The Smark Avengers - Vol 3, Ep 49: The Smark Avengers Talk About Magneto

Episode Date: January 31, 2025

The Smark Avengers have been reunited once more! Jon is back to join Corey and Dylan in a deep dive on the Master of Magnetism Magneto as they continue their series of breaking down X-Men characters. Join the Smark Avengers as they discuss the life, times, names, lays, children, psychotic breakdowns, and Magneto getting turned into a baby!

All right. I mean, I'm good. You guys all good? Yeah. John, you're looking real good. I always look good. Yeah. It's going to be like riding a bike for you.

I don't know. It's been so long since the last time I was on the show. I mean, all you got to do is straddle it and move your legs in a circular motion. You'll get where you need to be. I'm talking about bike riding, are we? I thought so. Okay. Hi, everybody, welcome to Smart Avengers.

My name is Corey. And with me is Dylan and returning to us in not quite Johnless January, because this is January 31st. It's John. Hey, yo. Hi, John. Welcome back. How have I missed?

Yeah, not too bad. The kids are doing well. That's good to hear. Good to hear. Dylan went away on a secret mission. that Dylan has not heard yet. So that's something you can look forward to on this episode on the 17th, Dylan.

But I definitely will listen to. Yep, I hope so. I hope so. I know you do. Nobody's more dedicated to the show than Dylan. That's what they say. That's the T-shirt. It's a really wordy T-shirt.

We need to streamline it a bit. Yeah. Well, that's for the T-public that will open at some point. It's already open. It is. Okay. I'm going to go and register it now.

Yeah. No. So, John, what you have missed, we did New Year's resolutions. Mm-hmm. We talked about our pet peeves for the X-Men. Mm-hmm. I did an episode talking about non-superhero comics. Mm-hmm.

And our last episode, we talked about supervillains that we thought could have their own title. And somehow that came about. That's what you missed. Ah, I explained it all. Yep. So that 20 minutes that we, that unfortunately did not make it to the final cut of that episode, essentially it was just 20 minutes more of that. I think we held it up for a prolonged period of time and really wanted to detail.

The end of it was very, very much like, because we knew it was the end. So we're like, well, that's just, people have already stopped this. Let's just keep showing. And Skype thought better of it, decided we did not need that footage. Which I don't like. I don't like that censorship, man. I don't like Skype taking the initiative and saying, people don't want to see this. People do want to see that.

And because of this Skype, I'm going to show that picture every single episode. Everybody's going to see it. That's the shirt. That's the shirt. Yeah, that's the shirt. The uncensored version, just full on hands everywhere. Big old faces. You know what I mean?

There's a lot of hands, you know. A lot of hands involved. One big pre-hensile tongue. Oh, yeah, that's in the picture, for sure. It certainly is. I've seen it. Well, you tell that picture, you haven't seen the thumbnail, like the own sensor one? I think it's true.

I think it's worse. Yeah, now I'm curious to see that. I mean, I do appreciate that you have the sensor version up there because it adds a level of mystique to it. I will try to. Maybe I will show you that. Maybe it will, maybe it won't. Maybe it's a little mystery. Maybe a little secret for Dylan.

Yeah, you know, and I've got a lot of secrets. I'm a secret of mine. So anyway, John, that's what you've missed. What did we miss? You know, I've been fighting crime and then doing a bit of crime myself. Just the usual. That sounds a bit more accurate. Yeah.

Yeah. Gotta balance it out. Do you fight yourself? John, are you the century? Yeah. Are you doing the crimes? Is every good thing the century does, the void does something bad?

Yeah. To read the century? I guess so. I'm not quite as powerful as the century, but, you know. I don't know. You might be. I mean,

this week was the first week I did any kind of exercise in about six weeks. And my... Six years? My hamstrings are a killer. killing me like two days on. So what exercise? Oh, was that the bicycle riding you were doing?

No, this was just, I did a few squats and like a few like a bicep curls and stuff. And yeah, it's like, oh God, no. So welcome back to Smart Avengers. It is obviously we're getting well acquainted with one another once more. As we get back into the rhythm and the flow of the three of us being here, we're going to get back to the rhythm and the flow of a project that we first started over a year ago, which is doing deep dive on the original X-Men.

So obviously we started with Beast. Then we went with Angel, Iceman, Cyclops, Gene Gray. You're thinking, that's the five original X-Men, right? You'd be completely incorrect because in the very first issue of X-Men, there are seven mutants that are mentioned in one of them, their first ever villain, Magneto. So technically Magneto is a member of the X-Men right now. He's on the Jed McKay Ryan Stegman, X-Men comic. He's been in X-Men lineups in the past.

If you listen to two episodes ago, you know that Dylan and I aren't necessarily crazy about Magneto turning up on the X-Men teams, but he's there regardless. So Magneto first appeared in the debut issue of X-Men in 1963. We'll get into some of his his fictional biography and everything like that. But when asked about creating Magneto, Jack Kirby stated, quote, I saw my villains not as villains. I knew villains had to come from somewhere and they come from people. My villains were people that developed problems. And Stan Lee followed up on that in 2008 with he did not think of Magneto as a bad guy. He just wanted to strike back the people who were so bigoted and racist.

he was trying to defend the mutants and because society was not treating them fairly, he was going to teach society a lesson. He was a danger, of course, but I never thought of him as a villain. Now, except for all the villainous stuff that he did, which was numerous. Yeah, I will tell you, I always, anytime Stan Lee makes a comment about the X-Men, I always take that with just a grain of salt because really no one cared about the X-Men until Claremont. So, like, yes, Stanley was part of the X-Men. of, you know, was responsible for creating them, but those early X-Men stories are kind of unremarkable

for the most part. Dylan, you have a judgmental look to you. This is my face, Corey. Okay, I'm sorry. Thank you for your point. Everybody knows how weird my face is. Well, they've been watched the last couple episodes. They've seen it.

Yeah, I know. And I've read the comments, guys, leave me alone. It's not my fault that I have a face like this. The way God made me. And God made me in his own image. So I look like God, really. So if there's any issues, take it up with the big guy. He made me in his own image.

So. What he said in the book. Yep. That's apparently what he said. So, John, you're a big Magneto fan. Yeah. That being said, I kind of went into this episode feeling like you would be taking point on a lot of things. Are you comfortable with that?

Yeah, sure. Okay, cool. Yeah, I know a lot about Magneto. I know everything about Magneto. Okay, John, when's his birthday? May the 5th. All right. What did you get him on his birthday?

Magnets. He already has him. He's stick to him. Yeah. Imagine him open his presence and like, oh, son of a bit, not again, you know. How do we turn this off? He, you know. He can't.

But he must be able to turn it off at some point, right? So John, traditionally we were talking about more like the fictional backstory of the character. Do you want to dive more into like somewhat of the creator's thoughts on or do you want to just hop right into like, here is Magneto Day 1 kind of deal? I really think let's start from the beginning and just like go through his long and complicated history in the comics. By all means, take the leap. Cool. Well, as you guys probably know, he's a guy of many names.

He was born Max Eisenhardt and later changed his identity to Eric Magnus Lenscher, which is when he met Professor X. But the world at large pretty much knows him as the mutant terrorist Magneto. He was born as a Jew in Nazi Germany. And as a result of that, like many Jewish people, he ended up in a concentration camp, I believe Auschwitz, where he sort of experienced the horrors of the genocide, like, firsthand and witnessed his entire family, basically get wiped out. But it was also the place where he met the love of his life, Magda, as well. and the two of them managed to escape from the camp and begin a life for themselves. Even having a daughter called Anya, who like most people either don't know existed or completely forget about because he gets around and he's had a few other kids. Well, maybe he hasn't, but we'll see.

We'll talk about that in a bit. I mean, who hasn't? Who hasn't gotten around and had multiple kids? I know I have. John, you know you have Yeah, sweet little Sarah and tiny Tommy Yeah, and that's just two of them

Yeah Those are just the non-criminalism Those are the two you remember Oh, that bomb They mean all the criminals It's hard to forget them, you know Exactly Scarring, really

Especially the people they murdered There was a lot There was a lot Yeah, but Magneto His daughter Anya didn't really get a chance to murder anyone because she was killed pretty early on in her life when like Magneto's powers first manifested and the KGB sort of found out and decided they

were going to go burn his house down so yeah they did that and killed his daughter and in his rage at seeing her killed he basically killed all of them and like the entire a village as well that they were living in, which frightened Magna so much that she basically ran away, not realizing that she was pregnant with twins at the time.

