Marvel Comics: Then and Now

And Wolverine's Animal Factor. I could have told

you that, bub. Giant Monsters everybody plays.

Not giant, yay big! Welcome to... The Pole Bag.

Join us as we dig out our latest comics. and

discuss them with the rotating panel of the GCRN

crew. So sit back and enjoy this week's Colbag.

Hey, this is Steve Bloom, and you are listening

to the GeekCast Radio Network. Hey, Bub, I keep

telling you, don't call me Wobby! Snicked. Hello

and welcome to The Pole Bag. This is episode

20. I am your host, TFJone Mike, and holy crap,

Canada has invaded the pole bag. Jesus Christ.

Help me. Please help me somebody. I'm joined

by - You need more help than any of your listeners

can give you. I know, sadly. All right, so there

you go, folks. Ryan the Uneven Flow is back.

You heard him last week basically listing off

every comic he's ever bought. I didn't come close

to listing all of them. It's called exaggeration

dude. I'm fine. Yeah, and also we have JT from

Saskatoon. Hello Hello, and don't worry Mike

and under our benevolent dictatorship. You will

be well cared for Well, you gotta lull them into

a full sense of security for you throw them in

the dungeon Well, he's not a Canadian citizen.

So it doesn't get her free health care That is

true We're here tonight to talk about Marvel

Comics in general. Originally this was kind of

going to be what we'll do in a few weeks with

DC pre and post New 52. I didn't realize that

the Marvel quote -unquote relaunch Basically,

they just said hey, let's put a giant sticker

with an exclamation point on it Marvel now It

was a very soft relaunch and I mean they gave

creators the choice really of what they wanted

to do and the majority of them Chose to not really

do a lot and I mean some of them were already

well on their way like Dan slot and superior

spider -man was already well into its storyline

of introducing a new Peter Parker quote unquote

Yes, how many spoilers do we want for that? But

you know JT and I just reviewed about two about

three weeks ago JT, and I just reviewed Issues

8 through 11 so I mean if people haven't don't

know what's going on Spider -man amazing spider

-man 698 to 700 there was a body switch And then

the superior Spider -Man is one of Peter's greatest

villains. There, that's telling you what happens

without actually spoiling who it is. I like the

fact that this week we figured and found out

that Castle was smart enough to know something's

up with Spider -Man. Oh, I didn't pick that one

up. Yost writes him quite well, I was surprised.

You know something's wrong when the Punisher

is telling you to cool down. Pretty much. Yeah,

but I mean back to Marvel I think one of the

other things to note here too is that you in

particular Mike like one of the reasons you didn't

get into comics is because of All of the history

and everything well DC Just to be blunt about

it DC has been around longer and actually ran

It's run longer than Marvel like with Marvel

take something like X -Men for as an example

X -Men was canceled for years It didn't run for

a really long time and that's something that

didn't happen with someone like say Flash or

Green Lantern who started in the 50s and 60s

and never stopped Marvel at least has these sort

of breaks with things that happened and I mean

they didn't become Marvel until later. I mean

they're originally timely publications, that's

it. And then they were Atlas for like a decade

or so, and eventually finally became Marvel Comics.

Yep, they got started in 1939. The publisher

back then was Martin Goodman. Yeah, they started

a year, well... DC launched in 38, right? Yeah,

but before yeah, so basically Marvel came along

a year later Well, not necessarily Marvel, but

you know what would eventually become Marvel

But yeah, not with any of the characters that

we'd associate DC at least launched pretty quickly

into some of the characters Well, I should say

relatively quickly into some of the characters

that are still around today Yeah, now it was

a national periodicals or publications something

like that the was on the trade dress originally

Yeah, I think so It still it still wasn't DC

Comics yet, but I mean it it got there and Much

like the mutants. They went through a couple

of evolutions before they got to the Mary Marvel

Merchant Society that we all know today Yeah,

I mean for Marvel Comics too. I mean the other

thing to kind of take away from it is And just

be let's just have to be absolutely blunt with

it here Stan Lee in a lot of ways is Marvel Comics.

It probably wouldn't exist in anything resembling

what it is Today without Lee and yes, he had

a lot of people who helped him with it but he

really brought the majority of the characters

that we associate with Marvel into the limelight.

And there are other runs. Chris Claremont's X

-Men run is the one that made most of the X -Men

popular, and they've had numerous cartoons, movies,

and everything based off of Claremont's stuff.

So I mean a little bit unlike DC is a little

more fractured There's more creators to mention

when you're talking about them with Marvel, you

know You've got those two big ones that I think

any comic book fan knows the name of certainly

Stan Lee Yeah Yeah, and really, you know, yeah,

you're right I didn't the only thing is a kid

I remember reading I remember reading DC versus

Marvel that four -issue miniseries Do you never

read amalgam comics? Yeah, they eventually had

the amalgam comics most of which by the way,

we're absolutely This was before that. This was

the original for issue Battle with the two gods

the blue god and the red god or whatever the

hell it was. Yeah the brothers Yeah, that's that's

what I had read originally. Well, no exciting

with me I started reading like, you know reprints

everything basically the old Marvel comics that

my dad had left with my grandma You know years

ago, and I kind of grew up for a lot while reading

late 60s early 70s Marvel stuff You know it's

primarily fantastic foreign spider -man And that's

really one of my favorite periods of Marvel is

that kind of post -silver age? Getting into the

whole 70s vibe You know the the countries and

the crap or the presidents a dick that sort of

thing and that was some of the areas that you

had stuff like Thor going to the future and meeting

the original version of the Guardians of the

Galaxy and you know Fantastic Four Just anything

out of the early 70s. I love Fantastic Four style

going into the 80s and You know when you talk

about Marvel now, this really isn't anything

new. I mean they're putting a trade dress on

it They're really pimpin it, but this is not

the first time they've done this. I mean you

look as far back as post the onslaught saga in

the mid -90s where, you know, I know Professor

X is possessed by the evil of Magneto and develops

a split personality and then becomes its own

creature. Don't forget teenage Tony Stark. Oh,

God, why would I ever want to remember that?

