I'm Gary Butterfield. And this is Days of Future Cast, the podcast where Gary and I talk about all things X-Men. And we're back to talk about X-Men 97. the second episode listeners for you. It's been one week. For us, it's been 5,000 years. We are in the long winter. It's been many moons. It's been a large amount of summers, however you want to describe it. But Gary and I are back. And we're going to be talking about the X-Men 97 TV show. How are you, Gary?
Good. One thing about coming back to this, you know, our schedules haven't lined up and everything. But a nice reminder, this is a damn good show. It is, yeah. I was watching it today and I'm like, I don't want to take notes on this. I just kind of want to watch it. I wish my memory was good enough to remember a 30-minute cartoon show. But instead, I'm going to have to type while I watch this.
Don't push yourself to remember a 30-minute cartoon show. That's nuts. Nobody can do that. I couldn't have done that when I was young, just talk about a cartoon without notes. Yeah. Absolutely. This is like Simpsons or something. I've seen like a billion times.
um yeah this is this is a very like it's i mean we talked about it in the first episode but like the animation is so good the the voice acting is really what is really good the fight scenes are so good and then this episode uh more than the first one i think really brings in the angst of the x-men yeah um and uh boy am i here for it am i am i here for these relationships and for these people
A lot of pathos going on in this episode. How are you doing? I'm doing well. I'm excited to talk about the X-Men. I've been kind of disconnected from comic books lately. You've been giving me like... random details about the modern marvel universe i just don't understand like you give me little factoids and i'm like i don't think that's dc i don't know what you're talking about the uh i i keep reading comics
you know, trying to read comics. And then I was reading Krakoa-era X-Men and enjoying it. And I got to the Sins of Sinister event, which was pretty fun and kind of fell off because some of the writing I don't like. Uh, so I was looking for other stuff, but I keep seeing things with this new X-Men relaunch and I don't, it doesn't seem like my cup of tea. I haven't, I haven't watched it yet, but there's just a lot of weird shipping going on. Like X-23 and Angel. And it's like, isn't she young?
yeah you know and is it well i mean it could be teenage it could be like time displays oh teenage angel it could be is he is he back though i think for some reason i thought they put those guys back I do have a quick comics corner. Two things I read that are only vaguely, one of them is only vaguely X-Men related. But a good recommendation. One, I read a little alternate universe miniseries last night called Dark Ages.
Um, it's like an alternate future where there's like an EMP and it gets rid of electricity and it's like, you know, apocalypse versus everyone. That's pretty fun. Oh, dark. Yes. I get it. It's not dark like it's, you know, just super dark. It's dark because of lights. That was good. It's dark because of lights. As a Tom Taylor comic, I've never read anything. He's apparently a big Batman guy. Okay. Never read anything by him. I liked that.
And then the biggest surprise, though, I read, you know, and I'm going to pronounce this wrong. T-Henisi Kowat? Okay. Do you know that name? Coates. I know the last name. I think it's Tahiti Coates, but I'm also definitely one of those people that I've seen written about quite a bit and definitely respect the stuff that he has written. Like I didn't watch that good morning America where he talks about.
light video where he talks about balance light so i just don't know how to pronounce his name i don't know how to pronounce it i've read his work uh you know intellectual um he did a run on captain america that was very famous i was like i'll give this a try like i'm not a big cap guy uh it's excellent
uh should surprising nobody like i i over the last like week and a half i sat down and just read 24 issues of captain america surprising myself and and live is that uh is that steve rogers cap or is that It's Steve Rogers cap. Oh, okay. So I thought he did the Falcon cap run for, he might at some point. It's right after Secret Empire. So it's Cap when people don't trust him. It's really good. It's really good writing. I like that comic a lot.
Excellent. Everybody go buy those comic books that Gary just told you to go buy. Go do it immediately. Comics moment. um that's that's all the comics stuff i've come up with in the last like six months okay since we've recorded i've read two comics i've read um i've read all of the expanse like a second time actually this might be my third or fourth time
The Expanse. The Expanse. It's kind of like the X-Men, but like... what if space right like you know what i'm saying like what the x-men is already kind of what it is really um mcu corner I just want to mention that I have been watching Agatha all along as it's been airing. And that is a fantastic return to Marvel form, I think. I'm really excited to start it. Also, hella gay, if that's your... It's, you know, it's not particularly, but it doesn't bother me. I just want, I am excited. Boys kiss.
Oh, interesting. Yeah. Cause I'd seen stuff, um, just in the periphery and I was like, Oh, girls can. Girls have not kissed yet. But if they don't, we riot. Because there's a lot of tension there. So if they don't kiss, we riot. That's what I was assuming just from pictures of Aubrey Plaza. Uh, online. Um, but yeah, good, uh, good, good for, good for boys.
that's gonna yeah i'm excited to to watch that i know one of the big reveals in it which is the danger of not watching these things when they come out but i've still just been busy for for move is it who the character one of the characters is is who the boy is yeah So it's not even your fault, but I think we can fully blame that on Funko Pie.
because they made Funko Pop characters of the two big character reveals in this. One of which, as of episode six, has not been revealed on the show yet, but I know. That's very irritating. Yeah, yeah. And then they just tweeted them out. The character who a specific person is playing, which is kind of a big deal in terms of cosmic marvel.
was just revealed and honestly like it's one of those things where like it's pretty fucking obvious like yeah like there's one moment in episode five where i was like yep that checks out um but it's it's still like a reveal is a reveal and i like to i like to be Yeah, it's still bad for him. And I'm looking forward to all of the future Marvel projects that we've got on. We've had trailers.
though thunderbolts looks pretty good yeah thunderbolts looks fun uh you know yeah it's um it's weird because the leaked thunderbolts trailer had uh Yelena uh doing the the narration but it was just in like that chick's accent it was just like just an American accent I was like well this is trash but obviously like they've ADR'd it since then so it's like she has that kind of Russian accent
from one of the Disney events and that shit looks incredible. That looks really good. So happy that I was right on how they were going to approach that whole project. And I'm super excited that they just kind of made my thing that I've been talking about for fucking years. Well, the period piece version of that way back in the day, there's a Michael Chabon pitch.
for a Fantastic Four movie from like way back in the day that I read. That was this. It wasn't this literally, but it was a period piece. Having that aesthetic is going to be so fun. Yeah. I'm excited. It's a, it's a good stuff's coming down. It's slowed down, which I like, you know, tons of, tons of shit's not coming out.
