The Smark Avengers - The Smark Avengers Halloween Special (Queen in Black, AEW/DC, Peacemaker, & More)

Episode Date: October 31, 2025

It’s spooky season, and The Smark Avengers are diving into the madness of modern comics! 🎃 Corey, Dylan, and Jon sit down for a Halloween hangout full of chaos, laughs, and hot takes as they cover: 🦇 The Batman Who Laughs and why DC can’t quit edgy reboots 🕸️ Marvel’s Queen in Black event and if it’s just more symbiote overkill 💀 Blackest Night revisited – what the fuck was that about? 🔥 The Peacemaker Season 2 finale and what it means for the DCU 💥 Corey’s ongoing war against Geoff Johns 🧠 Marvel turning Doug Ramsey into a villain (???) 💪 Plus the AEW x DC Comics crossover that sounds like trash Whether you’re a DC diehard, a Marvel maniac, or just here for the chaos, this Halloween special is for YOU. 🎧 Subscribe to The Smark Avengers for weekly laughs, comic deep dives, and debates that get as wild as a Deadpool storyline! 👇 Drop your favorite Halloween comic storyline in the comments — we might read it on next week’s episode! Click the link for Dylan's radio show!: http://www.bouncedigitalradio.co.uk Click the link for Dylan's Twitch stream: http://Twitch.tv/spookylaroux Click the link for Jon's Letterboxd: https://letterboxd.com/bigjonbowski/ Click the link for Corey's project "Henry's Usual": https://www.tumblr.com/henrysusual Click the link for Corey's show "Large Old Cup": https://open.spotify.com/show/2YHMppnl9inQevwLIxR64f

Yeah, yeah, like we get it. He killed himself. Yeah. Did he? Mm. Mm. Wow. Hmm.

Somebody killed him. Yeah. I don't know. I almost said Courtney Cox, but no. That's the fucking twist. It was Courtney Cox. Wow. She got away with it.

That's how she did. Someone's going to think it's the other Courtney. Yeah. Oh. What a. what a great twist that is. Obviously you blame on that, Courtney.

She's a drug-outled maniac. Or she would be the one to do it. Nobody would suspect a beautiful old Courtney Cox. America's sweetheart. Yeah. It's got free. Perfect crime. Get that on tape.

All right, everybody. Welcome to the Smart Avengers. Never watch Friends again. Boycott it. Yep. She's going out with, like, one of the guys from Snow Patrol. Courtney Cox? She lives in, like, North... Yeah, she lives in, like, Northern.

She lives in, like, Bang or whatever. She lives in Northern Ireland. Are you going to go visit her and bring her to justice? This is for Kurt. I'm pretty sure I'm not allowed to go visit her. Not after this. I'm going to turn up their house with, like, the police. Like, we got you by your rights.

They're already waiting for you. I know what you did. I got the evidence right here. I'll show with this. The clip. You even gave us the plan for how to catch you. The police are like, we need something a bit more concrete than this. That's where you pull up the...

Right now, you reach out of her and pull up a knife that you're going to stab her with. I'm not stabbing her. You're bringing her to justice, vigilante justice. The police are here. Anyway. Anyway. Do you guys like... like comics. You do.

Dylan, you've been reading the... We're in the middle of like some comedy and then it just cuts to me go, do you have like comics? Yeah, it's going to cut to us talking about the Uncle Scrooge comic. How have you been enjoying it so far? We're two issues in. I have them. I got them. Yep. Oops, I dropped it. That's issue one.

Good pro stuff. That's the issue one. Very nice. It's still I keep it, it's still in the plastic Yeah, because I wanted I'm going to give these to my kids someday. They'll be worth a lot of money. And then I'll give the kids away and they'll be worth even more money, I assume. And that's

out of issue two. Yep. This is Scrooge McDoug. Very nice. You probably wonder why Scrooge McDoug is fighting a bunch of robot aliens. John, I assume you haven't read it. Cora, you've been right now, right? Yep, I'm up to date.

What do you think? I've been enjoying it so far for the most part. I'm a little confused about one element of it. And so, like, the idea is that, so these aliens have invaded Duckberg and the planet, and they have enslaved all of the citizens there. And they have Scrooge McDuck in, like, plug up to a machine because they can't find his gold. Because that's what they want. They want all of the money and all the valuables in the world. So he's hooked up to this machine because they think if they pry into his memories, they'll see where he left it.

So all of the scenes with Scrooge McDuck are like dream states. and he's like going back through his like memories interacting with like old versions of himself and bringing them up to date because then the aliens are invading his memories and erasing them so he's forgetting things i was confused about the knight like the the the the night like scrooge because all the other versions he'd interacted with were old versions of himself like the little kid that was like polishing shoes and then the part of him that was like in america and the dakotas like wrangling cattle and stuff. I'm confused about the knight, because that was like his ancestor.

That can't be his memories, though. That was the one part that got threw me off. Well, let me double check, but I think the knight was him in Castle McDocke in Scotland. Yeah, I thought that was like an ancestor of his, and that was what was throwing me off because I was like, that's a little strange, but oh well. Well, he would inherit the castle. So I think that the idea is, he was wearing the seat of LRG, kind of like defense. themselves. Let me double check.

Yes. So this is Jason Aaron, by the way, John, writing this. Jason Aaron writing a Scrooge McDuck comic. Wild. Mighty Thor, scout, Wolverine. Wolverine and the X-Men.

It is just him defending his castle. It was his memory, then. just to defend the castle. I think the gimmick is that the aliens are trying to steal all the coins in the world. The reason that they are after Scrooge

is I think they already took all the gold in the money bin. I think they want his number one dime. Because that's like the last coin yet. Yeah. And that's why they're after Scrooge because he is the only person that knows

with the number one dime is hidden. And that's why they're raising his memory so that the only memory he has left is where the dime is. Yeah. Because I think in like the first episode, they break into the first episode, the first episode, the first issue. They break into the money bin

and all these coins are there. It's empty, yeah, yeah. Well, they empty it, yeah. Yeah, I empty it. So I think that it's the number one dime after. Because not the last coin. Do you know how many issues this is? Four. Four. Okay, so we're already in the half waypoint.