Okay, now hold on. No, no, I'm just saying. Hold

on, hold on. In defense, not necessarily of that

comic series because I never read it, but in

defense, the Iron Man Armored Adventures. Cartoon

series the Teenage Tony Stark and that that is

actually damn. No. No, I don't disagree I love

that this is sadly is something completely different

what they did with the or if I you don't mind

right is Tony go right ahead if I have to remember

it my head will start hurting Avengers the crossing

crossover where it's revealed Tony Stark is a

mind -controlled minion of Kang the Conqueror

who kills several Avengers like also rands and

some supporting characters and the Avengers decide

the smartest thing they can do is go back in

time and bring into the present day a 19 year

old Tony Stark who just happens to take an energy

blast to the chest and has to get a mechanical

heart and joins the Avengers and then onslaught

happens and this is where I'm getting at is what

they did is they cancelled Avengers Iron Man

Captain America and Fantastic Four because they're

all believed to have killed or been killed in

the final onslaught battle. And they had Heroes

Return which is kind of a big thing for Marvel

at the day because this is where they brought

back Jim Lee and Rob Liefeld back into the fold

and they were each running two of these books

as artists and general editors. Although Liefeld

flaked about five issues in and you know well

it's not a big surprise because it's Rob Liefeld.

But since then, this is pretty much his MO. Yeah.

So I mean, they cancelled those comics. They

re -numbered your number ones. They're in this

alternate world that Franklin Richards created

when he still had his reality warping abilities.

And then eventually they cancel after about a

year, which was basically their first experiment

in trying to maybe pull off a DC reboot in that

they updated all these characters with these

new stories. But I think they knew very early

on that it wasn't going to work pan out. So they

just did the year brought them back with a new

number one and then So basically what i'm getting

from all this is marvel has been rebooting since

the early days All as they do with their reboots

is they just hey, let's go back to number one.

Oh, they both have I mean dc's rebooted themselves

and tried to the big thing with dc was they tried

to shift they frequently tried to shift tone

they've always kind of been trying to be a little

more edgy and dark. They've sort of been trying

to shake the Silver Age DC, the Silver Age idea

of DC fans have of them for probably a good 10,

20 years. They were trying to shake that through

the 80s and 90s and I'd say they still tried

to do it in the early 2000 and in a lot of ways

stuff like 52 not the new 52, I mean the event

52 and Blackest night and that stuff was them

still trying to reach that sort of darker edgier

ground that Marvel had kind of pulled off back

in the 90s to sometimes it was successful, sometimes

not. I mean the one big difference between the

two companies is DC has really only a couple

anti -heroes, Batman is one, or vigilante anti

-heroes, Batman to a certain extent is one, Green

Arrow's been one before, etc. etc. Marvel's filled

with them. and those are the ones that get relaunched

the most often for whatever reason like ghost

riders at eight hundred different series over

the years that's true the last one involved the

ghost writer becoming a woman uh... yeah that

was and so not good i'm fine with it i'm fine

with this revenge is didn't help anything no

that's fine to watch when you're drunk well that

one of the things to living Bringing in the movies

Marvel now is a way and that's one of the things

they've done is They've shifted some of the characters

into more the characters from the films. I Mean

if you read some of the Tony Stark or some of

the Tony's Iron Man, geez I'll use the actual

series name if you read some of the Iron Man

He's a lot more in line with the Robert Downey

jr. Tony Stark than he was with some of the ones

from the 90s and early 2000s It's not necessarily

a bad thing and it makes sense for them to shift

some of these characters into more of a movie

mode They'd be stupid not to to be honest but

Yeah, I suppose for some longtime fans. It could

be jarring if it had just happened But I mean

it's one thing that's happened over time. Oh

with the exception of Nick Fury and his random

color changes Red, blue, yellow, purple. Well,

I was thinking more of his race changes, because

I mean, he's... Well, I was trying not to...

Yeah, I know, but... Well, no. But, I mean, you

look at the renumbering, because, I mean, they

did that after Heroes Reborn, where they renumbered

those titles. They also did it with Spider -Man,

where they cancelled most of, like, the eight

titles they had at the time. They had Peter Parker

and Amazing. But then they kept, after a few

months, they started running the original numbering.

And it's like really this was just their attempts

at creating jumping on points for a character

So you wouldn't necessarily have to go back and

read, you know, Avengers 1 through say 500 or

whatever And then companies have done that over

the oh, yeah, yeah Yeah, and then you look at

Marvel like just and again trying to do the reboot

I mean that was basically the genesis of the

ultimate universe was and that was a little more

intended to be the replacement for, you know,

the Marvel 616 universe, but it just became so

popular they started running them both sides

of everything. As this Marvel isn't willing to

do what DC does and completely, you know, I wouldn't

say necessarily to say negate, but they're not

really to call it do -over, but they'll, you

know, they'll restart a title just to bring in

more readers, but... And it's just kind of annoying

that every two years they're going to do something

like this. Because that's what it seems to happen.