So, yeah, for the next few years, Magneto was basically trying to search for Magda before discovering that she died in a place called Transea, which is, I believe, where Mount Wondegor is.

That sounds bad. And after that, like, you know, Magneto's a bit, like, sort of bummed out. He's a bit directionless. He doesn't know what he's going to do. My wife, it's a kid died. I'm a little bombed on. This isn't the best day of his life. But he basically traveling abroad, ends up in Israel.

Like, I guess a lot of Jews at the same. that time and that's where he first meets Charles Xavier and the two sort of forger a friendship and kind of in spite of the fact that they're ideologically and philosophically like opposed on certain things about you know mutant coexistence with humanity and all that kind of jazz but then they both find out that each other are themselves when they run into Baron von Strucker and Hydra and they have to rescue their friend, Gabrielle Haller. And so, yeah, they kind of reveal who they truly are to one another and then go their separate ways because of their contrasting opinions and what they should do with their powers. And so, yeah, so Magneto in the years after that decides he's going to go track down some Nazi war criminals.

At some point, he has an affair with a married woman by the name of Susanna Dane, which is basically where Lorna Dane, aka Polaris, comes from. but then after getting betrayed by some CIA agents he was working with, he pretty much loses his last shred of faith in humanity. And from there, he decides it's time to start preparing for the inevitable war ahead. So that basically means he's going to create his iconic helmet to help him block out his old friend's telepathy. he's going to create like a space station called

asteroid M and he's going to start assembling Brotherhood of Evil Mutants which I mean call a group the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants it sort of gives a pretty strong bad impression I think

It hurts the branding It hurts the branding It's like I don't know about this Magneto Is he good guy? Is a bad guy? Let me see Well his group's the brotherhood of evil mutants, so he's probably okay.

Let's let him into the UN. Yeah, why not? Yeah. But anyway, Magneto sort of emerges on the world stage at this point and attacks Cape Citadel army base to like try and take the missiles they've got control of there.

But that's where the X-Men also debut and sort of... What coincidence. Yeah. They managed stop him as they tend to do um and then yeah that's basically the pattern that follows like magnito showing up to uh you know do bad things and then getting shot down by the x-men or the avengers or whoever else yeah um and uh it was at this point that he uh he attacked uh

the UN building, and he first proposed the idea of mutants being given their own country, something that he was, you know, putting out there fairly early on, which has been like a recurring theme, I guess, in the years since. But once again, he was defeated by the Avengers and the X-Men combined, which sent him into a retreat in the savage land where he used his scientific know-how to create the mutates. Which to me kind of came on the left field, doesn't it?

Yeah, there's a lot of things like that. He seems like he's become sort of a jack of all trades kind of guy at this point as well, because you said he made the helmet that blocks out telepathy, like how does one acquire that knowledge? Well, yeah. This is the material that blocks out telepathy. Let me craft a very nicely well-designed helmet. I believe in the very first issue of the X-Men as well.

He was able to send his consciousness out into, what's... I can't remember what it was called. Basically, like, send it out into the world, basically, like, to go and visit someone. It's like, well, that's definitely not one of his powers. So... Here's the thing, right?

Being able to... He can move metal. So if he had some metal that he shaped into a helmet, just using his magic powers, that I can believe. That makes sense. If your powers are magnet metal base, that makes sense. But the sending your brainwaves out to somebody else to talk to them. I don't know. Now we're getting into like, I don't know if that's magnets.

Well, this is sort of the problem with the early days of the Marvel comics anyway. Like Stan Lee does not know what magnets do. every power was explained away by magnets like Iron Man's armor was full of magnets and transistors It's like what? Yeah I don't think that's how it works Dan

Like surely you don't even have to explain it like that Iron Man's armor is made out of fucking metal Done Not hard You know Yeah Because they do that a lot with people's powers where you're like You think like

We're talking about this with like Ice Man and stuff You think he's just like that power of ice, whatever, but they're like, oh, no, but like, on a molecular level, he can do this and you can do that. I'm like, you gotta just make it shit off now. Like, because I read sometimes you read like Magneto's power skill and stuff. And you're like, the stuff that you think he can do is more than just moving metalorine. Like they're making shit off. You know what you mean? Like he can move like the fibers in your brain to make you do stuff because.

Yeah, like the iron in your blood or whatever. Sounds awful lot like the flash, doesn't it? It does. It does. But you know what? It's not as irritated as the flash. So basically we're at this point where he's gone to the savage land. He's great the mutates.

And it's another scheme that fails. The X-Men show up, kick his ass, send him back in. So he gets back into the old genetically engineering game. And this time comes up with a being called Alpha the Ultimate Mutant. but this The name like that, how can you go wrong? Exactly. The ultimate mutant can't, I mean, how can he beat him?

He's named Alpha. It's right there. The problem is he can't control him because he's the ultimate mutant. So this creature turns on him and uses its reality warping powers to turn him into an infant. Which is what you would do. If you were like an alpha, the ultimate mutant, you were like, let's make him a baby. Is that what happened to you?

Is that why you're only seven apples high? Some of Alpha, the Ultimate Mutant, thought he'd make you small. You'd think that I would start messing with Alpha the Ultimate Mutant? I don't think so. Not after what I've seen him do to people. They turn them into babies. Exactly. Yeah, he got turned into a baby.

And, you know, he couldn't really fend for himself. So he got left in the care of Moira McTaggart on. your island and she tried to help Magneto become a better man like you know teaching him lessons and stuff and trying to I think I don't know she was doing some sort of sort of experimenting on him to you know try and help him try turn it back experiment on a baby Holocaust survivor that's not the weird of what dad's normal no that's fine so was was he aging rapidly or no it's like what kind of how was she trying to teach her to be a better man when he's he's a baby. Like, she should be focusing

like teaching him how to walk. Yeah. I read Shakespeare. I don't think he was quite a baby. Like he was like sort of a toddler age. Okay. I thought this was like an infant and she's like trying to teach him ethics. Yeah, that wouldn't be a good

use of anyone's time. But luckily for Magneto at this point, the Shia agent Eric the Red showed up and decided he was going to return Magneto to adulthood, albeit slightly, well, not even slightly, but a bit younger than before. So he was more sort of in the prime of his life than an old man.

And like he did so in exchange for Magneto, basically taking care of the X-Men for Eric the Red, which... Because he's like, dude, I've been watching. You have not been able to take care of the X-Men at all. Yeah. The point where you got turned into a baby. But I will make you not a baby on the condition that you do the thing that you've never, ever, ever been failing to do. For yourself, but you do it for me, Noi.

So now it means more because I'm asking you to do it. Yeah, I mean, he just didn't have the right motivation. Yeah. Yeah, doing it for yourself, you felt bad. You're like, I can't beat up Charles Xavier's little kids. But now that I'm asking you to do that, you're like, well, it's not my fault. This face guy told me to do it. So.

Yeah, this guy who has a vaguely Viking name. name despite being from space. I got to let this space guy that turned me into an adult, but slightly younger than I used to be whenever I was in the Holocaust, I can do it for him. I'll do it for you, baby, you know?

But I'm not the baby anymore. But just clarifying. Makes sense. It makes sense. Spoiler alert, it didn't work out. He got beat again. Man. And Magneto decided to go

and lick his wounds in his island base in the Bermuda triangle but guess what happened someone decided that they couldn't let Magneto live basically

he's too dangerous he's too dangerous why he hasn't done anything well he keeps threatening to do stuff and the threat is enough to justify the Soviets sending a submarine to attack him so

Magneto basically kills everyone on the submarine. And then... And then in his rage, he destroys a Siberian city as well. Yeah, he kind of loses it a little bit. But following that, he almost kills Kitty Pride as well in his rage. but then I think he only just realizes that she's Jewish as well

when like a little pendant comes out and he's kind of he shocks himself into stopping at the last moment has a bit of a crisis of conscious and wait a minute he's like I'm a mutant and I fight for all

mutants and then he's not afraid to kill mutants because he's going to try to kill Kitty Pride but then he stops himself from killing a mutant who he's dedicated his life to save him Because she also happens to be Jewish, and he is also Jewish. And he's like, that's the reason I'm not going to kill this person. Despite the fact that his whole career up to this point has been trying to see of the mutant population and make them important. That does beg a question.