Um, we're, we're recording this last thing we recorded and put out was the Wolverine Deadpool thing. That's coming to home video soon. So we all shall live. She's excited. It's out. It's I think it's on. It's out. Yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So we're going to watch that maybe this weekend. Good, good, good Marvel times. In the meantime, we were talking about days. Excuse me. We're talking about X-Men 97 season one, episode two. Mutant liberation begins.
This aired on March 20th, 2024. When Magneto was forced by the UN to stand trial, a group of anti-mutant rioters... This was directed by Chase Conley, written by Bo DeMaio, and we are just not going to talk about Bo DeMaio on this podcast because I don't want to get into it. Yeah. Still not worth it. And this is taking...
The thing that X-Men 97 does so well and take old 90s storylines and around them that you maybe forgot about and kind of reimagining them. So this is our trial of Magneto. This is our executioner. Nobody ever thought the executioner would be in anything. No, he doesn't either. He's a bad 90s villain. Here he is. He's also contributing to the parade of awful costumes that we get with Magneto's costume.
I think Nintendo's costume is great, dude. This big M is just fantastic. I love it. It's so funny. I've loved it since day one. Yeah, it's so good. Uh, the, uh, but yeah, we get excuse for a song and stuff. Um, the other thing we get is, uh, this is very clearly the January six riots. Yes. You know, just a word. I make a January six joke in mind. so if we're reading that together like note that they call it the insurrection yeah late in the episode
What happened last time? Last time, we found out that Jean Grey is pregnant. Xavier is presumed dead to the world, but actually he's just hanging out in space. And he left everything to Magneto in a great hardback book. containing his will, including the X-Men. yes he published he self-published his hardback you know on amazon you can get your will turned into a book you think he got what's his name from you died to do like a really nice version oh yeah get the tune in fairweather
It's $600, but it's really nice. There's probably like 12 people that get a tune in fair weather joke on an X-Men podcast, but okay, here we are. Yeah. So we get the beginning with the new animation logo, Marvel animation logo, which is nice. And everything like in this series, one of the cool things they do is the intro changes each time. We get little reminders of things from X-Men history in addition to updates on what's currently going on.
So they show us two things, very importantly, that are referenced in the episode. We show Stormfighting Callisto, or Callispo. I think it's Clisto. I think I wrote Clisto. Yeah, sorry. Clisto. Yeah, no, no, no. That's my fault for doubting my memory.
uh, fighting Callisto and, uh, cause we're gonna have more locks in this and we see the dark Phoenix because Jean Grey is going to mention being in the blue area of the moon. Yep. And then we're going to start the episode and classic X-Men fashion with a child trapped in a Ferris wheel.
never gonna i'm glad they don't i i like a ferris wheel quite a bit because i can't do because of motion sickness uh and if i do something more intense than a ferris wheel i sometimes get queasy it's like a roller coaster light it's like the diet It's exceedingly rollercoaster light. It's like a rollercoaster. It's like the sit down concert of rollercoasters. Yeah.
All of your classmates are making suicides at the fountain drink and you're asking for a can of ginger ale. That's what's happening. Literally asking for water. Like, can I have one milk, please? But yeah, it's falling apart in a horrible way. Yes. It's a Coney Island disaster. And a firefighter manages to get up here to save this kid. But as the firefighter is about to bring him down, like the whole thing starts falling. And it's frozen in place in midair because it's caught by Magneto.
yeah and oh my god it's magneto it's a villain but he's doing good stuff what do we do says the news um and cyclops is just watching this like on the news like going god damn it like he's doing good shit and getting good press like why am i not out there i'm just hanging out watching tv uh he's whining to gene he was like why didn't xavier trust me why didn't he give me the x-men
And Gene says, well, you're thinking about this wrong. Maybe he did it for us. Like I'm pregnant. Remember, we got to go do family now. We got to stop being X-Men and stop in Ferris wheels. And we see Val Cooper and her like, you know, the Council of Generals or whatever kind of watching this news report as well. And then we see the Friends of Humanity or Execution.
Also watching this as he builds his little anti-mutant gun. Yes. And then we go to the sewers where the Friends of Humanity have now captured the Morlocks. And we see some of our old friends. We see Callista. Table Boy. Table Boy, our classic Table Boy.
