over by a major crossover.

[00:08:52] And we were like, said, fuck that.

[00:08:54] We're reading image like exclusively from now on.

[00:08:57] And we fell off X-Men.

[00:08:59] But the cartoon was always, almost always pretty goddamn good.

[00:09:04] And one of the highlights of my childhood was waking up on Saturday mornings to see the cartoon.

[00:09:10] Whatever the turmoil was happening in the print, the cartoon was always, almost always pretty great.

[00:09:18] I felt so lucky to have it, you know?

[00:09:21] I mean, it's kind of a miracle.

[00:09:22] Yeah, exactly.

[00:09:24] Going back and watching it now.

[00:09:26] And I just watched a recap of all the stuff that went on on it.

[00:09:30] It's like, it's not a Saturday morning cartoon, like at all.

[00:09:34] It's like this complex melodrama about trauma and sexual desire.

[00:09:39] And like all this bizarre, like psychosexual stuff in like, with like these cartoon characters in these ridiculous situations.

[00:09:49] And this paramilitary school for adults.

[00:09:54] But still, like, it works.

[00:09:56] It works on a basic level.

[00:09:58] Because it really just, instead of doing the Saturday morning cartoon formula.

[00:10:03] Where you have the good guys and the bad guys.

[00:10:05] And they have this almost sitcom-y situation.

[00:10:07] They got to get through.

[00:10:09] And it's very formulaic.

[00:10:10] They tell this long, overlapping, recursive storyline.

[00:10:16] Which is quite complex when you break it down.

[00:10:19] Similar to what made the Chris Claremont run.

[00:10:22] And so, um, groundbreaking.

[00:10:24] Yeah, I've been doing a rewatch, actually, of the animated series.

[00:10:27] I had not revisited it as an adult, really.

[00:10:31] Um, so I sort of, we just really have been just diving through.

[00:10:36] And it is not my favorite animated show.

[00:10:41] But it's very impressive and very good.

[00:10:45] It surprises you.

[00:10:46] It's surprisingly complex.

[00:10:48] It's surprisingly emotional.

[00:10:51] Going back at, is the animation always great?

[00:10:54] Not necessarily.

[00:10:55] But you can tell that there's some episodes that are better than others.

[00:10:57] There's going to be moments where we're like, oh, they brought in the A-team for this one.

[00:11:00] Um, but yeah, one of the things that is so great about the show is because I missed the Claremont era in comics.

[00:11:07] What I know, or what I sort of knew in my brain as the classic X-Men stories was stuff that I had absorbed from the TV show.

[00:11:16] And the TV show was basically just doing the whole Claremont run and sort of cleaning it up into a streamlined, coherent, easier to sell, more compact thing.

[00:11:27] But that was capturing so much of what the narrative through the sprawling comics were as well.

[00:11:32] Um, yeah, it's mostly, it's in a lot of ways, there are a lot of improvements.

[00:11:36] And I think we talked about this on our Days of Future Past episode.

[00:11:39] So, like, the comic is alright, but the cartoon version makes it, like, makes the story, like, work a lot better than the actual comic.

[00:11:49] It's hard because it's like, on the one hand, I don't like people taking a story away from Shadowcat and giving it to Wolverine.

[00:11:54] But, like, there is a sort of elegance to how it is told that way, for sure.

[00:12:00] Yeah, and there's, and there's less, uh, Chris Claremont racism, I think, is what we, what we talked about at the time.

[00:12:07] It's like, awkward white guy trying to say the thing and then actually being like, no, maybe you actually don't know enough to talk about this.

[00:12:15] Have you considered that you may not be capable of doing this right now?

[00:12:19] On the topic, the original X-Men cartoon, it really drove home that allegory for the X-Men of being about oppression and, you know, race and gender and sexuality.

[00:12:34] Which X-Men 97 picks up big time?

[00:12:37] Oh, yeah.

[00:12:38] I was so impressed and relieved that the show was as political and ambitious as it was.

[00:12:45] You know, that's not a given.

[00:12:46] Like, it's inherent that you can't tell an X-Men story without it being political.

[00:12:51] But this show went so much farther than I thought it was going to.

[00:12:56] And I was so impressed by that.

[00:12:58] I mean, you could technically do it if you turn it into just, like, mutants fighting mutants because of whatever reason.

[00:13:07] You know, you could turn it into G.I. Joe.

[00:13:09] But they definitely do not do that in X-Men 97, which you can watch on Disney Plus or anywhere else where you watch stuff very, very easily.

[00:13:20] I'm sure that they have enough of your money already.

[00:13:23] It took me a while to get into the show.

[00:13:26] But once I did, I was hooked.

[00:13:29] I think it maybe starts off a little bit slow.

[00:13:32] But as it progresses, it becomes some of the best, you know, X-Men stuff I've seen.

[00:13:38] And some of the best of this type of cartoon I think I've seen.

[00:13:42] Absolutely.

[00:13:42] I mean, the show is just tremendous.

[00:13:44] I have found that a lot of people who are not superhero cartoon show watchers but are interested in political pop culture can be sold on watching this.

[00:13:57] And you really don't have to have watched the original series at all to be able to watch this.

[00:14:02] And my old beloved paid intern from my podcast, a hardcore DC kid, I think like DC Comics, not Marvel, like 19 years old.

[00:14:16] And they were saying, like, I've never seen an X-Men thing and I fucking love this show.

[00:14:21] I'm like, great.

[00:14:22] So there you go.

[00:14:23] Oh, that's interesting because I was wondering, you know, how easy it would be for somebody who doesn't know anything to get in.

[00:14:30] So I didn't do a refresher.

[00:14:33] And I was surprised by how many direct callbacks there were to the original series.

[00:14:40] I mean, X-Men 97 picks off like, it feels like it picks up like the day after.

[00:14:44] Yes.

[00:14:45] Like the last episode of the series.

[00:14:47] Like surprisingly so.

[00:14:48] I actually assumed because this was produced by Disney that there would be some kind of soft reboot going on.

[00:14:56] But it doesn't really seem like there is.

[00:14:58] It's like people have finally learned the lesson that audiences are savvy enough to understand serial narrative without having to begin at the beginning every damn fucking time.