It's funny because I actually prefer it this

way because you get more of a sense of an author's

take on that character. I'm not a fan of what

DC has done in the picking and choosing. the

background for their characters. I feel like

that's a lot easier for somebody to do, and in

a lot of ways it simply becomes fan fiction at

that point. You can kind of go like, hey, this

event didn't happen to them, but this one did,

and it's almost sort of a cheat. I prefer to

see the writers have to deal with some of the

fallout from previous events and have to get

past that if it's something they didn't like

or something they... want to skip over or just

not want to deal with, whatever. But there's

something almost sort of disingenuous in just

hitting a reset button and deciding, eh, none

of this happened. Yeah. That's really what I'm

kind of getting at with that is just that there's

almost no cause half the time. It's just like,

OK, we're going to cancel this. We're going to

start it over again. I mean, I understand with

the Marvel, you know, it kind of ties into the

Marvel movie universe a bit, you know, they want

to get kind of a more of a cohesive hold, like

more of a, you know, each title is in its own

individual state, which is kind of what they

did in the mid 90s, where, you know, there was

the Spider -Man family of titles, there was the

X family titles, there's the Avengers family

titles, and stuff like that. So, I don't know.

don't know I always I know is with Marvel I'm

still like in the future here in the pull bag

will probably be doing character months where

we take four or five episodes and they'll be

specific to that character whether it's a Marvel

character DC character whether it's transformers

whatever it is in the future but I'm going back

and I'm looking at because I like Wolverine just

like the next guy everybody loved him in the

92 cartoon you know I enjoyed Steve blooms both

of Steve blooms version both in Wolverine and

the X -Men and superhero squad so I'm going back

and looking through trades for Wolverine I'm

you know obviously you know JT and I are doing

superior spider -man I'm as far as Spidey goes

I'm just sticking with what we're doing now with

that Don't think I'm ever gonna go back and read

any of the old spider -man trades because I've

said it a million times before I know people

are tired of hearing me Say this there are only

so many damn stories. You can tell with Peter

Parker True, you know, and it's one of those

things where to me You know, you know Ryan you

mentioned earlier, but all those Silver Age fans

They they like their their Silver Age thing.

I remember somebody said I think it's a quote

-unquote mutual friend of JT's and I, he's like,

I have no interest in reading Ock is Spidey,

whatsoever. And it's like, hey, fine, if that's

your thing, fine. I find it interesting and fascinating,

because... it's just something i had never seen

before done with that character but that's the

benefits of every doing this sort of soft relaunch

every three years if you have somebody who doesn't

like that or doesn't like that version of spider

-man guess what wait a couple years and the other

one's probably going to be back some new creators

going to come on and they're going to do another

soft relaunch i mean i had to endure the nightmare

as a punisher fan that was map fraction and then

rick remainder Writing it and during that time.

I also got to endure Joss Whedon write it which

was Freaking awful some of the worst stuff ever

written, but then afterwards I mean jumping into

you know Jason Aaron Started on the Mac series

which was one of the better runs on it and then

Greg Ruck is absolutely amazing series and I

mean the thing with the the width the marvel

writers right now you look at somebody like daredevil

it's a character that's been around forever and

has this really long history but if you were

to say pick up and start reading daredevil at

number one when mark wade took over this is recently

or reasonably recently now it's been a couple

years but i mean if you were to start there wade

has done such a good job building the universe

or rebuilding it that you don't necessarily need

any of the old knowledge. You need sort of the

basics, but I mean, you can get that from reading

the Wikipedia page for two minutes, or even if

you had watched the not so good Ben Affleck Daredevil

movie, you know the basics of him. He was blind,

he could see through radar, blah, blah, blah.

Daredevil is one of the best, one of my favorite

titles in the current Marvel Now relaunch after

Hawkeye. Cuz yeah, you basically even read it's

in maiden mentioned in passing throughout that

first issue what daredevils deal is And this

is everything it's like a ma feel like almost

a year past the shadowland storyline where you

know, he took control of the hand ninja clan

and was possessed by the devil and Killed bullseye

and but and it again. Yeah, like you said Wade

has not only built but rebuilt The daredevil

mythos because and he brought it back He's taken

all the way back to the original daredevil in

the 60s and you know early 70s where it was fun

He was like this. He was basically a blind spider

-man. You'll crack and wise will crack and skulls

When you mentioned so fun, you mentioned the

other one that got relaunched that I wanted to

bring up too And that's Matt fractions uh...

hawkeye and i mean his hawkeye in that has absolutely

nothing to do with any continuity really it's

basically all it is is hawkeye on his days off

from the avengers if you've seen the movie you

know the avengers are heli if you've or even

if you've only seen hawkeye in four You can still

pick that up and you already know everything

you need to know. There's nothing else to it.

