The X-Men TAS Podcast: A Force to be Reckoned With

The X-Men have been replaced by X-Force and to a lesser extent, X-Factor but Jubilee degrades latter by calling them C-Tier on the latest episode of X-Men 97! Join us as we discuss...

• What we were up to in 1997 and why pure 90s  nostalgia rings a bit hollow!
• Wondering why Deadpool isn't involved!
• Feeling like Emma Frost is being a bit short-changed!
• Polaris being the most beautiful green character in the Marvel Universe!

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Transcript

SPEAKER_04 0:05

Welcome to the X-Men Task Podcast. My name is Willie Simpson.

SPEAKER_02 0:08

My name is Sonia Rappaport.

SPEAKER_04 0:10

Sonia, we are back almost immediately as far as we're concerned. We are recording episode two of season two of X-Men 97. This episode called A Force to Be Reckoned With. This is a fun X-Force X-Factor episode. Something I've kind of wishcasted for years, sort of.

SPEAKER_00 0:31

Yeah, you have.

SPEAKER_04 0:32

Where I'm like, just give me a full-on X-Factor show. Give me a full-on X-Force show. Give me X caliber uh Alpha Flight.

SPEAKER_00 0:39

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_04 0:39

Whatever you got. Just make a show and I'll be there, as opposed to like these dumb shows about Avengers and other spin-off characters. I care about these characters. Um, so we get a little taste of that. Very exciting. Uh before we get started, just a reminder, check our show notes for our plugs and for uh ways to contact us on our social media and donate. We appreciate everyone who does just that. Very exciting times because X-Men 97 is back. And just another reminder, uh, these first three episodes were releasing three days in a row. So this episode should be coming out Thursday morning. Uh the first episode came out Wednesday night. Uh, we are recording all these episodes on Wednesday night, which is a little crazy for us. And the third episode will come out Friday, and uh we'll be back after a two-week or so hiatus to resume talking about X-Men. So, Sonya. Where were we since the last time we spoke? Which was just a few hours ago as far as we're concerned. Uh the X-Men, half of them are trapped in the future, and now instead of going to the past, we're going to the present in this middle sandwich episode. Right. The year 1997. What were you up to in 1997?

SPEAKER_02 1:52

I believe I was in seventh grade.

SPEAKER_04 1:54

Really? That I was in seventh grade.

SPEAKER_02 1:57

I think you were finishing seventh grade and I was beginning seventh grade in nineteen ninety seven.

SPEAKER_04 2:02

Alright, that makes sense.

SPEAKER_02 2:03

Um I was in misery, probably. Right, yeah, middle school. Not great. Not the best years of my life, I'll say. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 2:14

Um but 1997, you know, people have a lot of fondness and nostalgia for the nineties. For me, the the early nineties, I can't say much, I was very little. The mid-90s were the sweet spot as far as my childhood goes. I think I very much enjoyed the years of like 94, 95, 96. Well, 96 it gets iffy because then it starts getting murky. Sixth grade, middle school, puberty. It's 1995 for me was like a peak year. Being 10. I was happy.

SPEAKER_02 2:47

I think like most people, you're like fully aware and conscious by the time you're like eight.

SPEAKER_03 2:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 2:53

And you have like a few good years from like eight to ten, maybe eleven, twelve if you're lucky. Right. And then like adolescence starts and things go downhill for a while.

SPEAKER_04 3:02

Yeah. 12 was rough for me. I think I got braces. That was terrible. 13 was a continuation of 12. Um, I made some new friends. I don't know. I I can't really. But as far as the year 1997 goes, I remember the summer for some reason. I forget what movies came out in '97, but uh remember going to the movies a lot? I just remember some summer movies. Was that the year of Independence Day or was that 19? That might have been 96.

SPEAKER_02 3:29

It was around there somewhere.

SPEAKER_04 3:30

Yeah. Um, I think for me though, I I thought it was like a nadir of culture. I didn't have much music that I connected to in that time. I didn't obviously I wasn't like into boy bands. They were starting to get big around that time, right?

SPEAKER_02 3:43

I wasn't either. I was still firmly in a situation phase.

SPEAKER_04 3:47

Me too, yeah. And like no one else like that that I knew.

SPEAKER_02 3:52

Oh, we should have known each other.

SPEAKER_04 3:53

I know. I felt so musically, like I didn't have like some cool, like I wasn't into Green Day so much. I don't dislike Green Day. I liked a few of their songs, right? But I didn't like love them, you know.

SPEAKER_00 4:04

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_04 4:04

I just I don't know, it was a being 13, it's just such an awkward time. I'm trying to think like what else was going on. Uh I I think it's just mainly like school depression was like the big theme of 1997. Puberty depression.

SPEAKER_00 4:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 4:21

Having braces like just and all and again, it's just like people glamorize the 90s, but I don't know. Like to me, there I I remember a lot of the years of the 90s feeling mainly because you're a kid, I felt like trapped by school and just frustrated that the world was kind of lame. And I did you have a Tamagotchi? No. I didn't get anything cool. I f eventually got rollerblades at one point. Uh my mom bought me like the cheapest ones. I'm not complaining. But it's not like when it came to stuff like trendy stuff, like I never really got it, you know. Um, I didn't wasn't my m my parents never got me like video game systems.

SPEAKER_02 5:04

You got a Game Boy though.

SPEAKER_04 5:05

I got a Game Boy.

SPEAKER_02 5:06

I wanted a Game Boy real bad, but I didn't get one.

SPEAKER_04 5:08

But you had a Sega Genesis. I would have taken that like 50 times over a Game Boy. Uh yeah, I mean I wasn't, you know, I played outside a lot, which is good in retrospect. I read a lot of books. Uh I had a computer. You know, I guess this show is uh was a little old by this point, but I recently this summer I've been watching old episodes of Ghost Rider. Not Rider, the Marvel comic, the uh character.

SPEAKER_02 5:33

Ghostwriter.

SPEAKER_04 5:34

Ghostwriter, the PBS show that I love so much. And I remember trying to tape all the episodes just like I taped X-Men. And I discovered kind of I don't know, we may have talked about it before, but all the episodes are free on YouTube. I'll say And I've been watching Ghost Rider all summer and I loved it so much.

SPEAKER_02 5:50

Yeah, I remember loving it as a kid because I I don't know, I didn't watch it all the time, like I didn't catch it, but I did like it. Um, it doesn't hold up for me as an adult.