And the Friends of Humanity are like, oh, I'll use this metal gun that shoots energy at Magneto. And Magneto breaks in and is like, that's not a good idea. That's stupid. Yeah, Magneto breaks in. They didn't think Magneto was going to be there. They were just going to execute some Warlock. The speech Magneto gives here is great. This whole like, you know, you will not even let them have the dignity of living in your field.
you know, as he just bodies these humans. Maguino is the king of speeches in this episode. It's incredible. Like, I don't, who is ghostwriting his speeches? Like, I need to know. he's doing really good uh this is this is real good like i this whole episode i was just like oh man you know so fucking cool yeah i need it was just the best he's everything that the x-men is like it's everything i love about
He's so good. Like, I never think about him when I'm being asked, like, my favorite X-Men characters, but he's really fucking up there. Yeah. Love Magneto. So he takes them out. It's left unclear whether he kills them. This is going to come up later. You know, we go back to the mansion where Wolverine's wondering why Xavier left everything to Magneto and everyone else is having the same.
issue until Rogue says, you know, none of us have spotless past. Maybe we should give him a second chance. This is a weird thing that the show does because Rogue and Magneto have a history that we've never seen on the cartoon. This wasn't part of the original animated series. It is a thing that happens in the comics, but not in this timeline exactly.
If I recall... Yeah, it's a weird... I've got the weird 90s trading... this where they're all loved up on each other um it's it's a weird like offshoot timeline uh and and also like we haven't really seen we didn't see in the comment in the cartoon uh like rogues checkered past right like in the cartoon she was just on the team we never saw her like her or We get a little bit of that. There's the flashback episode where she gets the powers with Captain with Miss Marvel.
But we don't get to see her as like an evil mutant under control of Mystique and stuff. We don't see her with the really bad haircut that she has. That's what it is, yeah. Yeah, I remember that haircut, but holy shit. So yeah, Rogue is like, hey, we should give everybody a chance. And Wolverine's like, I've killed thousands of people and I don't think that that's right. Yeah.
Meanwhile, Magneto comes in and he's like, guys, y'all were letting mutants live in the fucking sewer? What the fuck is wrong with that? wrong with you y'all had billions of dollars and you have your and your fucking like mutant brethren are in the sewers are you fucking kidding me it's ludicrous like i'm disappointed you and xavier yes so good it's really good
And then I love Scott being like, oh yeah. And I bet you those jerks in the sewers are. And he's like, they're alive. Yeah. It cuts him off. Like Scott's being very petulant. He left those sapiens. I love the fucking emphasis and the sheer disgust, the distaste he puts on those sapiens alive. Because again, he's trying to prove to them that he's all about sapiens. but Cyclops can't quite let this go. So he tells Gene like, Hey, we need to read his mind and find out what he's really.
Like we have to find this. And Gene's like, I don't want to do that. And it wouldn't be accurate. Maybe he'd be honest now, but not be in the future. And she goes, well, then we do it once an hour every day. Cyclops is being such a dork. Cyclops is a huge dork throughout this episode, unfortunately. And I get it. This is his dork wheelhouse. This is his thing. He gets to be dork.
He's stressed. He has an eminent baby. And then, of course, he looks at Magneto and is like, I'm keeping an eye on you. Which is... Very funny. Storm says, hey, listen, you were our greatest foe. Of course we wanted to prove yourself. And Magneto goes, yeah, no, that makes sense. uh you're the closest thing to a goddess so it's hard to say that i'm not gonna let you read my mind um you know it leaves later you know cyclops says you know maybe xavier was wrong
And Manito goes, yeah, perhaps he's made a mistake. That is, I've been saying this for years. Yeah. And he even does say like that, you're coming close to a conclusion that I made years ago, right? Like way to catch. Yeah. And then we have like and I think this is the first moment that I've realized like this was going to be a truly different kind of X-Men cartoon because this is a moment between Jean Grey and Storm.
Where Jean is, like, packing up her old outfit because her and Cyclops are still planning on moving out of the mansion and kind of living their own lives. What's your credit score like? Where are you buying your mortgage from? I want to know. I got to know details. What's your W-2 look like? Whatever.
um can't be worse than trying to buy a house if you're a full-time podcaster who knows tough stuff the uh she's talking about she does some you know she's like oh i wore this outfit back when i was the dark phoenix and scott was there for It just sounds like she's doing exposition, you know. And she's kind of reminiscing about this. And she says, you know, all the shit we've been through, I'm worried about my baby's future.
You know, how the world's going to treat him as a mutant. How do we tell him he's different? This is obviously, you know, it's very... Like things I've seen written by people of color talking about how to talk to their kids. You know, like how do I explain to my kid that they're always going to be different and outsider and have to be careful all the time. Yeah. And one thing I think that.
if we not to strip away controversy or anything, but like one thing that Bo DiMaio does is bring that, that perspective of, as a person. And like, I think for one of the first times, maybe the first time in the animated and in the animated world, like making that metaphor.
it's much more upfront about it yes you know which is part of why this the show resonated with people and everything regardless of the crapulence of that particular person uh you know or whatever the actual truth is i don't fucking know I'm not subscribing to an OnlyFans to get it. You can watch it. If you're listening to this and you want to watch it, you don't want to do that. People have done rips.
of it i'll save everybody the the time it's really irritating yeah he just says like if you keep subscribing i'll tell you more yeah uh it's very frustrating there was a dude doing that during the uh drake kendrick uh earlier this year and then yes i'm gonna drop the details on drake and just say subscribe to my Twitter and like, you know, I'll drop it in six weeks or whatever. Like, just what are you doing? Like, what is this? What is this attention?
Are you marketing a new soda? Yeah. Is this a new Britney album? Like, why are you talking about it three months in the future? Like, what are we doing? Shadow drop. that somebody's a sex pest because in that time between when you shadow drop it they can do more sex pest shit yeah like it's like how everybody who knew about diddy probably should have said something yes i understand why you know people didn't but also like who knows what happened while you didn't
you know, that is a responsibility not to, not to sound like an X-Man here. Um, but yeah, Jean's, Jean's worried about like what her, uh, child is going to be like and storm kind of reads this and it's like oh you you wish him to be born human and and storm says that she's had very similar thoughts about herself
But she always comes back to the fact that her mutant gifts gave her the life that she has now, her family with the X-Men and specifically Jean as a sister. And this is what I was talking about when I said this was like a different type of show, like this moment removed of any kind of life.