Like, if he encountered like Moon Knight or the thing, would he like relent on attacking them once he realized they were also Jewish? Is that like the weakness of Magneto? Like, Magneto, like, oh, I can't handle fighting another Jewish person. Yeah, that's his line. It's like, no way. That's, I remember, I remember when Sir Ian McKellen delivered that in X3, United We Stand, I guess. I don't kill him over, Jewish people. Like, thanks a beautiful, beautiful stuff.

Who, me? Gandalf? I would never do that. Like, well, he said he wouldn't do it. And I take him on his war. He seems like such a nice old man. It's around this time that Magneto discovers that he's seemingly the father of Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver, which is like another sort of contributing factor to him, you know, like

softening some of the the sharper edges of his personality. To ask a clarifying question, this is after they remember as the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, right? Oh, yes. How fucking wild is that? Yeah, yeah, yeah. He treated them pretty badly when he was, well, when they were all in the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, as he treated everyone.

Well, I was going to say, do you think after that, did he, like, take a look back and go, are the rest of them my kids as well? Yeah. Fucking frog guys. Was there a drunken night somewhere in a medieval times? And I ended up fucking a woman to get towed. All of them? Like, I don't know if I want to. I mean, I'll take the witch, sure.

But the rest, I don't know. He just looks over it, Bob. Like, that guy really? I mean, I don't want him. take them back all right I just want to ask that clarified question because sometimes the timing on the quicksilver Scarlet Witch

Magneto relationship is really bizarre to me and I'm sure we'll get to that oh yeah mm-hmm John's not like he's gonna happy to talk about that bit like this is this bit's gonna take for fucking ever it's an episode right there

it really is I feel like it is the gist is he didn't know they were his kids then he found out. Then he tried to kind of make it up to them a little bit. And they were obviously pretty resistant to that. He didn't want the bicycle. He went to Quicksilver and threw him a baseball glove.

And he's like, want to play catch for the old man? And... Quicks silver through the ball too quickly. Yeah, exactly. Because the ball wasn't made out of magnets. We can do it on the water. There you go. My story.

So moving on from Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver. Magneo also showed signs of redemption, I guess you could say, by helping the X-Men when they were being attacked by the purifiers and then assisting them and stopping William Stryker from using Professor X's powers to kill or living mutants in the graphic novel God loves man kills which was like you know

what partially inspired the storyline in X-Men 2 and then Secret Wars happens where the Beyonder takes a bunch of heroes and villains and takes them to battle world and interestingly enough

in that when he transports all the Marvel character was over. Magneto ends up with the good guys. He ends up yeah, in the same places like the X-Men, the Avengers and stuff. Do you think they turn to what? They just turn to

another? Like, what the fuck is this guy doing here? Yeah, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, sure, the guy that killed a submarine, like, boff. We love it. We love to see this guy killing submarines. Thumbs up for us. He's one of the boys, not. He's one of the

other guys on a good team. Like, listen, we've all killed submarines full of Soviets. Don't worry about it. It's the style of the time. That means you're one of us. Meanwhile, like, you know,

some small incidental adventure, like he appears with the villains team. They're like, oh, what am I doing over here? You know what you did. You get that little boy with that car. Yeah,

repeatedly. Yeah. No need for that. Continue. You knew you, dad. You knew you've, dad. You kept going.

I just had to be sure. I couldn't let the secret come up there. sure his head fell off. It's hereditary all over again. Yeah. Sorry, continue, John. So, yeah, so Secret Wars happens. He kind of ends up working with the X-Men.

And again, like, it's all thawing away at, like, the ice-cold relationship they previously had. For some reason, he also hooks up with the Wasp in that storyline in a weird, romantic relationship that never went anywhere. Why the fuck? It's not. Yeah, probably. They gave Bertua a

small Avenger. They called refrigerator magnet. Yeah. They're only good for holding up small pictures of like hand drawn like finger bains. And then like that fucking sucks. It doesn't look like a dog. You know? Trouples it up with those in the bin.

Quick silver and cries a little tear. So, uh, So, spoiler alert, they win the secret wars and go back to Earth. Good. It's a happy ending for most people. And then, uh-oh, something bad happens. The government passes the Mutant Registration Act and starts riling up people against mutants again. And Magneto gets captured and taken to Paris to get put on trial in front of the World Court.

and he sort of willingly goes along with it even though he's powerful enough to like you know escape if he wants to but because of all these little things that have been happening like finding out he has kids and then you know working with the X-Men a couple of times he's had this sort of change of heart and he's like okay maybe maybe I am the bad guy and so he's like okay I'll have my day in court and we'll see what happens. But the proceedings get interrupted by an attack by Fenris, which results in Professor X nearly dying. Magneto basically saves the day and defeats Fenris. And then the judge pretty much throws out the trial and says, well, since he's been reborn, like, you know, from, being a child turned back into an adult, he's had a second chance.

He killed a submarine full of Soviets after he got aged back up. Correct. Yes. Okay, I just wanted to make sure that was great. And Finris, by the way, is that not the brother-sister mutants that like to get their powers by holding hands? Yeah, and I think there might be some incest going on there as well, but that's not. It's pretty heavily applied.

Yeah. Let's not talk about that. John. I can see you want to, Dylan, but let's... Always ruin our fun, man. Always running our fun. You never talk about the things we want to talk about. We'll talk about them on our next episode of, like,

top characters with incestual relations. Number three. Like, they're going to be number three? So, yeah, Professor X got attacked during that whole debacle, and he's dying, basically. But the only person who can save him, is Lelandra who shows up and takes him off to Shia space to help him heal himself. With Professor X basically asking Magneto to take over his school and look after his students

hoping that if he can basically guilt-trip him into doing that, then it will help him change his ways and help his friend become a good person. A real man. I guess. But the trouble is Magneto is still Magneto. He's like, you know, a pretty hard, taciturn, like, set in his ways kind of guy. He's not exactly the most friendly person at the best of times. And as much as he tries to be better, he's still got all these, like, insecurities and doubts, which kind of start to get the better of him.

especially, you know, when he's faced with all the mistrust that he gets from like the new mutants and the X-Men themselves who, understandably aren't too keen on their former enemies, suddenly living in their school and basically their leader. Totally justified, really. So that all... Go ahead. I was just going to say, I mean, a lot of this is like... That judge probably should be investigated for his ruling on this one. It just seems like there's a lot of like, I mean, yeah, he was, he got turned into a baby,

and then he got aged back up with the edict that he must immediately destroy the X-Men, which he failed to do. But then, you know, he destroyed a submarine. And, yeah, he went to battle world and hooked up with the wasp and helped the good guys. But we also, he also found he was a dead beat dad. It's just like, but, you know, he's essentially been reborn. And it's, hey, there's a lot there that indicates that maybe a lesson was not learned. Okay, so here's my question.

When Magneto questions, like, whether or not he's the good guy or not, is it coming from a place of maybe mutants and humans can get along? Or is it mainly like, maybe I'm just not a good person. Because like a lot of the time, this is getting ahead of ourselves, a lot of the time, when Magneto does, like, fair on the side of good. It's at a point where the X-Men are being the most isolationist that they can be. And very rarely he's, like, on the unity X-Men teams where it's like, let's work for Charles Xavier's dream. So, like, when he's had that, like, face turn, essentially, and the judge is like,

ah, he seemingly learned his lesson. Is he still coming from a place of, like, you know, like, I realize I went about some things the wrong way, but mutants are still superior to human beings and we should not be silenced and we will march and take what's ours and fuck everybody. Well, yeah, because Magneto is still Magneto at the end of the day. Exactly. He may lean more towards like, you know, trying to be a better man or something. But at the end of the day, he still has those like ideas of mutants being superior to humans,

like hard baked into his brain. And that kind of thing. Yeah, it's hard to get rid of. and that sort of plays into like the collapse of his time with the X-Men as well because he feels like he's the bad guy understandably so yeah because of all the stuff he did and then like other things start happening like the X-Men seemingly died in Dallas during a fight with a guy called the adversary Doug Ramsey dies at the hands of the animator, which is a shit name if ever I've heard one. Oh, classic part of comic history right there. So, yeah, Magneto leaves the X-Men.