SPEAKER_04 6:00

For me, it did. I felt like I was looking at a time portal to the mid-90s or whatever, and it just felt like this is the 90s. These characters are real. Ghost Rider happened, Ghost Rider is real. He's my friend. All the characters, Jamal, Lenny, Alex, they're all my friends still. They're out there. I mean, like that, I don't know. I was really enjoying Ghost Rider. Getting emotional watching a lot of those episodes. Um I asked you if like we should talk about Ghostwriter in the podcast, like actual episodes. You said no, you were not.

SPEAKER_02 6:30

I wasn't into going through all. I mean, it's an educational show for kids. It shows you how to use the Dewey Decibel system very slowly and painstakingly.

SPEAKER_04 6:38

Yeah. It's funny. In many ways, the tech g we have technology that simulates Ghostwriter.

SPEAKER_02 6:45

Like, because we have AI?

SPEAKER_04 6:47

It's not just AI, but just the idea of like being able to look up information easily or like find out where things are. That's so much of what the plot of Ghost Rider is. These kids in Brooklyn.

SPEAKER_02 6:58

How to do research.

SPEAKER_04 6:59

Right. They're researching. They also need ghostwriter, like fly out into the neighborhood and like find clues that you know, trying to like track they had to find a phone book to find the name of a store or address. We could, you know, now we just have our ghostwriter phones to do all that stuff. Um so true. Right. Uh anyway, 1997, I don't know. I just again, like, my I look at so much of my childhood as just uh like I was like a dork nerd that I had so many like big dreams that seemed impossible to reach. And I just felt again, just felt trapped in school and in like a boring life that didn't feel satisfying. I wasn't like I wasn't bad at sports, I wasn't like good enough at them. I wasn't bad at music, but I wasn't good enough at it. You know, like I just like felt lacking in some. But you know, I felt like I was like a very average ordinary kid. And uh so wishing to be an X-Men mutant. Well, yeah, it's just uh I wouldn't like say I was wishing to be an X-Men, but it maybe. I don't know. Like I maybe I wished I had the powers and I was special or something. And I could go to Xavier school. Like so but it wouldn't necessarily have to be about superpowers, just the idea that uh like wishing you were special and that you'd be noticed and uh swept away by like some cooler something cool would happen to you or right, you'd end up on TV, uh you know, on MTV or on Comedy Central. Like I don't know what I was like dreaming of, like to be in. But just you know, like I'm sure these are the dreams like most everybody has, especially in America growing up at the time we grew up in. But like the my point about all of it is it's it's not like looking back, it's not some warm nostalgic glow I feel about the 90s in like in particular. Like they're so great. I think a lot of that like feeling is overrated, to be honest.

SPEAKER_02 8:43

Um I mean, I think when you're talking about 90s nostalgia and people looking back so fondly on the 90s, I think that's mostly through like internet memes.

SPEAKER_04 8:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:51

I don't know if that's a true experience of many people that we know in real life.

SPEAKER_04 8:56

We may have talked about this, but there's all these videos of like that people are posting on YouTube of like the last day of school in 1999 or shopping in the mall in 1998, and all the comments are from people saying it's like, yep, it was really great, and I lived back then, and now we're missing it now. Like, what happened to society? You know, like society is really falling apart, no one's got phones, like every I don't know, dude this voice. But like everyone's happy, they're all present. Like, maybe, but people were you know what I'll say about the 90s? I think people were meaner back then. And I think there's a great school or just people in general. I think that adults were meaner, I think that kids were meaner. I think it was like a meaner world.

SPEAKER_02 9:37

Yeah. It it was it's just like I think therapy wasn't as accepted as well. No, definitely. So like a lot of people hadn't faced themselves and their demons as much as now. But also I think now there's a lot of like anti-bullying um left out, like none of that rhetoric existed then.

SPEAKER_04 9:54

And like I wasn't even necessarily bullied, but I had friends and whatever. But like my point about that is uh uh anything I like that was into like for instance the Beatles. There's no like Beatles group I could join, like now. Like if you're a young kid and you become a fan of the Beatles, you could find internet communities, go down rabbit holes, find you could find your people and talk to them. Like for me, it was just like nothing. Like I could talk to my dad about the Beatles, you know?

SPEAKER_00 10:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 10:20

Uh and that was it. Like, and so I think in some ways it's like there's a lot of like a lot more loneliness that's different. But maybe, you know, they talk about how boredom is a good thing too. Maybe like the the feeling isolated and alone and bored like helped develop our imaginations better than today.

SPEAKER_02 10:41

I don't know. I think it's really just like a pre versus post-internet culture thing because I've seen things about people posting about like, oh, and I'm gonna host like a 90s style hangout or like a 90s party or something, but they don't mean in terms of like a dress code on the music they're gonna play, they mean that they're expecting everyone to like keep their phones out of sight for the duration of the party or something. It's like you could just say it's a phone-free gathering or something. You don't have to brand it as a 90s style party or something for that reason. You know what I'm saying?

SPEAKER_04 11:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:17

Um, I think like there there is like it's a double-edged sword having the internet, right?

SPEAKER_04 11:22

I mean, I think there's something particular about our generation because we grew up without the phones, but then we got them and they were great.

SPEAKER_02 11:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 11:28

And I get it that like kids now, it's like who the fuck knows how demented their brains are from these things. But like we're still from the mindset of like it's great to have the fucking internet in your pocket in some way. Yeah. And it is like a super power enhancement. Uh you know, I don't know. It's it's difficult. What what do you feel most nostalgic for? What uh time of your life now that we're both over 40?

SPEAKER_02 11:56

Um probably like my early twenties. Yes. And I think that's also one of those things that's just a developmental phase. Like, 1920. It's like I mean, specifically like post-college. It's like post-college. I have a degree in hand. Like I didn't have any money, but I didn't really care. I could just do whatever I wanted.

SPEAKER_04 12:17

There to me, it's like it was up and down. Like 1920 in college, I felt great. I felt peak, uh-huh. Uh super happy. Um, I wish I could go back and like redo over some things just for you know, cause to enhance it even more. Uh right out of after college was rough with like no job prospects, no money, uh, briefly living at home. And then it peaked when I moved like in with my friends in New York City. Like it got like that. I have some fondness for. But even then, like a lot of stuff's like marked with like like the developmental stuff you go through where it's like friendships break up and people move and get relationships, and it's like that. Like there's a lot of like clustered bad stuff too. So I don't know either. It's just it's it's also personal, right? You know?

SPEAKER_02 13:04

But that's the thing. It's like really I think it's really more about what you're going through than the time. Right.

SPEAKER_04 13:09

Well, that's why I think that well, that's what my point is this time bullshit.

