Across the Omniverse

Derek says nobody reads these. Is he right? Let's find out!  This week: how is it possible that the follow-up series to a mediocre nostalgia bait 90s cartoon is the best X-Men adaptation ever? It's nuts! This first part of a three parter is the kind of stuff most shows hold for season finales! Meanwhile: who is Paul Walker Hauser playing in  Fantastic Four ? And was 2019 actually forty y...

Gambit is dead. Real dead! Getting buried and everything. And Rogue is on a rampage - can Captain America stop her? Are Jubilee and Sunspot in their own TV show? And why did the X-Men wait a whole week before going to Genosha? All this and more on the latest  X-Men '97 ! Also: is Zack Snyder in his Kevin Smith era? And is it surprising that two middle aged white nerds would find themselves si...

To space, my X-Men! We finally catch up with Professor X, who has been walking around and boning down in the Shi'ar Imperium. Meanwhile, Storm has to confront her greatest fears to save Forge, even though it's his fault she has no powers. Do you like X-Men cosmic stories? If so, you're in luck. If not, you're Derek. And there's Marvel news, including a Captain America: Bra...

This week things go  nuts ! This is the big episode towards which everything has been building, and it has everything you want in an  X-Men  story: romance! betrayal! intrigue! violence! tragedy! It's got it all! Plus: a bunch of news from CinemaCon. What's up with the asterisk in the  Thunderbolts  title? How about that new Superman logo? And what's up with Beau DeMayo? Double plus...

This week: can we trust James Gunn? Does anyone want a movie where Superman fights Evil Superman? And will the Human Torch really have those little lines on him when he flames on? Plus: I have an amazing experience at the bank. It's better than it sounds.  On  X-Men '97 : Jubilee gets sucked into a video game by Mojo while Storm chills out at Forge's cabin... but something just ain&...

This week the X-Men cartoon sorta adapts the crossover event Inferno , and jams it all into about 40 minutes. Is it too rushed? Yes. Does it still mostly rule? Yes. In the news segment we have thoughts about Spider-Man 4 and the rumored directors. Plus: we talk more about bringing an It's Always Sunny attitude to Fantastic Four .  Thanks for listening and see you next week!

First up, a programming note: we will be swapping the days we release our podcasts. We are going to release Marvelvision on Fridays and move The Bad Batch to Mondays. So expect another episode of Marvelvision this week.  On this episode: wait, the new  X-Men  cartoon is  good ? Like,  really good ? How did this happen? What miracle has occurred?  And in the intro: some small news, and I tried smel...

As we get ready for  X-Men 97  starting next week we take an episode to just catch up with the news, including the latest on  Blade ,  Eternals  sequels and the eternal production of  Thunderbolts . Plus: they finished  Wonder Man ?!? Next week it's all nostalgia all the time as the continuation of the 90s  X-Men  cartoon hits Disney+. We'll be covering the first two episodes. See you th...

This week we're talking about the 96th annual Academy Awards, the first Oscars Derek has watched in over a decade! And he picked a good one to return to, as the night had surprisingly deserving winners, big fun moments and also Godzilla.  Find out our thoughts on who deserved what they won and which losers should have been winners. Hear us discuss "I'm Just Ken" and also get in...

This week we're doing something a little different. We're pulling an episode of Watch Men out from behind the paywall and letting you get a listen to it - free! The episode is about  The Marvels , a much-maligned MCU film that we quite liked and that is now on Disney+ and finally picking up some appreciation. What better time to get this back in front of your ear canals? But don't w...

The Dynamic Duo is born... and right off the bat there's something a little odd about their relationship. Now, we're not taking Wertham's side on this one but it is really strange for a rich guy to simply abscond with a recently orphaned little boy.  It's  Detective Comics  #38, the first appearance of Robin the Boy Wonder, the multi-murdering sidekick to the Dark Knight Detect...

When Captain America throws his mighty shield.... well, he's not throwing his shield yet, but he's already got a 9 year old sidekick who sleeps in bed with him? Yes, this is just one of the revelations coming out of  Captain America Comics  #1, where Joe Simon and Jack Kirby introduce the Star-Spangled Avenger and his nemesis The Red Skull.  And there are backup stories, and get this - t...