Fraction is an outstanding writer, his Punisher

run notwithstanding and a couple other not so

great ones, but every writer has some not very

good stuff in their closet somewhere. His Hawkeye

is another one that you don't need any prior

knowledge. It's not that it wiped out the past

with you know, the Marvel now relaunch It's just

they basically ignore it. You don't need to know

it and they're really good writers can do stuff

like that They're able to ignore that past or

they acknowledge it with one line that you're

not missing anything if you don't catch it Yeah,

well that's sorry you go Mike Well, that's one

of the things where, that's kind of one of the

reasons why I wanted to do this episode so I

could find out honestly more about some of this

Marvel stuff. Because like you guys said, you

know, with Mark Waid's Daredevil, I could start

there. Yes, I've seen the movie, regardless of

Ryan's opinion of it. Yes, I will agree. The

theatrical cut... wraps everything up a little

bit too much, but that director's cut version

was so much better. Yeah, the director's cut

was a huge improvement. I still wouldn't say

it was a great movie or anything. I'd say it

was pretty... I like it. I'm not saying it's...

No, I would say it's solid. I definitely wouldn't

say it's bad. I would say the theatrical version

leaned towards bad. The director's cut, for people

who didn't like Daredevil, if you get the chance,

track down and watch the director's cut and give

it another... chance. Although never ever pick

up Electra. No. In fact, Jennifer Garner. Yeah.

I love her to death. Thank you for alias but

no. Well, it wasn't her fault. That movie was

bad. Again, you could have cast anybody in that

and if Robert De Niro was in it, it would have

been terrible. Okay. At what point did Typhoid

Mary have the power to rot things? Cuz as far

as I knew she was just crazy and good with blades

But I'm I've always been okay with different

interpretations of characters for movies because

some things in comics don't work My bigger issue

with it was the movie was just terrible There

wasn't even if everybody reason why the movie

was terrible at least in my opinion was you've

got the same director that did Daredevil Mark

Steven Johnson and he And I guess, and you guys

can tell me if I'm right or wrong here, I assume

in her history she comes back to life. See, that's

what kind of pisses me off about Daredevil and

Elektra is because the theatrical cut version,

when I saw it, I'm like, oh crap, she's dead,

oh no, you know. And then there was the thing

at the end of I will always find you or I will

always know where you are or whatever. And then

we get Elektra, and she's reincarnated, and I'm

like, oh, god, really? This is... This kind of

takes away the emotional value of what Daredevil

had. Well, yeah. No, I mean, it's the Marvel...

Like, they're a little more... I wouldn't say

polished, but they're definitely more abrupt

with moving the movie stuff into the comic universe,

because, I mean, you look at the new Nova title,

which is, again, one of the... I think it's Nova

Hawkeye... are two of the best ones coming out

of the Marvel now and in recent issues of Nova

they've brought in the Chitauri from the Avengers

movie who apparently have always been out there

in the Marvel universe out in space and they're

like this you know No one wants to mess with

them because they're so badass and shit and I

was like they didn't appear out of left field

They've been mentioned and that sort of thing

and they've actually appeared before way back

when So it's nothing new. But yeah, they never

had like the role that they've had until now

and it's pretty obvious It's because of the movie's

success Yeah, cuz I mean the original as far

as I'm aware the original mention of the Chitauri

was in ultimate fantastic foreign or was in the

Ultimates and then it was revealed in Ultimate

Fantastic Four that Shichari are basically the

ultimate scrolls. You know, that's as far as

I knew. But, you know, you look in just a step

back a couple of years, you look at Fraction

and was it David Aja who'd work on Hawkeye and

you look at the complete turnaround they did

on Iron Fist. I mean, before they did that series,

Iron Fist was this dude who wore, you know, this

pimp collared kung fu unitard with ballet slippers,

and they turned him around and made him a complete

kung fu badass. And not only did they do that,

they, again, recreated Iron Fist mythos, like

what happened on Daredevil, and they completely

rebuilt his world and made it like this huge

epic storyline. And that's the one thing that

I love about Marvel over DC some days, is like,

if you find the right guys, Like Mark weighed

on daredevil and fraction on iron man and iron

fist because his iron man run was epic, too There

are some people view find the people with the

right passion. They create goddamn gold Rukas

Punisher run, which was a runner -up for an Eisner

Actually, it was Wade's daredevil that beat it

out. But that's another one I mean all you needed

to know about Frank Castle They even removed

Vietnam from him and I'm fine with that. Basically

just he was a soldier. His family was killed

That's all you needed to know. There was no backstory

Necessary at all It's like Peter Parker's Spider

Bites Spider -Man, there you go. Yeah, and that's

all you really need. Now you can play with that.

I notably am a big fan of what Joe Michael Straczynski

did where he sort of turned Peter Parker's origin

sort of upside down. He introduced that element

of mysticism. It's like the chicken or the egg

sort of thing of spider -man. Was it the spider

or was it the radioactivity? Yeah, and I actually

like that I didn't mind sort of revisiting it

and changing it around a bit and I mean again

with the sort of soft relaunches that Marvel

does whether it be Marvel now or whatever if

you hated that well again, you know wait a couple

years and It was gone. I mean they redid it in

a Nightmarishly terrible story that most people

of trying to forget but still That's how it is

stupid brand new day Yeah, never make deals with

the devil yes That was even if he even if he's

a character in I was brand new brand new day

It's what came out of it and one more day was

the actual event. Yes issue miniseries or whatever

and then it became brand new day, which was also

not great Oh my god, I am just imagining now

a Spider -Man movie with Jack Nicholson in it.

Tell me, have you danced with the devil in a

pale moonlight? Oh god. Um, yeah, Marvel stuff

is, you know, now that I hear you guys talking

about it, there's, cause like I said, I've -

I enjoy a lot of the characters that Marvel has.

I just enjoy them in other mediums, like cartoons,

like films. You know, JT, you mentioned Nova.