This is just a moment of two women talking to one another about their lives and about who they are and who they're going to become. And even Jean is like, I sound like a fool. And she's like, no, Jean, you sound like a mother. just a really just like absolutely brilliant brilliantly written scene and just like how often do you get these two characters just talking about some shit
It's something that it's interesting to see it here because it's done much better. It's something that I really liked in the original series. Every once in a while, you'd have these tiny little moments. I remember the first Rogue episode, highlight episode, where she's watching Scott and Gene hold hands.
You know, and the camera really artfully. And then she talks about how she can't touch people and everything like that. Like these little character moments have nothing to do with fighting or the macro plot. It does it much better than the old series does. I'm not comparing it. It's just something I remember attracting me to that X-Men animated series in the 90s. Rogue goes in to bother Magneto. Magneto wants to be left alone, but she's bugging him. Your pep talk didn't go well.
I don't know if you noticed this. She uses three fucking cat metaphors in this conversation. It's a lot, dude. It's a lot. Everything is compared to a cat. Even, I mean, like they really took that, like, you know. tail can't rocking chair tail of a cat thing and we're like nope that's her thing now she just talks about cats yeah
If you live in the South, everything is through the lens of cat. What if Dolly Parton only sings songs about Jolene? Like, you know, your pep talk went over about as well as a bunch of cats in a yarn store. Working nine to five with Jolene. I can't stop thinking about Jolene. Did you ever see that tweet where it's like, hey, honey. Hey, Julene. I've got kind of a weird voice message here. I don't know if you checked the messages, but it's kind of intense.
A small spoiler, and who knows when this episode is going to be. actually came out. It's a spoiler for Jolene because we all know how that song ends. But they heavily imply in the latest Agatha that Agatha was... the original jolene oh that's very funny that's great did i tell you uh when i was reading uh kakoya era x-men you know how uh destiny's name is just straight up irene adler
Yeah, I do. Yeah, because Irene Adler is a Sherlock Holmes secondary character. They retconned that mystique with Sherlock Holmes. are you serious yeah yeah um mystique was in body morphed at sherlock holmes and she's the irene adler that is so weird It's fucking nuts. A big laugh out of me when it came up. Classic Kieran Gillen bullshit.
Um, so, you know, he, she's, uh, she's talking to a Magneto, uh, here and it's just like, he says, Hey, you know, when Xavier was around, I could always feel him in my mind. Like he wasn't probing. He was just there, you know, I, he, cause he cared for me. You know, and we eventually became enemies. I felt like I needed this helmet to block him out.
Yes. You know? And Rogue says, you know, you're worried that if you felt how much he loved you, you wouldn't be able to go through with your crusade. I ship it. It's very direct in this kind of thing. I know you're anti-shipping gear. I just don't, you know, if the characters have sex, I'm good with it. I don't need to, I don't, I don't know what it is. Gary wants to shut the ports now.
He wants the workers to go on strike. He wants to set all the ports down. No shipping in the U.S. The scene, later we're going to get them in the mindscape. Yeah. You know, actually together and stuff. And I just, I don't... I don't know. Here's the thing. I don't ship anything. Here's the thing. Uh, let's say that you, you were going through, you were Magneto and I was Xavier.
Okay. And tell me more. I'm getting down just really, really hard. No, but you know, the, I think I just, it bothers me because I like deep friendships. I pull back my four. I just, I like a non-sexual deep friendship. I just, I know I want that in more stories where it's like, no, I love my friends.
Like I would do these things for my friends and I don't want to suck their dicks. I just love them. You know, they're, they're family. Like, uh, you know, it's okay. It's okay to have platonic friends too. yeah yeah i just want i i don't like the the um i don't like fandom spaces that erase that possibility yeah is the thing i'm really reacting to this does feel like it's it's definitely
It is being very, very direct about this very, very publicly known subtext. I think that is definitely what this is going for. I like my data's response to this too. like, you know, I want to honor Xavier's last wish because he sacrificed And he kind of wonders if, like, will any of these X-Men be able to accept him? And Rogue points out, like, you know, I was in the same situation, but, like, I didn't demand their trust. Like, I just earned it by being.
And then we have this moment, and you kind of mentioned this a little earlier, where McVito holds her hand and like... It's like, you know, I'm surprised you would allow yourself to be in the same room with me alone. And we're like, what the fuck? Do they bone? What is happening? What's going on? And in this universe, yeah, like they have a romantic past.
And we're going to see it later, but apparently his magnetic ability, and I think this is pulled from the comics, prevents her powers from working on them. So they can actually touch each other. Yeah. And when you talked about this not being error appropriate, it is what happens in Age of Apocalypse. You know, which happened around the same time. We just haven't seen it in the 80s and 90s, like this old relationship.
And Rogue doesn't want to let that particular cat out of the bag, doing the third of the cat metaphors. I can't remember the second one she does, but there are literally three in the same paragraph. I didn't write them down, but I'm glad you brought that up. Meanwhile, helicopters land outside them. government soldiers run out or aiming guns at the X-Men and Val Cooper.
And she demands that they hand over the terrorist Magneto and warns Magneto that their guns won't respond to his magnetism. But yeah, they still flew in with metal helicopters. Yeah. This is like, I think this kind of, this is an interesting moment where it kind of proves what Magneto used to preach before he's adopted this new kind of path for himself, right? Like this is exactly how he would expect the government to.
Yeah, everyone's kind of, I told you so. And yes, like when this happens, you know, even Cyclops is even saying Magneto's like, don't, you know, don't do anything to Rash and Cyclops like we don't lose our cool with the good guys show up.