Comics are for kids. We all know that. But don't kids deserve a little bit more respect? This is the question that hangs over the two stories in  The Flash  #110, which sees the introduction of Wally West, aka Kid Flash, aka a future Flash.  Before we get to the origin of this scarlet speedster we got ourselves some news, including pondering about whether they'll keep Israeli superhero S...

“Whosoever holds this hammer, if he be worthy, shall possess the power of Thor.” We all know the Mighty Thor today, thanks to the MCU and of course his appearance with the Incredible Hulk on TV, but how did he start? The latest entry in our Secret Origins series has shown us that many of the most famous comic book characters were born with their fundamental DNA intact. Not so much with the Mighty...

The finale of  Echo  is here, and the show was better than we expected - but how much better? We do not agree on this particular point, but we do find ourselves in agreement on a lot of elements that we actually did like quite a bit. And then there is the news - a lot going on in the world of comic book movies, including the groundbreaking news that Superman will have a sense of humor in the upcom...

This week I finally come clean about my serious case of John Krasinski Derangement Syndrome,  and we speculate about Pedro Pascal's schedule. Then it's on to the first three episodes of  Echo , which showed up on Disney+ and Hulu this week. The whole series was released at once, but we're splitting it up because it would be a very, very long episode indeed if we did it all.  The big...

You asked, we answer. This week we interrupt our regularly scheduled programming to bring you a special Q&A episode. We asked your for your questions and you came through - so much so that we couldn't answer everyone! The questions range from the silly to the sublime, and if you listen you can find out why I would marry the Red Skull, who Derek's least favorite Flash is and whether w...

This week we are talking about  all  the episodes of  What If...?  season two all at once. That's partially because Disney+ dropped em one day after another and partially because I had COVID and we couldn't do this in two parts like we intended.  Was this a bad season? One of us thinks so! Was this a 'whatever' season with a few good eps and one  great  episode? One of us think...

Trigger warning: someone farts on mic this episode.  And if that's not bad enough, my mic was not set properly for the intro of the episode. But don't worry, the bad sound quality only lasts  fifty minutes . We talk about all kinds of news and stuff, and also there's a recorded fart, but it sounds very bad. So if you don't want to suffer through it skip to 50:19.  When we get t...

A Cinema Sangha Special Presentation! This week we are giving you a free glimpse at one of our other podcasts, The Bad Batch. That's our weekly  Star Wars  show, and this week we're talking about the new documentary  A Disturbance In the Force , about the legendary Star Wars Holiday Special . It's a pretty terrific documentary that gives you a good sense of the context of early  Sta...

This week it's a look back at the birth of the Marvel Age of Comics, and it's not completely what you might expect. It's weird, silly and not actually the Marvel Universe as we know it. For one thing, the Fantastic Four debut in a fictional city, not New York! Before that we have some news, and some movie talk - Derek has caught up with  Napoleon  and  The Hunger Games: Ballad of So...

Welcome to the debut of Batman... or should we say, The Bat-Man. In  Detective Comics  #27 Bob Kane and Bill Finger introduced a character who would impact the pop culture of the 20th century in ways nobody could have guessed. Hell, reading this entire comic book it becomes clear nobody would have guessed this stuff would still be around in ten years, let alone 80+ years later.  We attempted to re...

This week we're back to reading comics, and we are continuing our origins project. It's  Amazing Fantasy  #15, the historic first appearance of Peter Parker, the spectacular Spider-Man! You can find this comic on Marvel Unlimited or for free on the Kindle app; what's nice is that Marvel has reprinted  the whole comic , which includes a bunch of frankly terrible back-up stories... wh...

While we wait for  What If...?  to start, we decided to do more comic book readalongs. But we learned a lesson from  Secret Wars II  - we can't ask you guys to read 9 comics a week. So our interim activity will be reading first appearances of famous characters, and what more famous a character to start with than Superman himself, first appearing in 1938's  Action Comics  #1. But first: a...

It's the end of  Loki ... and it's the end of Loki? Big series finale here, with major consequences for the God of Mischief. But does the rest of the season support the finale? Is it possible the last episode of a show can be amazing if the ones before are kind of not great? Find out! Also: we talk a little bit about  The Marvels , saving the main discussion for our podcast Watch Men. Yo...