Yeah. It's been pretty good, though. I like it. Huey Dewey and Louie is like the freedom fighters that are like a little more haggard from time and fighting the resistance. It's been, you know, that's been nice. Donald's there. Yes. He is.

The Beagle Boys. Yeah, I like the Beagle Boys showing up there in the last issue. That was nice. They're on the side of good or? Oh, they're helping. Really? They're helping, presumably, because at the end of it, they're going to double cross them and try to steal the gold.

Yeah, of course. If anyone's going to steal, it would be them. That would be the Beagle Boys. But I think that's part of it too, is like, well, you're going to let these aliens steal the gold? I don't think so. They don't deserve it. There's some punks, but the Beagle Boys have been after Scrooge for years.

Mm-hmm. literally years. So I think it's been fun so far. I'm looking forward to reading some more of it. I'd like to see how it ends. It's just like a fun little story. Yeah. Yeah.

Sometimes, you know, it's a lot of comics get really serious and get really over the top with trying to up the stakes. It's sometimes just a really silly one. I like the Supergirl comic currently for that reason. It's a very silly book. There was a whole issue that focused on all of the various super pets. So there was like a team up between crypto, the super dog,

and a super bunny and a super cat and a miniature gorilla. Was it a super miniature gorilla? Yeah, yeah. So pretty much it was a the first villain of the series is trying to redeem themselves and turn over a new leaf. And she made a clone of Titano who is a giant cybernetic

gorilla. So she shrunk the clone of the giant, of the clone, she shrunk down the clone of the giant cybernetic gorilla into a small cybernetic gorilla and so she's trying to uh you know redeem herself and so is the tiny gorilla okay yep sometimes it's just fun to read something silly well that's it man we were talking with this like why comics getting really heavy um like the spider man's like not fun anymore it's all like really yeah Bampassick and

like almost over the top like obviously comics are over the top but like it was too like well well let's use the Screeze McDuck comic as an example like it's very over the top because it involves aliens

that have come down to steal all the coins like the fuck does that even mean but like it is it's silly and not like unbelievable in the world of Duck Teals because it all kind of like this is what, you know, Duckfields is about.

Screech McDuck is an adventure. He's not afraid of aliens. He's been to space. It's in the intro, you know, and they're collecting coins. It makes sense that they would go after the man with the most coins. Like, you know, it all kind of ties together in a silly way, and I'm sure it will all come together in a silly way. But the Spider-Man stuff recently has been, as we've talked about,

has been very, like, heavy, and he's dealing with, you know, demons from hell a lot and like his clones have died a billion times he died wasn't that the thing like he died like 20 times or something yeah yeah he definitely died yeah like this is well ben Riley yeah died like 38 sometimes

yeah yeah did peter not die at some point or am I making that up Peter I don't think he died I think he well actually saying that there was the 8 S of Spider-Man which I've literally just finished reading like last week. That's the Spider-Man.

Yeah, it was like if you looked at the cover of the front, the like first issue, you'd think, oh, it's Spider-Man and Dr. Doom. Nope, Dr. Doom basically played no part in the story whatsoever. It was all about Dr. Doom

was the sorcerer of Supreme at the time and like Citarak, the sort of demon god who gives the juggernaut his powers. Yeah, I was about to say, like the juggernaut Cedarack? Yeah, his, his, like, demon kids were coming to try and kill the Sorcer Supreme, but, like, Doom basically nominated Spider-Man as his champion for some reason, and so Spider-Man was tasked with

learning magic and then fighting these demons, and, like, he had these. feathers or something, which meant that if he died, then he could basically use it as like an extra life and come back to life again to keep fighting them. But he only had so many feathers.

And yeah, so that was like the whole story. It wasn't great. So he did, in the context of the story, he would have died then because he would have given the feather to come back to life. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He died like at least like five

or six times and then he ended up giving some of these feathers like the last of them that he had to like Aunt May and Randy Robertson and all these people that had been killed in one of these demon attacks to bring them

back to life um loves that old lady but that's I think I was thinking of like that I had heard Spider-Man like you had death's a Spider-Man or whatever and you're like I mean I'm like do we really need

Out of all the magic users in the Marvel universe, do we really need to go, Spider-Man's the only guy that has to learn magic today? Like, are you sure he has to learn magic from scratch and then do this? We could use this, like, phone one of the other magic guys. Yeah. You know, it just makes you. Yeah, you're just kind of wondering, like, what's ultimately, what's ultimately the point of Spider-Man?

Because it feels sometimes, like, because, God damn, you know. What is the point of Spider-Man? Because it feels like a lot of the time, like, When we think, when I think of Spider-Man, I think of, like, the 90s television series, and I think of, like, fighting, like, Craven the Hunter and the vulture and the hobgoblin and stuff. And I'm not thinking of, like, interdimensional demonic threats and stuff. We talked, we talked about this before. There was some weird time travel shit in the comic.

Yeah, yeah, but it just, it gets to the point, like, this shouldn't be for him. Like this seems like it's somebody else's story that he's getting put in. Right. And like, like, even if that was the angle, if it was some other person that Spider-Man was dragged into, you're like, well, this makes sense because Spider-Man's here tangently. Like, he's not supposed to be somebody else's story that he is not involved in. And then that works. But it's not.

It's just somebody who's writing it going, now Spider-Man learns magic. And they're like, well, then now he's Spider-Man going to just use magic. Right. Yeah, yeah. Now, Spider-Man can just always use magic for stuff. Why does he have to fight anybody? He's just, like, use magic against all these demons and shit. Now, if Dr. Octopus comes over, he'll just do a spell.