But he weaponizes the helicopters as a threat. Like they're holding guns against him. He's going to hold helicopters against them. Yeah. You know, cutting off their heads with the blades and stuff. He brings it near them, but the soldiers, you know, Val doesn't flinch. She just says, listen, you need to be put on truck.
You know, he says, oh, you know, if I do, you know, I assume this trial will be fair. He says sarcastically, if I succeed in this, you'll forgive me. And she's like, yeah, that's how trials work. And he surrenders. He knows he needs to prove himself to the X-Men. And this is a medium in which they would respect.
And everybody is shocked at this. Like the whole X-Men team was like, as he like literally surrenders, allowing humans to put cups on him, which is something Magneto would never have let happen. He, you know, he absolutely just like surrenders and the X-Men are like, what in the fuck is going on? Who is this man? Yep. So it kind of works. We go to the trial. It's being aired live. And Val Cooper is laying out his crimes. You know, it's easy to forget. Like, Matt Ito is a pretty big terrorist.
in this thing. I love how Wolverine decided not to go. Yes. Wolverine's hanging out at home watching TV with Jean. You know, Jean's there. Scott and everyone else left to go protect Magneto at the trial and protect from January 6th, the insurrectionist. She's like, oh, I didn't know.
She says, you know, oh, I didn't know he left. And Wolverine says there's a lot of that going around. You know, he's noticing a division between them. Earlier, she said, hey, I need to tell you something to Storm. You have to promise not to tell Scott. We see outside the courthouse, the executioner kind of preparing his. I keep associating him with a friend.
I don't think that he is, but I kept associating. He is. He is. Okay. Yeah, he is. He's one of the main Friends of Humanity guys. Okay. He talks about when he shoots Bishop. He's like, time for a rematch. He was in the last episode. The court has been doing their trial thing. And now they give Magneto a chance to speak on his.
I'm not going to cut in the whole speech. We're not going to repeat the whole speech. Y'all should be watching the show. It's great. We should have watched the show. Yeah, you should have watched the show, but you should be watching it again by this point. He starts talking about how as a child he was hunted. by people who believed in a different God than he did. And then as an adult, he was hunted by his own people who believed in the same God but just for being different.
And then he talks about Xavier's dream of relinquishing everything that happened in the past and for mutants and humans to live in harmony. And it's this really beautiful speech. And he also kind of has a tone of threat in it as he talks about... humans building sentinels and collars to inhibit their powers and hunting and exterminating mutants.
And he insists that he was only acting to avenge his people. And Val Cooper is like, I'm sorry, sir. You were an X-Men, not the Avengers. You can't use that kind of language. He's basically making the point that he was doing the same thing they're doing now. Yes. You have me on trial for crimes. You were doing crimes to my people and continue to. I was also just seeking justice. How can you judge me? Magneto, you stole a bunch of nuclear bombs and wrote your name in cursive.
You've done a lot of stuff like that, man. You've done some stuff. The court says, how can we trust you if this cycle is going to continue? They eventually kind of get it, but they're just like, this kind of leaves us an impact. But January 6th happens, alas. Alas, January 6th happens. And sure enough, the protesters that have been outside this entire time are starting to break.
in um cyclops uh gathers the team who are sitting in like the juror section of this is very funny the x-men section of the jury yeah are you with the bride or the groom no i'm with the x-men I'm with the weird dressed people over there. And Cyclops specifically tells them our goal is de-escalation. We don't really want to hurt anybody here. We're just trying to take everything. Meanwhile, my favorite moment of the episode happens at the mansion as Gene.
uh cries out loud logan he's here and wolverine uh you know, claws out, who? Apocalypse? And she's like, no, the baby. And she like telekinesis his keys to him and he catches the keys and then they're like frozen. It's like, oh no. It's a, one of the things I love about this, this thing, and this whole series has a few of these. This is a sitcom beat. Yes, absolutely. I would say.
In like non-derogatory, like this reminds me of the best parts of like the She-Hulk show or something. Yeah. Where it's just a Marvel TV thing straight up just being a sitcom for a second, which if it was all sitcom, like I like She-Hulk a lot. That's mostly sitcom. If this were all sitcom, I don't necessarily want like an only sitcom X-Men. You know, I still want X-Men shit. Yeah. But sprinkling this in does make it feel more like a family. That is the predominant like medium for family drama.
Exactly. You know, in family stories or sitcoms, it makes sense for the X-Men to occasionally have sitcom shit happen. Yes. And it's just funny. Especially in this like wildcat drive to the hospital where like... Wolverine's driving her in a Jeep, which is just funny to me in general. But then also he's so impatient that he's driving on the sidewalk and she's literally moving people with her mind out of their way. And as her contractions hit, she's tearing the roof off.
I love that. Very, very... Like I said, it's Madcap, right? It's a sitcom kind of beat. You guys have... People, like, she can fly. Maybe now she's pregnant. You know, it does seem like they could have. Sounds like you're putting a lot of limitations on women, Gary. Jeez. It is true. It is the most powerful goddess-like thing a woman can do, and they should be able to fly extra. Okay, okay, dial it down. Too far the other way. The protesters break in, and the X-Men are trying to stop them.
and doing fine until the executioner shows up. And this is very funny to me. It reminds me when I was reading old Claremont comics, X-Men comics. One of the things I really like about 70s and 80s X-Men is they kind of fucking suck. uh and this is one of these things where like beast like we don't know what his weapon is and this guy fucking hands it to the x-men he just fucking nails him dude it's bad he just and a bunch of them three of them in a row like beast uh bishop and then i think gambit
Like, why did nobody else try this? Like, what if he shot him? He's got this, he's got a super rifle that shoots big orbs. Yeah. It's not his mega rifle that he says he only has one shot with. That's the plot rifle. His regular rifle, though, just takes out the X-Men. Yeah, the problem with being Toad is that you think it can solve every problem with your tongue. When you really just pick up a gun. Give Toad a gun, everybody. Guns are the mutant power we give ourselves.