SPEAKER_02 13:12

Go up and down or whatever, but it's like it's not like the uh the aughts were the best time in history because I personally was having a good time.

SPEAKER_04 13:20

I know, exactly. It's such it's so person-dependent, and that's why I think this time and generation thing is such a dumb conversation, you know. Like the more I think about it. Like when people are like, I'm millennial, I'm Gen Z, I'm Gen X.

SPEAKER_02 13:32

I think all that stuff is fake. Yes. That's just like invented up there.

SPEAKER_04 13:35

It's marketing. It's literally like marketing, and it's it's just another it's literally another trick to divide people amongst themselves. Yeah. You you are we are all the same people as our grandparents and great-grandparents, just with different clothes and technology, but it's essentially uh very similar socioeconomic conditions. I mean, I that might not be true for like really turn of the century people.

SPEAKER_02 13:58

Right, or like the Great Depression or something.

SPEAKER_04 14:00

Obviously, was something that's but from the birth of teenagers in America at least, from 1950 on, it's been the same shit, but with like different fads and you know, and it's all just again, just like marketing to me to hype people up and get, you know, I don't know, people like that stuff too.

SPEAKER_02 14:20

Was that oh yeah, weren't we talking about it yesterday, uh or sometime about how like when writing was first invented, like the great thinkers of the time, I forget who it was, like Ptolemy or something was looking back on the advent of writing and being like, you gotta watch out, it's gonna ruin society or something. It's just like whatever like the new technology is, it's like Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 14:41

From his perspective, it's like people aren't going to be engaged in nature enough now, they're gonna be in like lost in the fantasy of reading or something.

SPEAKER_02 14:47

Right. They're not gonna engage with each other in conversation because they'll be too busy with books.

SPEAKER_04 14:51

Right. Um yeah, so again, it's just like it's the same old story endlessly. You know, the older generation will always think the younger generation is bad, and that they've you know they're idiots, and that the younger generation will always think the older generation is bad and that they're oppressive, or that they're you know, they're also idiots. Right, yeah. So I mean, it's just this eternal thing. And um fascinating. And it's just fun. We uh this we're all basing this off the first words of this episode, 1997. We've gotten to quite the divergence here.

SPEAKER_02 15:22

I was wondering why, because we've done a whole uh season and plus one episode of X-Men 97 already. Right.

SPEAKER_04 15:29

But this might have come up too. I mean, it you know, it's like I don't I I think it's actually I don't like that it's called X-Men 97. I don't know if I've said this before or articulate this out loud. Uh I also think it's interesting too when they do the recaps, they still say previously on X-Men. They don't say previously on X-Men 97. Uh I still think they should just call the show X-Men to me. Just it and it's a continuation. They're just picking up where they left off anyway.

SPEAKER_02 15:55

It should have been like season six.

SPEAKER_04 15:56

Mm-hmm. Should have been season six. Well. I mean, I guess it's from a marketing standpoint they want people to feel like they don't have to watch the old show. Um, which I get, but this show is enormously popular. So does it matter? Like, did they have to retitle it? Would people I think people would have been just as happy if it was just they're saying we're bringing back X-Men. And it's called X-Men. There's nothing complicated about it.

SPEAKER_01 16:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 16:22

New show or not. All right. Well, anyway, this episode opens with a bunch of young mutants. These characters are made famous by Grant Morrison, who I guess created them or co-created them with Frank Quitely in the early 2000s. Um, they're like a new generation of mutants. They're on the run, they're trying to get to the Xavier School for shelter, and they discover that it's been destroyed. Uh and then they're arrested essentially by X-Factor, who were introduced in the original series as well. Uh some of these mutants, like Wing is one. Quentin Choir is like the most famous one. He turns out to be a bad guy in the Grant Morrison comics. This he's like the young kid with the pink hair and wearing the Phoenix shirt. In the comics, he famously wears a shirt that says Magneto is right when he goes to all his X-Men classes. Oh wow. To antagonize the teachers there. Yeah. Right. He's a little bit of a uh annoying character. Um and then you see a bunch of other ones that are recognizable throughout the episode, like the Stafford cuckoos show up. They're Emma's disciples. Right. There's like this like little girl mutant who looks kind of like monstrous alien, but she's got like really sad eyes. That that was a big feature in the Morrison Quitely comics too, that character. I forget all their names. Forgive me for that. But anyway, X Factor shows up, uh, consisting of Havoc, Strong Guy, and my notes are wrote Feral, but it's definitely not Feral, it's Wolf's Bane. Uh Multiple Man and Polaris. I think most of these characters we've seen on the show before, um, like famously in that Iceman episode, where Iceman comes back to like find Polaris. That's one of my favorite episodes. Um here they're like, they're more Oh, Forge was on the team too in the original series. Forge was on X Factor in that Iceman episode.

SPEAKER_02 18:11

I forgot about that.

SPEAKER_04 18:12

And they say what their mission was. Uh they say it's like part of like a secret US government program that it's like a cover to like arrest mutants, but really they're trying to help them. Here it's like they're more explicitly doing the opposite.

SPEAKER_02 18:27

Right. They say that their uh mission is to protect both humans and mutants.

SPEAKER_04 18:33

Right. They're like a federal agency. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_02 18:35

But they don't really explain how they're gonna protect the mutants because they are essentially just rounding them up and putting them in jail.

SPEAKER_04 18:40

Yeah, I mean that's like the worst, like I when Havoc says, like, don't worry, we're the good guys. Come on, kids, you're coming. Like, I was like, okay, yeah. But then later they're just in jail. And it's like, wait, they're this is fucking not the good guys. They're ice agents, essentially. X Factor the Ice Agents. Um Ironic, because Icemen would want nothing to do with them given the Havoc Polaris situation. Uh so these kids are arrested. We hear in the news that violence uh against mutants is on the rise, and Valerie Cooper's the one who's in charge of this X Factor program. Her mission being to relocate these mutants for their own safety.

SPEAKER_02 19:14

Uh which relocate them to jail, but which is the part they don't say.

SPEAKER_04 19:17

Yeah, maybe temporarily. I have no idea. Yeah. Alright, and then what happened? Who are we introduced to next?

SPEAKER_02 19:22

Next, um we get a spotlight on Sunspot and Jubilee. They're at an arcade, and um Sunspot is like w winning I guess he's betting or something against.

SPEAKER_04 19:34

Did he get cut out of his will? Like, was that what happened to his character in the first season? Remember, he's like a rich kid?