[00:15:08] You can just start the story.

[00:15:10] Like they can just start happening.

[00:15:13] And man, a lot of shit happens.

[00:15:16] They really go for it in this series.

[00:15:19] There's lots of adaptations.

[00:15:21] And folks, we may get into some spoilers here.

[00:15:24] I was spoiled on it, I don't think, because people were talking about it week to week.

[00:15:29] Which is another big thing that I think helped the show's popularity.

[00:15:34] Like it was something that people kept being excited to see every week replicating how we felt when we were kids watching the original series.

[00:15:42] But we will be getting into some spoilers.

[00:15:45] I don't think it really.

[00:15:47] If you know anything about X-Men, it's a lot of the same stuff you've seen from the comics.

[00:15:50] But there's some stuff that goes down differently.

[00:15:53] Like I won't say, but like there is a death that was not expected, for example.

[00:15:59] Yes, there is one big death.

[00:16:01] And we will give you the warning as we get into it.

[00:16:05] X-Men 97, it starts off with, yes, Professor Xavier died in the last episode of the original series.

[00:16:12] He's actually not died, was dying, but sent off to live with his she-are girlfriend because she's the only one who can heal him.

[00:16:24] And so he's off planet.

[00:16:26] He's out of the picture.

[00:16:27] And X-Men 97 begins with Magneto saying, all right, this is my shop now.

[00:16:33] Now, Professor Xavier, he sent me a text.

[00:16:36] He told me that he wants me to run the X-Men.

[00:16:40] So to me, my X-Men.

[00:16:42] And, you know, some of them are pissed off about it.

[00:16:45] Some of them, but most of them kind of agree to go along with it.

[00:16:49] And that sends the series down a very different path because it's much more, I think, even more political than the original series because you're now from the perspective of Magneto, who is a lot more hard line about this shit.

[00:17:06] You know, he is, you know, the classic example comparison is always supposed to be MLK and Malcolm X.

[00:17:14] But, you know, the pop culture bastardized versions of those two figures.

[00:17:20] Yeah.

[00:17:21] They're actually.

[00:17:22] Yeah.

[00:17:22] I just have to always digress to be like the line that that was intentional is not accurate.

[00:17:29] It was stuff that fans began saying that Stanley repeated because it made him sound like a serious writer.

[00:17:37] And obviously the story was always very political, but it was not drawn specifically as a civil rights allegory of that nature.

[00:17:44] And in fact, like if you're looking at the original comic, the original comics in the 60s, like it's just more, it's more effective as a metaphor for like a group of Jews in the suburbs trying to assimilate, which is not shockingly a lot closer to the lived experience of the people writing the series.

[00:18:02] Then whether or not one should join like a militarized, like radical, like black group or not.

[00:18:08] Like, so, and again, like, yeah, it's like, this is like, you know, MLK would never have done any of this fucking Professor X bullshit.

[00:18:16] Like, it's just like, no, Professor X is very complicit with the government and the government is not sending Professor X subliminal messages telling him to kill himself.

[00:18:27] Like it's, we did a whole episode on my podcast thousands of years ago that we've actually gotten, gotten the audio cleaned up because this is like from the days of like not great audio.

[00:18:38] So, but with a couple of different historians talking about the problem with the use of that metaphor, like as a sort of a catch all way to describe the story that was being told.

[00:18:53] So like, if you want to hear like black historians and comics historians, like talking about like why that, why it's not an easy one for one metaphor, as well as like, that wasn't what was being done in the comics in the sixties.

[00:19:09] Like go listen to, I'll send the link graphic policy radio.

[00:19:12] We did a whole thing on this.

[00:19:14] But that's not to say that the comic wasn't always, that it wasn't very, it was very political.

[00:19:18] Like the first issues are all about the red scare.

[00:19:20] Like that's, you know, but yeah, you're right.

[00:19:23] Like this is not like Professor X is not radical.

[00:19:27] Like MLK at any point in time under anybody's pen.

[00:19:32] And what we keep coming back to in X-Men 97 is like Xavier fucked up.

[00:19:40] Like his plan is not working.

[00:19:42] Things have just keep getting worse for, for the mutants doing it his way.

[00:19:48] Even Magneto tries to do things Xavier's way and ends up not working out for extremely complicated X-Men reasons.

[00:19:58] What did you think of the lineup of X-Men that we got in this series?

[00:20:04] And, you know, how, how they were, you know, kind of organized because it's, you know, Magneto is the leader.

[00:20:10] And then right under him, like second in command, we got Rogue who got, you know, up.

[00:20:16] You've got a push in this series.

[00:20:18] Yeah.

[00:20:18] It's interesting.

[00:20:19] I mean, she's definitely is sort of a co-protagonist in a lot of ways through here.

[00:20:25] But I feel like Storm, you know, is kind of established as being like the key leader until she threw a certain point in the story.

[00:20:35] You know, I mean, the cast is the same as the cast from the, from the, from the old show.

[00:20:41] You know, they, they remembered that Morph existed and brought them back, which like I had forgot, I had forgotten that Morph wasn't just in the, you know, original 90s series getting killed.

[00:20:53] And then that was it.

[00:20:53] And I had forgotten that Morph came back.

[00:20:55] But yeah, they got tortured.

[00:20:58] They got brainwashed and tortured by Mr. Sims.

[00:21:01] I know, you know, and so, so it's like, it's the same cast really.

[00:21:05] Um, you know, include, I mean, even having like Bishop disappear almost like immediately to go back to his own time.

[00:21:11] I'm like, yeah, that happens.

[00:21:13] Um, so I, I mean, it did, it made sense.

[00:21:16] Um, and, but I, I was really excited about them bringing Magneto in in a central way because I mean, truly one of the biggest shifts in polarity, pun intended, in any pop culture narrative in my lifetime has been the shift to recognize that Magneto is right.

[00:21:31] Right.

[00:21:31] Yes.

[00:21:32] And like you, if you're going to do an X-Men story now, you're going to have to have Magneto in a protagonist like role because he's who we understand to like.

[00:21:41] Like have been making legitimate points.

[00:21:45] So he's there, you know, and he said his fabulous opera gloves, which is just great.