He ends up, he's fighting Cyclops. Cyclops is trying to, you know, tell him off and everything. And I love this fight scene where he breaks his goggles and starts beating the shit out of him and just saying, you know. You think you have it so hard. We actually have it harder. We just don't whine about it. It's the whining that I hate. That's straight out of the mouth of racism.
You know, that's literally a racist thing to say. Absolutely. Racism has said. But it's so well done here, right? Yeah. It's so well realized. and it's like just i'm sorry to keep us on this for a second but part of it is that the characters are talking to each other during the fight this is the thing that drives me fucking nuts in a lot of comics and cartoons and uh even just like you know tv shows right like when the characters confront each other A lot of times it just doesn't happen.
You know, in a show like we I don't need like a huge long speech. I'm not looking for purple prose or anything like this. But like when you finally have the person that's the subject of your ire. in your hands, say something. It's a huge opportunity to reestablish the themes and your motivation in addition to just being very fun. You know, and you're giving the character a chance to react to your ideology rather than just punch you. Yes. You know, like a lot of times it just doesn't happen.
You know, it's one of the things I like about like a Spider-Man or whatever is they're constantly talking. Most of the time he's joking, but he'll tell people off too. And like, you can say, you can see what they're, what, you know, I.
You could do anything. You could cure cancer. I don't want to cure cancer. I want to turn people into dinosaurs. Like do shit like that because it's explaining. It's fun and it explains where they're coming from. Exactly. And it's not just shouting out their powers, which a lot of the stuff. Exactly. At the same time. Yeah.
Morph breaks in, and we get Morph on Morph powers. We talked last time about how the line here with Morph's powers is that he can do anything, any quote-unquote physical powers that a mutant can do. So as he morphs into Lady Deathstrike, he knocks Executioner away from Cyclops. Then he morphs into Colossus. So that as the executioner tries to hit him, like the stuff just starts bouncing off. And then he changes into Psylocke.
Because I guess her physical mutant power is sword. So she can just use sword now. The sword's made out of his thumb. Yeah, absolutely. And while all of this is happening, Gene makes... telepathic contact with Scott and is like, hey, by the way, my baby's coming. Why did you leave the house without... And Storm, hearing this on their psychic link or whatever, is like, okay, Rogue, take Scott back. Everybody else fall back. We're going to protect the judges.
And we have this really great moment where she orders the judges to take off. Magneto's collar that inhibits his powers. And they're like, Oh my God, what are we going to do? And she's like, you need to shut the fuck up and do what I say. You'll live if you do exactly what I say. Yeah. Like, you know, it's good. Good storm energy, man. This is a great show for storm, even though some of the.
In between episodes, I'm going to probably have some issues with it. It is until Ford shows up. Yeah, exactly. The IMO. So they get there. The hospital is refusing to take Gene in. They don't do mutant births. And one of the things I like about this is that, like, obviously that shit sucks. But the doctor's not wrong. Yeah. You know, he's like, if in labor you lose control, your power is like people die. That happens in the X-Men. Canonically, there's a bunch of people whose backstory is like.
their their baby killed the mother in labor you know because of stuff so he's not wrong here like the baby still it's it's kind of part of why this is like a good conflict you know it it makes if you just made this conflict white racist against people of color. You couldn't do the same kind of stories because that makes no fucking sense. Yes. Like in real life, racism makes absolutely no sense.
Right. It's just, it's contentable. It makes no sense. It's not logical. It's dumb. Black people aren't going to do anything to you. You know, trans people aren't going to do anything to you. People just want to be left alone. Nobody is trying to hurt you here.
One of the things about the X-Men is it's saying, even if there is that risk, you still take it because that's what it means to be a kind person. There's still people, they still get all the rights that people do. There is a risk to it, but that's okay. It makes it a question, but also it's still the right thing to do. And he even says, like, the doctor is like, you know. I have no idea what would happen if I try to, like, if you have to have a C-section.
And Wolverine, who is caught up in the moment, is like, I'll give you a C-section, bub. And he's like, what? I would have loved to have seen that scene. Please stop. I have patience. I'm on rounds. Please stop C-sectioning me, Mr. Wolverine. I have a stepdad in a coma. Got to go see, okay? Can you chill? I have things to do today.
Cyclops arrives there just to stop it and says, Rogue, can you absorb the doctor's knowledge? Yes. And this is the nice consequence of this. This is the compromise. Like she's assuming all the rest.
You know, so if Gene needs a C-section, Rogue is going to get a face full of mutant womb. Yes. Not the doctor. And she's worried. She's like, what if my, you know, my powers, what if I touch your baby? And they're like, we just have to do it. Like, we have to keep going. Get the proportionate strength of a baby. Oh, God. She just falls down and forgets how to walk. Yeah. Rogue One, rattle.
Rogue, this is unbecoming. Yes. So the protesters break through. Magneto uses his powers as a force field for Storm and the judges as they're just shooting him. And he gets really mad. He's super mad. You know, he rips, I love that, you know, again, just great magnetic lines. He rips the balconies, turns them into gigantic swords hanging over them and says, if you're going to act like animals, you're going to be in a cage.
And drops this prison of swords around them, which storm electrifies, making an electric fence. Super good. Super good. I looked at the INV page for this episode. And I want to read you just a little bit of trivia. If you have a couple of minutes. You know I like my...
