Screw It, We're Just Gonna Talk About Comics
299 episodes - English - Latest episode: 2 days ago - ★★★★★ - 252 ratingsCOMIC BOOKS! Join Kevin and Will Hines — two brothers, lifelong comics fans and kind of comedians — as they discuss the comics they have loved their whole lives! What we lack in accuracy we make up for in enthusiasm!
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Episodes
Across The Spiderverse discussion / RIP John Romita Sr.
June 28, 2023 07:00 - 1 hour - 73.4 MBThe Milksops discuss two Spider-Man related events: 1) the passing of John Romita Sr., one of the best and most important Marvel artists in the company's history, (he took over drawing Spidey after co-creator Steve Ditko left), and 2) the recently released "Across The Spider-Verse," a worthy and terrific sequel in the Miles Morales animated franchise. __ SHOW INFORMATION Twitter: @ScrewItComics Instagram: @ScrewItComics Ema...
Catwoman #1-4: Anodyne
June 21, 2023 07:00 - 1 hour - 58.3 MBWe go over the first arc in the Ed Brubaker Catwoman series. Guess what: it's good! We've got: Darwyn Cooke art, film noir aesthetics, questions of good versus evil, a for-real supervillain, a little Batman which all adds up to a great story. __ SHOW INFORMATION Twitter: @ScrewItComics Instagram: @ScrewItComics Email: [email protected] Subscribe: Apple Podcasts Subscribe: Spotify
One-Shot: Comic Shop Shelf Appeal with Casey Bruce
June 14, 2023 07:00 - 1 hour - 60.6 MBIn this "one shot" episode (a name I just made up where we examine a topic separate from our current season) we take a break from Catwoman to discuss the topic of "shelf appeal." This means roughly the way comics look on the shelves of comic shops. We bring on former guest Casey Bruce, co-owner of Danger Room comics in Olympia, Washington to talk about the challenges facing shop owners when it comes to making their product look appealing to customers. There's packaging, what editions are ava...
Selina's Big Score
June 07, 2023 07:00 - 1 hour - 69.5 MBWe cover one of the all-time great comic book stories: Selina's Big Score. Written and drawn by Darwyn Cooke, this story is a masterpiece of crime fiction, active storytelling, redefining a classic character all with some of the prettiest art you could hope to see. There's echoes of crime fiction author Richard Stark in here (there's a character named after him), but also reminders of classic 1980s superhero crime stories by Frank Miller, Klaus Janson and David Mazzuchelli. Truly a pleasure ...
Trail of The Catwoman
May 31, 2023 07:00 - 1 hour - 62.2 MBWe begin our coverage of the Ed Brubaker / Darwyn Cooke era of Catwoman comics. We start with Trail of the Catwoman - written by Brubaker, drawn by Cooke.. Originally published in 2001 as a backup feature in Detective Comics, it's now collected with the solo Catwoman series that Brubaker and Cooke worked on. The plot of the story is that hard boiled private eye Slam Bradley (himself an actual golden age character from the pre-Batman Detective Comics) as he tries to determine if Selina Kyle i...
Guardians of the Galaxy 3 Discussion
May 24, 2023 18:18 - 1 hour - 69.2 MBThe Milksops discuss the third installment in the MCU Guardians of the Galaxy franchise. Kevin liked it more than Will, but Will admits that maybe he's just going through MCU fatigue, and he's not being fair. Both of us love that James Gunn got to finish this trilogy, and appreciate that he's kept the same tone and voice throughout the series. We talk about the challenge of balancing so many characters and places, and which characters have changed the most since the first movie in 2014. In o...
Mini Ep: Marvel Assistant Editor's Month
May 17, 2023 07:00 - 1 hour - 60 MBThe Milksops review "Marvel Comics Assistant Editor's Month," one of the first crossover events Marvel ever did. Here's what happened: For comics dated January 1984, readers were told that the assistant editors had been given reign over the content since the regular editors were away at San Diego ComicCon. Some comics took this as an excuse to do very far-out stories (Marvel Team-Up featured Galactus and Aunt May), whereas some did only very small changes (Moon Knight has a typewritten lette...