[00:21:50] Um, my, uh, my late friend, Stephen Adwell, um, who died this spring and, uh, made sure that we recorded an episode of the show before he did.

[00:22:02] And, um, was pointing out that the, he like drew some similarity between how Magneto was wearing his hair long in this and the way, um, broken samurai are depicted in anime.

[00:22:14] And I was just like, I would not have picked up.

[00:22:16] Oh, wow.

[00:22:16] Right.

[00:22:17] And I was like, you're right.

[00:22:18] That is his haircut.

[00:22:19] And that was just to show that they're feeling emotional.

[00:22:21] And I'm like, that is how Magneto would feel when his boyfriend dies.

[00:22:25] His, but it's ex-boyfriend dies, Xavier or whatever.

[00:22:27] Um, you know, even though it was, you know, so it was like, it was, it was a really interesting insight.

[00:22:31] Cause I, I hadn't really, I was like, yeah, they gave him, you know, long hair cause it looks cool.

[00:22:35] It's like, no, it's not just cause it looks cool.

[00:22:37] It's cause they're doing an anime thing.

[00:22:38] Like, okay, well, there we are.

[00:22:40] Um, but, uh, but yeah, like I love this take on Magneto.

[00:22:45] The voice actor was tremendous and you know, the opera gloves are, they should stay.

[00:22:50] Yeah.

[00:22:50] I liked the suits.

[00:22:52] I, I expected them to do a lot of different things.

[00:22:54] I expect them to change the cast up.

[00:22:56] I expect them to change the suits up.

[00:22:58] Uh, you know, just because that's just what you expect.

[00:23:01] These modern retailers, but they just didn't, they just went with, in fact, they got, they even went backwards and got even more like comic booky.

[00:23:09] costumes at certain points.

[00:23:11] Well, I, I, I love that.

[00:23:13] Like the one real costume update that you get is Jubilee switching from her 80, switching to us to her late nineties costume at one point.

[00:23:22] Cause, which I think is cool.

[00:23:23] Cause it's a little bit more grown up in style.

[00:23:25] It was more like scuba suit trench coat combination.

[00:23:28] Yeah.

[00:23:29] So we did get one, you know, pretty significant addition with sunspot who has an ongoing storyline slash bro friendship.

[00:23:38] Friendship pants, maybe with Jubilee.

[00:23:40] I do.

[00:23:40] They kiss.

[00:23:41] They do kiss.

[00:23:42] They kiss.

[00:23:42] They do kiss.

[00:23:43] Yes.

[00:23:43] Um, and I was okay with that.

[00:23:46] Don't one thing I didn't like about this sunspot though, is I'm used to sunspot who was like the leader.

[00:23:52] Yeah.

[00:23:53] You know, who had already kind of gotten over a lot of this shit.

[00:23:56] So I'm, I'm waiting to see that kind of sunspot coming, come around, but I liked their little storyline.

[00:24:02] Uh, let's see who else we had.

[00:24:04] I mean, his whole thing with his mom was amazing and like necessary.

[00:24:10] So, yeah.

[00:24:11] I love that scene at the dinner.

[00:24:13] Oh, was it?

[00:24:14] At like a fundraiser.

[00:24:15] At the fundraiser for those poor, poor mutants.

[00:24:18] I mean, yeah, exactly.

[00:24:20] I, uh.

[00:24:21] And she's just like, oh, I'm so glad.

[00:24:23] Well, I knew you were a mutant.

[00:24:25] Now we just got to make sure to keep this quiet and let's make sure no one else knows.

[00:24:29] Yeah.

[00:24:29] And like the whole, like, well, we can show support for them as a charity, but we don't want to be seen with them in public.

[00:24:34] It's like very real.

[00:24:37] Like, I mean, that's a lot of people's parents when they come out, basically.

[00:24:42] Um, yeah.

[00:24:44] Cyclops and Jean Grey.

[00:24:47] They go through it this season.

[00:24:49] Um, all three of them.

[00:24:52] When this show starts and I was not quite expecting this, this is something that's from the straight from the comics.

[00:24:59] That's kind of an interesting story.

[00:25:01] Madeline Pryor, who was a clone of Jean Grey, uh, who was swapped out with her at some point in a very bizarre and disgusting plan by Mr. Sinister, who is one of the main and who remains the main antagonist in X-Men 97.

[00:25:20] And it's all sorts of fucked up because Cyclops, they don't know when they they're switched out.

[00:25:27] Yeah.

[00:25:27] And, but we do know that Madeline Pryor is the one who got pregnant and gave birth to Nathan Summers in the early episodes of this season.

[00:25:38] Yeah.

[00:25:39] I mean, they just straight up went for Inferno, which is an amazing, we got, we got to talk about the Daredevil, uh, crossover with Inferno on my podcast a while back, Leslie.

[00:25:50] Uh, but yeah, uh, but yeah, Inferno, like the, I just was like, they, they're doing it.

[00:25:53] They're straight up doing it.

[00:25:55] And they did it in like the second episode of the series.

[00:25:57] I mean, wow.

[00:25:59] Okay.

[00:26:00] So yeah, you're going to do like a horror themed, you know, Medea, like Greek tragedy, trauma story.

[00:26:07] Um, and one of the things I really appreciated is that it's a story in which it's very easy for them to prescribe blame to all of these different characters that we are compassionate towards.

[00:26:22] But it really was empathetic towards all of them, which I think is the fair way to treat it.

[00:26:28] Like Jean Grey didn't ask to be disappeared.

[00:26:31] Madeline Grey didn't ask to be a clone.

[00:26:33] Scott didn't ask to have his life partner switch out with him without him knowing.

[00:26:38] Like it's, nobody was trying to hurt anybody.

[00:26:41] Just is a terrible thing that happened to everybody.

[00:26:45] And like, they're continuing to make lives hard for each other, but they're able to try to get past it.

[00:26:49] Like there isn't, I, I like, I don't like when they're just like, let's have women fight for no reason.

[00:26:54] It's like, no, they fought, but they figured like, no, like we, Mr. Sinister is the real bad guy here.

[00:26:59] Like that's the actual problem.