And look, 17 people found this helpful, so I want you to know. Let's see if it's going to be 18 at the end of this bit. It makes sense that Storm is left behind to help Magneto. She can supercharge his magnetism powers with electricities if necessary.
So are you the 14 people that did not find this helpful? I didn't find that helpful. That's not helpful. I'm going to click on that. Oh, I got to sign in to do stuff. I'm not doing that. I'll do it on my own time. I'll do it afterwards. I'll make a note. I want you to create an IMDB account.
on air yeah that shit sucks uh i interview trivia uh the executioner comes in during this and you know and he's on a mission he's been on a mission this whole time it's not just here to hurt the x-men uh he has a specific thing he wants to do with the super gun and he takes advantage of the chaos to take aim at Magneto. But Storm notices this and dives in front of the bullet.
So she gets zapped, not him. And as Maidito grabs him and the weapon, we see Storm struggling. She looks up and she kind of holds her hand to the sky and she realizes she even has this really... just heartbreaking line of the breeze is gone. I cannot feel it, nor the moisture, nor the air. What has he done with me? Yeah. So we realized like heartbreakingly, she has lost all of her power.
And this is the worst thing you can do in Magneto's eyes. Like it's really not only does it grab the executioner guy, he pulls the UN symbol. from the wall, crucifies him on it and flips him upside down. It is a metaphor. It's very on the nose. The judge is like, this wasn't us. And Magneto's like, sure. You know, like all we have done is use our power to protect those that, you know, fear and betray us.
And he, you know, is this what happens at the High Road's destination? Then I'll say what I always say, never again. And he lifts up this sphere of rock with the judges and the executioner up into the sky. And he's scared. He's crying. You know, or Magneto is crying. The executioner is terrified.
And I think there's this moment where you think that, oh, so it's going to take, it just takes this. Like Magneto is going to bring these people to the sky and fucking murder them, right? And get them into space. And he even like starts another speech where he calls them like bigot, ingrate, sycophant, worm.
But at the last minute, he holds himself back and says, Xavier entrusted me with his dream. It does not ask you to love or embrace my kind as your own, but merely to accept that this is a shared world with a common future and that my kind like yours has a... Again, I think it's one of the most... Especially in this episode, it's one of the best expressions of the X-Men metaphor.
you know, hated and feared, right? Like the metaphor for this being racism or homophobia or transphobia or whatever, like has never been more clear than. And I think it's really well expressed. Because sometimes that metaphor misses for me. The way that people work with that metaphor sometimes misses for me. This is very...
It's a metaphor with some flexibility, but not infinite flexibility. And it's something where I think with X-Men, the writers or whoever's working on the individual story has to make a choice. to invoke it you know when it doesn't work for me a lot of times i feel like the writer is not even really trying they're just trying to do other x-men And then you can plausibly kind of read this as the metaphor and then it doesn't work. Yeah. Like the writer needs to take it on head on.
for it to work there are definitely comics and you know other like there are movies i think engage with this metaphor directly this is as directly as it's ever been engaged with And as part of what made X-Men 97 so special is because this was just a big popular mass market pop culture Disney thing in a post MCU world, you know, that is officially part of the Marvel brand that is taking on that stuff directly. No pussyfooting at all. Covering Hannibal.
means that i'm constantly asking like how did nbc ever let this crazy shit be on television like you made a totem of human corpses on the beach like how is this on nbc like how is this after the office right like what is going on um but and then like i think the same thing about this show sometimes it's like it's almost like slipped past the normal disney filtering
They just let these people do their thing. Let them cook, Gary. I love that it was such a huge hit, too. I hope that they take the right lesson from that. Me, too. We let our guard down a little bit, and bam. You know, we have this thing that's the most popular thing we've done forever. In a time when the discourse is even more so that we've lost it.
Things are kind of turning around now, but there was this bleak period where everyone was like, this fucking sucks. What were we thinking? This was a big part of bringing people back around, I think. And it's like letting it be obvious and political and not safe. Exactly. Not nearly as safe. He, you know, dragging them into the sky and he, you know, he says, I'm not going to do this to you. Like he backs down and we cut in with various scenes.
around um gene has the baby um i love the baby being born with a whole head of hair In the world of action figures, you can buy a Madeline Pryor action figure now, and it comes with this baby. Okay, perfect. And I already have a Mystique that has a tiny baby Nightcrawler, and they're basically the same shape, and they both fit into the Hulk's hands. So you can have a Hulk action figure and have him be about to spike both these babies or like...
do anything with them. You gotta, you gotta, you gotta start making like really high definition photo shoots with this stuff, Gary. These are great ideas. You shouldn't be just giving these ideas away. You're just handing out money. Who has the time? I also had to find the mechanism that would pay you for this. I don't know what that would be. Find me on Kofi. Yeah.
Magneto, as he whines that speech, he says, please do not make me let you down, which I think is a pretty powerful statement. And sure enough, the baby is safe and sound. Gene names him Nathan Charles Summer. There's a real funny beat for me where Logan is watching from the door. I think that's pretty funny. And then we cut to some news reports talking about how the UN is going to allow Genosha, the mutant nation, to be a member of the UN for the first time.