Mini Ep: Brian's Quiz - Mount Rushmore of Comics
May 10, 2023 07:00 - 1 hour - 57.5 MBMilksop Brother Three Brian is back with a quiz of comics-related questions for his older brothers. "What's your favorite comic" type of questions, but these go way beyond that. We thought this was gonna be a mini-ep, but Kevin and Will spend so much time discussing things that we got to a full hour. But think about how you would pick YOUR Mount Rushmore of Comics, and see if you can answer quickly. AND you KNOW we've got some Loose Screws™! __ SHOW INFORMATION Twitter: @Screw...
Cosmic Rays + Correspondence 12 - FF 263-264
May 03, 2023 07:00 - 1 hour - 76.6 MBIt's your Friendly Neightborhood... Mole Man?!?!?! Yes, kind of! The Thing and The Human Torch team up with Mole Man to defeat a Walt Disney-esque captain of industry who has gone completely nutso and wants to save the Earth with a plan which will unfortunately also destroy it! We also have a hugely long plug for the Comedy Bang-Bang (podcast) (book) in which Will wrote a piece as Morpheus. And in the mailbag, we answer questions about: Miracleman, the appeal of TMNT and much more! __ SH...
Cosmic Rays and Correspondance 11 - FF 261 + 262
April 26, 2023 07:00 - 57 minutes - 53.3 MBREED RICHARDS MUST DIE! Harsh, right? Or at least rude. Then again, Reed did save Galactus, who has a nasty habit of eating planets. So we have ourselves a legal conundrum as a council of aliens decide if Mr. Fantastic should be executed. The Watcher gets involved, which he's never supposed to do, yet always does. This is also "Assistant Editor's Month" in which Marvel allegedly lets its junior editors run the show. For the FF, that means that John Byrne himself is in the issue, to bear witn...
Cosmic Rays and Correspondance 10 - FF 258-260
April 19, 2023 15:46 - 1 hour - 68.7 MBWe've got three fairly Doom-tastic issues of the FF to go over. We get a day in the life of Doom running the show over in Latveria, and then a two-issue battle of Sue, Johnny and Ben vs. Terrax the Untamed (who's gotten his Power Cosmic back thanks to Doom). The FF end up winning, with the help of the Silver Surfer, but in the end one question remains: where the heck is Reed? Plus we get to some mail, where we cover 70s sci-fi recs, thoughts on Reed and Sue's romantic activites, how we would...
Zot #33
April 12, 2023 07:00 - 1 hour - 78.8 MBThe Milksops 3 finish their coverage of Zot! with a humdinger of an issue: "Normal." Originally released as Zot #33, this tells the story of Jenny's best friend Terry coming to terms with her sexuality as a gay teenager in a very homophobic high school. Although it's aged very well, it still helps to remember this issue came out in 1990. As the rest of comicdom was about to embark on a bombastic era of variant covers, millions of X-books and the birth of hyper-active Image Comics, Scott McC...
Zot #23-25 - The Ghost In The Machine
April 05, 2023 07:00 - 1 hour - 66.1 MBThe Milksops Three continue their coverage of Zot!, the late 1980s indie comic that featured a Golden Age style optimistic hero wrestling with the emotional challenges of "our" Earth. In this episode we cover "The Ghost in the Machine" which is Zot's three-issue battle against one of his main villains, 9-Jack-9. Jack is a legitimiately terrifying villain, an assassin who can travel via electrical wires, has no emotion, and is incredibly smart. By the way, he killed Zot's parents. But in typi...
Zot #11-12
March 29, 2023 07:00 - 1 hour - 60.7 MBThe Milksops Three (Will, Kevin and Brian) discuss the "black and white" era of Zot! comics. We discuss how much this comic levels up in terms of quality, ambition and emotion, in both art and story. We see Zot trying to convince Jenny that her Earth is worth living in, as she tries to convince him to visit more and more. We meet Jenny's friends, and even see a few tender moments of older brother/sometimes monkey Butch. Email us at [email protected]. __ SHOW INFORMATION Twitter:...