[00:27:01] Um, you know, it's, it's kind of funny because this, there was a similar storyline on the boys, uh, this season and they handled it much more poorly.

[00:27:12] Like the woman who was swapped out was angry at the guy, like really angry at him.

[00:27:18] Like when he didn't freaking know it was, it was, it was kind of immature and it was nice to see this show handle it.

[00:27:24] Yeah.

[00:27:24] Like she freaks out, but like she gets over it.

[00:27:27] Like they talk about it and she's like, oh yeah, no, I see why that would be hard.

[00:27:30] Like, yeah, exactly.

[00:27:31] Yeah.

[00:27:33] Like, uh, yeah.

[00:27:34] I haven't been watching the boys, but yeah, I, all the cool stuff with the different mental scapes with the characters.

[00:27:39] I, I was, I love everything they did with cable.

[00:27:42] I love that they actually had cables theme music from the original series.

[00:27:46] Anytime cable was on screen and you know, in, in the comics, in the animated series, we never got the truth behind cables origin story.

[00:27:55] So that gets revealed here.

[00:27:57] Yeah.

[00:27:57] He just, oh, that was so great because I knew, I knew it from the comics, but in the cartoon, he's just a dude that just shows up with a bionic arm and a big gun and starts shooting stuff.

[00:28:09] You're like, for some reason, the Terminator's here.

[00:28:11] I don't know.

[00:28:13] Yeah.

[00:28:14] But I, I loved it.

[00:28:15] I love how they finally revealed how it, now it went really fast and this is a fast paced show.

[00:28:21] Like from the time that he's born to the time he has to be sent into the future, the curious techno virus is only a few minutes of screen time.

[00:28:30] I think, but you know, they keep it moving.

[00:28:32] It's like the fastest paced, uh, show since I think empire or something.

[00:28:36] Yeah.

[00:28:36] No, it's so this and adventure time.

[00:28:39] Cause adventure time was operating in a format where episodes were like 11 minutes are the two like fastest moving shows I've ever witnessed.

[00:28:46] And it's shocking to me how effective they're able to tell stories that fat, like it's like some wizardry.

[00:28:53] I don't even understand.

[00:28:55] And even in the comics, a lot of this stuff didn't make a ton of sense, right?

[00:29:00] Like a lot of the stuff with cable didn't make a lot of sense.

[00:29:03] A lot, some of the stuff that they're, uh, even I think some of the, um, fernal stuff, cause it was messy.

[00:29:10] It was a lot messier.

[00:29:11] There were literal demons involved.

[00:29:13] I think a certain point show kind of gets to it and kind of streams lines it and gets to the emotional core and the core of the characterization, uh, that matters.

[00:29:26] And I think that's what makes the, made the original series great.

[00:29:29] And what made this show great.

[00:29:33] Any, any story great.

[00:29:35] It's about the characters, not the powers or the plot.

[00:29:39] It's about, you know, how these characters react, uh, to these situations.

[00:29:43] And the show puts all the characters through a lot of shit, uh, to see how they react.

[00:29:48] Yes.

[00:29:49] They really do through the wringer.

[00:29:51] A lot of people have been talking about how they like to see.

[00:29:55] Like Cyclops in this series.

[00:29:56] And I think we talked about before Cyclops is not my favorite.

[00:30:00] Yeah.

[00:30:00] Cyclops is not my boy, but are, are, are, are you more of a, are you a Cyclops fan?

[00:30:05] I began to appreciate, I did not enjoy Cyclops in the original animated series because he was very much positioned as like a stick in the mud.

[00:30:12] I grew to like the character reading comics later on.

[00:30:15] Um, he's not my favorite character, but I like him.

[00:30:18] And I, I, and I thought he was, I really enjoyed him in this show.

[00:30:21] I, I loved him like struggling to figure out how to be a dad to an adult son.

[00:30:27] And right.

[00:30:28] Like he's like, he's also his adult son.

[00:30:31] He was like larger than him.

[00:30:32] Um, it is so, it's so sweet.

[00:30:35] My large adult son.

[00:30:37] Really?

[00:30:37] My very large adult son.

[00:30:39] Um, and like, yeah, Cyclops figuring out to be a dad and his, those, he had lots of really great moments to shine with parenting and with sort of figuring out his relationships at a more adult level, which is something I think we needed to see.

[00:30:59] And he has, gets to show a lot of empathy here.

[00:31:02] And it all felt very in character, even though, you know, I, I just think that like, because the earlier series was really positioned like for kids, even though, you know, I was like a pre, you know, I was a young teenager watching it and like other, you know, people of all ages were watching it too.

[00:31:19] Um, it really kind of had to, it forced Cyclops to just be playing it straight so that Wolverine could be the coolest of cool guys.

[00:31:29] And I like that this series doesn't really make you choose.

[00:31:33] Um, cause I like everybody.

[00:31:35] I like everybody in their really messy love quadrangle.

[00:31:38] Actually, it's a love heck.

[00:31:39] It's a love pentagram.

[00:31:42] No, sorry.

[00:31:43] It's a love hexagram.

[00:31:44] It's a love hexagon.

[00:31:45] I have identified six sides to the, to the love hexagon.

[00:31:49] This is what I wanted to talk about next.

[00:31:51] Okay.

[00:31:51] So what do we got?

[00:31:53] So this is my memory memory.

[00:31:55] Okay.

[00:31:55] Okay.

[00:31:56] You got Gambit wants to sleep with rogue, but he can't because they cannot touch.

[00:32:03] And we find out in the X-Men 97 shocker that rogue and Magneto had a little thing going on because Magneto's powers allows him to subvert, uh, rogues anti, you know, vampire sucking life force ability.

[00:32:20] And so, and they picked that back up in this series, even though rogue at a certain point decides that Gambit is the one she really loves, but it's just before it's too late.

[00:32:32] Unfortunately.

[00:32:33] I love.

[00:32:33] Yeah.

[00:32:34] Yeah.

[00:32:34] Sorry.

[00:32:34] Keep going.

[00:32:35] It did.

[00:32:36] All right.

[00:32:36] So then you have Cyclops and who is married to who we think is Jean Grey at the start, but it's actually Madeline.

[00:32:44] And prior, Jean Grey comes back.