Yeah. I would never read that character once,

so I hate that character. And it's all Ultimate

Spider -Man's fault. He's a huge dick in that

cartoon. Oh, no, no, no, no, no. I got to stop

you right there, Mike. The current volume of

Nova and the previous volume with the original

Richard Rider Nova... Those are honestly some

great comic books and you do yourself a disservice

at least the current one just because his name

is Sam Alexander He is not nearly the douchebag

that he is an ultimate Spidey well, we've had

the same Mike and I have had the same argument

to that booster gold was a douchebag in the Animated

DC stuff, but the 52 version and then post 52

version of him was fantastic They really sort

of turned that origin around with him Yeah, and

it's one of those things that you can do with

comics when you play around with the origin or

play around with the characters It's one of the

things I like about comics in general is that

There's in different interpretations for everyone

and that started to extend to the movies too.

I mean you look at Batman Chris Nolan's Batman

is Completely different from pretty much any

other version of it Yeah, and I'm yeah, and I'm

fine with that. I mean, I remember most notably

and this made me really sad I remember really

notably on reviews on the run Victor Lucas hated

the Dark Knight Rises because he was angry because

well batman never quits well batman's been around

for 60 some odd years he it's open to different

interpretations and nolan's version of him it

didn't feel out of Place for him to want to quit.

I mean it was clear that that's where it was

headed for him Or he was gonna die. It's one

or the other and I was okay with it and that's

one of the reasons I like reading comics is there's

so many different versions and yeah, I don't

like all of them, but if You know if you do more

power to you and if you don't like it Well, there's

plenty of other stuff not only that but it doesn't

erase, you know 50 years of some of these characters

existing You know if I ever read a booster gold

comic as long as his origin is not Dumbass medium

mogul from the future come back to the present

to realize. He's useless like that's my old Origin

though Mike when I watched the greatest story

never told that was my biggest problem with the

character Just watching that episode of Justice

League unlimited was that? He's a douche A popular

douche in the future that comes back to the past

and no one realizes no one, you know everybody's

just like ah, you're the next guy in line and

I just like I just don't his redemption in 52

is what Sold it for me. I really in the end I

ended up I really liked that event because it

gave focus to a lot of the minor DC characters

and that's kind of one of the other differences

between the two major companies is that DC has

their a -listers which is pretty much Batman

Superman in terms of comics you have to add Green

Lantern and Then that's kind of about it. I mean

people know who Aquaman is but easy all that

popular They don't necessarily have a B team

either it all there's almost this sort of drop

-off and then you look at somebody like Marvel

and They've got their A team, which right now,

you know, you have to include guys like Iron

Man and Captain America on it. Although you could

make a point that maybe Cap is like on the B

team. But then they've got a solid roster that

most people know of beyond that. And I mean,

even their minor characters, people know the

names of whether you've read a comic a few times

or not. Yeah, yeah. You know like I said for

me Marvel characters like I Don't know you know

I love the Claremont stuff that was done in the

x -men 92 series So I guess I could find trades

for that Where would I start like now for x -men

because if I was gonna start and I'm not saying

that I'm going to start reading x -men I'm just

asking where do you guys think? You know I love

those characters, but I love the characters from

the 90s if the current x -men doesn't You know,

I probably wouldn't pick it up if it doesn't

have Wolverine, Storm, Cyclops, Gambit, Rogue.

Well, the one thing you can look at, I mean,

there's the current Wolverine and the X -Men

series, which is basically Wolverine Rebuilds.

Because years ago, a few years ago, the Xavier

School was blown to bits. They all moved out

to the West Coast. And then Avengers versus X

-Men happens. Just before that happened Wolverine

split from Cyclops is like we can't just always

be prepared to fight these kids need a future

So he rebuilds the school and christened it.

I think it's the Jean Grey school for gifted

youngsters Jean Grey Academy of higher learning.

Thank you, and then Jason Aaron. Oh, yeah, so

I just couldn't remember so basically Wolverine

is Professor X now and it's you know mutant teenagers

and just trying to basically live their lives

and they run into like the new version the Hellfire

Club, which is also these preteen multi billionaires

who are also complete and utter assholes and

It's it's ridiculous fun, too. I mean, yeah One

of the things is Wolverine is playing the role

of Xavier The issue here is that he's still Wolverine.

He's not very good at that role He's doing the

best he can but it's not something he's really

he's more capable in terms of running around

and stabbing people He's not necessarily fit

to teach Children how to fit in or how to survive

and then you bring in the kiddie prides the vice

principal Storm is one of the teachers as his

rogue Gambit is a teacher ice man Yeah, they've

got a number of the 90s X -Men and then you know,

the other thing to note about Wolverine and the

X -Men is It walks that line between so stupid.

It's awesome Really? Well in a lot of issues.