Zot #10 1/2 and Matt Feazell
March 23, 2023 07:00 - 13 minutes - 12.2 MBA special mini-episode to honor the special mini issues of Zot that came out, which were drawn by stick figure genius Matt Feazell. The Milksops were all big fans of these. They inspired a young Kevin Hines to make mini-comics of his own! Email us at [email protected]. __ SHOW INFORMATION Twitter: @ScrewItComics Instagram: @ScrewItComics Email: [email protected] Subscribe: Apple Podcasts Subscribe: Spotify
Zot #10
March 22, 2023 07:00 - 1 hour - 78.5 MBKevin and Will welcome Milksop #3 - Brian Hines, the legendary third Hines brother to the podcast. We talk about a comic that has meant a lot to each of us: Zot! Created by Scott McCloud (Understanding Comics), Zot ran from the mid-80s through the very early 90s, and represented a sensitive, human and nuanced look at a superhero arc. The stories brought influences of manga to an American book in a way that hadn't been done in any prominent fashion. Plus the sweet, compassionate world of Zot ...
Cosmic Rays and Correspondence #9 - FF #255-257
March 15, 2023 03:35 - 1 hour - 73.3 MBThe FF finish their Negative Zone saga! We've got aliens that look like salamanders, Reed rebuilding his own consciousness, and a plan to save the end of the world that worked because the Avengers are able to, um, well... okay, we can't tell why it worked. But it DID work and so the FF return to their own Earth in time to stop Annihulus. Or maybe just scare him off? In our mailbag section, we get corrected and then (probably) make more errors!
Cosmic Rays and Correspondence #8 - FF #252-254
March 08, 2023 08:00 - 1 hour - 65 MBThe FF are in the Negative Zone. The Negative Zone is an alternate universe which is different from our universe in that it is.... well, it's not that different. But it means Reed, Sue, Ben and Johnny are visiting a new planet every issue, meeting a new alien race and encountering a big ironic twist! Kinda a la Star Trek. Meanwhile super-mean bad guy Annihulus has taken up residence in the Baxter Building. More Negative Zone coverage next episode! In our mailbag, we have more pitches for our...
Cosmic Rays and Correspondence #7 - FF #250-251
March 01, 2023 08:00 - 1 hour - 77 MBFF #250 has the FF vs Gladiator, plus the X-Men (kind of) and the Skrulls, in a double-sized fight-tastic story. Then #251 sets up what is going to be a run of stories set in the Negative Zone. Your hosts, the Milksops, like it all. Plus we've got mail. Sop it up! __ SHOW INFORMATION Twitter: @ScrewItComics Instagram: @ScrewItComics Email: [email protected] Subscribe: Apple Podcasts Subscribe: Spotify
Cosmic Rays and Correspondence #6 - FF #247-249
February 22, 2023 08:00 - 1 hour - 71.6 MBThe character that we refer to many times as "Guardian" is actually "Gladiator." Three more John Byrne FF issues! We've got "This Land Is Mine" which makes the argument that Latveria might be better off when Doom is in charge. The Milkshops are not convinced, but also can see that Byrne is trying to give nuance to the main FF nemesis. We've got an Inhumans one-and-done story where the FF are trapped (and.. murdered?) by a huge alien. And finally a big battle against The Guardian (super-pow...
Marvel Firsts - Daredevil
February 15, 2023 08:00 - 1 hour - 64.3 MBKevin makes a really good case that this first appearance of Daredevil is one of the strongest first issues we've read. This is in contrast to the sort-of "second tier" status Daredevil will have for much of the 60s and 70s. Even after Frank Miller and Klaus Janson brought the title to the top of the sales charts in the early 80s, there have been almost no "bad runs" on Daredevil. Has he quietly been one of the best Marvel characters this whole time? Will perhaps unfairly compared this issue...