Because Dr. Octavis can't protect himself from that. He has no idea Spider-Man's going to do a spell. How could he possibly know that? And he just goes like, oh, he'll put a spell over New York, and it's good now. And then that's it. Like, how do you beat that? So if we can stay on the topic of Spire... Because we've definitely talked about this before,

about how Spider-Man keeps getting pulled outside of like street crime and into this like more and more bigger bombastic shit. And it's like it's kind of ruining Spider-Man in that sense of like being able just to do street crime stuff. Let's let's go a different direction with it real quick. Because I sent you guys the thing saying like Marvel announced what the next, one of the next big events for next year will be. And it is the symbiate queen. And it looks like it is another storyline involving null. but this time mixed with Hela of the Asgardians

Do you think There's like a time When they introduce a new character And then that new character just gets done to fucking death And you hope to never see that character again In DC Comics for me For me in DC comics A character is the Batman who laughs

Who is like introduced by Scott Snyder And like He just looked dumb And he's like he's the Batman But he's crazy crazy. He's got a bunch of little demonic robins that he puts on collars and leashes. And it's like, this is, I don't like this. This is really stupid. And it doesn't feel appropriate for Batman to have this problem to deal with. Is, is null that on the Marvel side? Because it seems like the guy just keeps fucking coming back. And it's like, it seems like no matter, anytime I go to check in on what's going on in Venom these days. Invenom isn't some other person that's not Eddie Brock. It's like null's involved as well. well I don't know I slightly disagree with that

because he Noel came in as sort of a looming threat for a long long time where he was like you know basically trying to break free from his prison on the planet the symbiates to come and

all the codexes whatever the fuck it was about but then like after that whole king and black story-line we haven't seen him. Okay. That ended in like 2021, I want to say.

So it's been a couple years. Yeah. You know, like they've shown a bit of restraint considering he was like a well-received villain and stuff. And they, they haven't gone back to the well until now. So, so basically,

the Batman Who Laughs got introduced in like, I believe it was like around I think it was It wasn't death metal Because death metal is a storyline Where they resolved his shit But it was like

In Scott Snyder's Batman And it carried over into Snyder's Justice League And then resolved in death metal Which was another Scott Snyder Storyline And this is ultimately And I don't want to keep bringing it up Because I don't

Scott Snyder is someone who I find to be problematic for me Because I think he has great ideas I just think he sucks at executing them and I'm not a big fan of what he's doing right now with DC either but like the you know the Batman Who Laos has not really been used in the last like three or four years either so there's been a space but it just seemed like there was this period of time where he was just done to death like he was always around he was getting referenced he's like in the shadows lurking

and you're like they keep telling you this is a big threat this is a big deal and it's like I don't see it I just see like an edge lord Batman yeah right I think it's a little different from the null thing because like John said they did like you know they they teased it and referenced it

a lot before you actually saw him and then whenever you do see him like it was a big deal it didn't just turn up and then Spider-Man uses magic on him because Spider-Man can do that nice but like you know stuff happened and then there was a conclusion

to the story but like like John said they've also kind of ended that he you know there's more to it he's probably not dead because in a way that would also be deeply unsatisfying if like lord of all

symbiotes was just killed by venom or whatever like there needs to be you know he's he's a fucking immortal god that's existed for eons it feels a little anti-comactic for just that fucking dick to kill him so I think

like it makes sense to like bring them back and make them a legitimate big bad, but like, you have to do it right? And I've, fuck knows we've had conversations about how much I detest what they've been doing with the symbiotes recently, you know? I'll be honest with you. The notion that there's a planet of symbiotes, I don't know how that works. Because are there other things on the planet that the symbiots are living off of? Because if so, that defies the whole point of what a symbiote is if there's not a dominant species. that they're currently leaching off of.

Well, that's the awkward thing about how this whole null thing came about was they kind of forgot that. They got to forgot how science works. Yes. Originally it was a planet of symbiotes where the symbiotes existed on a planet. And therefore, I never read the original.

But I think, you know, because it is a planet with other living things on it, the possibility of them being able to leaf up with the things certainly exists but when they did the more recent kind of retcon where null exists the idea is that the planet of the symbiotes exists as a as a planet itself is a massive symbiotes that is keeping null trapped inside of them so inside of the earth there is a molten core and inside of the planet of the symbiote is null. He is inside of the planet

and the planet itself is just millions and millions of symbiotes wrapped around themselves to trap him inside it. Which when you say it, when you read it in the comic seems like a good idea. But if you talk about it the way we just did, it makes fucking no

sense whatsoever. Because then you're like, okay, so none of the symbiots are the planet, but also because we've seen Spider-Man go to the planet of the symbiotes, it actually is a planet. There's shit on it. there's trees and stuff. So, like, it's a planet. Also, it's not a planet because it's just made up all shit that venom is.

But it's still a planet. So do they use their ship shifting powers to turn into stuff that they've never seen before? How does that work? Because if they live on a planet by themselves, they've never seen trees or grass or sand, they don't know what that is. How do they be it? So, yeah, Marvel editorial is very bizarre to me in the way they work sometimes. I won't lie.

Somebody just said this would sound cool, and somebody was like, yeah, that would sound cool. And they just signed off on it. And to be fair, like, when you read it, it does sound cool. It's like, oh, wow, it's like a prison for that guy. Then once you think about it, you're like, they couldn't have found a better prison. Yeah. Like, I don't know, actual fucking prison. Like, but I'm in a black hole.

Why does the planet, why does the actual planet have to be? Like, that seems like real bad. like it's called the planet of a symbiotes because it is a planet made out of symbiots they probably don't call it that probably not I think the idea was because the symbiates like

rebelled against null and like broke free of his control they kind of took it upon themselves to kind of create their own prison for him which turned into this like artificial planet I guess

but like then that would suggest that before they broke away from him that they existed on a planet already so they would have to exist on a planet with him before they broke away from him and then once they did then they trapped him inside the planet of the symbiotes yeah so let's uh where did they so i did want to i do want to switch topics real quick on this i did read um because it's fucking shit i i I read Age of Apocalypse Alpha, which was the mini-series that takes place during the age of apocalypse characters coming to the regular Earth. I read the first issue of it, and I think it's only like a four-issue miniseries. It's not even a full six. And the first issue, so pretty much, like, because we talked about this when we're talking about age of apocalypse and age of Revelation, because that's starting up, like, now. and I think they've already confirmed in the age of Revelation

like several characters are already dead but remember we were reading the solicitations and the one that got to me was they're talking about and the ghost of Philadelphia like who the fuck's the ghost of Philadelphia it's Kitty Pride through events yeah through some events

she can't turn her phasing off so she's essentially a living ghost now so she's now the ghost of Philadelphia Deep from Philadelphia I don't know. I don't know. But anyway, so in the age of apocalypse alpha, pretty much like the crust of the story is like, they killed apocalypse and they, they thought like, okay, cool. We shouldn't exist anymore, though, because this timeline should be corrected itself.

