Storied Arcs

Send us Fan Mail New year, new season of the Storied Arcs podcast! And to kick things off, Mike and Alex will be covering two books by the same writer, the Hugo Award winning and up-and-coming comic star Sarah Gailey- Eat The Rich (with artist Pius Bak) and Know Your Station (with artist Liana Kangas), both published by Boom Studios. The guys talk about what drew them to these books, another set o...

Send us Fan Mail We've reached the end of another calendar year and once again, Mike and Alex have come up one week short on stories to talk about. But fear not! Earlier this month, Mike, Alex, and great friend of the show Andy took a quick road trip up Interstate 71 to attend GalaxyCon Columbus 2023 and decided that was a perfect opportunity to record a podcast episode. In the car. So with A...

Send us Fan Mail "-I mean, after everything you have seen, it is so hard to believe there may be a design to the universe? -A design? All I see is chaos and death." We've reached the conclusion of Jeff Lemire and Dustin Nguyen's space epic, and Mike and Alex are here to break it all down as they jump into Ascender Volumes 3 and 4, The Digital Mage and Star Seed (issues #11-18)....

Send us Fan Mail "There is no magic in the galaxy that I do not oversee. No power I do not control. I am Mother and the universe is mine ." The cover may say "Ascender" but these collections might as well just be Descender Volumes 7 and 8, and Mike and Alex are here to break it all down, starting with Ascender Volumes 1 and 2, The Haunted Galaxy and The Dead Sea (issues #1-10)....

Send us Fan Mail "But  do you know the irony of that, Doctor? Robots never lied before you created the Tim series... before you gave robotkind the upgrades that made us more human and more like you ." In this finale that's not really a finale, Mike and Alex are here to discuss the last chapters of Jeff Lemire and Dustin Nguyen's Descender in Volumes 5 and 6, Rise of the Robots...

Send us Fan Mail "What does it look like, Creator ? I'm doing that you programmed me to do. I'm eliminating waste... just like a human. " Mike and Alex are here to jump right back into Jeff Lemire and Dustin Nguyen's Descender as they dive deep into Volumes 3 and 4, Singularities and Orbital Mechanics. The guys debate and discuss the choice Lemire and Nguyen made with Volu...

Send us Fan Mail "Because they fear us, Tim-21. Because they were hurt and they wanted to hurt something back. Because they are human." We've arrived at a brand new season of Storied Arcs and Mike and Alex are diving right into Jeff Lemire and Dustin Nguyen's space opera epic Descender Volumes 1 and 2, Tin Stars and Machine Moon (issues #1-11). The guys discuss how this book to...

Send us Fan Mail For the next season of Storied Arcs, Mike and Alex are revisiting the works of Jeff Lemire (aka Mike's literal favorite creator in comics) as they plan to dive head first into a pair of books by Lemire and superstar artist Dustin Nguyen, Descender and Ascender from Image Comics! The guys give a quick tease of this epic, two-part space opera and give you some insight on why lo...

Send us Fan Mail "And what if I could make it so race would never be a part of the equation again? That the way the world views us would never rely on how much melanin our ancestors needed to protect themselves from the sun? I could make us all the same. I could make us better." The final installment of the James Tynion IV and Eryk Donovan's Apocalyptic Trilogy, Eugenic (issues #1-3...

Send us Fan Mail "You were always selfish. You rallied us together to stop him all those years ago because you were afraid of losing one life you treasured more than the whole. You convinced us that life was all about those little glories. The little loves. And we believed you . And here, you've done it again." The end of the world, take two! Humanity meets its demise yet again as M...

Send us Fan Mail "So the fate of the world rests in the hands of the maniac who decided to end it with a weird picture of a sloth." Storied Arcs is back with another great season as Mike and Alex get ready to talk about the end of the world three times over. First up is part one of James Tynion IV and Eryk Donovan's Apocalyptic Trilogy from Boom Studios, Memetic (issues #1-3). The g...

Send us Fan Mail "No matter where we hide, we die. But, even if they know they will die... even if they know they will die no matter what they do, they do not abandon hope. That's what it means to be a human." At last, we have arrived at the epic conclusion of Naoki Urasawa's Pluto and of the Storied Arcs/Tankobon Podcast crossover event! Mike, Alex, and Cole are here one last...

Send us Fan Mail For the next season of Storied Arcs, Mike and Alex invite you to join them at the end of the world as they get ready to dive into the Apocalyptic Trilogy, a spiritual and thematic trilogy of comics from Boom Studios by James Tynion IV and Eryk Donovan consisting of the books Memetic, Cognetic, and Eugenic. As usual with these zero episodes, the guys will give a preview of the comi...