Marvel Firsts - Avengers
February 08, 2023 08:00 - 1 hour - 69.1 MBMilksops Assemble! We go over Avengers #1. It's crazy and also good in the way a lot of early Marvel stuff is both crazy and good. Kirby's art is great. The inventiveness is BIG. The leaps is logic to justify the plot are .... ALSO VERY BIG. Big jumps. Why Hulk decides to "hide out" by posing as a robot in a circus is never going to make sense. Never mind that he... doesn't look like a robot when he's in disguise, He just looks like the Hulk with the smallest amount of clown makeup on. Or wh...
Marvel Firsts - X-Men
February 01, 2023 08:00 - 1 hour - 62 MBWe cover the first appearance of a group of heroes that would change Marvel, superheroes and all of comics forever: The X-Men. And we find the issue: really rushed! Like, no backgrounds, crazy powers (even for 60s Marvel standards), a lot of panels with the team simply freaking out that a pretty girl is joining the team (Marvel Girl) and Magneto writes in the sky in surprisingly legible cursive. It's Jack Kirby, so even a rushed Kirby is dynamic and inventive and good, but there's a long way...
Marvel Firsts - Iron Man and Dr. Strange
January 25, 2023 15:10 - 1 hour - 78.4 MBWe cover the first appearances of Iron Man and Dr. Strange. We find Iron Man has a pretty solid story. Extremely problematic depictions of the Vietnamese? Yep. But the character of Tony Stark is well-developed, and much like he will remain right up until his rise to the top of the MCU. And you know we visit the 4-page introduction of the classic red and yellow armor, designed by Steve DItko. Speaking of Ditko, Dr. Strange has a slower start. It has the the terrific Ditko art. But since the i...
Marvel Firsts - Ant-Man and Thor
January 18, 2023 08:00 - 1 hour - 77.8 MBWe continue our examination of Marvel First Issues with the Ant-Man and Thor. We talk way more about Ant-Man than we expected to. But Ant-Man has a way of surpassing people's expectations. Who would have guessed that the hero of "The Man in the Ant Hill" or whatever it was called in Tales to Astonish #27 would go on to be Marvel's second-ever super-hero? Not the Milksops. But that is exactly what he is. And that's despite: odd powers, a shifting origin story, a complete lack of logic within...
Marvel Firsts - Amazing Fantasy #15, FF #1 and Hulk #1
January 11, 2023 08:00 - 1 hour - 57.2 MBWe start a new season analyzing the number 1 issues of all the original Marvel Comics series. Today we start with the big three: Spider-Man, FF and Hulk. Known informally (to us) as "the good ones" this discussion gives us an excuse to again celebrate the special alchemy of creativity, recklessness and just plain goodness that made these issues such milestones. We also discuss Alan Moore's new short story collection "Illuminations" and the recent DC movie "Black Adam." __ SHOW INFORMATIO...
Marvel By The Month - 1963 by Alan Moore
January 04, 2023 08:00 - 1 hour - 108 MBThe Milksops were guests on the terrific comics podcast Marvel By The Month to discuss the Alan Moore penned series 1963. This is that episode presented here in our feed for the convenience of our listeners / laziness of us. "1963" was published in 1993 by then-new Image Comics. It was Alan Moore's homage to the superhero books of the early 60s, basically the birth of the Silver Age. We have a Captain America-like person, a Fantastic Four-ish group, a Spider-Man sorta fella, and lots more. A...
Cosmic Rays and Correspondence - FF #244-245
December 28, 2022 08:00 - 1 hour - 70.8 MBOn the FF side of things, we start with the fate of Galactus and Frankie Raye, and we end with the beginning of a Dr. Doom story ("Too Many Dooms!"). Both fine issues. But in the middle we have one of the best FF issues ever, and certainly one of the signature issues of John Byrne's run - #245 "Childhood's End." It's Byrne's thesis statement on Susan RIchards, The Invisible Girl. What makes her special, powerful, indispensible? It is demonstrated masterfully in this tale, where Susan takes o...
Cosmic Rays and Correspondence - FF #241-243
December 21, 2022 23:53 - 1 hour - 68 MBWe have some Galactastic issues of FF! John Byrne continues his tour of the big Kirby stories with a visit from Galactus! First we have to deal with some magic armor that has allowed a Roman soldier to preserve ancient Rome in a column just outside of Wakanda. You know, little stuff. But then it's Galactus, who is dying. Reed decides we gotta save him, which is a hot take. On the correspondence side, we have an impassioned defense of Squadron Supreme from Mark Gruenwald superfan, Chris Getha...