Like, we shouldn't, we should be. But like, things have been continuing the way we've been going. Like Magneto is still leading, leading his X-Men. and so they come to this realization like they get intel from morph saying like hey the world that we're on like this this dimension this thing is going to end and we need to stop it so we need to go to this other place to keep it from ending and like that's the crux for why like gambit and rogue and like saber tooth and wild child and blink and slain stuff are in the regular continuity right now because they're trying to keep their world from ending and they're like playing up like the gambit rogue and magneto relationship there because in age apocalypse magnino and rogue are married and like it's apparent she still has like a thing for gambit and gambit obviously has a thing for her and he considers magnito his friend and anyway

like i read through the first issue and the last like page reveal because he's come up on the podcast a couple of times is like the characters show up in the 616 Marvel and they're like oh wow this place doesn't suck there's nature and I can breathe the air it doesn't smell like death here and then fucking X-Man out of nowhere and X-Men's like you shouldn't be here

like that's the big last page reveals X-Man showing up going what the fuck are you guys doing here so I really quickly interject yes the Kitty Pride is from Illinois the ghost of Philadelphia

So essentially, like what, I guess what, in the age of Revelation, um, revelation, like, let's loose like a gene bomb that kills a bunch of people and turns a bunch of people into mutants. So if you don't get killed, you do turn into a mutant. So, like, for example, like the X Avengers are made up of, you know, Danny Moonstar who, Captain America with his dying breath. gave her his shield and said keep it keep the go keep it going i wasn't aware they had a lot of interactions but he was like of all the people you danny moon star you keep you keep this thing going um

but like black widow gets aqua powers like she's turned she could turn into hydraman essentially and uh hawkeye grows a bunch more arms and so like they get mutant powers but part of like what has happened is like there's a part of the United States that are considered the Revelation lands and the United States government is just like listen let them have it they could keep it we'll just keep all our shit over here and Revelation and his weird mutant world can just be there on that side of the country. No no it's the northeast I think it doesn't I don't think it goes down into Louisiana because part of the one of the storyline that Gail Simone is writing is Gambit, like, trying to keep things going on his own in Louisiana, and it's, like, outside of the Revelation territories. It's mainly, like, Washington, D.C. and, like, the part of the country that I live in. Aw.

I get to be a mutant and or dead. Hopefully mutant. Hopefully, dead. Years crossed from me. I mean, it doesn't seem like it's a great place to live, to be honest with you. Well, isn't this, like, really? The whole Terrigan bomb storyline they did with the inhumans a few years ago. Sounds like it.

Mm-hmm. But with an age of apocalypse twist. Yeah. Oh, my God. So, so. Water. Learn magic. Oh, well, I thought you were asking about magic.

I'm like, well, she died. But then she, like, her body resurrected itself and she's dark child again. Okay. Yeah, part demon. It happens. Oh, did you ever get? Did you ever pick up the first volume of Generation X? No, I ran out of money.

Ah, okay. I actually did, because the way that you guys were talking about it made me really want to read it again, so I ended up picking it up. How much did you pay for it? It's probably like 40, 50 bucks. Right, that was my issue. Yeah, it's a little on the price of your side. First trade. First trade's always the more expensive one.

It was pretty rough. And I really want it. Like, I really really do. But I'm like, I'm going to have to wait till like payday. Or maybe like, tell somebody I want that for Christmas. And even then, I'm like, I don't think they want to spend 30, 40 pint of me on Christmas. So that could be a bit of a stretch. So I'll just see how much money I have by the end of the month.

They spent like 40 pine preordered Pokemon this month. But I won't have to pre-4-4-money. So that made. Next. Thursday. So it means that the Pokemon money that I haven't spent next month, I can spend on

Generation X next month. So, Dylan, you're more of a video game person than I am. I'm not sure if John's a big video game person, but what the fuck is Marvel rivals? Because that queen, that symbiate queen's storyline, a lot of people are going, great. Now we're like synergizing with the fucking video games.

I'm like, what do you mean? and I saw people like, oh no, it's Marvel rivals. I'm like, what the hell? I haven't played it. Is that the... John, have you played it? No, I've not played it. The online one?

I believe so, yeah. Yeah, you know what I'm talking about? Like the big... It's like Overwatch, but like, will Marvel? Yeah. That kind of thing? I think so. Yeah, like you get all getting teams.

and like you can all pick a Marvel character and you'll fight. Yeah, it looks like Fortnite. Not Fortnite. It's like a shooter game, yeah. Yes. Yes. I forget what the proper term for it is, but like, you know, you go online, you get in teams with people, you pick a character, and then like, it's like a four-on-four thing or five-on-five or whatever it is. and team-based

one guy's a healer and one guy's the tank and one guy's to whatever three people of Wolverine because everybody loves Wolverine you know I heard Vanham's really good and people used to play it in game

but I haven't I don't I haven't played it but part of it's pretty good I couldn't tell you what storylines are going on in it because I haven't played it all right so yeah looking it up it does

look like there is hella is a character that you can play in the game. And she has a skin called the Queen in Black, where she is done up to look like null. So I guess that's why people are saying, like, yep, this is synergy with the Marvel game. That's some nice foreshadowing for a thing that's going to happen next year.

In February. Yeah, but that's still like four months away. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, so obviously synergy is a big thing at the moment. It has been for Marvel for a while. So like a lot of people say that a lot of the choices that happen get made, you know, are made because of Marvel Synergy or what have you. I don't know if I necessarily believe that for the most part.

Like, I think the most egregious example of synergy actually came from D.C. And there was a new Aquaman run that was starting. And it was around the same time that the gym. Jason Mamoa movie was coming out. And the thing about Jason Memoa's Aquaman is that because Jason Momoa is of Polynesian or Maori or Samoan descent. I'm not sure which one. Islander. I feel like it's a little vague, but it's just a

islander, but he's of that community. His Aquaman, when shirtless, has a lot of, like, the tribal, like, tattoo body, like, body tattoo style. So when he's appearing at first in the Aquaman movie, he's usually shirtless so you can see, you know, the physique and all of the tattoos. So they came up with a reason for why Aquaman would have those similar kinds of designs on him. And, but he, they kept him white with a blonde, with a blonde hair and a blonde beard.