Send us Fan Mail "If the stronger man wins, someone even stronger will just take him out. That's all there is to it." The Storied Arcs/Tankobon Podcast crossover continues! In this penultimate episode, Mike, Alex, and Cole examine Pluto Volumes 5 and 6 (chapters 32-47) and discuss how Naoki Urasawa is able to masterfully juggle a murder mystery detective story-turned-global conspira...

Send us Fan Mail This week, Mike and Alex sit down and chat with the creator of Plume, K. Lynn Smith! They discuss her artistic and storytelling influences and look back at her origins posting her first work to the webcomic community. Then they dive into Plume, looking at why the Western genre was an appealing setting for her. They also examine how the immediate feedback from readers as the comic...

Send us Fan Mail "A.I.? An A.I. is not created. It is raised. Terrible sadness, frustration... these are what nurture and A.I." Welcome back to the Storied Arcs/Tankobon Podcast crossover, where Mike, Alex, and special guest Cole are jumping right into the next volumes of Naoki Urasawa's Astro Boy-inspired manga, Pluto Volumes 3 and 4 (chapters 16-31). The guys discuss the widening...

Send us Fan Mail "Revenge is for the selfish, justice is for the brave." In this episode, Mike and Alex head back to the wild, wild West and dive deep into the concluding arc of Plume by K. Lynn Smith with Volumes 3 and 4 (issues #10-17). They revisit the litany of Western-genre story tropes and discuss how Smith was able to once again subvert those genre expectations and deliver an endi...

Send us Fan Mail "He kept waving his hand until I could no longer see him. It filled my hard with emotion. My robot heart." Welcome to the Storied Arcs/Tankobon manga crossover event! This week, Mike, Alex, and Cole from the Tankobon Podcast dive right into Pluto Volumes 1 and 2 (Chapters 1-15) by Naoki Urasawa. The guys talk about the origins of Pluto, its ties to the classic manga Astr...

Send us Fan Mail "My father once told me that revenge was like a plume of black smoke. It seems tangible... but when you reach for it... you're grasping nothing but air." In this first episode of the new season, Mike and Alex head to the Old West to discuss Plume Volumes 1 and 2 (issues #1-9) by cartoonist K. Lynn Smith. They look into the history of the Western as a genre in popula...

Send us Fan Mail And now time for a special announcement! On Tuesdays in the month of October, we will be dropping some bonus content on this feed that we're super excited about. We have teamed up with the Tankobon podcast for a manga crossover event to discuss Pluto by Naoki Urasawa, a story inspired by the classic manga Astro Boy by Osamu Tezuka. There are eight volumes, or tankobons , and...

Send us Fan Mail Mike and Alex are back for another season of Storied Arcs, and for this outing, they are diving into the world of webcomics as they get ready to discuss Plume by artist/writer K. Lynn Smith, originally published on the internet (RIP Smack Jeeves) and then in print by Devil's Due Comics. The guys get you primed for this supernatural-tinged western saga by teasing how Plume pla...

Send us Fan Mail Mike sits down with the writer, penciler, colorist, and letterer for Gospel... Will Morris! They discuss the book's meaning, especially the ending, and how/why there was a change from the single-issue release to the trade paperback. Will also settles the score on the debate Mike and Alex had during their discussion of Gospel- which pop culture theory of interpretation is more...

Send us Fan Mail "Joan of Arc never sought to be martyred, nor to be venerated. She wanted only to deliver France from oppression. That is what I want. To deliver my friends from danger." Mike and Alex are back for another one-shot episode, this time discussing Will Morris' book from Image Comics, Gospel. The guys take time to praise Morris' wonderful artwork before exploring h...

Send us Fan Mail Welcome to a new season of Storied Arcs! In this entry, Mike and Alex will be diving into the Gospel from cartoonist Will Morris and Image Comics. They'll talk about what drew them to the book (and maybe why Alex missed it when it was initially released) and also give some big picture thoughts on the story to set-up the discussion. Then as usual, the guys give the lowdown on...

Send us Fan Mail In this one-shot, Mike sits down with Javon Harris. Javon has dreamt of writing and publishing manga (Japanese comics) since the 3rd grade. Now, he's making it happen. In 2022, he founded what is now an international collaboration of creators and he's trying to get the word out. Know someone who is a manga fan? Be sure to share this episode with them! Be sure to support...