Cosmic Rays and Correspondence - FF #238-240
December 14, 2022 08:00 - 1 hour - 80.8 MBOn the FF side of things, we learn about Frankie Raye's hidden powers, see the return of H.E.R.B.I.E. the robot, and watch the Inhumans move their city to the moon. Very solid issues sandwiched in between a few more iconic chapters that we will soon get to. From the correspondence side, we get questions about how to deconstruct The Enforcers, do we care about "collecting," and somehow start talking about The Last Action Hero! __ SHOW INFORMATION Twitter: @ScrewItComics Instagram: @ScrewItC...
Squadron Supreme #10-12
December 07, 2022 08:00 - 1 hour - 57.1 MBWe finish our analysis of 1985's Squadron Supreme series and come to the same conclusion we had at the very beginning: it's good but reading it now isn't as fun as reading it then probably was. We also go over Sean Howe's Marvel Comics: The Untold Story even though Will is only 20% through it! #screwitinstapush is still in effect as make our drive to get 1500 instagram followers. WILL IT HAPPEN? WOULD WE NOTICE? __ SHOW INFORMATION Twitter: @ScrewItComics Instagram: @ScrewItComics Email: S...
Squadron Supreme #7-9
November 30, 2022 08:00 - 59 minutes - 55.1 MBCORRECTION: Yep, Will is still saying 'Madame Ape' instead of 'Ape X' -- please enjoy his wrongness! Three more issues down, and the Milksops opinion of the Squadron has... remained mostly the same! They appreciate the books' strengths and find it interesting BUT we both feel that it suffers when you read it, like, now (post-Watchmen, post-multiversemania). Still, we examine the stories in this issue which include: Fake Evil Hyperion dating Recently Widowed Princess Power (recently widowed b...
Squadron Supreme #4-6
November 23, 2022 08:00 - 1 hour - 57.4 MBCORRECTION: Will keeps saying 'Madame Ape' which is very wrong -- he should have said 'Ape X.' Three more Squadron Supreme issues, and it's growing on the 'sops. There's a brainwashing machine in play and it's giving the Squadron some Clockwork Orange creepiness. We like. Plus there's guilt and death and betrayal and just to keep things interesting, another 10 or so characters added. We like these more than we did the first three, maybe because the exposition is finished? Plus we grieve the ...
Squadron Supreme #1-3
November 16, 2022 08:00 - 1 hour - 62.9 MBThe Milksops begin their coverage of Mark Gruenwald's most famous work, the 12-issue "Squadron Supreme" mini-series from 1985. It's the OTHER comic where a bunch of heroes who are not in the normal comics continuity have to deal with a realistic world (the primary one from this time in comics being Alan Moore's Watchmen). We get into the huge cast, the Squadron's history up until this point, the gutsiness of Gruenweld's story, the surprises, and also the shortcomings (perhaps TOO "regular co...
Cosmic Rays and Correspondence 2 - FF #235-237
November 09, 2022 08:00 - 1 hour - 61.8 MBOn the Byrne FF side of things, we've got two great issues and one very solidly okay one. In the "great" column we have the FF battling Ego The Living Planet in issue 235 -- one of Kevin's favorite FF issues ever! Then in issue 236 there is one of the most revered issues in Byrne's whole run - "Terror In A Tiny Town" which has the FF facing off against The Puppet Master, Dr. Doom as well as.... their own minds! Then issue 237 is pretty okay too. We also get into our mail which has a listener...
Cosmic Rays and Correspondence - FF #232-234
November 02, 2022 07:00 - 1 hour - 65.1 MBIt's a new era of mailbags episodes! Starting now, we are covering issues of the John Byrne Fantastic Four run on the eps where we also read some mail. In this first FF/mail ep, we talk about what we learned about Byrne from reading his run as co-creator of X-Men stories. We discuss his "back to basics" approach with the FF, his terrific fight scenes, the clear story beats, simple characters, cool clothes, advancement of female characters and of course his stupendous rubble! We read mail (ba...