So, like, the character went from having, like, short hair and no beard to long hair, a beard and then, like, Polynesian tattoos despite being a white man. And it was very weird for when they did that. Now, it's odd. The writing for that particular run was pretty good, because I, I think it was Kelly Sudiconic, maybe, I think. I don't know. Regardless, that was probably the worst example of, like, synergy I've seen in comics,

where we're having to, like, make a white man look somewhat islander because of Jason Mamoa as playing him in a movie. Are there any other examples? Yeah. Yeah. Are there any other examples recently you can think of where there is, like, this is, like, really weird Marvel synergy? Um.

night. Because I know a lot of people for a long time were saying that the reason like the X-Men books were getting ignored for the most part was Marvel Synergy. And like Fantastic Four was getting downplayed because of that. And then like the big renewed push in Inhumans and Eternals was Marvel Synergy. Because like when the Inhumans TV show was coming out that flopped really bad, that was when they had the Inhumans versus X-Men storyline with the Terrigan Mist bomb. they create a Kamala Khan to make it like a big deal and boy

they have kind of completely overwritten the fact that Kamala is inhuman by making her a mutant on top of it recently as well they love Fakamara they certainly do she is a character that like has three different superhero

descents on her because she's she's an inhuman she's a mutant and she's also a legacy captain Marvel character It's like, wow, you just hat on top of hat on top of hat. Right. That's what's really annoying about that because, like, her, the original run with her, you know, Miss Marvel was really good.

Yeah. I really liked it. It was a very sweet, fun story. But the way that they're kind of pushing stuff now feels a little like they're really, like, they're really pushing somebody hard with. thought like the definite like

um I don't be a spy I don't know you know what I'm not explaining this very well yeah but it's like

well the WWE push like a jack guy for no reason like the audience might not like him one guy in particular likes him so that way he's going to be

on TV all the time they're like okay cool but like just because you push him hard and fast and quickly relentlessly

doesn't mean people are going to buy it I think people did buy yeah into Alcan originally. I think that it was a very, very good, very sweet story when it started.

And Marvel just kind of like put their tendrils into it. And they're like, we'll put her everywhere. We'll send her through time. She'll be like in all facets of everything. And people are like, you don't need to fuck with this character like this. You could just leave her.

Maybe that's the way Marvel are going these days with their editorials is that instead of them adding it to, tone things dying they're like toning things up but like no it has to be bigger and it has to be more bombastic and they have to travel through they have to learn magic like maybe it's not the writers maybe

because you know what's happened this man and Kamala Khan where and the symbiots and all this stuff where like it's getting so big and ridiculous that you're like is it all the writers being big and ridiculous or is it just somebody in Marvel going everything needs to be big and ridiculous you know

like you said with I think people are going to get sick of Kamala Khan. If they're not already, they're going to, because of the way Marvel are kind of pushing her with such an inconsistent backstory and constant retconning and stuff like this, people are going to lose interest and they're going to start booing her like, she's John Cena.

Because they're sick of it. They're like, we've seen this. And we've seen better versions of this. And you're not giving it to us. You know? John, do you have any thoughts? I mean, I've not read

a lot of Kamala Khan's solo comics I've seen Miss Marvel pop up in other stuff like she was a pretty big part of like the you know the last

part of the Krakawa stuff she she's regular like in well in the last Peter Parker Spider-Man run like she was working at

OzCorp with Peter and Norman which is where she died and stuff and she's obviously got like a long-standing relationship with Miles Morales as well like friendship so like that's pretty much where all my experience with her is

I think as a character though like she's she's she seems like she's still popular. Like I, from what I understand, like, you know, obviously she, uh, offers like some representation that, uh, you could argue was lacking in Marvel comics. So like that kind of, um, uh, you know, uh, uh, um, uh, um, uh, um, um, uh, um, um, um, uh, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, upset. Yeah.

The demographic, that's what I was looking for. Yeah. And, yeah, like, uh, in terms of the, the Marvel universe as well, like,

the character has been, like, just an absolute breath of fresh air and everything that she's appeared in so far. Like, I just watched the Marvel zombies, the animated,

uh, show that they just released last week. and she is great in that. Like, she's basically the main character and the heart and soul of it all. So I'm all up for this Marvel getting pushed. Did you enjoy?

Did you enjoy Marvel zombies? I did. I thought it was, because it was sort of, like an else world's type thing, like something where it's not, heavily connected to you know the MCU or whatever like they were free

to kind of take risks with it and you know people were dying and stuff like that and uh it I don't know it felt like it added a bit more weight to things because it was more unpredictable and like you know it couldn't keep someone alive just because this act is playing them or whatever

so yeah it was enjoyable. So, So Peacemaker just finished its second season last night and ended on a big cliff note that's supposed to set up the future DC storyline and the movies and TV shows and stuff. Have you seen anything about that or

curious about any of that? I've, all I've heard is it was not a satisfying finale. I don't know how or why. I could see why it wouldn't be. and if you if we can we can we can we could cut it out if if you if you if you don't want spoilers by all means I won't say anything I don't care I couldn't care I'm probably not going to watch

John I know you do watch stuff so if that if you want to watch peacemaker by all means I will not say I mean I probably will watch it but at the same time I doubt I'm going to avoid these spoilers anyway so you might as well let me know okay so the premise of the season season was the Chris Smith character has been trying to grow as a person, like, realize that he's not been a good individual and he's trying to be better, but he's having a hard time. Like, the world doesn't seem like it wants to accept him. So he finds, like, this pocket dimension where there's essentially all these different doors that open up into parallel universes.

And while he's exploring them, he runs into a version of himself. that tries to kill him. So he fights back and kills himself in self-defense. And he goes to that world's, that Christmas world, and it's like everything he's ever wanted. Like his brother is still alive. His dad is a hero. He's like a respected superhero in this world.