SPEAKER_00 19:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 19:41

And then his mother finds out he's a mutant and there's a f like disowns him. Is that what happens? And so that now they have to like scrape by for money? That's what I'm assuming is the situation here. Maybe we should have rewatched X-Men Nice season one. It's okay. People will let us know.

SPEAKER_02 19:56

Right. So Jubilee is just like talking to Sunspot about like how what's going on with the mutant roundups is like really messed up, and uh now the X-Men have disappeared, Forge and Bishop are no longer around, so like what are they supposed to do? They're like wasting their time in an arcade. Luckily, Cable is sitting right next to her.

SPEAKER_04 20:14

Right. And they bring back his theme music. I don't know if they had that in season one.

SPEAKER_02 20:18

Oh.

SPEAKER_04 20:18

That horn little refrain they play. Doo doo doo doo. I appreciated that.

SPEAKER_02 20:24

Yeah, cute.

SPEAKER_04 20:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 20:25

Um Jubilee's really surprised that she's the one being recruited. Um, and Cable explains that one of the horsemen, one of uh Apocalypse's horsemen is around.

SPEAKER_04 20:34

So he does have all the like enjoying a milkshake, which is funny for Cable.

SPEAKER_02 20:38

Yeah, it's funny they show him like sipping on the straw.

SPEAKER_04 20:40

Right, because in the original series, Cable is like so uncompromisingly a badass. He just got his gun in every scene, doesn't even have an interior life at all. He's just the force of mystery and violence. And here they're they're humanizing cable quite a bit in this new show. Which makes sense because they show him as a kid and everything.

SPEAKER_02 20:58

Right, yeah. So um the horseman that's uh uh like around in the present day is called War. Um he's this guy, he has a green face with a gray bowl-cut hairdo.

SPEAKER_04 21:10

His real name is Abraham Kirios or Kiros. We learn more about him here than we did in the original series, where I guess he was introduced in the Muir Island episodes when uh Mystique is fake recruiting all these mutants for apocalypse and turns them into the slaves. Yeah. And he's one of them at the Irish Bar or the Scottish Bar? No, Irish.

SPEAKER_00 21:30

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_04 21:30

And uh Muir Island's off Ireland. I mean fictional Muir Island is off the real Ireland, right? It's not off Scotland. I think so, because Banshee is Irish, and that's part of his territory with Moira McTaggart McTaggart. Is she Scottish? I'm confused now. Anyway, uh that's where we like we we do see war in human form in season one of X-Men. That's the only reason I'm mentioning that. Now he's just like a green faced guy with a gray bowl cut, he's very ugly like.

SPEAKER_02 22:01

And then we get the intro to the show, and this is uh really funny. They make it an X-Force intro. Um with like, you know, your standard intro music.

SPEAKER_04 22:12

Right, yeah, this this is great.

SPEAKER_02 22:13

But they changed out the characters to reflect X-Force and X-Factor, and uh they go through the whole thing with like the two sides running at each other at the end.

SPEAKER_04 22:22

Yeah, yeah, and it's different characters, and the X-Force team is Cable, Jubilee, Sunspot, Silock, and Archangel. No Deadpool. They didn't want to introduce that character. Yeah, that's too much. It's kind of crazy that I wonder if like could they get Deadpool for the show? I know they had Morph do him as a cameo last season, and he was in the original show too as a cameo. But like, would I bet like if they're not they're gonna stay away from Deadpool because I feel like they'd want Ryan Reynolds to do it. The voice. But I feel like he would do it. I think he'd want to be part of the X-Men cartoon universe.

SPEAKER_02 22:58

Maybe it I don't know, maybe he was too expensive or something.

SPEAKER_04 23:01

Right, or he just has no intro. That's part of his contract.

SPEAKER_02 23:07

But I also feel like I like I don't mind that he's missing here, honestly, because I do feel like it's one of those things like he could be distracting because he's like I would like him as a force of mischief in the sense of like if it's portrayed by Ryan Reynolds, uh-huh.

SPEAKER_04 23:20

And like uh it would to me it would be funny to hear a line from him or because I feel like he would be part of his power or whatever is that he breaks the fourth wall. Right. And he would say something like that I think would be funny about being in the cartoon versus like the reality and uh or like distinguishing uh between like his movies and the cartoon and like making a commentary. Like I just think that would be very welcome humor. I know like sometimes that fourth wall shit's like cringe or it doesn't work in the movies all the time, but I think in a cartoon context it would be kind of amazing and epic. So maybe they're saving that or uh maybe they just they can't use them or they have no plans. I have no idea.

SPEAKER_01 23:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 23:58

But Deadpool is traditionally part of X-Force and many continuities. Alright, anyway. Intro is cool, the X-Force Intro, alternate X-Men.

SPEAKER_00 24:09

Yep.

SPEAKER_04 24:09

Uh and then we go to Rio de Janeiro. So Cable and not Cable, Jubilee and Sunspot agree to join the team. Uh they're convinced when cable says beats playing video games, so the world is going to hell. Right. Feel like that's a little bit of a prescient comment on kids of today, anyway. Um and so they're trying to track down this war guy. They're uh what is it like Carnival going on in Brazil? Right. So um Silock and Archangel are like doing recon from the rooftops and flying around. And uh Julie and Sunspat are dancing in the crowd, which Julie's like blending in. Yeah, we're trying to blend in. Um I'd it is funny the more we see of Silock, the more impractical that uniform seems to the character.

SPEAKER_02 24:53

She seems comfortable, it seems fine.

SPEAKER_04 24:55

I remember Olivia Munn saying when she played Scylock in the movies, like that the costume was the most uncomfortable, most impractical costume you could design for a woman to wear.

SPEAKER_02 25:05

I believe it.

SPEAKER_04 25:06

Yeah. I'm sure there's been many cosplayers that have like struggled being Psylock. Yeah, I'm sure. Like not tearing their like skin-type bathing suit. Um, so they're looking for war. Cable like mentions like, be careful around this guy. You know, he's responsible for more genocides, massacres, and civil wars, and there's more blood in the history books than you can count. And that just made me think of like many different like uh things. Like, are we just gonna attribute like all the current world atrocities to this character? Um, I don't know. Like I ward's power just seems to be like he blasts shit from his hands. But the other characters that are the horsemen are like pestilence, like I could see pestilence going to a country or famine, that's the other character. Their powers directly cause pestilence and famine. Right. And that seems like you could spread a pestilence or a famine from one mutant character, like that's fucked up and like could cause like horrible starvation or disease. But like war just shooting lasers out of his hands, like who's he genociding and how? Like, does he have does his power extend beyond that? Does he infiltrate? I'm thinking of the stupid Wonder Woman movie, uh, the first one with Gal Gadot, where she's going after the Greek god Ares, who's literally responsible for all of World War One.