It is ludicrous fun. It's It's I liken it to

some of the issues. It's as if you're reading

army of darkness It's so it's so bad. It's outstanding

because there was an arc where this frankenstein

monster who's in charge of like this supernatural

version of the soup circus of crime comes to

town and like possesses the adult x -men and

makes them like attractions in their show including

wolverine being a clown a bar foe or puke go

or something the clown or something like that

where he basically get they beat him up and he

heals and he pukes and they do it all over again

and it's up to all these kids who are like unsure

of their powers and everything to you know, save

the teachers. And the guy who kind of spearheads

the charge is this guy named Quentin Quire, who

is a major character in the Grant Morrison run

that resulted in like Jean Grey being dead for

like the fifth time. He's basically like a telekinetic,

telepath, anarchist mutant. He has to come save

the day along with all the other students. And

one of my favorite characters in the Wolverine

and the X -Men is Brew. Brew is, you know, the

brood from X -Men, don't you, Mike? No, okay,

they're basically they're Chris Claremont's versions

of the xenomorphs from the alien movies. They

appeared in the cartoon series. They were the

ones that Wolverine was the only one who got

away from them in an episode. It was like an

alien ship that crashed Yeah, they plant their

spawn in him and they take over your body brew

is a mutant brood. He He's educated, he's erudite,

he speaks with a proper British accent probably,

and he has - He's basically Beast's best friend.

Yeah, he is a mini -Beast. And then, at one point,

one of the Hellfire kids, you know, he gets shot

in the head, he goes into a coma, and now he

comes back, he's all, like, snarly, normal brood

now, and, you know, uh, the big arc now is this

girl named Edie who's, like, this conflicted

mutant with hot and cold powers, like, literally

fire and ice. From you know Africa and she goes

to join the new Hellfire Academy in order to

find the guy that shot brood and kill him and

it's all about Wolverine and everyone else trying

to find the school and you know deal with the

Hellfire Club and If you don't and it's so stupid.

It's fun isn't your thing. You can look at the

new uncanny x -men title, which is you know,

Cyclops and Emma Frost and Magneto have gone

out and they've created this big underground

complex and it's the new Xavier school for mutants

since the end of, they killed the phoenix at

the end of Avengers vs X -Men, oh sorry, spoilers,

and now in that whole thing Scarlet Witch reversed

her whole no more mutants snafu and now mutants

are showing up all around the world again. And

Cyclops is going on recruiting all the mutants

that he can, you know, there's a war coming.

He's basically become Magneto. Well, basically

to sort of to make it easier for people. Right

now, the X -Men family, the X -Books, there are

three schools. There's Wolverine's Jean Grey

school of higher learning and by the way while

it is stupid fun I should note it had one of

the best moments of the year With the issue that

where brew was shot was one of the sort of saddest

comics in a long time. Oh, yeah There have been

other great comics over the past few years, but

it's weird because Aaron can do the serious stuff

really well still too. But anyway, there's that.

There's Cyclops's school, which you mentioned,

and then of course the Hellfire Club is a third

school that's against the other two as well.

Yeah, some of the kids from Wolverine have defected

to that one. But they also have all new X -Men,

which is basically Beast who is... I guess because

of Avengers versus X -Men his mutation was killing

him or something in order to and that's kind

of a side plot he goes back in time and brings

the original five X -Men to the future in order

to show them what has happened so he can send

them back and try and ensure that it won't happen

and they're all so horrified by what they see

they're like screw that noise we're staying here

and then Angel joins Cyclops's Academy like he

skipped Sudden Wolverine and everyone else and

Here we get into one of the problems with Marvel

is too many Too many teams because I know all

this I read most of these books and you're giving

me a headache. So Yeah, my brain hurts. I think

if I'm gonna get into X -Men I'm gonna get into

the old stuff the old Claremont stuff I don't

think I'm gonna be reading any new X -Men There's

that or I mean just pick one team and stick with

it. You're not missing anything by not touching

the other ones. The events, particularly in Aaron's

book, the events of the others don't bleed into

his. He just sort of chooses to ignore them,

which for the most part has been a good call.

And that's one of the best things overall of

Marvel now is that a lot of the titles, their

stories, unless it's a specific crossover, they're

entirely self -contained. Yeah, like Wolverine

in the X -Men. Like I said, if you want to read

X -Men, I would totally recommend that one because

that one, you know, it's enough of the 90s cartoon

that you get that. It's more or less the classic

setup of, you know, the mutant school. Iron Man

right now is, you know, again, he's off in space

and he's part of the Guardians of the Galaxy.

And yet somehow he's still on earth. I don't

think they've explained it in terms of just to

again simplify it for anybody If I were to recommend

like books from Marvel now to pick up since the

relaunch daredevil is Actually daredevils probably

second on my list number one would be Hawkeye

Yeah, two is daredevil Third is tough. See, third

would be easy for me normally. I'd recommend

Ruckus Punisher, but they canned it, so he could

be on Thunderbolts, which has been terrible,

by the way. Good call on that. Retards. I do

not like Daniel Way. At least he's leaving now,

so it may improve significantly. Anyway, I don't

know who to put third. I'm really tempted by

Wolverine and the X -Men, but that's sort of

a personal choice. How many issues have come

out for Wolverine and the X -Men so far? 31.

Okay, so it'll definitely be traded then. Yeah,

that's the way to read it. The first three trades

have come out. I mean, they're all readily available.

I think they're at 36 already now, actually.

Something like that. I just picked up the new

one today. I forget what number it is. Yeah,

for me it's going to depend on the character.

Right now I'm okay just doing Superior Spidey

for Marvel. JT didn't know this a couple weeks

ago until now, but we will also be doing... is

it a four or a five issue miniseries for Superior

Carnage? I think it's a four issue mini. We'll

be doing that as well Yeah, you mentioned you

like Wolverine and Wolverine has a lot of the

same problems as the Hulk and the Punisher in

that he's frequently cursed with not very good

writers and in terms of good Wolverine runs It's

kind of been a while Jason Aaron's run was okay.