[00:32:49] Madeline prior leaves.

[00:32:51] Jean Grey and Cyclops are not quite seeing it.

[00:32:55] I to eye to eye and Cyclops is talking to Matt Madeline prior psychically behind her back.

[00:33:01] And at the same time, Jean Grey is feeling some kind of feelings for Wolverine, who of course is in love with Jean Grey, but no, but feels in his heart.

[00:33:11] It can never happen.

[00:33:13] And Morph is in love.

[00:33:16] Oh, yes.

[00:33:18] Wolverine.

[00:33:19] Although I think it's subtextual.

[00:33:21] I think it's subtextual that they've got kind of like a friends with benefits situation happening, but maybe Morph wants it to be more than just friends with benefits is my read of that whole thing.

[00:33:30] And then the last party of the love hexagon is space.

[00:33:34] Space is calling to Jean.

[00:33:36] Oh, yes.

[00:33:37] So does Jean go for her husband?

[00:33:40] Does she go for Logan?

[00:33:42] Does she go for space?

[00:33:44] You know, she's got all these choices.

[00:33:47] But yeah, it's just a messy hexagon.

[00:33:50] And I love it.

[00:33:51] I mean, like the soap opera-ness of the series has always appealed to me as a fan.

[00:33:57] And just bringing in all of the parts of the hexagon here have brought me great joy.

[00:34:04] And as somebody who found Wolverine's pining for Jean in the original animated series to be tiresome and the least compelling thing he had going on,

[00:34:17] I was glad to see him get to show himself to be a really good friend to her here when it came to like her having a baby and saw her acknowledge that she was attracted to him.

[00:34:31] Because I don't find that whole thing compelling if it's one directional.

[00:34:35] If it's both of them, which is how it is in the comics, then it's more interesting to me.

[00:34:41] So I was glad they got to have that little moment.

[00:34:45] I mean, there's even more.

[00:34:46] I mean, Forge and Storm have a little something going on.

[00:34:49] But we know that there's a version of the future where Storm and Wolverine fall in love with one another.

[00:34:57] In this series?

[00:34:59] In the original X-Men series, they're shown a future, alternate future where Storm and Wolverine end up together.

[00:35:09] In the animated series?

[00:35:11] Yes.

[00:35:11] Oh, okay.

[00:35:12] I don't remember that.

[00:35:13] Because I know they were a couple in the comics for the Logan and Storm during the Jason Aaron run.

[00:35:20] And then I really read like Logan hanging out with Storm and Yukio in Japan as like a whole thing in the comics back in the day.

[00:35:31] But I did not remember that from the animated series.

[00:35:34] That's interesting.

[00:35:35] I mean, yeah, I think Storm and Storm and Logan are really an interesting couple potential for sure.

[00:35:40] I had not remembered that from the animated series.

[00:35:43] Yeah, I think it's episode 54.

[00:35:48] Of course, it ends up very sad.

[00:35:51] I think most of the X-Men die in their version of the future.

[00:35:55] Okay.

[00:35:56] Well, but yeah, like give all of these messy, interesting characters all their messy, interesting options.

[00:36:04] Like I really respect that the show lets Rogue be horny and doesn't demonize her for it.

[00:36:08] Like I have heard fans respond to this plot line for her in a way that felt really sexist and like fucked up to me.

[00:36:16] But like the show is like it's not unreasonable that Rogue wants to get fucked.

[00:36:22] Like she wants to have sex.

[00:36:24] That's her right.

[00:36:24] And it's tragic that but like it's she's not a bad person because she wants to go and have sex with Magneto.

[00:36:31] Yeah.

[00:36:32] And, you know, I'm sorry.

[00:36:33] Here lies Remy Lebeau.

[00:36:35] He never scored.

[00:36:36] But that's not, you know, Rogue's problem.

[00:36:38] That's not her fault.

[00:36:40] Yeah.

[00:36:41] I don't know why you hold that against the character.

[00:36:44] That's very, that's very funny.

[00:36:45] Well, they expect her to just like never have sex and just pine with at each other forever.

[00:36:50] And like if the genders were swapped, like no one, like none of them would say it.

[00:36:55] Yeah.

[00:36:55] Like no one.

[00:36:56] Exactly.

[00:36:56] Exactly.

[00:36:57] They wouldn't.

[00:36:58] So, you know, and I mean, and, and, and everything between her and Remy is so touching.

[00:37:02] Like, like let her be torn and let it be complicated.

[00:37:06] That's what's appealing.

[00:37:08] I think.

[00:37:08] Character.

[00:37:09] I remember certainly from the comics, he was always this, you know, roguish kind of guy, this ladies man.

[00:37:15] But to have him be the one that's the most emotionally vulnerable of them all in this series is really heartbreaking, especially when the spoiler happens, which is I was did not see coming.

[00:37:30] I was not expecting and I didn't think it was real.

[00:37:34] I was like, oh no, they're going to undo it.

[00:37:36] They're going to tie.

[00:37:38] They're going to change the timelines, but no, it happened.

[00:37:41] My, my guy.

[00:37:42] I mean, I was so shocked, but as soon as it happened, I was like, oh yeah.

[00:37:49] Okay.

[00:37:49] So they're going to bring him back as one of the horsemen of the apocalypse.

[00:37:53] Yeah.

[00:37:53] Which I mean, I, I promise you that is what will happen.

[00:37:57] And like, I promise you he will be a turn, but it'll be traumatic, which is good.

[00:38:02] Cause we enjoy that.

[00:38:04] Yes.

[00:38:04] Yes.

[00:38:04] They, they've stretched it out.

[00:38:05] He didn't come back like the next episode.

[00:38:07] Yes, exactly.

[00:38:08] Like give us.

[00:38:09] With X-Men.

[00:38:09] That's basic.

[00:38:10] With X-Men.

[00:38:11] That's basically like a real, real super death.

[00:38:13] It is.

[00:38:14] Exactly.

[00:38:15] It's not about whether you die.

[00:38:16] It's how long you stay there.

[00:38:19] And if they hold off for a while, then that means a lot.

[00:38:22] Some self-control, you know?

[00:38:23] But yeah, I found his death really moving.