SPEAKER_02 26:22

Right.

SPEAKER_04 26:23

And she's like, she he put evil in men's heart. Dumb accent. You know, it's like, and we have to stop him, and then you know, she does, and then like war, a peace breaks out amongst men. Is that what this character does too?

SPEAKER_02 26:36

I don't know if it's so much a question of power set as like intent.

SPEAKER_04 26:40

Right.

SPEAKER_02 26:40

You know? Like that's his role as the horseman. He wasn't it's not like he was war before he was one of the horsemen.

SPEAKER_04 26:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 26:46

So maybe it's just like that's the mission he's on.

SPEAKER_04 26:49

Yeah, but cable accuses him of committing genocide.

SPEAKER_02 26:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 26:52

I mean I don't know. Again, is he just lasering people or uh the I ca you know, because based on what we've seen from War in the cartoons, anyway, he's just like easily defeated several times.

SPEAKER_00 27:03

Yes. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 27:04

Alright, whatever. Um Silock flips into action, uh Sunspot flies Jubilee around, they get into a fight with war, and Silock sort of like knocks him out with her psionic blade.

SPEAKER_02 27:17

Right. She says sleep as she uh stabs him with it or whatever, and uh he's knocked out. So they capture him kind of easily, actually. They tie him to a tree, like a palm tree on the beach.

SPEAKER_04 27:29

Um it's kind of a funny scene.

SPEAKER_02 27:31

Well, until the end.

SPEAKER_04 27:33

Right, yeah. Um Silox got her butterfly psionic power set, which is interesting.

SPEAKER_02 27:39

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_04 27:40

And again, as we mentioned in the last episode, the British accent, which is speaks to the Betsy Breddeck-ness of it all.

SPEAKER_02 27:46

Right. So War is still knocked, or well, he's come to, but he's not giving any information. So Archangel punches him and he passes out again. And then they tell Silock to just use her psychic powers to like try to see what's going on inside his mind. And Jubilee's a little bit like, wait, like you didn't get consent. That's like kind of not cool. Because she's used to like Professor X being more ethical, I guess. But we know that he's not always, Well, you gotta do what you gotta do. Like, this guy's a real danger, so we have to. Silock goes in there, but she can't like really see what's going on, what his intent and motivations are, or like the plans from apocalypse or anything. She says there's a diamond shield in front of everything.

SPEAKER_04 28:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:30

So obviously, as a viewer, you're like, okay, Emma Frost is involved here somewhere.

SPEAKER_04 28:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:34

Um and then she says that's all she can get because she's locked out. And Cable's like, all right, we gotta kill him.

unknown 28:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:42

He hands his gun to Archangel to do it. And Jubilee's like, wait a minute, like, you're just gonna kill him? That's like pretty messed up. Like, Archangel, you were saved from being one of the horsemen of Apocalypse. Like, why can't this guy?

SPEAKER_04 28:57

He's like, that was my rogue and she's gone.

SPEAKER_02 28:59

Or like maybe we could get more information out of him at a later time, or like I mean, Jubilee's right.

SPEAKER_04 29:04

This is insane.

SPEAKER_02 29:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 29:05

Uh it's first of all, it's insane that cable gives Archangel his gun to shoot war. Yes. Why doesn't Why doesn't Cable do it himself?

SPEAKER_02 29:13

Right.

SPEAKER_04 29:13

Why doesn't Cable do himself, or why doesn't Archangel murder War himself too? He's got his titanium wings or whatever, like a poison-tipped arrows, he could just kill him in his own way. Uh I find that a little odd. Um I also do think it's weird that like they've reduced Archangel in this continuity to being a bit of like a soldier follower for cable, almost like a chump.

SPEAKER_02 29:35

I know. Yes.

SPEAKER_04 29:40

Right. He has got a lot of agency and depth to his character in the original show. And in this so far, just in this one episode, he just seems kind of like a henchman almost of cables. Uh I mean I enjoy seeing him. It's just still to me, it's like an S-tier character design, that version of Archangel from the 90s with the purple and blue and the wings. Uh I don't know. So they kill uh they kill this like two-bit X-Men character. Right. Rest in peace, war. Right. It's just a nonetheless.

SPEAKER_02 30:11

It's something we talk about all the time is like our heroes allowed to kill in whatever like iteration that we're seeing. Yeah. And I feel like if it was like the actual original series, they wouldn't have Oh, never.

SPEAKER_04 30:22

Yeah, this would never happen.

SPEAKER_02 30:23

But like because they know the audience is adults now and not kids, they're not like as concerned about it.

SPEAKER_04 30:28

You know, it'd be cooler if the scene, if instead of cable I don't even does cable say like kill him. But he he should have just if he if cable told Archangel destroy him, I would be like 100% on board.

SPEAKER_02 30:39

Oh yeah, I don't remember what they say, but it definitely wasn't that.

SPEAKER_04 30:41

No, no, no. They gotta like they gotta bring that back as a meme. That's like so much funny. How they can't say the word killer killing in the original series, they have to say destroy.

SPEAKER_00 30:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 30:50

Um that I would have been laughing if they went to that direction. Uh Cable says, like, trust me, Jubilee, this isn't murder, it's mercy. Or maybe Archangel says that. And uh Cable says to Jubilee, we are the authority. And uh Jubilee is pissed at Cable, but she's still riding along.

SPEAKER_02 31:09

She still believes in his cause, even though she doesn't like his methods, and she thinks she's gonna like wear him down to see it her way and like not continue on that path of killing.

SPEAKER_04 31:19

I feel like it's I feel like that's going to work if this storyline carries on with Jubilee and Cable.

SPEAKER_02 31:25

I get the sense that he will be like they introduce that piece of moral complexity for like what happens later.

SPEAKER_04 31:33

Yes, yeah, yeah. There's a consequence to this. Um anyway, they they know it's Emma Frost and uh they have to go visit her. Right. I was a little disappointed in the Emma scene. Emma was introduced in the original series, she's just like a standard villain with the Hellfire Club stuff with Dark Phoenix, there wasn't much to her. That was before Grant Morrison kind of revolutionized the character, uh, and then I guess Joss Whedon to an extent by making her like a good guy, but like a dark good guy with like a lot of weird moral complexity again. Uh, here it's kind of just like she's still a villain and she's out for money. And I don't get the sense that they're setting up the Emma Frost arc, so to speak.

SPEAKER_02 32:17

No, I think she's just gonna be a side character here. I don't think they're gonna do too much with her.

