Ruth Fletcher Gage

Episode 134: Ragegiving

Last week was Thanksgiving in the United States, a holiday where family members travel for hours and miles to share a table with family members and take a moment to express gratitude for the good things in their life. Then they follow that moment with hours of barely-suppressed acrimony, sarcasm-dipped references to long-buried grievances, and barbed rejoinders about the political beliefs of family. They then disperse to Black Friday sales around the map, taking their frustrations out on fellow shoppers and leading to those awesome fight clips on YouTube.

Rob and Amanda did not go to any Black Friday sales. They did, however, read Civil War II #7, and they do have a comics podcast.

Due to vagaries of comics publishing (and the fact that Civil War II has been late almost since it was solicited), this week we not only discovered the result of the battle between Captain Marvel and Iron Man, but we began to learn the price that certain characters will apparently pay for their roles in suspending the Constitution, ignoring the First, Fourth, Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments, contributing to the deaths of at least three Avengers and arguably sending the Marvel Universe on the road to literal apocalypse.

And we found that price to be wanting.

So we spend a lot of time complaining bitterly about:

Civil War II #7, written by Brian Michael Bendis with art by David Marquez and Andrea Sorrentino,
Captain Marvel # 10, written by Ruth Fletcher Gage and Christos Gage with art by Thony Silas, and
The Ultimates 2 #1, written by Al Ewing with art by Travel Foreman.

But, since we can’t be negative about everything, we also discuss:

Deathstroke #7, written by Priest with art by Larry Hama and Carlo Pagulayan,
Buffy The Vampire Slayer Season 11 #1, written by Christos Gage with art by Rebekah Issacs, and:
A. D.: After Death Book 1, written by Scott Snyder with art by Jeff Lemire!

And, the usual disclaimers:

This show contains spoilers. If you don’t want to know what happens in Civil War II, just try to forget some of your biggest disappointments before reading it.
This show contains adult, profane language, and is therefore not safe for work. If you said to your mom what we say about Civil War Ii over the Thanksgiving table, you’d be disowned. So get yourself some headphones.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:14:08 — 73.4MB)

Thanks for listening, suckers!

November 28, 2016 by Rob

Episode 129: I Wanna Go To Canadian Jail

NO COMMENTS YET

We are more than halfway through Marvel’s Civil War II summer event, which, like most Marvel summer events, has dragged into the fall with no end before the darkest days of winter in sight. And while we previously have idly wondered how Marvel intends to deal with characters who are on the side of profiling and pre-crime, the event has really reached the point where, in order to keep the plot moving, characters like Captain Marvel and Black Panther are acting in truly reprehensible ways that will likely require rehabilitation on the level of Matt Fraction’s reboot of Tony Stark’s brain after the first Civil War.

And while there is no main Civil War II issue this week, there are several books that feature main pro-Predictive Justice players in the event doing horrible things that run the gamut from emotionally destroying adoring teenagers, to entrapment, to asking people if they are for or against you and placing those in the latter camp under arrest without even precognitive evidence. All of which makes Tony Stark’s Civil War pro-registraton stance look like good, old-fashioned flag-waving New Deal patriotism.

So we discuss these books, including:

Ms. Marvel #11, written by G. Willow Wilson with art by Takashi Miyazawa and Adrian Alphona,
The Totally Awesome Hulk #10, written by Greg Pak with art by Mahmud Asrar, and :
Captain Marvel #9, written by Ruth Fletcher Gage and Christos Gage with art by Thomy Silas.

And we discuss not only what can be done to rehabilitate characters who are clearly meant to be on the wrong side of issues, but how the series maps to recent social justice events and causes in the news.

And, the disclaimers:

This show contains spoilers. While we try to give warnings ahead of time, if you don’t want to know why the Canadian justice system is the most ruthless yet enticing in the world, consider yourself warned.
This show contains adult, profane language, and is therefore not safe for work. We did this show on a mix of beer, Sudafed and cough medicine, and we pride ourselves on our vocabularies even under adverse circumstances. Get some headphones.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:26:40 — 85.9MB)

Thanks for listening, suckers!