It wasn't great, but It certainly wasn't bad.

It's one of the better ones in the last few years

Basically, the last really solid Wolverine run

was Mark Millar's enemy of the state. This is

in my opinion though, right? Certainly people

can argue with that but like Millar's enemy the

state's is a good one. You don't need it It's

another one. You really don't need any backstory,

you know Bad Wolverine kill lots of things. That's

all you need to know somebody One of my friends

on Twitter and another podcaster I've listened

to since 2008, Michael David Sims from Earth

-2 .net. I asked him and I asked Twigs Mike Lademan

for suggestions on Wolverine on Twitter. And

they and Mike Simms said not dead yet enemy of

the state weapon X in the original Wolverine

miniseries by Miller Yeah, and I was trying to

yeah Frank Miller's I was trying to go like recent

and that's of those I mean Millar's enemy the

state is like the most recent one and Certainly,

yeah going back and reading those other ones

They were really good reads like in a lot of

ways Frank Miller's run is what would end up

defining the character Probably as much as Chris

Claremont bringing him into the X -Men team way

back when. So yeah, those are definitely big

ones. Those old Claremont X -Mens, too, if you're

a big fan of Wolverine, are great ones to go

back to. And you've seen the cartoon show. I

think you'd have a blast reading the Chris Claremont

stuff. Yeah, I've seen all of the cartoons. And

each one takes... I haven't seen Pride of the

X -Men. I don't ever want to see Pride of the

X -Men, but starting with 92, I've seen X -Men

92. I've seen X -Men Evolution, even though I

wish I could erase it from my memory. That wasn't

bad. I liked some of the later stuff, especially

the apocalypse. Yeah, no. And when it came to

its ending, it wasn't that bad at the beginning,

though. Yeah, I wasn't a fan of the whole, like,

conflicting schools sort of thing, basically.

Yeah, no. And then Wolverine and the X -Men,

which was... basically got shafted after one

season, which sucked. I loved that. It was a

great show, but I hate cliffhangers like that.

I mean, it's not their fault. I would have been

fun. Yeah, obviously I was same with I mean superior

spider -man or superior spectacular spider -man

I loved that series Josh Keaton is in a lot of

ways He is spider -man for me now, which is shocking

because I mean I grew up with the 90s one in

there Oh and the original I should say but I

mean I loved that series so much and that was

another one is really sad to see go And see that's

the thing with spider -man over the years in

voice acting like oh God JT remind me when did

Shattered Dimensions come out? Like what two

three years ago something like that. Yeah Everybody

remembers Bumblebee as spider -man before he

was bumblebee Dan Gilvazan everybody remembers

Dan Gilvazan as the voice of spider -man and

spider -man his amazing friends Two three years

ago you get Shattered Dimensions, and he's 2099

Spidey And it's so much darker than what he ever

did in Amazing friends, and I was like oh my

god. That is so freaking awesome. Oh, yeah, that

was So that was just the best thing about shutter

dimensions. I mean like you said you had Christopher

Daniel Bonds you had Josh This was my favorite

He has a decent voice for Nightwing in Under

the Red Hood, but as Spider -Man, no. I do agree.

Josh Keaton as Spider -Man was really good. I

just could not get past the animation style in

Spec Spidey. I gotta go back and watch that series

again to see if I'm gonna like it anymore. But

yeah, I mean, you know, who knows what Marvel's

gonna do next? Is there anything else you guys

wanna bring up? I guess the one thing I gotta

say is Marvel, at least with their animated series,

just given my two senses, more so than DC. Like

DC does excellent animated series, do not get

me wrong. It's Marvel puts a lot more effort

into integrating the different, I guess, the

different versions in one series. Cause I mean,

you look at Wolverine and the X -Men prime example.

And even Avengers, Earth Might, these heroes,

they mixed in different characters, design elements.

They try to bring everything together to give

us the best possible package. And really, that's

one thing I love about Marvel, especially now

in this age of the Marvel Cinematic Universe,

how they're trying to bring everything kind of...

They're trying to mix everything together somewhat.

And that's kind of what I appreciate about it

is because it's a lot Marvel takes great care

with that sort of thing. So it's not so heavy

-handed They've started to get things right with

their animated stuff The problem is they keep

canceling everything before it can get going

I mean people seem to have forgotten that that

first season of Justice League was not all that

good. I mean, even when you listen to the commentary,

the producers and everyone that worked on it

will admit that it wasn't great and plus they

had this thing that every week when they wanted

to introduce a new villain to show that he's

a badass, he would beat up Superman in the first

act. I mean, poor Superman. Go back and watch

the first season and count the number of times

he gets knocked around. It's pretty frequent.

So I mean, yeah, people forget that it takes

some time to Builds these shows and unfortunately

Marvel just isn't giving anyone the time it goes

for one season and that's it And even the ones

that start off really well for a season don't

get to go on and improve. So let Stop canceling

things Yes, it's one thing I am almost loathe

to mention like Greg Johnson the guy created

gargoyles He's had, you know, he is kind of the

driving force between a lot of Marvel animated

projects. Like he's a huge difference in making

Spectacular Spider -Man as good as it was. And

the same thing again with Wolverine and the X

-Men. And it's almost because he goes in with

a Bible and he's got a vision and he's got a

storyline. He has like an end game planned out.