He has a brief fling with the rogue in the Savage Land. And then he returns Asteroid M to its former glory as well with a new group of followers known as the Acolytes. and but still at this point he's like clinging a little bit to Xavier's dream like he's not actively attacking humans or anything he wants to use asteroid M as like basically a sanctuary give the mutants at home that they can all live on far away from human persecution because he he recruited Colossus to Astrodem. One point is an accolate. Yeah. Right around this time. But the X-Men, or the rest of the X-Men, at least, don't really trust him still.

The suspicious of his motives. And the UN is obviously pretty suspicious as well. So they activate these protocols called the Magneto Protocols, which prevent him from returning to Earth. via like a guess like a bunch of satellites which block out magnetic waves or some bullshit

but Magneto destroys them all and then deactivates every electronic device on Earth way that they were like we got these manitin protocols we're going to invent a device to stop Magneto from messing around with Earth

at no point where they're like should we stop Magneto from messing around with the device that stops and messing around with stuff. They were like, no, Magneto can absolutely destroy this stuff with no problem. It's not the best thought out plan, but then... It beats the purpose, doesn't it? You know what I mean? Yeah, it's not a ringing

endorsement on the UN. The UN, man. Bumbling a case after case. Yeah. useless. What are they good for? Not this, that's for sure. Now it's fighting Magneto. They should really learn. Like, we are not equipped to handle this fucking magnet guy. No. All right. How do we go?

So, yes. So the X-Men decide to head up to Astro-Dem and stop Magneto. And this is where the infamous moment happens where Magneto is so enraged.

He pulls all the adamantium from Wolverine's body, which fucks up Wolverine for the next few years basically leaves him in a feral state. And Professor X doesn't take too kindly to that. So he shuts down Magneto's brain and effectively puts him in a coma. And so, yeah, that's where he remains for a little bit.

But do we want to talk about Joseph at all? I think we have to at least briefly mention. Yeah, briefly mentioned Joseph. I do want to say that it's at this point. that I think the iconic Magneto stories end. Because like everything you've been touched on, these are big moments. The Magneto, you know,

starting the Brotherhood of Evil Mutant being their first big enemy. You know, the face turn, leading the new mutants, Asteroid M, pulling the Adamantam out of Wolverine's bones. These are all huge Magneto stories. And then I feel like we get caught up in modern day Marvel, which is just meddling around with the status quo only to revert it back.

It's the only thing I wanted to interject on that. Mm-hmm. Thank you. Well, okay, let's talk a little bit about Joseph who was a young man with amnesia who just shows up with the

same powers as Magneto. Like, he joins the X-Men who like pretty much think he is Magneto and like somehow de-aged. We know how... We know exactly.

Yeah. Because he's trying to get out of going to prison again. Yeah. Guys, if you're a criminal out there, here's how you avoid going to prison. Just get some space wizard to make you a baby again. Yeah. Ding, ding, ding. So I do have to ask the question. The X-Men have some of the world's

like strongest telepaths ever. How do they not know for a fact that's Magneto or not? Like, wouldn't they be able to... Well, he has amnesia. So he couldn't remember anything. Yeah. So does a... Does a telepath only read memories, or are they able to access parts that the person can't? Because I remember that was like a big thing that Emma Frost took over Iceman's body and made him, like, use aspects of his powers that he didn't even know he had.

Well, that's Emma Frost, though. Like, yeah, that's what I'm saying. Like, maybe he's not the world's strongest telepath. That would be what Gene Gray or Xavier. Yes. Wow. Whenever you said, I mean, I mean, this kind of answers your question, I guess. it should have been like a flag, but like if he's got amnesia

and what we know about Joseph, which John's about to reveal, there's a good, there's a good chance that like, those thoughts weren't in his head to read to begin with. Yeah. So they couldn't read them anyway. But like you said,

like that should surely be a big red flag. Like, wait a minute, I can't read anything about this guy. Like something's up with that, isn't there? Like he is not nothing in his head. That would remotely tell you who he is. That's a bit suspicious. you know he is a thing of rogue doesn't he yeah he does as well yeah can't keep his hands offer

anyway sorry tell us more but joseph uh so he's a clone that bingo there it is does he count then as as getting with rogue then if he's only a clone no it doesn't kind of as a clone because like nito didn't really him correct but like i said earlier magnio had a bit of a fling with rogue in the savage land and i'm about to say i was thinking it's a count twice that kind of The second one doesn't, the Joseph one doesn't count. The third time is going to count. Yeah. We'll get there.

He's daffing a fucker again, is what we're saying. Boy, I would say it's magnetic. I don't actually know who made the clone of Joseph. I don't know if... I think they did reveal it, but I don't remember who it was. That was some big revelation then, huh? But that's because I think the storyline, John, you know me know this. I think the storyline was supposed to be that it was going to be Magneto.

and then at some point they were like this is stupid. Probably. Which is less stupid. And also it was the 90s. Clones were everywhere. Exactly. Yeah.

It's sort of been done. Yeah. Do it again. Either way, like the real Magneto comes back and he's in full on you know, evil mode. Well, not even

even like proper evil. He's basically blackmailing the world into creating a mutant nation by threatening to invert their magnetic poles if they don't give him like an island or a country or something. So the UN give him genotia, which previous to that had been like one of the most anti-mutant places in the entire world. But like their government had been cleared out and now Magneto was able to swoop in and basically turn it into a haven for mutants

and he pretty much intended to use it to build an army course yeah but before he could like really you know utilize that plan he gets stopped once again by the X-Men with Wolverine like severing his spine

and leaving Magneto in a wheelchair so that's where Magneto is at when Cassandra Nova decides to, you know, show up for the first time, send a bunch of mega sentinels which attack Genosha and kill like 15 million mutants, with Magneto seemingly one of them who gets killed. I'm just like, man, I never killed that many people. As a quick as a quick aside, Joseph was created by a mutant name Astra, who apparently was a

former member of the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants who just became obsessed with Magneto and created her own. No, he's dead. Didn't you hear it? Corey? He died. He was Edginoia, whenever the wild sentinels destroyed everything. He was one of the 15 million mutants that died. He was in a wheelchair for God's sake. He's not getting up and fighting

him. He's gone, man. And he basically becomes a martyr where like it turns into a movement of, you know, people saying Magneto was right. Yeah. And around this time as well, we had a new mutant show up called Zorn, who sort of, you know, embedded himself with the X-Men, gained their trust, even became a teacher at the school, before revealing himself as Magneto. Before we get any further into Zorn, can you tell me what Zorn's powers were?

Because if you told me what Zorin's powers were, you can easily point out who created this character. Well, it's a black hole, isn't it? Yeah, that's pretty much. Exactly. Was it a black hole or was his, like, the star? Was his brother that had the black hole? One of them has a black hole. One of them was a star.

Yeah. But yeah, that's, that is the most Grant Morrison fucking thing. thing ever. Which power? Black hole inside my head. All right then. How'd you figure this out? It was in an ice cream one day and it disappeared before I got in my mouth. Just like a black hole. Sucked it right in. Did you even taste it? Well, yeah.

All right, continue. Anyway, this version of Magneto basically is more psychotic and more. dangerous than ever before he you know like um attacks new york and he's threatening all these people he actually kills jean gray um and then that pretty much prompts wolverine to kill magnito but then if you would describe magnito then one word john because of his actions what what word would you to describe this man after taking over New York and killing Jean Grey, you know, just one word. My one word would probably be complex. Interesting.

Corey, what word would you use? I don't know. I mean, he seems like kind of a twat. I would definitely call him a cunt. Yeah. Yeah. It's a pretty cunty thing to do if you're being honest for yourself. The thing about it is, we talked about Zoran Magneto, which I have talked many of the time on the show about how I think that's, I think that's the last great Magneto storyline.