Love and Rockets - Heartbreak Soup
October 26, 2022 07:00 - 59 minutes - 54.8 MBWe continue our examination of Love and Rockets comics with a focus on Gilbert Hernandez's first big Palomar story "Heartbreak Soup." We discuss the hugeness of the world, the variety of influences (Jack Kirby, Don DeCarlo, folk tales, punk rock), the wildness of Gilbert's plot, the progressive sex and love, the problematic sex and love, the boldness of the mature themes. We get into Gilbert overall: how much he's done, how challenging he can be to read. Will talks about how much this affect...
Love and Rockets - The Death of Speedy
October 19, 2022 07:00 - 1 hour - 66.2 MBThe Milksops go over one of Will Hines' all-time favorite comics: Love and Rockets. Done (mostly) by two Mexican-American brothers, Jaime and Gilbert Hernandez, Love and Rockets mixes sci-fi, soap opera, folk tales, sexuality, surrealism and sometimes even good 'ol superheroes to make one of the coolest and most innovative comics ever. Published in various forms since 1981, this is a mammoth comics run. To spare our listeners (much) of Will just rambling forever, we are doing only 2 eps on t...
Guest: J.M. DeMatteis - Spellbound Comics
October 12, 2022 07:00 - 1 hour - 69 MBComics (and prose and TV) writer J.M. Dematteis returns to plug his new independently funded comics line: Spellbound Comics. JM is teaming up with 4 terrific artsts (Shawn McManus, David Baldeon, Matthew Dow Smith, Tom Mandrake) to tell a wide variety of stories. The Milksops talk about that a bunch and also ask him about: keeping a positive attitude, the influence of Ray Bradbury and Twilight Zone, themes of identity that recur throughout his work, his recent novella The Excavator and much ...
Mutants and Mailbags #29 - X-Men #198-200
October 05, 2022 07:00 - 1 hour - 65.8 MBTwo huge milestones: Magneto is taking over the X-Men, and the Milksops are stepping away from the Uncanny X-Men. Claremont and John Romita Jr. are on a roll -- these issues are fun and exciting with surprising character moments (Magneto good? being foremost among them). But we've done over 100 issues and we want to shift onto “new” things (John Byrne’s early 80’s run on The Fantastic Four is as new as we get). We talk our opinions of what it's been like to read this huge swath of X-books, w...
Mutants and Mailbags #28 - X-Men #195-197
September 28, 2022 07:00 - 1 hour - 68.3 MBThree X-Men comics that actually feature the X-Men! Whoops, except the first one which is almost all Power Pack. But the Milksops love Power Pack, so they're happy. Then we've got a murder mystery which only kind of features a guest appearance by the omnipotent Beyonder (here to promote Secret Wars II, a comic which the Milksops read and remember almost nothing of), and then a Doom/Arcade story which is, as they say in an old Beach Boys song, fun. We're getting ready to wrap up our mutant co...
Mutants and Mailbags #27 - X-Men #192-194
September 21, 2022 07:01 - 1 hour - 66.7 MBWhoa, we are coming up on 100+ issues of the Uncanny X-Men reviewed on this podcast! Pretty good for two idiots who'd skipped this stuff the first time it came out. We go over some fun stories in these issues including: the X-men face off against Magus (alien robot lifeform) who's come looking for his son Warlock (a member of the New Mutants) the return (sort of) of original new X-man Thunderbird (sort of), and a battle with Juggernaut. I believe all of these battles end in a draw, which now...
Mutants and Mailbags #26 - X-Men #189-191
September 07, 2022 07:00 - 1 hour - 63 MBFirst the Milksops review a three issue span where the X-Men and New Mutants team up against the magic villain Kulan Gath, who has thrown Manhattan back into Conan the Barbarian-esque time (NOT Conan O'Brien, despite what Will says a few times). Kevin liked that it was a short arc, and the glimpse into telepath Rachel Summer's terrible dystopian future world. Will was fed up with Claremont's overly-complicated plots and the density of characters! Like, wait, who's Amara? Why is Spider-Man un...