But Marvel, for some reason, is like, ah, we

got 26 episodes out of you. You're done. Well,

that's pretty much what most You know this could

be a whole other podcast a whole other thing

on animation. That's pretty much the thing. It's

like most the time it's Let's get 65 that way

we can have enough for syndication but You know

the thing with specifically Marvel and also transformers

cartoons is that? Marvel will have a series say

for example over in the x -men. They'll do 26

episode and be like oh, hey X -Men first class

is coming out so we can't have this cartoon anymore.

We have to cancel that and do something else

for this new movie or you know same thing with

with Spec spec Spidey versus Ultimate Spidey

They were like or Avengers Earth Mightiest Heroes

versus Avengers ass, which is the new series

Because I've heard the new Avengers cartoon is

nothing but ass It's not terrible, but it's nowhere

near what Earth's Mightiest is. I'd say the same

thing. Ultimate Spider -Man is okay, but it's

a shell of what Spectacular was, unfortunately.

See, I never got into spec, and I love the humor

in Ultimate. So you take the storylines in Ultimate

Spider -Man and add about ten layers of intelligence,

and that's what you had with Spectacular. It's

also frustrating, because in a lot of ways, Spectacular

was a much darker show than Ultimate is, too.

I mean, you mentioned the animation style. Yeah,

it was, you know, much brighter. But because

of that, they were able to get away with doing

a lot more adult things than they've tried on

Ultimate. Oh, yeah. No, they went... Spec was

very much a love letter to the comics, whereas

Ultimate... And the 90s series, too, I should

mention. Oh, yeah, but I mean Ultimate Spidey

is like I enjoy that show but they are so ripping

off that the Teen Titans humor With the littlest

sides and all that. Yeah Nova is essentially

Beast Boy in my eyes. No, no Beast Boy wasn't

near that douchey Yes, he was Yes, he was a complete

dick. He might have been a bit of a dick, but

he wasn't a complete dick Both of the Teen Titans

show, the old show, and this new crappy kitty

animated short shit. They both suck. But anyway,

back to Marvel Comics. You know, I'm really gonna

start looking at some Wolverine stuff. I'm gonna

start, you know, I'm gonna start looking into

some Punisher stuff, some Daredevil stuff, eventually.

Like, you know, I've said this before, honestly,

with any of us, it honestly comes down to cost.

And right now, I'm spending anywhere between

90 to what? $120 a month for comics. Wow, I'm

not even spending that much. Well, that includes

trades though, because I'm buying a lot of trades.

I'm not telling anybody what I spend in a week

then. Would we laugh or would we, you know, pat

you on the back? You'd both probably cry, actually.

You'd both probably cry, actually, because it's

probably a whole... Ryan is someone who reads

everything. And I read a lot, like books and

everything else, so I still average a novel every

couple days. Jesus. Yeah, he... I read quickly

and I try to consume whatever I can, so... Yeah.

That's fair, that's fair. All right. Well, I

know we haven't covered every single thing with

Marvel because that would take 8 ,000 podcasts

that are seven hours long Yeah, seven hours long

each. Yes If I might suggest Mike Or if I might

make a suggestion three titles that anybody that's

listening this should check out daredevil Hawkeye

Guardians of the Galaxy and I'll make it for

Wolverine and the X -Men I would suggest Superior

Spider -Man, but I know a lot of people that

want to burn Dan Slot's ass. That, and I mean,

for a lot of people just starting out too, they

may be more familiar with Peter Parker as Spider

-Man, so it might be a bit jarring for people.

Also, zero props for stealing three of my picks.

All right, Ryan suggestions why are you did mine

remember I said like three earlier so I? Struggled

with picking Wolverine and the x -men because

I think it's a little more niche than the other

two I really think you know Hawkeye and daredevil

are two that pretty much anyone can pick up and

enjoy The Hawkeye is the Met Fraction run and

the Daredevil is the Mark Waid run, right? Yeah,

and to be fair, there's other stuff too. I mean,

X -Men just relaunched with an all -female team

and it's female members that people from the

90s who watch the cartoon will know the majority

of. The only one who wasn't in a lot that's in

this is Psylocke, really. And so, I mean, that's

also an option. It just started over at number

one. However, having said that they're all characters

that are in Wolverine and the X -Men as well.

So Maybe that's the right pick. I don't know

and honestly, it's I think it's like what 20

some issues in the current ultimate comics Spider

-man which is you know in if you haven't read

ultimate comics is ultimate Peter Parker died

Trying to save Captain America killed by the

Punisher, baby And then he wades into a crowd

of police, punish me! He's just like a masochist

now. No, he's fine in the end, though. I like

how they closed it out with him back in a prison,

torturing out all the prisoners. Yeah. But the

current Ultimate Spider -Man, I would highly

suggest, if you want to get some that's not too

far... Miles Morales. Yeah, Miles Morales. Again,

bitten by... one of the last remaining oscorp

genetically altered spiders he gets a couple

of new superpowers which basically gets like

a venom shock and he can turn invisible and they

had uh where earth 616 like peter parker spider

-man got sucked into the ultimate universe and

he literally gave miles morales a pair of web

shooters which i thought was really cool And

it's only about 22 or 23 issues into the series

right now and that's some anybody would be able

to pick up and catch up on pretty darn quick.

Alrighty then, well we're gonna head out of the

pull bag this time around next week. I have no

idea what we're doing for episode 21, no clue.

So keep reading those comics and we will talk

to you later. Bye. You just heard the latest

episode of The Pullback, GCRN's comic book review

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