I think it's a piece of shape. You can't say that because it wasn't Magneto at all. No. Hording the Marvel. What's really annoying about that was they did that storyline, great reveal, wonderful. Like, the reveal where it's Magneto is so good, because they played that for like two or three years. Like, it's so good. and then they retconned it

like almost immediately. Yes, thank God. So quickly, but with no thought as to how Magneto survived as to what Zorn was. They didn't think about any of that stuff. They just said, fuck it, bring back Magneto.

Done. We need this mass murdering, adulterous, horrible person to come back into the comics immediately, you know? Well, we'll get onto this because I think

you're wrong basically I know everybody thinks I'm wrong about everything trust me I've heard this before you know Magneto has done bad things that is killed a submarine

and then almost started the Cold War yes almost but he didn't do it so you know points for that all right well he abuses kids no he didn't even abuse his kids not knowingly he didn't know they were his kids not knowingly

people that he didn't know were his kids his kids. Yeah. When they were his kids, he would have given a birthday cake. Probably.

But like, he's had these, uh, like psychotic problems. Yes. In his early years, he was like, just a generic villain,

basically. He was like a supremacist, uh, with cool powers, but like, he, he has a supremacist of any kind. I don't know.

No. But he, he, what kind of supremacist? He was, you know, know he wasn't a good person but like he has been struggling with like his conscience for a good while now like going back to these to that first like incident with kitty pride and stuff like

he's been trying to grow trying to be better and um yeah and right then then you go to the bit where he takes over Genosha and then Wolverine severes his spine. Wolverine wouldn't do that for no, they wouldn't go, well, he's trying to be a nice guy. Like, I mean, was Magneto building an army of mutants to attack

humankind or just to protect Janosha? We won't know because he got attacked by Wolverine. Yeah, and then some Sentinels showed up and killed everyone. Also, to go back a little bit further, speaking of Wolverine, was Magneto having a crisis of

confidence when he's pulled all the metal out of Magneto or out of Wolverine's body was he really like I don't know if I am a good guy or not when he viciously fucking tried to kill one of the most popular X-Men Yeah because He was just chilling

in his asteroid Was he? He was just chilling in his asteroid And then the government says Oh we're going to put these satellites up And stop you from coming back to Earth And then he gets pissed off He like destroys satellites may have, you know, knocked out all the electronic devices in the world.

The way that you describe that is sort of the same way of like a homeowner getting mad because they realize their next door neighbor put up cameras that might capture part of their backyard. But this is Magneto. Like he has these psychotic problems. It's like baked into him. We should just forget about all the bad stuff he did. No.

This is the mixed up troubled man. Listen, just turn him back into the baby. We can change him. We can change him. But the thing is, he isn't like, in his own mind, he's still the hero of his story. Yes. That's correct. I don't think that that excuses him for all the bad shit that he did.

So is Dr. Tume. So is Lex Luthor? But he's, yeah, he's a product of his, like, environment as well. Like, he grew up in the concentration camp. He obviously saw a lot of monstrous things. And so, like, him following the Nazi playbook at times, like, trying to subjugate humanity and stuff, like, especially in his early appearances, that is, like, you know, that hypocrisy is part of what made the character appealing in the first place. Although, even saying that, like, we didn't even find out about his Nazi, like, upbringing, or not upbringing, but, you know, like, growing up in. Nazi Germany.

Yeah. Nazi upbringing makes his sound like he was rea's by Nazi. Yeah. Yeah, the opposite issue. Yeah. We didn't even find out about that until issue 150 of uncanny X-Men. Like 150 issues in

is the first time that we actually got some actual backstory about him. Before that, he was just a generic villain, basically. And like even his past with Professor X, Like it was sort of alluded to in the early years that they'd had like a falling out, never really expanded on, never really shown.

It wasn't until issue 161 that like we actually go back and see the first time that like Xavier and Magneto meet and how they kind of form their friendship and stuff. So like all these intrinsic parts of his past that we, you know, obviously take for granted now. weren't there to begin with. It's all part of the evolution of the character over time, which, yeah, which I think sort of plays into why it was a mistake to have him revealed a zorn

and then acting completely out of character compared to, like, all the growth that he's had over the years since then. I mean, I see... I don't think it was a car. I think, yeah, I can see why, as a villain, why he would want to, like, let's flood whatever, because, like, yeah, humanity wiped out, like, millions of his people. Like, it was literally he was going for the eye for an eye thing.

I don't necessarily think it's out of character for him to think that route, though. No, I think it. Like, something horrific happened to him. He went through two different Holocaust. You basically got two options from Genosha getting blown up. I'm going to write these down so I know what my two options are later on. You write them done. Just the case you turn into Magneto, you want to be like, I got to make sure I get this correct.

I have the two, three, turned into a baby. Yeah. That's always on the table, Corey. It's always on the table. The two options are what they did, basically have him go on a revenge tour and then get stopped and killed. And that's it. Yeah. Which is the least interesting option, if you ask me.

the other option is instead of, you know, that event turning him into like an even bigger monster than the people who, like, killed all of the mutants, he's broken by it and he needs to kind of, you know, he's like broken by the guilt that he couldn't protect his people, that everything that he's fought for has just been wiped out in one fell swoop. It happens to me all the time. Don't worry about it. And yeah, and I think that was the way more interesting option because for one thing, it keeps him on the board,

doesn't kill him off, like a great character with a lot of history and a lot of potential, you know, for storytelling. And for another, like, we haven't seen Magneto that broken before as well. like him becoming a monster and trying to take over New York and kill Dream, Gray, and all this stuff. Honestly, who cares? That's just like, that's a dime person villain shit. Do you feel like you feel that way about it because there was never a follow-up to what Grant Morrison was wanting to write?

Because, I mean, that Grant Morrison X-Men run was all about taking what people knew about the X-Men and turning it on its ear, which like taking their first villain and taking them off the board like does that not open up the opportunity for other stories but you know Grant got pulled from it so I mean that that is an angle there like I feel like you're approaching it from the like you

saw what they did and they undid it yeah but you didn't get to see what Grant playing out with the rest of that story could have been I mean for all you know I mean we're dealing in a world where people are resurrected and come back from the dead all the fucking time it's possible

there could have been a further Magneto's story where he like came from the Hells or something like that. I don't know. I'm just saying like a lot of people I know who have very strong negative feelings on that storyline are usually coming from a place of like this is what they did in the story. It's like well yeah, the story that Grant never got to really follow up on.

Also I feel like given like Magneto's like past history and the way that people have treated meetings before and his very like quick to anger issues with like things that are much much smaller in scale than 15 million mutants dying

I feel like for Magneto that's a very appropriate reaction for him to just be like well 15 million of my mutants stack he would be irrational in his is it appropriate though like him it's not appropriate of course

I mean he'll make some villain yeah let me out Is it like reactionary if he like puts on the mask pretends to be someone else infiltrates the school for months on end? That isn't reactionary. That's like a well thought out plan. Yeah. If it's reactionary, he would have just like showed up in New York and smash it up. But like him do this complex plan just to get into the X-Men and then I don't know, like be able to pull off the mask and say, ha ha, you didn't know it was me.

like what the fuck the X-Men had nothing to do with Genocia so why is he doing that that he doesn't know that like Nino doesn't know that like Nino doesn't know that it was Cassandra Nova he has no idea what the fuck happened but also does he think that the X-Men sent the Senate the Sentinels no I could see him thinking the X-Men didn't do anything to stop them because of their position have always been like X-Men you know mutant human harmony I can see him going you didn't try hard enough I would also like to point out as well I agree with that. Like, because like, Magneto is a cripple. He's on Genoosa. He's by himself. He's not, that's not, don't, he's in a wheelchair. It's not a, you know what I mean? Like, he couldn't do anything about it. The people who are supposed to look after the, the mutant world are the X-Men. They didn't do anything. They let 50 million people die in his opinion. I can see why he would want to be like, guys, I got something to say about that. I'm going to hurt you the way you've hurt me. But also, in the storyline, part of the reason that Magneto does what he does is because he's addicted to.