The girl that of his, the girl that he's been pursuing through season one is already his girlfriend there. It's like the perfect world for him. And throughout the course of, of the series, he comes to the realization it actually gets painted in front of him that it's a world of Nazis. And like his dream world is a is a world of Nazis. And it's because a character, like, one of the other characters from his world like finds him there. And she's like, have you not notice there's no people of color around? He's like, I've not really paid attention to that. And she's

like, yeah. And also every desk has a copy of mine conf on it. And he's like, I didn't notice that either. And she's like, well, yeah, and also look at the flag. And she hands him the American flag, and he unrolls it. And instead of the stars, it's just a white swastika. And he's like, yep, didn't notice. And she's like, and there's also that mural. And then behind him, there's a giant mural of Adolf Hitler in front of the White House. And he's like, okay.

So it does have that serious same sense of humor. But like he comes like this, you know, he ultimately is like, learns that he can't run away from his problems. He has to face them head on. And one of the B storylines has been Frank Grillo's character, Rick Flagg, Sr., is pursuing him for revenge because in James Gunn's suicide squad movie, John Cena's character Chris killed Rick Flagg Jr. So he's like pursuing him because he wants revenge. So, and he's like, obviously, he crosses a bunch of lines in the pursuit of that revenge. It ends up like making a deal with Lex Luthor, which was a big cameo in one of the. the episodes is that Nicholas Holtz-Lex Luthor was in prison because it takes place after the

Superman movie. And basically he finds the world of alternate dimensions. And the show ends with Chris getting arrested. And instead of being put in a regular prison, Frank Grillo at this point has come to the conclusion that metahumans can't be trusted. And he finds a suitable dimension that he is going to use to throw away all the metahumans. essentially like we're gonna take all the metahumans that are on our planet and we're going to put them on this alternate world and the world they call salvation because there is a

storyline in DC comics called Salvation Run where that's the plot basically the United States government goes you know what every metahuman re-arrest they end up breaking out of prison fuck it put them in another dimension so John seen the show ends with John Cina's character abandoned and alone on this alternate dimension and he here here's like a murderous scream in the distance and that's the last thing you see. So, yeah, obviously that's why a lot of people are like, well, that's kind of unsatisfying conclusion because it ends on a rather big cliffhanger of him trying to do the right thing and end up getting like arrested and sent to an interdimensional jail where he's going to be

forgotten, essentially. So yeah, that's what's going on in peacemaker. And that seems to be, if they're going to be. I do the Salvation Run storyline. It's, it's very ambitious to say the least, because, like, it's a world, it's, the storyline is basically like the Joker and Lex Luthor and all these other villains get abandoned on this interdimensional planet and are fighting like hell to get off because there's, it's a hostile world where there's a giant monsters and shit that are trying to eat them.

Like Deadpool? Yeah. Yep, pretty much. It's a, it's a other dimension where there's something there that doesn't want them there. So, yeah, Salvation run. came out in the 2000, early late 2000s early 2010s. And it was a

it was the lead up to the final crisis event because that was another thing people were pointing out about the peacemaker too is like, okay, are we going to like speed run into final crisis? Because if so, like that's another choice there as well. Like because yeah, that was like a big Grant Morrison storyline being final crisis. Because that's the one that led to, that's the one that led to Batman getting killed,

but not really being killed, being sent back in time. Back in time. Yep. Because that was part of the league, because originally when I talked about, like, oh, what can we do for the Halloween episode? I'm like, oh, well, let's talk about Blackest Night.

And then as I was, like, as I was, like, John and Dylan are going to be so fucking bored because I'm going to have to explain who all of these Silver Age characters who are back from the dead as zombie black lanterns going after the newer heroes that have replaced them but used the same name. I'm like, this is going to be fucking nonsense to them.

How many of them are the Flash? Coincidentally enough, none of them are the Flash. Because at this point, all of the flashes are alive at this point. We probably could have got through it pretty quickly then. But the Flash does become a blue lantern at one point. Blue Lantern. Yeah, blue lantern. Okay.

We've talked about green and yellow lanterns. I don't know how we talked about blue lanterns. We have not talked about it. Because that's another reason that Black as Night was going to be very difficult to talk about. Because I was going to have to explain the emotional spectrum of core. Because that's another plot point is that because they're outnumbered by all of these black lanterns,

because it's a zombie storyline, all of the other lantern corps deputize new members. so all these other characters get new get lantern rings for the first time so like green lantern is a green lantern and then there is uh gant that who's a guardian he ends up becoming a green lantern as well for the storyline uh st walker is the main blue lantern and he deputizes barry allen to be a blue lantern um there's the indigo core and they deputized john stewart to be one their emotion is compassion uh blue lantern is hope Green Lantern, of course, is willpower. You have the Star Sapphires, or pink lanterns, and they're love. There's the yellow lanterns or the Sinestra Corps, which is Fear, the red lanterns, which are rage. And then there is the orange lantern who is greed. And there's only one orange lantern, because of greed, they kill each other until there's only one,

and then the spirits of the ones that get killed get turned into constructs of the one that's still there. so like wonder woman becomes a star sapphire the scarecrow becomes a member of the senestro core lex luther becomes an orange lantern it it becomes a huge thing and then they because they're also like trying to become like to free the power of the white lantern which is life because of the black lanterns are death the white lantern is life so john like hal jordan and senestro are fighting to see who can tame the white ring and become a white lantern it's a fucking thing and that's why i'm going I don't think I can do a Black as Night episode because it's a lot of explaining

and it's going to be a lot of Dylan making the face that you're making right now of just like Yeah. Hmm. So they kill all of these characters. I think I would have preferred it if you would have turned into a blue mini. Some Daisy Dukes and a half t-shirt. Oh, that blue mini.

Yeah. I thought you met like the Beatles Blue Mini in which case. I would also read. that comic. Yeah. That was great. So yeah, like, it would have just been a fucking mess. And that I'd been like, yeah, so they kill all of these characters.