[00:38:25] I mean, everything in that whole Genosha sequence, just like grip you in the guts.

[00:38:31] Especially with Magneto and the children.

[00:38:35] It was incredibly powerful.

[00:38:37] The one thing I wish the show had a little bit more of is happy Genosha.

[00:38:42] I wish like, cause it felt like we got like maybe half episode of happiness and then they

[00:38:47] were blown up.

[00:38:47] But like, if that's one thing I would have seen a little bit more slow down because I

[00:38:52] thought they were doing, they were going to do a little bit of the, I think it's Karen,

[00:38:56] is it Karen Gillan who does the new comics?

[00:38:59] Yeah.

[00:39:00] The new, the new X-Men comics.

[00:39:02] They're all about, are they all about Genosha or Krakoa?

[00:39:04] Well, no.

[00:39:04] So Krakoa.

[00:39:05] Yeah.

[00:39:05] So Krakoa is sort of following in the line of the Genosha storyline being like a country

[00:39:12] that is run by mutants and is a mutant utopia.

[00:39:15] Yeah.

[00:39:16] But the Krakoan storylines in the comics have a very different polarity with the rest of

[00:39:21] the world.

[00:39:22] Because basically, I mean, Leslie, you should read these.

[00:39:25] You're going to love them.

[00:39:26] They're like holding the powers of the world ransom.

[00:39:28] Basically, you're like, you can't fuck with us.

[00:39:31] Obviously, eventually things go and change back because this is part of a serialized narrative.

[00:39:35] But yeah, Karen Gillan was running a series called Immortal X-Men that was just about power

[00:39:45] politics within the X-Men community on Krakoa, the mutant new homeland.

[00:39:52] And it's like, it was just everything I wanted from a comic.

[00:39:56] Andrew, I guess I'll have to read.

[00:39:57] I was hoping I could cheat and just watch the cartoon.

[00:40:00] I thought they were depths.

[00:40:01] I guess I could beg.

[00:40:02] It'll eventually get there.

[00:40:03] I mean, maybe.

[00:40:03] I don't know.

[00:40:04] The show moves so quickly, but it is true.

[00:40:07] Like, this is a storyline that just ended a few months ago in the comics.

[00:40:10] So it's pretty recent there.

[00:40:11] But I honestly think the Jonathan Hickman relaunching of the X-Men series and this whole period,

[00:40:21] the Krakoan age, or as we call it, the first Krakoan age of X-Men comics,

[00:40:26] is just the most visionary shit since Grant Morrison and maybe even arguably more so than the Grant Morrison.

[00:40:35] It's amazing science fiction, political storytelling.

[00:40:37] And if you think you might ever be interested in an X-Men comic, pick it up.

[00:40:43] Okay.

[00:40:44] That is a high recommendation.

[00:40:46] So if you've never read any X-Men comics, you're saying pick up the Krakoa.

[00:40:51] Start with that.

[00:40:51] That is...

[00:40:52] Wow.

[00:40:53] Yeah.

[00:40:53] Wow.

[00:40:54] Yeah.

[00:40:54] I mean, just understand that the things that are confusing to you are confusing to everyone.

[00:40:59] Like, it is beginning a science fiction story.

[00:41:02] Yeah, that's the...

[00:41:03] I mean, and that's always been the nature of X-Men comics, frankly.

[00:41:07] This is true.

[00:41:07] It's really ambitious science fiction storytelling with a lot of political focus and creativity.

[00:41:13] All right.

[00:41:14] So we've talked about the X-Men cartoon, the 97 reboot, the modern comics.

[00:41:20] But we would be remiss if we didn't talk about perhaps the biggest X-Men related property that there is.

[00:41:28] I mean, this might be one of the bigger years for X-Men period because of this one movie.

[00:41:35] Wolverine versus Deadpool.

[00:41:37] Who knew?

[00:41:37] Who knew?

[00:41:39] Oh, my goodness.

[00:41:40] So I barely watched this.

[00:41:43] And you have not watched it, correct?

[00:41:45] I have not.

[00:41:46] And why has it?

[00:41:48] Oh, well, because I don't do indoor movies.

[00:41:51] And my local drive-in didn't have it this summer.

[00:41:54] So I guess if it's on streaming, I would watch it.

[00:42:00] And I'll also say it wasn't until people began telling me, actually, it's good, did it even occur to me to show any interest in it.

[00:42:07] Like, just telling me there's a movie that's like Logan and Deadpool is not.

[00:42:13] I'm like, and I care why.

[00:42:15] But when friends began telling me they enjoyed it, I looked to see and it just wasn't available at the drive-in.

[00:42:21] But I did want to show you this one clip.

[00:42:23] And I wanted to know if it made you want to see it more and more.

[00:42:26] Because, you know, we're both big comic book fans.

[00:42:29] But the Deadpool series is not quite the comics.

[00:42:33] It's kind of its own thing.

[00:42:34] It's like if Ryan Reynolds is kind of cosplaying with his friends as the comics, kind of.

[00:42:41] Yeah.

[00:42:42] In a certain sense.

[00:42:42] Have you seen the other Deadpool?

[00:42:44] Yes.

[00:42:44] I saw the first and second movie.

[00:42:46] I enjoyed them.

[00:42:47] They're not, like, my favorite thing ever.

[00:42:49] But I enjoyed them.

[00:42:51] All right.

[00:42:51] So I just want to show you this one sequence as a hardcore comic book fan to see what does it do for you.

[00:42:57] Because when I saw this sequence, it made me kind of think, like, this is made for me, but it does nothing for me.

[00:43:04] So I'm going to share my screen with you.

[00:43:07] Okay.

[00:43:07] I'm ready.

[00:43:08] So this is a sequence where Deadpool is trying to find, going through the multiverse, to find a Wolverine who's alive because his is dead.

[00:43:18] And this is supposed to be a comic-accurate Wolverine.

[00:43:23] Oh, God.

[00:43:24] It's his look from...

[00:43:25] And now we have Age of Apocalypse Wolverine with the one hand.

[00:43:31] They kind of animated that action in an entertaining way, at least.

[00:43:35] And this is...

[00:43:36] Patch!