SPEAKER_04 32:20

Right. Like, and I'm not even saying they have to do anything with her this season, but I thought they'd plant a seed maybe for future seasons where they would like hint that there's something more going on to Emma that she's gonna be a major character with the team. Because she like really dominates the comics after the year 2000. Like she's just such a major team member. Uh they don't really do I mean, they kinda I thought they were setting it up because Emma's a survivor in season one of the Genosha attack, just like in the comics too, and she's like crushed by it like emotionally, which is true to the comics. It's part of like her turn from evil to good, is that she there's some kind of thing that like reckon there's a reckoning with her that makes her turn. Yeah. It's connected to the Jenosha massacre.

SPEAKER_02 33:01

Jubilee says something about that when they like first see her. Yeah. And she's like, or like when they're trying to negotiate with her, and Jubilee's like, you know, the X-Men saved you in Jenosha. You you like owe me one, and Emma's like, No, I don't, basically.

SPEAKER_04 33:16

Yeah, she gives a cynical response. She's like, Oh, the only thing the X-Men, in addition to saving people in Genosha, you also saved your heroic image. Uh, and so she's got like this like shitty attitude about it. Um, so you know, not much from Emma really in this episode. I mean, we see her later too. Uh there's an action sequence, she turns into her diamond form, but as a character, like, there's not much going on. Um, I think they like Emma is like pretty well presented in that X-Men anime we covered.

SPEAKER_02 33:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 33:46

They like get into like her love triangles with Scott and Gene and like can she be trusted or not?

SPEAKER_02 33:51

Is she really a good guy?

SPEAKER_04 33:52

That's good shit. It's really interesting.

SPEAKER_02 33:53

I think like X-Men I think like one of the reasons I liked that show show so much.

SPEAKER_04 33:56

Yeah, she was like the best character probably in that show. So I think if like the X-Men 97 can play that Magic Strict Tune maybe in a future season where they just make Emma like part of the thing and have her interject herself in the Gene Scott romance, that would be fun. Um maybe they'll do Silock first as the first like you know, femme fatale foil for those two.

SPEAKER_02 34:16

Yeah, maybe.

SPEAKER_04 34:17

Uh anyway, they like convince her to show her, show the team what uh war was after, and they go they end up in Gestatt, Switzerland. Good old Gestatt. Um and it's some like weird tech base. At first, Cable thinks it's a it's apocalypse technology to turn people into horsemen, but Archangel says no, this technology is way more advanced than that. Apocalypse is cooking up something else.

SPEAKER_02 34:42

It all the stuff is empty though, like a lot of the tech isn't it's not there anymore. Um, and then uh X Factor shows up and they realize that they've been betrayed. Emma just like led them into a trap so that they could also be captured and put into prison store.

SPEAKER_04 34:58

Right. And she said, and they're like, Why do you do it? And she's like, Oh, well, I you know, I need amnesty in the United States. Another thing I'm a little disappointed in, I know Emma is an American character, but I believe she was raised in Britain. I just like to imagine Emma with a British accent, and I think Grant Morrison wrote her as like a British character, and Joss Whedon definitely did too, and that's how I imagine Emma in my mind as like a British sassy character, like an evil British woman, and less of like just the standard American January Jones type for lack of a better example. Um anyway, so now X-Factor has to fight X-Force, which is very fun and fan service-y. Uh the fight is quite good. Um I mean, but in the end, Polaris is like so overpowered and she just like wraps Archangel's wings around himself and she uh gets everyone tied up neatly, like very quickly.

SPEAKER_02 35:46

It's easy for her. Uh and then Jubilee is like, Polaris, what the hell? You used to be one of the X-Men. Uh like, why are you doing this? And um Havoc is like, listen, like, you don't have any authority here, and we do, so this is what's happening now. But Jubilee uses her fireworks to break free.

SPEAKER_04 36:05

And the team sort of runs away, but uh they all escape except for Jubilee.

SPEAKER_02 36:10

She's held back, and Sunspot really wants to like stay and go after her, but Silock puts him to sleep.

SPEAKER_04 36:18

Yeah, yeah. It's so they all make their That was a cool scene. I like that. Yeah, it was. That was interesting. Uh Polaris remains one of my favorite X-Men characters just visually.

SPEAKER_02 36:28

Yeah, definitely.

SPEAKER_04 36:29

Just the ultimate green-haired goddess kind of character. I feel like the the premise of Polaris is like imagine a like the most beautiful woman ever, but her theme is green. And but not not as green as she-Hulk, but you know one step less green than She-Hulk.

SPEAKER_02 36:46

Yeah. It always mystified me a little bit because Polaris obviously is a star. Yeah. And there's no green stars. I always thought she should be blue.

SPEAKER_04 36:54

Oh, that's interesting. Hmm.

SPEAKER_02 36:55

That was always a mismatch to me.

SPEAKER_04 36:57

Interesting. Yeah, I don't know. I think it was just they wanted like a green woman in the comics. Green-haired woman's kind of interesting. Uh I I like Polaris's hair. It's very 90s, like. And she obviously looks like a supermodel, so it's just something. I feel like it would look ridiculous in real life if they cast a woman.

SPEAKER_02 37:16

Give her like a Tina Turner kind of hair.

SPEAKER_04 37:18

Right, yeah. Uh I don't know. I still would I still think that would be the only way to go. I would be mad if they like made it more demure. Uh that that's not the way to do it. Like, I think they did that. They had Polaris and that uh ill-fated Brian Singer live action X-Men show. I forget what it was called. Yeah. It was like a there's a green-haired Polaris character, and she was just kind of boring and ordinary.

SPEAKER_02 37:37

She had normal shiny hair.

SPEAKER_04 37:38

Yeah, no, she needed the blue is green, but they needed to poof it out. Give her the full Cindy Crawford or whatever. Cindy Lopper. Yeah, Cind the Cindy Lopper. Um, okay. So Jubilee's captured.

SPEAKER_00 37:51

Okay.

SPEAKER_04 37:52

Uh Havoc is like I guess this is like the the shield helicarrier they're on. It's flying above the skies of New York City. Uh and Havoc's interrogating Jubilee. Jubilee's they have the cut the mutant callers, so her powers are being suppressed. There's some funny lines here where like Jubilee calls them X Factor C list. And then she also calls She calls Havoc knockoff Cyclops.

SPEAKER_02 38:19

Right.