But then the white lantern, before he, the white lantern entity, because that's another thing, is that all of the lanterns have a spirit animal, basically. And the spirit animal is like the personification of the power. So before the white entity or the trespasser, as it's referred to, disappears, it creates a bunch of white lantern rings that resurrects certain characters. so like Aquaman comes back Hawkman and Hawk Girl come back Dead Man gets a body which is weird Hawk and Dove come back

Captain Boomerang comes back and Maxwell Lord comes back So like some villains come get resurrected But there's a bunch of other characters that people are like Well that sucks that that character just gets to fucking stay dead forever I guess It's a weird storyline and it is one of those like Alan Moore things because Alan Moore, in a throwaway line, in some comic that he wrote, I think in Swamp Thing, mentioned the Black as Night prophecy because of the Green Lantern Oath of Brightest Day and Black as Night or whatever. Alan Moore just made up some little line, and then Jeff Johns, who is forever jerking off to the Silver Age,

goes, I know, I'll write a zombie comic, and I'll mention, and it'll call it Blackest Night. And it'll all be about how Barry Allen is the best flash ever, and Howl Jordan is the best Green Lantern ever. You could have just said that instead of writing the whole comic, you know. He pretty, he, boy, if only he did, because he had so many long-ass runs of Green Lantern in the Flash that was just nothing but like how, how Barry Allen and Hal Jordan are the best two comic book characters of all time. Which is clearly not true. Well, I don't want to say it's not true. I mean, I just think that like at this point, so he brought back Hal Jordan as a Green Lantern because at that point, because at that point before he did, Hal Jordan had. turned heel in the 90s and became the villain called parallax.

And then he died. And as his punishment to redeem himself in the afterlife, he became a character called the Specter, where he was sort of this like ghost, this angel essentially that was kind of there to rebalance things. And then Barry Allen disappeared into the Speed Force in the 1980s. So like he'd just been gone. And then that whole time, like, DC had introduced Kyle Rainer as a Green Lantern and changed the concept of what Green Lantern is.

could be and Wally West's whole journey to be coming the Flash was like a big to do because he was the one sidekick that grew up and had to advance. So like these were like pretty long runs, but Jeff Johns, when he was a kid reading comics, it was Hal Jordan and Barry Allen. So when he got in charge of DC Comics, Hal Jordan and Barry Allen bringing him back. Fuck the development that they had. Fuck all the storylines that came before it. We're just going to act like none of that shit happened. If only somebody that didn't know with Spider-Man. honestly honestly it might happen at some point

that's kind of like the thing so like so that's it's a thing I've noticed as I've gotten older is that you can tell the people who are currently writing the comics what era they grew up in because of the emphasis on the characters they put so like right now the people

writing DC were people who were reading comic books in the 90s so like Connor Hawk who replaced Oliver Queen as Green Arrow in the 90s, Connor is getting more storylines, and, like, Kyle Rainer is getting in a backup in Green Lantern after basically being ignored a good bit by Jeff Johns. So, like, in a couple of years,

it'll probably go back to, like, the people who were, like, reading comics in early 2000s when they were kids, and then, like, you'll see a bunch of characters that were popular in the 2000s getting used more prominently. So I don't know if it just Marvel's really good about, like, making sure people don't read, reset shit. But you would feel like at some point someone's just going to act like, you know what?

I was a kid. It was before like one more day. Let's just go back to how that was. I don't know, but that. The way Marvel works. I don't know if they're going to go and do that. Yeah. I don't know. I mean, we've kind of already seen it a little bit with like, oh, we're going to just kind of go back and do our own take on Age of Apocalypse with Age of Revelation. The difference is that it's Doug. It's Doug Ramsey. because I think ultimately Yeah, I saw like the

An interview with Tom Brevert by the way Who's like the main X-Men editor And he was talking about like the decision And he was just like Yeah you know Doug Ramsey's kind of got like Not the most impressive power So he thought like it'd be easy to make him a villain

It's like really Doug's existence since the 1980s And now suddenly people are like Yeah because Doug doesn't have really great powers We just make him a villain But they made him talk to a whole fucking planet or whatever. Yeah, he was talking to Kerkola.

And when they first brought him back after Necrusha, I remember they said, oh, yeah, he can read body language, so he can handle himself in a fight. Right, which I thought was a cool. Yeah, it's a good use. Yeah, make. Did they use it?

Probably not. No, they used it a little bit, but yeah. At least when that person he brought it back. Not to, like, the full potential. No. You know what you mean? No. I don't know.

John, what are your opinions on Doug Ramsey as a character? I mean, he's never been a favorite of mine. But I don't know, like, pairing with Warlock and have that relationship going on, that's kind of interesting. And I guess he was sort of a key component of the Crocoa era as well, being the only person who could talk to Krakawa and communicate with him or it. But, yeah, I don't know. I think his powers, for a long time, sort of limited him as a character.

But like you say, once they started exploring it more and having, I don't know, more of a creative interpretation of it. Yeah, yeah. and you can do way more stuff with it, but it sort of, yeah, it sounds like they just gave up on that to go for something else. Yeah. Because it's just, I don't know. I mean,

everything that they've done post-Kercoa with Doug just feels weird. Like the air of apocalypse storyline was weird. And now this whole thing like, yeah, Doug's gonna like, in an attempt to follow Apocalypse's, like, mission for him. He's basically going to nuke part of the United States and turn people unwillingly into

mutants and then like set himself up as some sort of a weird overlord. Yeah. It just odd all over. And it just doesn't seem like that's Doug. Does it make sense to me. You know? It's tough because I always think that fucking around with apocalypse.

that never ends well for anybody. You know, it's just, we have an apocalypse. His name is Apocalypse. Yeah, because remember Chamber. Remember when they changed? They made Chamber gray skin with blue lips for no reason. And they did nothing with it, and they changed them back. Put them right back.

You know what? We didn't know what we were doing with this one. Like, they didn't know what to do with them anyway. So, like, I'll make it about apocalypse. Like, how is that a solution? you know, but to something you don't know what to do with is make of apocalypse.

I don't think it works like that. Speaking of like sometimes not knowing what to do with that character, there was a mini series that came out not that long ago that I read the first couple of issues for. Weapon X-Men, which seemed to be like kind of a classic take on X-Force without calling it X-Force. The team lineup was cable,

Deadpool, Wolverine, chamber, in Thunderbird. Yeah, I read the first couple of issues of it Because it was like, I think they were they They invaded Latvaria on a mission And she's like, what the fuck is going on here?