[00:43:37] Wolverine.

[00:43:38] So that's Henry Cavill.

[00:43:40] Oh, wow.

[00:43:40] So the question I have for you is, like, it went through all those different types of Wolverine, those comic covers, those iconic images.

[00:43:49] But it's just, like, a few clips that are kind of treated as a joke.

[00:43:55] So I don't...

[00:43:56] So, like, it's referencing comics I remember that I love, but it's not really doing anything with them.

[00:44:02] Right.

[00:44:02] I just wanted to talk with you as a comics fan.

[00:44:04] Like, what are we seeing here?

[00:44:06] Because, like, this is made for us, but it's not really the thing we...

[00:44:11] Yeah, it's treating the movie like a scavenger hunt for Easter eggs.

[00:44:16] Like, that's the only thing that we care about.

[00:44:19] And that's not what art is for.

[00:44:23] It's for storytelling and feelings, you know?

[00:44:26] And, like, I'm someone who says, like...

[00:44:29] Oh, here we go.

[00:44:30] Hugh Jackman does an excellent job of playing Wolverine.

[00:44:34] I don't want the fact that Hugh Jackman is tall to trickle into the comics.

[00:44:39] It is important that Wolverine is short, but I'm not going to say they should never have casted this excellent actor because he's tall.

[00:44:49] Like, whatever.

[00:44:50] That's okay.

[00:44:51] It's fine.

[00:44:52] Like, let the comics, you know, do the comics and let the movie be the movie.

[00:44:58] But I don't need to just, like, go and, like, look for moments of recognition in a movie.

[00:45:07] I want the story to be good.

[00:45:08] And that is why X-Men 97 does not fall into the trap of just being nostalgia or rehash.

[00:45:16] The story actually still works in the medium.

[00:45:21] I mean, that's why the original cartoon worked.

[00:45:23] Because they took it seriously.

[00:45:25] Like, compare it to...

[00:45:26] Like, there were other cartoon comic book shows that weren't nearly as good.

[00:45:32] No, like the Spider-Man one.

[00:45:33] It was like, you know, Spider-Man one, like, I would watch it, but it wasn't like...

[00:45:38] Not really.

[00:45:39] Even though...

[00:45:40] And they did have a crossover with the X-Men cartoon.

[00:45:43] That was...

[00:45:44] When...

[00:45:44] I think it was when Spider-Man, he grows his forearms.

[00:45:48] He gets...

[00:45:48] And he doesn't want to...

[00:45:49] Oh, God.

[00:45:49] He's like, I don't want to be a freak.

[00:45:51] I don't want to be a mutant.

[00:45:52] Help me.

[00:45:53] And they're like...

[00:45:54] And the mutants are like, who are you calling a freak, buddy?

[00:45:57] I think that the ambitious nature of the series, of the X-Men 97 series, you know, operating on so many levels with the music, soundtrack choices, trusting the audience to be able to read subtext into stories.

[00:46:16] It was so ambitious.

[00:46:18] And it paid off.

[00:46:19] People care about it.

[00:46:21] They're invested in it.

[00:46:22] And I hope that it encourages the series to continue to grow.

[00:46:26] And I'll say another point is that comics look good as drawings.

[00:46:31] And I think that animation is the medium best suited for taking a comic book and making it move through time and space.

[00:46:39] We've been preaching that on Struggle Session from the beginning.

[00:46:42] And I feel set.

[00:46:44] Sorry, we haven't talked a lot about the animation.

[00:46:46] But in X-Men 97, the animation, especially in the later episodes, is superb.

[00:46:52] Yeah.

[00:46:52] It's extremely stylized, very anime influenced in the best way possible.

[00:46:58] It seems like, especially in the later episodes, they really knew how the best...

[00:47:04] Kind of like getting their money's worth with their animations.

[00:47:07] It's like everything just is works and conveys action without necessarily being a ton of animation on the screen.

[00:47:17] Or it conveys mood in a very simple way.

[00:47:21] It reminded me in some ways of like Berserk 97, which is a show which didn't necessarily have the highest animation budget.

[00:47:28] But it was able to adapt the manga in such a way that it made like a lot of still images feel like they were moving.

[00:47:36] And like a lot of things were going on, even though not a lot was happening on the screen.

[00:47:41] And I think this series does that in an extremely, you know, terrific way.

[00:47:47] And a lot of the episodes are animated better than their original series at times.

[00:47:52] Oh, yeah.

[00:47:52] The animation quality for the original animated series was very spotty.

[00:47:57] And there would be certain kinds of stiffness that was just almost unavoidable and consistent.

[00:48:01] I also didn't find that the character's facial acting in the initial series was not that great.

[00:48:08] But that also was, you know, par for course of the time, really.

[00:48:11] This show, I mean, people are fucking emoting.

[00:48:14] And the art is beautiful.

[00:48:17] And I love how it handles the character's hair, the body motions through space and just everything.

[00:48:24] It's so rare to see, you know, one of these animated reboots be better than the original.

[00:48:32] It's unusual.

[00:48:33] Yeah.

[00:48:34] I mean, it's just, it's amazing.

[00:48:37] Before we go, let's talk Bastion.

[00:48:40] What the hell is Bastion?

[00:48:42] Because this was a lot.

[00:48:44] This was a lot.

[00:48:44] This was the most X-Men-y of all the X-Men things in the show.

[00:48:48] And I know he's straight from the comic.

[00:48:50] And I know his storyline is very similar in the comic.

[00:48:54] I'm sure it didn't make much a damn bit of since then.

[00:48:57] By the end, it works.

[00:48:59] I think just, again, the animation made me buy into Bastion by the end more than, you know, his character or backstory necessarily.

[00:49:11] You know, I think Bastion, like, he's campier than Mr. Sinister, which is really an achievement.

[00:49:19] Yes.

[00:49:20] And I think it was cool for them to introduce a villain who Philp's haven't been exposed to quite so thoroughly before.

[00:49:29] I think that having him be the sort of the source of the Operation Zero Tolerance bullshit and being, you know, his AI is timely.

[00:49:42] Right?

[00:49:42] Like, I don't, I think.

[00:49:43] Yes.

[00:49:44] Right?