SPEAKER_04 38:19

I wonder if she knows that they're brothers. I wonder if that information would be I think that was revealed to her. She was in the X Factor episode in the original show. Because she was all into Bobby. She related to Bobby because he was the young X-Man who was always getting into trouble. So she would have found out that Havoc and Cyclops. Although, but were they revealed to be brothers on that episode? That I'm not sure of. Now I'm confusing myself.

SPEAKER_02 38:43

I don't remember the sequence. I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 38:44

Yeah, alright. Very well. Anyway. Um Jubilee's not intimidated in the slightest. Uh I don't know. Havoc leaves. I'll just say this last thing. Jubilee calling the X Factor C list reduces my hopes that Marvel has any plans to make the X Factor cartoon.

SPEAKER_00 39:01

Oh.

SPEAKER_04 39:02

They're just making, they're saying, look how dumb this is. Like, no one, you know, you guys aren't the real X-Men. No one's really interested in them. Big mistake, Marvel. Anyway, go on.

SPEAKER_02 39:13

Um, so then Havoc leaves the room for a little bit so that Polaris and Jubilee can talk because they're having like a little heart-to-heart as the only two like X-Men that are still in the present on Earth. Yeah, opposed to all the other time-traveling ones. And like Jubilee's like, look at what you're doing here, Polaris. Would Professor X be proud of you right now? And she's like, I don't know if she he would be proud of me either. And like this is the conversation where the moral ambiguity with cable kind of comes into play again. Because Polaris is like, you know, we heard that that that like cable killed that guy on his orders or whatever. Like, that's not cool.

SPEAKER_04 39:54

And like Jubilee's like, yeah, I know, but this is good moral ambiguity, these like little dynamics. They don't play it up too much. Uh like I feel like they could attribute it to real-world discussions on politics or social issues, but they don't like explicitly go there. They sort of leave it to your imagination, but they're relevant themes, I think, anyway. Uh so Jubilee is sent to prison, though, and she sees all the other like Grant Morrison type mutants, and she's crying. And then Polaris, it did work on Polaris. She goes into the prison cell and she frees Jubilee. She knocks out the cameras, and uh the She's like, You have five minutes.

SPEAKER_02 40:39

Whatever you do in that time is up to you. And she leaves.

SPEAKER_04 40:41

And then I mean, this is sort of a reprise to the Slave Island episode from season one where Jubilee like breaks out of prison with all the mutants are being captive and she's trying to lead prison revolts. This is a little more successful this time. Because I think Jubilee gets recaptured quite easily in that episode.

SPEAKER_02 40:57

Um But she yeah, here she does it successfully. She has a walkie-talkie so she could talk to Sunspot on the Right.

SPEAKER_04 41:05

Well, she escaped, she's like fighting all these prison guards with her firework powers, and so she somehow gets a walkie-talkie and tunes it to Sunspot who's flying on the cable plane.

SPEAKER_02 41:13

And also has a walkie-talkie.

SPEAKER_04 41:15

Right. I don't know quite that's a little Convenient. Yeah, convenient. It's a little weird.

SPEAKER_02 41:19

That's like if it was modern day, they would have just given them cell phones, but Yeah, or they'd have communication.

SPEAKER_04 41:23

I don't know, who knows what. But uh so Sunspot this whole side has been arguing for cable to rescue Jubilee, and he's like, oh no, she could take care of herself. And uh but in the end, uh you know, they decide to turn around anyway, especially with Jubilee contacting them.

SPEAKER_02 41:43

Right. So they successfully pick up all the mutant kids. Um Jubilee, like you said, has an extended fight sequence that is really cool. I feel like this is a direct response to people saying that Jubilee, like her power set is kind of stupid, or like what could she really get done by herself or something? I think that's like a really common criticism of the character. Yeah. And so I feel like they they well, she's also like they owed it to her to be like, look, she can hold her own.

SPEAKER_04 42:09

Well, they they've upgraded her. I mean, like, she's older now. They've advanced the timeline of the show. She's like semi-graduated a little bit from the X-Men. Uh they're just making her more they're continuing the story. They're like not leaving her as a perpetual 15-year-old.

SPEAKER_02 42:25

Right. No, I mean the fight sequence looks great. It's cool.

SPEAKER_04 42:28

Right. It's set to Verucca Salt's song Volcano Girls. Uh a song you recognize, but I did not.

SPEAKER_02 42:35

Yeah. Cool song.

SPEAKER_04 42:37

Um, Jubilee also has rollerblades embedded in her shoes, which is kind of fun. Uh, and uh, you know, like if at one point you think she's like knocked out and captured, but she just explodes herself. And these guards like are not They're not mutants. No, they're also not exercising lethal force as far as I can tell. They're just trying to capture everyone alive. Uh X-Force shows up, they're landing their plane, they start fighting all the like weapons that are shooting at them and the shield helicarier, and they're fighting the guards as well. Too. X-Factor gets to the fight late. Uh Jubilee, you know, she helps rescue all these kids. They all get on the plane and fly off, except for Jubilee. She's the plane takes off without her, and she's cornered by Valerie Cooper and Havoc. And uh Havoc's like, Alright, you're coming back with us, you have no other choice. And he's like swinging the little collar around his finger, and she just jumps off the helicarier, which was uh kind of Martin McFly and Back to the Future 2.

SPEAKER_02 43:32

Yeah. Uh and of course, like the plane that took off is still nearby, so Sunspot has had his eye on her the whole time. He jumps out of the plane and like swoops in to rescue her.

SPEAKER_04 43:44

Right, and she kisses him on the cheek. Yeah. So Jubilee was fine. She's quite a powerful little X man these days. Um Cooper sort of like gives a side of a side eye to Polaris. She knows that she was involved in helping Jubilee escape. Um and then Cooper goes on TV and like announces to the world that X-Force are fugitives and shows all their faces and names. I'm I'm imagining like if you're just a normal citizen of this planet and you see all these different mutants, no matter who they are, they all have got little X insignias.

SPEAKER_02 44:13

Yeah, it's probably confusing to me like who's who's who?

SPEAKER_04 44:17

Right. X-Force, X-Factor, X-Men, X-Caliber, obviously, but it's like all these mutants wear an X, whether they're on the X-Men or not. It's just almost like a it's like a weird fashion, like political statement kind of iconography. You know what I'm saying?

SPEAKER_02 44:32

I think it's like each team wants to signify themselves as the good guys, you know?

SPEAKER_04 44:36

Yeah. Um But you know what I mean? It's like the X is like seemingly more than just meaning you're on the X-Men. It's almost like uh people who believe in Xavier's vision. Or maybe you're just saying announcements of the world you're a mutant and that's why you were an X. I don't know. I don't know. I think it's cool, but uh it's like one of the weird, unexplained things of the comics and the cartoons.