the kick. That's in the story too. Oh, that's right. The kick thing. He gets addicted to the drug. The Quentin Choir drug. Yes, which in the story messes up a lot of people. So the reason that he goes so overboard at the end of it and is so irrational is because he's on the drug. Well, yeah, I still think it sucks. I think it's okay. You can you can you can just think the story sucks. I totally get it like he said i got a job at a bookstore and i almost didn't get the job because i was asked about my opinion on grant morrison and i said i really love grant's work and they the manager was a big x-men fan and he did tell me very vehemently that was a point against me in the application process it's only me and you corey we're the only ones that like it

that's rude anyway there's more to magnito than just this one storyline yeah it continues past new x-men yes So, yeah, basically he's alive again. It turns out he was buried beneath, like, all the rubble and stuff in Genosha. Professor X went over there, found him. The two sort of rekindled their friendship and were sort of determined to kind of rebuild Genosha again. But that never really happens because then. House of M happens where Scarlet Witch, you know, waves a hand and like everyone's in a world

where mutants basically run the show. Magneto at the head of the table, basically getting everything that he thought he ever wanted. But then that, yeah, so the heroes stop that and Wanda says no more mutants and like mutine kind gets even more decimated. Like, I think there's only 198 mutants left at the end of it. Magneto is not one of them. He's basically

been depowered and turned into the thing that he hates the most humans. Why? Wanda did do that intentionally, because she also got her brother, too, because Pietro lost his powers also from that. Indeed. Yes. He got his powers back,

I think, by the Terrigin miss somehow. It was unstable, yeah, because that was a plot point in a couple of books was Quicksilver selling basically the Terrigan mist to mutants to give them a sample of their power back, but it was like overly amplified, so like it was harmful to them. Yeah, yeah. I think later on he basically claimed it was a clone or like a... Oh yeah, he claimed he was a skull.

Yeah, he claimed it was a scroll. It was my favorite storylines. Because it was like, he was on the Mighty Avengers and everyone that was listening. He's like, oh, no, no, no, scroll. He was a scroll. like his daughter knew and his daughter was like ashamed of him yeah fucking love quicksilver

yeah like file like son right yeah well Magneto also gets his powers back well first of all he he kind of gets them back for a small amount of time due to a being called the collective which was basically

I think it had something to do with Zorn like the real Zorn has or no, not the real one, the one who basically was posing as Magneto. Yes. And he was comprised of all the energy from all the former mutant's powers. And he managed to infuse it into Magneto for a little bit. But once again, they got defeated. So Magneto lost those powers.

And then he turned to the high evolutionary who came up with, some sort of scheme or something to lobotomize the dreaming celestial who was just like chilling in the Golden Gate Park at the time just standing there doing nothing yeah why not there um so they used material from his brain basically to help restart uh magneto's mutant gene but in a way where they stressed as well that it couldn't be done to anyone else. It was like a one-off thing. It would be very clear here. This only works for Magneto.

Yeah. Not your son. It's almost if the creative team realized maybe taking the powers off of the most iconic villain was a mistake. Yeah, yeah. And around this time as well, like this is when all the remaining

mutants left in the world pretty much all joined up together in San Francisco Bay in the former asteroid M, which was dragged up to the surface and turned into the little island nation of Utopia. And, you know, this was basically what Magneto wanted, like a little island nation, or at least like a little home for mutant kind. and so he pretty much offered himself to the X-Men considering his past was met with a lot of

distrust and you know people who didn't really want him there so he set about trying to earn his place by bringing back Kitty Pride who he thought probably another corner thing.

A giant space bullet. Yes, there was a giant space bullet, which was going to come straight through Earth, but then Kitty managed to get on the bullet and phase it through Earth, and she was still on it, like, flying through the cosmos into wherever. But Magneto brought it back, and they managed to get Kitty out. And I guess that was enough for him to earn, a place in utopia even if no one really trusted him still um uh you know i i guess that you could

argue maybe you know he needs to face some sort of consequences for his actions at this point but like what are you going to do like another trial of magneto storyline when we've already done that baby yeah got to make a baby it's only way he'll learn he won't learn he won't he won't he won't he didn't he didn't last time. I think like, you know, at this point as well, the mutants were obviously on the verge of extinction. Like someone like Cyclops who basically took over the leadership of the X-Men, he realized that and he was a lot more pragmatic than some of his. This is also when the X-Force like hit squad started.

Exactly. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So, you know, he was more willing to bring Magneto on board and, like, give him a place at the table. And so, yeah, we get into the whole thing with the schism between Cyclops and Wolverine, like, splitting up half the mutants going off back to Westchester, the other half sticking with Cyclops. and then we get like the whole Avengers versus X-Men storyline as well with the Phoenix empowers the Phoenix Five and I would say that's with that storyline

I was always surprised Magneto is not one of the five that the Phoenix took the one that stood out Namor yes like so the Phoenix took Cyclops Emma Frost magic Colossus and Namor Now, Colossus at that point was already kind of weirdly susceptible because he had become the juggernaut for a period of time. Like he had the jewel of that god whose name I'm not going to be able to pronounce. Sure, we'll go with that. But yeah, like all of them had been like morally compromisable characters with, of course, Namor, the first mutant being one of them.

But it just felt weird that like they would go with Namor as one of the Phoenix Five and not Magneto. It's because the Phoenix is like, dude, you kill that submarine. I'm into submarine. Fucking weird, dude. I don't like it. Meanwhile, Namor's over there sweating because Namor has definitely punched a couple of submarines in his time. Ah, but did he kill all the Soviets on board? Probably, yeah.

But he's fucking Namor. What are you going to do about it? He's like sweating bullets, but nobody you notice this because he's always wet anyway. He's always wet, yeah. Like, you're right. Do you put him a big tank? Yeah. You know.

Those little wings. Yeah. He needs to stay hydrated. That's why he's best buddies with Hydraman. I don't know. If he was, he'd be a lot more comics if he was. He climbs inside of Hydraman every now and then wears him like a Hydroman suit. It's a normal thing that people do.

Continue. Right. Yeah. So Phoenix Five happens. They get the cyclops kills Professor X while he's possessed by the Phoenix. He gets sent to prison. But Magneto pretty much bust him out. And they start their own sort of little mutant revolutionary group,

like fighting back against, you know, the hatred of humanity. stuff like at this point cyclops starts taking on more of like magneto's point of view rather than than professor x's and he's become more hard line and i guess magneto is almost there in a way to like kind of pull him back a little bit like trying to stop cyclops from making the same mistakes that he's made in the past but you know still supporting him as well um But yeah, around this point as well, Magneto spins off into his own solo series where he, you know, he starts going around and then he basically has a bit of a... Probably. He has a bit of a psychotic break where he decides to go around and kill some like anti-mutant hate criminals, like people. who are developing a mega sentinel technology, like purifiers,

and like even there's like a Hong Kong gladiatorial like thing that they've got going on with their forcing mutants to fight those Predator X creatures. But then he discovers that the Red Skull has taken over what's left of Genocia and basically turned it into a mutant concentration camp. So he decides he's going to go and sort that problem out, kills the Red Skull. But at this point in time, the Red Skull had basically dug up Xavier's corpse and stolen his brain to give it.

He's about to ask if this was around that time too. Yeah. I'm not sure if that's how it works. Well, did you dive on that one in the Xavier episode? Yeah, yeah. Can we just stay away from that whole bit? So long story short, Red Skull has Xavier's brain that gives him telepathy somehow, but okay. That's how science works.

If you put somebody else's brain onto your brain, you get all the stuff that he remembered. Double brain. Double two brain. It's science. We all know this. We all study biology in school. Mm-hmm. The double brain lesson, we know this.

Simple. And when Magneto kills him, then that unleashes red. on slot as well like a new version of onslaught who we didn't really talk about onslaught previously but skipped over onslaught really yeah i mean who cares i think that would probably we can touch on the bat with the Xavier episode i think that'll come out more in the Xavier episode yeah um but yeah and so scarlet witch and dr doom cast a spell to kind of invert uh red onslaught so like professor x's personality would take over and sort of stop him from being evil, but it kind of spreads and, it affects, like,

it affects, like, a whole bunch of heroes and villains and turns inside out and leads to some wacky adventures. Not literally turns of inside out. And not as far as I'm aware. Not like what Sanitary did to Aries. Yes. Definitely not like that.