Yeah. And Cyclops in the mansion brings Magneto a cup of coffee, which he assures is a dark roast and not poison. And you can tell he's grudgingly impressed. He never thought that he would ever see the day where Genosha was a part of the UN, this whole mutant nation. And Magneto is like, so do you trust me now? And Cyclops is like, well, I trusted Xavier, and Xavier trusted you, so sure. Yeah, sure. Let's do it. Let's try it. You know, it's a really happy ending for this. And the last episode.
which was also fairly positive. You know, they're talking about things are going well for mutants because of Charles Xavier's sacrifice. One of the things I like about the show is it's going to do the bleakest shit that's been in the X-Men cartoon and maybe in any of the X-Men movies.
as well, right? Like that's going to come up with the Genosha episode. They're setting us up for that. And Magneto lays it out right here. You know, he says like, hey, this was a good week for our people, but not without cost. Glad tidings will often, you know, stay on your guard. Like you're basically telling Scott and the audience, like things are going to go downhill from here.
And sure enough, we cut to Beast Lab downstairs where he's analyzing the weapon and the bullet that the executioner used on Storm and saying that it's built from the same technology as the inhibitor collar, but this time it's a permanent. and you can see Storm just break down. I love this moment where Gene is trying to talk to her, trying to reassure her, and the sound just turns into a buzz in Storm's ears. And she goes to a room and she's looking at her.
you know, her torn and frayed uniform where she went. that she was shot in, which someone has helpfully washed and folded for her. Whatever. There's a big bullet hole in the front. Never mind. Yeah. And for the first time probably in her adult life since she has her mute powers, lightning strikes, then she hears a thunder. and she's scared like she gets startled by it and it's one of those moments where you realize like oh this fundamental piece of her identity has been taken
It's really good. She leaves a note for Jean. I love that she leaves her earrings. That made me laugh big time. Can't have lightning bolt there. No. Can't have lightning bolt there. Unless you're a goddess of weather. Sorry. If you can't control it, don't put it on your earring, okay? And she says like, listen, you've said goodbye so many times. Hopefully you can help the others understand why I couldn't say goodbye.
And she's explaining that she's going to have to – we're in different worlds now. People crave connection, human nature and mutant nature. We're not connected. We're in different worlds now. And as this happens, we see our X-Men connecting. Rogue touches Magneto. Gambit's spying on them here, so getting disconnected there. I love this scene with Morph and Wolverine. I love that this keeps that thread of Morph just being Wolverine's favorite person. Wolverine is literally like...
just moping. He's pouting. In a tree. And Morph is like, hey, you want a six-pack? And then they start roughhousing together. They start tackling. He throws chips at them. yeah wolverine's like that doesn't work and he turns into saber tooth he's like let's fight roll around on the ground like dogs boys being boys dudes being dudes it is absolutely dudes being dudes it's great i love it it's so good yeah
We cut to eventually to Gene reading the letter to the team. Yes. And everybody is really upset. And Cyclops, of course, blames himself. It's like, I should have been there. And they're like, no, you could have done anything, Cyclops. You're kind of useless nowadays. Yeah. Also, your wife was giving birth. Yeah. You know, like, that's okay. And Gambit is like, no, it's not your fault, Cyclops. It's Magneto. If he hadn't been there, that bullet was aimed for Magneto. He should be the one.
And earlier when he was in the jury box, he said something to Rogue where he's like, maybe it wouldn't be such a bad thing if Magneto fails this trial. Yes. You know, and Rogue doesn't say anything about that. Up until this point, you don't get the sense that Gambit knew that they had a history, really.
And then Morph's like, you know what? Storm's just being dramatic. She's going to spend one day with the normies and then she's going to come back. And there's a knock at the door and he's like, oh, I'm right. Yeah, it's real cute. And I said he, I meant they. So then they go to the door, which has been knocked on, and it's Gene at the door. And Gene says, I need the X-Men. Dun, dun, dun. Dun, dun, dun. But Jean's in the room, Gary. How is this possible? I know. Jean's never been cloned before.
i'm seeing double four jeans um the uh if you this is a fun thing because i imagine a lot of people who watch this show didn't know the comics and like you know cable is not gene graze fun really like it was always madeline prior's son so you could have guessed this was going to be a thing
If you know the comics and then they just do it and they're like, here, here, here it is. Let's go. They do it. And it's like messy and difficult for everybody. And like, it's really well done. Angsty. It's going to be super angsty. It's going to be a lot of fun to, to delve off into the Madeline.
all of it all um super excited what a great episode of tv super great episode of tv and it's only you know again all coming up here uh going up from here like there's a couple episodes with a couple of plot bits i don't love but generally it's either fun or devastating Yeah. In, in the exact, the right amounts. What a great cartoon. Yeah. It's super good. Can't wait for season two. I'm super excited about season two to see the direction they go because of the, the, the crazy ending.
which we're not going to get into just yet. We'll get into it like 12 episodes. It's really fun. Yeah. So I guess this is it, everybody. Thank you for listening. Thank you for sticking around. We know we took a pretty long hiatus. sync their orbit together uh and i think they're finally back so hopefully we'll be ready to rock some of these episodes out um if you like this show and you want to support both of us you can go to patreon.com slash duck feed tv
Donate some of those hard-earned dollar rules that you get and turn them into delicious audio content. Tons and tons of exclusive content. Tons of exclusive podcasts, lots and lots of extra. access to the Slack so you can hang out with community members. You get a special profile picture on Facebook now. That's true. Oh, that's not true. I'm just making stuff up. I haven't been on Facebook for a while. You had mentioned Hannibal a couple of times. Yeah. Talking about Hannibal.
I started a podcast called Rude Eats with my friend Mary Vigarou, who is a total new person to all things Hannibal. has not seen the movies, TV shows, or anything, or any of the books, anything. So it's been quite the experience. We're coming up on, like, we're doing about two and a half. So in depth to this TV show that we both love and hate at the same time. And then you can find all my other podcasts at creepy, but necessary. Cool.
bunch of other stuff over there so check it out recommended uh and that's about it we appreciate you we do for listening and we'll see you next time bye everybody