SPEAKER_02 44:56

I mean, it is weird that like X-Force and X-Factor would use the X because it's like in the X-Men, it's because of Professor Xavier. Yeah. So absent him, like what are the other teams doing?

SPEAKER_04 45:06

Well, that's why I'm wondering if it's just like a grander tribute. That like Professor Xavier's, he's so much the Martin Luther King uh allegory or archetype metaphor in these stories that in this universe, like wearing an X is just like it's it represents like a whole social movement or something beyond just like being a member of the Xavier school or like literally being on the X-Men.

SPEAKER_02 45:30

I see, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 45:31

Like mutants just like wear X because that's I don't know, it's part of their culture. Uh anyway.

SPEAKER_02 45:39

Anyway, uh so Jubilee has a good line here.

SPEAKER_04 45:42

Yeah. Where cable's like, oh great. Uh or Archangel's like, now we have like the heat of the like world's governments after us and we've been exposed. And Jubilee says something like, Well, you know, if we're not defending the world apocalypse wants to destroy, what's the point of doing anything at all? Right. I thought that was a very powerful and prescient line, too, that you could apply to a whole number of things going on in the world today. Um And then we cut to well, then Cable has like a line about, you know, like Jubilee or somebody says, like, these kids, you know, I've worried about them, they might be traumatized. And Cable says, No, kids are tough. And then he flashes more resilient than you think.

SPEAKER_02 46:17

Right.

SPEAKER_04 46:17

He flashes back to his past, which is the future.

SPEAKER_02 46:20

Which is it picks up this scene picks up from where we left off in the end of episode one.

SPEAKER_04 46:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 46:26

Where he like sticks his hand through that circle thing, uh, and gets his like new and improved robot arm.

SPEAKER_04 46:33

Right. And uh not only does he get the arm, he gets the little cube computer. So we get the origin of cable's computer, which it turns out is the ship's AI, Apocalypse's ship's AI, which is Celestial in Origin. I mean, it does on one hand, I think this is a neat little narrative trick uh because it explains like how cable's computer is so overpowered. Because in the original cartoon, he's got this fucking computer and it's just like a time travel and knows everything. Like he asks it questions and it's it could yeah, it like could tell it tells cable at one point when the cartoons that like the timelines through the past and the future are fucking like being destroyed, and like you have to like go now to save them. It's like wow, that's quite the computer. In my mind, as a kid watching, I'm like, oh, it's just like it's super advanced computer from the year 4000, that kind of makes sense. Uh-huh. It's like one of those things where it's like they didn't need to explain that necessarily. Like, this is a cool narrative tie-up they do, but I was all I also would have been fine if he just had a super advanced computer that let him time travel. So I don't know, how do you feel about that? Because the computer cube is one of my favorite characters of the original series, I'll have to say that.

SPEAKER_02 47:38

I also just assume that the computer came from the future, but I don't mind this as like a retelling of that interpretation.

SPEAKER_04 47:46

I think it's fun. It's fine. It's like a nice not-I mean, it's not everyone has watched the original series or remembers it, so maybe it's the kind of thing where it's like if they go back and re-watch it, they'll open their eyes to it. But I think as we have watched the original series and continuing in the one direction, it's just sort of it's just a little bit one of those things that like maybe didn't need a backstory. Like it never bothered me that his like where his computer came from.

SPEAKER_00 48:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 48:14

But uh, you know, this is kind of cool.

SPEAKER_00 48:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 48:17

Again, I miss the original voice of the computer from the original series. All the little incidental voices I miss. I miss the original voices of the Sentinels. That's tough when they have to replace those.

SPEAKER_00 48:26

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 48:27

Like the voice of the computer. There's a bunch of little voices here and there that are, you know. I they're definitely doing their best in like copying, but it's um you know, you do miss the original voice. Apocalypse, especially for me anyway. Yeah. Yeah. Alright, where are we?

SPEAKER_02 48:43

Um The computer tells cable, like, all right, you have to send the X-Men back uh to where they came from stat because shadows are gathering in the past where history is still unwritten. Exactly.

SPEAKER_04 48:54

That's cool shit. That I that's what I like about that computer.

SPEAKER_02 48:58

Mother Ascani is standing by saying, Don't worry, cable's gonna be protected by people who care about him. Um he hugs uh Scott and Gene, and then he time slides them back to the present day.

SPEAKER_04 49:15

Presumably the nineties. Right. And then uh Cable, we cut back to Cable who's in the nineties, and he's remembering his past, which is the future. Right. Days of Past Future. First episode was entitled. Uh how do you feel about this one?

SPEAKER_02 49:30

I liked this one. I liked the setup of X Factor, X-Force. Uh they succinctly bring you into the world of all these characters and uh set up the stakes and like the motivations against each other.

SPEAKER_04 49:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 49:45

Uh and I assume they'll be part of the series going forward for at least the next couple episodes. I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 49:52

Uh you mean like X-Force? Yeah. I think X-Force is likely to be seen again, obviously. X-Factor, I don't know. They might be. You think they're done? I don't know. Maybe. I I feel like there might be some business there that needs to be resolved with X-Factor. Uh but it's cool.

SPEAKER_02 50:07

I like folding it all together.

SPEAKER_04 50:09

I I this is a very fan service-y episode, and I appreciate it. Like I I've watched these episodes twice. You've watched them once. I'm I was right on if I recorded this right after I saw it the first time, I'd be right there with you saying this is great. And it is great. I think it is very good. But the second time, I feel like uh re-watching it, like it might be the fan service might be doing a lot of the heavy lifting. And so re-watching the second time was a little it felt a little emptier than the first one. The first one, watching it twice, I thought was great both times. This one, good, but not it lost the great status for me.

SPEAKER_02 50:42

Oh, okay, interesting.

SPEAKER_04 50:43

All right, and that leads us to the next episode, which we'll be covering for everyone listening tomorrow.

SPEAKER_02 50:48

For us, momentarily.

SPEAKER_04 50:49

Right.

SPEAKER_02 50:50

Well, you have to go watch it.

SPEAKER_04 50:51

Right. We're gonna go watch it and then do one more podcast, three in a day. That is that's about as much as we could do in one day. I think we've done that in the past.

SPEAKER_02 50:58

This was a work day for us, also.

SPEAKER_04 51:00

Yeah, this is and you're traveling tomorrow. You are traveling to a different continent tomorrow. So this is such unfortunate timing, but whatever. We shall carry on. All right, Sonia, until next time.

SPEAKER_02 51:10

Good day. Good night.