And they're joined powers. So, like, the good guys are bad, the bad guys are good. Yes. This is a member of the X-Men for a while. Yeah, he actually feels guilt for all the people he's killed and stuff. Just like Magneto. Yeah.

You didn't even have to turn into a baby that time. Nope. He missed died, man. It's a hell of a time. He did find out, though, during this period that Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver weren't his children after all, because she in her evil state tried to cast a spell, which would affect anyone who was a blood relation. but it had no effect on Magneto.

And yeah, but the inversion got reversed somehow. Magneto finds out about all these incursions which have been happening, which the Avengers are trying to deal with with all these worlds, like trying to collide without, or their one, I guess. and that leads into another secret wars. But yeah, that gets sorted out. The timeline gets restored. Emma Frost brings Magneto back into the X-Men fold.

Just as the T-bomb, the Terrigin bomb, gets activated and start spreading Terrigin mist all throughout the world. And that has this adverse effect on me. and basically kills them and sparks a bit of a feud between the inhumans and the X-Men that nobody cares about. No, because nobody cared about the inhumans. No. Cyclops dies at this point because of the mist, but like because of Emma Frost, you know, using their powers, she made it look like he was still alive and leading the team.

but when the truth comes out Magneto breaks off and starts leading his own X-Men team but that soon falls apart because again he's running into trust issues with his past causing people not to think he's got everyone's best interests at heart so Cyclops not Cyclops Cy Locke even

pretty much tries to kill him and leaves him for dead and the savage land but Elixir and Exodus help bring him back to life and then he becomes a bit of a mentor to the time to play displaced X-Men Which is weird Yeah, admittedly. Really weird.

It came at the request of Gene Gray as well. The young Gene Gray? Yeah, the young one. The old weirdo. The old Gene Gray wasn't really. around at this point. That's right. She can come back to like X-Men, before X-Men read. Yes.

And yeah, but then again, you know, nothing really happened there. The X-Men got sent back to their original time. And then, I mean, we pretty much jump into House of X and the Cro-Croen age, where Moira-Montaga, like, makes all these revelations to professes. X and Magneto, which again makes them put their differences aside to form this in the nation. To very quickly try to explain that Moir McTaggart is actually a mutant. And her power is that every time she dies, she gets an opportunity to relive her life with all from memories. So she has like lived and died multiple times before she makes that confession to Xavier and Magneto,

which is basically like what the way you guys are doing shit ain't going to work. So there's probably a timeline where she did fuck me. you know and then she died my back in time and then she was like dude wasn't that good i'm not gonna do it put him on the list she was like how do you get so many women you're not that good at this and he's like shut up bitch and it's a whole like that was a weird i'm gonna make sure that in my next life i'm gonna take care of you as a baby i'm gonna make sure you remember that yeah whenever i do take care of you as a baby which in respect that whole thing was weird because i looked up to use a baby and then we had sex later on when you're a grown up person somehow um but don't worry about it it's not

all normal. Like, Zia was like, what the fuck? No, I'm here too. There is something, really quick thing about Magneto in this time. This is like going back to like the 90s with like the Jim Lee. Wasn't like part of their first confrontation

with Magneto about Magneto going after Moira? Because I thought I remembered that like he went after Moira because of her like raising him as a baby thing. Might just remember. Possibly. I can't remember that to be honest.

I just remember her being attacked on Mirr Island. I think she was always getting attacked on Muir Island, though. That's true. That place is... I don't know what you guys do over there in the United Kingdom. And Muir Island is not a safe place. Neither of us live on that island. No. No, was that Scotland?

Yeah. Because I just remember Banshee was always there, and I'm like, well, no, he's Irish, so I don't want to say for sure. He is Irish. well you know iron and scotland what's the difference basically the same thing English Welsh what's the difference but yeah that basically takes me to the end

as I haven't really I'm still working my way through the the Krokoan stuff now that it's all been released and people back I can give you some very like I'll skip out on some of the Krikowen stuff for you if that's okay I won't go into savvy spoiler stuff

and no spoilersies so he becomes a member of the quiet council which is sort of like the governing body of Krokoa he's like one of the 12 people so he and Charles are kind of like equals for whatever reason do you know about what happens with Mars

yes it gets terraformed he gets terraformed he's a big proponent of that and he relocates to Mars pretty much full time also as a sign of trust he does something to you know convince people that he's committed to the future of crocoa and like he's in it to win it that backfires on him a little bit but it's okay he makes it through anyway and where we are now I won't get into the crookin stuff because like what's going on with the x-men comics now

it's as almost as if the crocoe and stuff never really happened it is a return to like Hard reset. Magneto is left in a weakened state. He is wheelchair bound, essentially, because of a illness that has occurred because of being resurrected by the five. And now there's sort of like, that's kind of been like a, I want to say like C storyline in the X-Men book about like, hey, Magneto's so far the only mutant who's shown this. It has to do with like being resurrected the way that he was by the five, which happened

to multiple X-Men, so like Quinn Choir and Magneed, and Wolverine should be fucking terrified. But there's something wrong with his body and how it's reacted, and that's kind of where we are right now. But he is a member of Cyclops' X-Men team, even though he does not leave the base.

He's mostly there as like an advisor. He's a mascot. Yeah, that's what I was going to say. So yeah, he looks like he's straight up in like Xavier's like yellow floating chair from back in the day. But he's still wearing like the helmet in with like casual smart clothes.

Yeah, he's got it. He's still cool, yeah. Yeah. You got a sense of style, you know what you mean? So that is, I don't want to go too far into the Krikoa stuff because I've been really digging it and I don't want to spoil any of the stuff that happens with Agnito there. But there are some things that occur. Mm-hmm. He fucks a lot of people, but oh, yeah.

Maybe. Ding, ding, ding, ding. So, real quick, when we go, you. Usually when we do these episodes, this one's kind of gone a while because this character has been consistently used since the 1960s. With Magneto, we always talk about, like, how are they portrayed in media? Very famously, Magneto has been portrayed by two actors, Sir Ian McKellen and Michael Fossbender. We had an episode where we talked about, you know, what our favorite portrayals were. You guys were very heavy pro Sir Ian McKellen.

I really dug Fastbender. Is there any, yeah, is there any comments you want to make about that particular? thing that's not really going in retreading territory we've already covered. I mean, I think the movies did a pretty good job of like, especially first class of like showing the, the traumas that Magneto went through in his younger years, which kind of shaped the person that he became. There was always rumors that they were going to do like a Magneto Origins movie, but they basically incorporated that into first class. And I think it, yeah, it worked out really well.

There you go. Any comments on that, Dylan? I agree with what John said. Okay. Magneto in the in the cartoons is always a really big part. The X-Men series from the 90s and the revised X-Men from the 90s, we've seen a little bit of traditional Magneto. And then again, sort of a take on the Magneto that became part of the X-Men during like

leading the new mutants essentially. They touched on the rogue storyline there, which is a big thing that happened involving Gambit as well. Any opinions on that? I mean, I do love his betrayal. In the original animated series, I think, like,

it follows the same sort of path as the comics where he starts off as a straighter villain. But then as you start peeling back the, you know, the layers of the onion, you start seeing more of what shaped him and like more of his relationship with Charles Xavier and how, you know, they have influence on each other. And yeah, like the way that series ended originally with Professor X seemingly going off up into space and leaving the X-Men to

Magneto. Like I think the series did a good job over the course of, five or whatever series it was of building up to that moment where you could see Magneto actually earning that spot as like the headmaster of the school and the leader of the X-Men so yeah it was really cool I agree with Evan John said of course Magneto has also been featured another animated series like X-Men evolution and Wolverine and the X-Men and you know pretty much if there's a very much if there's a series like X-min evolution and you know pretty much if it's a very much There's, he, Magneto is like one of the iconic X-Men characters. If there's any sort of depiction of the X-Men, Magneto is going to be there. We could spend literally all day talking about video games and cartoons and what have you. Are there any sort of closing remarks about Magneto that you would like to make anything that you hope they do with Magneto in the future?