[00:49:44] Like, I think it makes sense to have the AI who is going into bars and, like, giving bigots superpowers.

[00:49:53] Feels, feels like it's saying something.

[00:49:57] And, you know, I really shout out to the Tarantino-worthy torture shaving scene.

[00:50:06] Oh, yes.

[00:50:06] I mean, I was like, and that was such a, I mean, it was a Scorsese needle drop, but it's like, oh, Tarantino scene, Tarantino needle drop.

[00:50:14] Um, I, I was very pleased with that moment.

[00:50:18] Um, so I, I, I enjoyed, you know, and what's wild is they give Bastion a chance to be like, look, what if you weren't alone?

[00:50:27] Yes, I liked that a lot.

[00:50:27] That was huge.

[00:50:29] And his line, like, humanity would rather.

[00:50:31] Yeah, that's something that, you know, separates, you know, this series from a lot of others.

[00:50:36] I think we talked about when we talked about Batman is like at the end when the X-Men defeat him, they give him a chance to say, join them and say, we're sorry, we should take you in.

[00:50:46] You have these powers, we can help you.

[00:50:48] And that's just so different than what you see, certainly in the MCU or like in a lot of stuff.

[00:50:55] I thought that was a great, great scene and very interesting.

[00:50:58] And especially bold because Bastion is incredibly powerful.

[00:51:01] Like they are risking losing everything to give him this opportunity because he really did have a, like, he was born this way.

[00:51:08] He was born fucked up.

[00:51:09] Like he needed help.

[00:51:10] And giving him the line, like humanity would rather die than have kids like us.

[00:51:17] It's like, yeah, like having a lot of queer feelings about that.

[00:51:23] Yeah, I, I, I was really impressed with that choice of a character and leaning into that.

[00:51:31] What do you think is going to happen though in the next season?

[00:51:34] Cause we see, we're seeing at the end, we see a stinger with half the team in the distant past with Apocalypse.

[00:51:42] I've been sore at the time.

[00:51:44] And then some in the future, I think some in the far future future.

[00:51:50] Yeah.

[00:51:51] I Scottie son.

[00:51:52] Oh yes.

[00:51:53] My, my, my home girl.

[00:51:54] She's my favorite X-Men.

[00:51:56] Oh wow.

[00:51:56] Rachel.

[00:51:57] I can see that.

[00:51:58] My favorite when I was good.

[00:51:59] I can see that.

[00:52:00] Yeah.

[00:52:00] Yeah.

[00:52:00] Oh, how cool.

[00:52:02] Yeah.

[00:52:02] I mean, we're going to get an Apocalypse story, the likes of which we haven't seen really done here yet in the past and in the future for sure.

[00:52:12] Um, I wonder, I mean, I wonder what they can do because I mean, they did a four parter on Apocalypse before where he almost destroyed all of existence.

[00:52:21] So how do you top that?

[00:52:23] I'm, I'm interested to see.

[00:52:24] Yeah.

[00:52:25] Yeah.

[00:52:26] Yeah.

[00:52:26] I mean, I think going to be, I mean, I think going to be, I mean, I think going to be, I mean, I think, do some character, like the saga of Slim and Red in space as well.

[00:52:46] Um, and I'm also going to be curious in seeing like what we're going to get from the characters that are stuck in the current time.

[00:52:53] And they're going to have to be the ones running interference, helping the mutants who are on Earth in that moment too.

[00:53:00] Which mutant do you hope shows up in season two?

[00:53:03] Ooh, good question.

[00:53:04] You know, we've never had Shadowcat in any of these.

[00:53:08] Like there was that, well, there was that series that I didn't watch.

[00:53:12] So I guess we had her in that, but I think this would be a cool series to, to have take on Shadowcat.

[00:53:18] And I think that for once, maybe they would finally feel okay with having her be canonically bisexual as we keep trying to have happen in comics for really generations now.

[00:53:32] What about you?

[00:53:34] I want to see Shadowstar.

[00:53:35] I love him.

[00:53:36] That was my dude back in the day from X-Force.

[00:53:39] He'd get the dual sword that shot out lasers.

[00:53:43] But then we have, they've only had Longshot in one or two episodes.

[00:53:47] Who is his father?

[00:53:48] They could bring him back.

[00:53:49] So I don't know.

[00:53:50] Yeah, we need some, a little bit of Longshot too.

[00:53:52] More Mojo world.

[00:53:53] The Mojo episode, it was kind of cool, but I want to see a little bit more of the denizens.

[00:53:58] More Mojo stuff.

[00:53:59] Go to Mojo.

[00:53:59] Don't make Mojo come to you.

[00:54:02] Well, I have, I've done Shadowstar cosplay.

[00:54:04] I will send you pictures if you're curious.

[00:54:06] Oh, awesome.

[00:54:07] But yeah, he's got, he's got really impressive hair and a lot.

[00:54:10] He's a very fun character.

[00:54:11] I mean, I'm a big fan of him predominantly from the, the X-Factor investigations era appearances

[00:54:19] that he'd had, which is sort of a different tone than how they had him in X-Force.

[00:54:24] A lot, a lot more fish out of water and a lot less like grim and gritty, you know?

[00:54:29] But yeah, we really haven't had, it could make sense for them to bring him back from

[00:54:35] the future in a way.

[00:54:37] Like that actually could be a way for him to come in where they're at now.

[00:54:41] Yeah, absolutely.

[00:54:42] All right.

[00:54:43] So we've been talking about this for so long.

[00:54:45] We'll have to talk about X-Men again soon.

[00:54:49] Thank you so much.

[00:54:50] Where can people find you?

[00:54:52] So my podcast is Graphic Policy Radio, a podcast at the intersection of nerd media and movements

[00:54:58] for social change.

[00:54:59] I am on Blue Sky.

[00:55:01] Folks should come and hang out with me over there.

[00:55:03] My handle is L-E-V-I-N, Levin, like my last name.

[00:55:09] Yeah.

[00:55:09] And those would be the best places to keep up with me.

[00:55:13] Thank you so much.

[00:55:14] Have a good one.

[00:55:15] Stay safe.

[00:55:16] Peace.

[00:55:16] Bye.

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