Sandman Netflix Show Review
August 31, 2022 11:59 - 53 minutes - 49.2 MBThe Milksops review the new Netflix' series The Sandman. We already did 10 eps on the comics so you know we're fans, so was the show good enough for us? Short answer: kind of! We respect the shows' reverence for the source material, the great casting and visual goodness. But something is missing from the show, and we spend 45 minutes trying to figure out what. But we love the Corinthian, maybe too much, and the show kept getting better and better as it went. We're hoping there’s a season 2 ...
Crash Course: She-Hulk
August 17, 2022 07:00 - 1 hour - 68.7 MBIn preparation for the Disney Plus show, the Milksops review She-Hulk in the comics! We go over the Savage era, the Byrne treatment, the Sensational phase (Byrne II), the Slott epoch and the Soule chapter. Plus dips into the other stuff. We talk about how Jennifer Walters went from a very tossed-off rip off of Bruce Banner into her own indominatable indispensible part of the Marvel Universe! __ SHOW INFORMATION Twitter: @ScrewItComics Instagram: @ScrewItComics Email: [email protected]...
Mutants and Mailbags #25: Wolverine (1982) #1-14
August 10, 2022 07:00 - 52 minutes - 49 MBThe Milksops go over the 1982 four-issue mini series Wolverine, written by Chris Claremont and drawn by Frank Miller. This was part of Wolverine's ascendence to becoming one of the most popular characters in the Marvel Universe. Kevin was expecting a "bigger" story, something akin to what Miller would do on Batman: Year One or Daredevil: Born Again. It's not that seismic, but there's plenty of terrific Miller art and layouts in this story. There's also ninjas, Japanese culture, an expansion ...
Mutants and Mailbags #25: Wolverine (1982) #1-4
August 10, 2022 07:00 - 53 minutes - 48.8 MBThe Milksops go over the 1982 four-issue mini series Wolverine, written by Chris Claremont and drawn by Frank Miller. This was part of Wolverine's ascendence to becoming one of the most popular characters in the Marvel Universe. Kevin was expecting a "bigger" story, something akin to what Miller would do on Batman: Year One or Daredevil: Born Again. It's not that seismic, but there's plenty of terrific Miller art and layouts in this story. There's also ninjas, Japanese culture, an expansion ...
Mutants and Mailbags #24: God Loves, Man Kills
August 03, 2022 07:00 - 46 minutes - 43.1 MBNO MAILBAG THIS EPISODE. For the "mutants" portion of our ep, the Milksops review the graphic novel "God Loves, Man Kills" in which the X-Men ally with arch-enemy Magneto to battle an anti-mutant televangelist/murderer! This was also known as "Marvel Graphic Novel #5," which was part of a series where Marvel creators could make more adult content. This story contains brutal murders, commentary on how people use religion and media to manipulate the masses, a man killing his family and Kitty P...
Talkin' Bout Busiek: Astro City #1 and #1/2
July 20, 2022 07:00 - 53 minutes - 49.8 MBWe saved (one of) the best for last: Astro City. This is Kurt's masterpiece. Along with artist Brent Anderson and cover artist/collaborator Alex Ross, Kurt created an entire superhero universe for Astro City. The characters are a combination of analogues of very popular superhero "types" (we see a Superman-ish person, a Spider-Man ish hero, a Justice League, a Fantastic Four), but also characters who don't fit cleanly into any box. What is true of every character in Astro City is they are: h...
Talkin' Bout Busiek: Secret Identity
July 13, 2022 07:00 - 1 hour - 72.7 MBWe continue our look into Kurt Busiek with a deepish dive on one of his most beloved works: 2004's "Secret Identity." What if someone woke up in OUR world had Superman's powers? Meaning there are no superheroes but there are Superman comic books. He knows what he's become, but not why or how. An off-kilter premise, explored with heart and sweetness and surprise. It's a moving story that covers far more emotional ground than you're ready for. The decency and goodness in this story gets at the...