Because like I said, right now, he's a member of the X-Men team, but he's dealing with physical limitations. I mean, I think, you know, for me personally I prefer him as a villain than as a hero but I think the fact that he has been basically on the X-Men for the last 15 years or so now it hasn't really like brought about that many memorable stories but I think just that time spent working with them and like forging relationships with them is going to make it all the more impactful when he does eventually

turn heel again because you know he will it's going to happen so I think yeah it's not been that inspiring or like engaging at times but hopefully it will make it more impactful like in future storylines when they do decide to pull that trigger I kind of think that like there's been a weird sense of on we in the X-Men world since like the 90s and I feel like a lot of that has to do with again when Disney purchased Marvel and they found out they couldn't make X-Men movies at first. So a lot of the X-Men stuff got really de-emphasized. And like that's why I feel like you don't have those iconic like X-Men storylines anymore. Because like you said, right after Wolverine gets the Ataman team stripped out of his bodies,

that's really when the iconic Magneto stories end. aside from, of course, him, you know, pissing off John by trying to destroy all of New York City. But also, like, I think him getting Genosha is a big, I think that's a good thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's what I'm saying. That's kind of what I mean is, like, the X-Men, the purchase of Marvel by Disney occurred in, like, the early 2000s. And X-Men was like 2000. The new X-Men by Graham-Worse, it was in that 2000-2001 area. Yeah.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. So like I said, it definitely, like, fell victim to Disney, essentially, in my opinion. And that's why, like, they're getting this emphasis through the Kerkoa stuff. I almost feel like it was a fluke. Because part of me feels like they gave Hickman X-Men because they were like, well, we're not really doing anything with it right now. So Hickman wants a giant sandbox to play, and we'll give him this. And then Hickman being Hickman made something kind of brilliant.

and then Marvel took it from him and decided like, oh, this was only going to a storyline was going to last this long. Let's extend it for five years. Yeah. To the point that it got really watered down and they had to blow it up again. Yeah.

Very confusing. But any closing, we already had our closing thoughts on Magneto. Dylan, do you prefer Magneto as a hero, villain, or something in between? I always prefer him as a villain. I don't think, like, you kind of pointed out there, like, the most impactful parts of Magneto are when he's a villain. When he's a hero, it's not interesting.

He's just like, the guy on the thing. You want to see him be a hero or you want to see him be a villain and go against those guys and make his own kind of thing, his own path, his own interpretation of the world. That's more fun than just him going, yeah, Xavier is right. Your guys are good. like you know it's not that doesn't seem like Magneto to me

I don't think he's ever said that though I think he's always well not a lie but he probably thought it he's still like the same sort of noble stuck up superior jerk that he's always been just he's grown over the years

so he's not the same guy he was like 60 years ago where he was trying to get some nuclear missiles and blow shit up he's more like you go back to that you can still do But there's still time. I believe in him.

What's the point of going back to like something that was so like, you know, unremarkable though. Like that's just villainy 101. There's no nuance to any of that. This time he could make it remarkable. Okay. Last time he tried to steal some moreheads, whatever. What if this time he tried to steal those moreheads as a baby?

That's right. Let's take him a baby again. I think that's the best way to do. Make him a little baby. I mean, that's the best way to keep him young because... Getting on the years. That's what we were talking about, you know, at some point that the Holocaust survivor's storyline is going to be like, so he's over 100 years old?

I mean, he might already be there. Yeah. Yeah, he must be. But not if he's a little baby, though. How young was he during World War II? I believe he was in his teens in World War II. Yeah, we might approach in that quick because it's 20, 25. Yeah.

But he's been de-aged. He's been, I think when he had the powers from the dreaming celestial as well, that may have affected his age somewhat and made him a bit younger. So it's an easier's excuse. Well, he's died and been brought back to life multiple times as well. So, yeah. Plus, he's like an old, bold guy as well, which, I mean, his age has always been. indeterminate.

Like, you don't know. What you're meaning is that there's hope for me. Yeah, exactly. Hell yes. We don't know how old you are. No, you never will. You could be 60, you could be 20. We don't know.

It was my birthday on Tuesday. And you were seven? I was seven years old. Nope, seven. Four? Just seven. All right. Well, everybody, that was our deep dive on Magneto.

John, it has been, Johnless January I guess two questions One, where did you end 2024 on your movie watch and where are you currently in 2025? Well, while I look up to remind myself

why I ended up on 24. John's been out of the game so long he forgot what we pitched to. Doesn't know that we do this every single time. Yeah. Would you like to hazard a guess how many I've watched so far this year?

28. I'm going to say you've at least, at this point, you've probably gotten close to 100. Jeez. It's somewhere in between. I've actually reached 55 movies at this point. 55, that bad. And last year I ended on 905. It's pretty good.

That your record is how many? 1,050, I think it was. Not bad. You were 100 off. Yeah. And I didn't even take time off due to, like, COVID and stuff as well. Not even COVID can stop you watching a film. No.

Invincible. So John, what was the last movie you watched? Not even get turned into a baby can stop you watching films. John was last movie you watched. The last movie I watched was actually comic book related. It was Swamp Thing. Oh, okay. Yeah, directed by Wes Craven of all people.

Way back when? Yeah, 1988. Is it Heather Locklear? No, it was it was the one with Ray Wise as Alec Holland, but he gets obviously killed off

and turned into Swamp Thing pretty quickly. And the female lead was Adrian Barbeau. Oh, okay. Yeah, she's in a lot of John Carpenter movies. Was the opening theme

takeoff of Wild Thing but with Swamp Thing instead. Unfortunately not. No, okay. That's sad. No. Like fucking. What was a bug monster thing? Yeah. Anton Arcane.

Yeah. Yeah. Fucking weird ass fucking whatever he was. It had like Anton Arcane in it, but instead of turning into a bug monster, he turned into like a really shitty looking beast man. Like for P-Man?

Yeah. Does that we sound like? Yeah. that's how Skeletor would say his name. Thank you. And remember. Wish, man. I don't like you.

Don't get in on this. No. No. Okay. John, real quick, as an aside, have you seen Nospheratu? No, I wanted to, but I've been

waylaid, so I haven't managed to go to the cinema. I will tell you, do you know what the, what Nassaratu sounds like? No. Okay, I'll not even see any pictures of what he looks like. I'm not going to spoil it for you at all then. I'm just going to say that if you are a fan of like some 1980s wrestling, you're going to hear a voice and it's going to be familiar.

Yeah, it's really weird. It's really weird. That would be amazing. Yeah. Oh, yeah, nothing but an appetite. Nothing but an appetite. I mean Sounds good to me

Dylan With our updates to you Skype Now we can see how you spell Captain Exploity What would you like to pitch? I guess the book I wrote a book It's called The Wonderful World of Captain Explody It's available on

Amazon.com And also all of the other ones Wherever you live It's all there It's a book. You can buy it. You can read it. You can do whatever you want with it. I'm very close to finishing the second one. I don't know what it'll be called or what the front cover will look like, but the contents is mostly finished. Right. I have to go back and, you know, proofread it and make sure that's... Because I started it years ago, so some of the stories probably suck. I'm like, I've got to change this shit. But so there will be another book at some point. So you can buy that one too. Keep an eye on the page. Check it out. Subscribe or follow me or bookmark it. I don't fucking know. Buy the book. And then buy the second one when it comes out too. Thank you very much. Thank you. And I have another show called Large Old Cup. It is a storytelling stream of consciousness podcast. I don't know what I'm going to talk about until I start talking. And it goes for 29 minutes and I think 37 seconds every episode. And that's because that's yeah, that's pretty much how I'm. time it. I just take the old file,

remove the audio, and record again. I start talking when the music ends, and I stop when the music starts. So it's the same link to every episode. Fair enough. Yeah, that's how I keep track. But until then, everybody, we will see you all next week where I think we might all be here again.

If not, we'll figure some things out. Goodbye. It'll be a surprise. Goodbye. Oh, we missed it. We missed it. There he is. We missed it. There, we got it.