Can you do that? Just invade Latvaria? I don't think you're allowed to do that. No, I think I was actually probably one of the plot points. But yeah, I was just like, this is What the fuck do these other two characters have to do with Wolverine, Deadpool, and cable? Like you can see that that that goes to. together easily.

100%. Like those three characters, yeah, they got history. Yeah. Sure. Yeah. I don't know. But that was it good, though? No, no, I didn't finish.

I read the first two issues and I was like, I can't be bothered. I think it was only a four-issue mini-series too. That's embarrassing. They don't have a screech McDuck in it. That's what you want from a four-issue mini series. If you're going to have a first-o-s series, it needs to have a duck. I don't have a excuse me duck in it or some yeah some kind of duck

I would accept the beak you put beak in there I'll give me a couple issues it's fucked up beak though didn't like I don't know what they've done a big oh no he's back to normal he's back to normal

oh is he yeah yeah he's back to looking like like weird oh cool is that because it Cricola yeah probably then like what's he doing though well he was so there was in the new mutants comic that and John

I don't know if you've read the new mutants in crocoa i feel like it was a mess of a series i feel like they changed course on that book so many times because at first it's like the team lineup was like a combination of the new mutants in generation x and then it just became the new mutants but then there was a storyline that was like boom boom go into like a farm outside of crocoa that that's where bird and his wife and their kids were living and they were like farming yeah yeah and then like some

terrorists or something followed them there and I think they tried to kill them or maybe they did succeed in killing them which sort of forced them to go to Krikawa to you know

not be dead yeah basically it was hard it was odd it was odd it was odd the thing about Kerkawa is a lot of people really, really liked it. But I think like when Hickman was asked to make it last longer than he intended, it went off the rails real bad.

Which I feel like is a very X-Men problem to have. Well, actually, no, we won't even call it an X-Men problem because it reminds me when you guys are telling me about the clone saga. Where it was like, oh, this is making money. Let's make it last longer. And you're like, I don't know if there's enough juice to make it last that long. Eh, we'll figure it out. And then they didn't. because like some of the stuff

especially at the tail end of Krakawa was just not good like I remember being incredibly disappointed with Excalibur and the Knights of X and then whatever it became after that it was just not good and I think Marauders

started out with potential and then I didn't care for it we sort of were talking before we came on air about like Steve Orlando and stuff and his run on Marauders was just not good yeah yeah yeah and I guess we'll yeah we'll bring this up and we'll this will help we end this one I think we originally started like before we started before we started we were talking about the announcement that AEW was going to be doing a tie-in comic with DC Comics. And I was like, I do not have a good feeling about this.

Because it's two issues long. And who's the creative team? And we started looking at the creative team. I was like, oh, okay, it's Steve Orlando, whose bread and butter in the big two have basically been Scarlet Witch. And anything that's not Scarlet Witch doesn't seem to last terribly long. And there's no ducks in it. No ducks.

but yeah to death and it's just like I don't really want to read a DC comics AEW crossover and so I'm not going to and it's like I don't know who this is for necessarily

but here we are in a way it is for us because we're the smart Avengers yeah we're comics and rest in a weird twisted way it should be for us but in a more specific way this is

absolutely not what any of us are into not only that so like obviously the three of us were not AEW people if you've not picked up on that over the years now that we've been doing this podcast

when we have talked about wrestling and AEW has come up we've kind of buried it a little bit but we're not really big AEW people and then two of the three of us aren't even DC comics people. So this is really not for the Smart Avengers.

The good news is so you can probably be able to pick up the issues cheap whenever they start giving them away with like drinks in whatever time AW or Yeah, buy a comic, get free tickets. Yeah. That's a great deal.

The comics cost 50 bucks. Did you get four seats? Jesus. All right. Well, we'll probably go ahead and shut it down from there. John, what's your movie total out for the year? I am now up to 898 movies. Whoa! He's going to crack your eyes. Easy. Easily. We still got two months. Easy. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. All right. What was your most recent movie? It was an old war movie called Run Silent Run Deep about Clark Gable and Bert Lancaster. It's like a couple of submarine, like dudes.

Clark Gable was the commander, but Lancaster was his second in command. And it was sort of a Moby Dick style vibe to it because Clark Gable's previous ship whatever he was on had been blown up by this Japanese warship. So now he was like sort of hell bent on revenge and not really caring about orders that he was given or like the lives of his men. He was just like, yeah, we're going to get these guys. And then, you know, obviously, yeah, it didn't turn out well for him. So, John, if they want to hear your thoughts on that movie, where can they go? go to read them.

They can go to letterbox and find me at Big John Bowsky Ormwood. And Dylan, what do you get up to you during the week? All sorts of crimes. I go to Courtney Cox's house, just look through the window.

Go all the way to London. Yeah, I mean, I take it very seriously. Wow. Yeah, that's why she had to move to London. Find it. I find her. Unless we cut all that bit out of which case this bit more useless.

It's not going to make any sense. On Monday nights, I have a radio show. It's available online, if you want to, listen to it, on Bynetidigitalradio.com. You can check it out. Monday nights from 9 o'clock to 11 o'clock. I play all sorts of fun music.

Let me see who we got. For example, Pearl Jam, Beck, Elliot Smith, Primus, Motorhead, Led Zapplin, Queens of Stone Age, Stone Temple Pilots, Metallica, Art 80P, all of fun bands that you love. So that's every Monday night from 9 o'clock to 11 o'clock, and then sometimes I stream on Twitch as well where I draw stuff at Spooky LaRue on Twitch. So that's, I reckon we bothered.

Fair enough. I've got another show called Large Little Cup. I've got a writing project called Henry's usual. Both links to those are in the description of the video, so you're more than welcome to check those out. Until next time, happy Halloween, everyone. Enjoy yourselves out there, and we'll see you later. I hope we spooked you today.

We give you a good spooking. You get spooked. All right. Bye. Goodbye. Go-boo. There is a ghost. Somebody was trying to spook people.

The ghost of Halloween past has visited. John, you have to change your ways. Ghost is fucking pop.