The Stack: Marvel Midnight, Jonah Hex, And More

Alex Zalben (0:08)

What's up, everybody, welcome to The Stack. I'm Alex.

Justin Partridge (0:11)

I'm Justin.

Pete LePage (0:12)

I'm Pete.

Alex Zalben (0:12)

And on The Stack, we talk about a bunch of books that have come out this week.

Pete LePage (0:16)

We sure do.

Alex Zalben (0:16)

We review them. Spoiler warning, up at the front, because we are going to get into it. I'll also mention, at the back of the podcast, we're going to talk about our pick. If you had just five bucks to pick up one book this week, what would it be? We're going to figure that out at the end of the show, so we'll move back to that. But why don't we give it up, kick it off with the Midnight Universe.

Justin Partridge (0:38)

These books have been already out on the stands for nine hours.

Pete LePage (0:42)

Oh, what have you been doing, guys?

Alex Zalben (0:44)

Yeah.

Midnight. It's midnight time. We're going to talk about all three of Marvel's Midnight books. They only released three comic books this week. Midnight X-Men, Midnight Spider-Man, and Midnight Fantastic Four. Lazy. Why don't we talk about each of them individually and then we can give, unless this comes up naturally, our broad thoughts about this kickoff to the Midnight Universe. Obviously, it's only three issues at this point, but it's anticipated. So first one up, Midnight X-Men, number one from Marvel, written by Jonathan Hickman, art by Matteo Della Fonte. This is a vampire book where we've got vampires, we've got mutant vampires, we've got mutants, and we've got humans. And as usual with Jonathan Hickman, there's a lot of strata of status going on with all of these different characters. What'd you guys think of this kickoff?

Pete LePage (1:32)

I'm sorry, are you trying to say vampires? Or what are you saying?

Alex Zalben (1:36)

Yeah, I am, I'm saying vampires.

Justin Partridge (1:37)

That also sounds weird.

Alex Zalben (1:38)

The wampires. The wampires.

Pete LePage (1:40)

Sounds like you're saying like wambulance.

Alex Zalben (1:43)

Wambulance? Vampires, they ate the people in the wambulance.

Justin Partridge (1:48)

Yes, we should say, Alex does a good job of sort of like covering his accent, but he has a very thick, like Eastern European accent.

Pete LePage (1:56)

If you ever talk. Surf Dracula accent is what he's got.

Alex Zalben (1:59)

Pete just learned Surf Dracula.

Justin Partridge (2:01)

He really into Surf Dracula.

Alex Zalben (2:04)

Let's talk about this book. What did you think about this? Is this a Surf Dracula of the book, or is it a Dracula you want to surf?

Justin Partridge (2:09)

I consider this sort of a Surf Dracula bottle episode of a comic book.

Alex Zalben (2:14)

Why don't we, in this episode, let's rate things on Surf or Turf. Do you want to Surf this book, or do you want to Turf it?

Justin Partridge (2:21)

Both are cool. I love Turf.

Pete LePage (2:24)

Yeah, why aren't we kind of talking about it in general a little bit? I would say I was very excited for this event, and I liked-

Alex Zalben (2:32)

You were talking about it in specific.

Pete LePage (2:35)

I was pleasantly surprised by Midnight X-Men. I was a little nervous, but yeah, this one of the three is my favorite, so I was very happy with this issue. I thought it was great. I also like that they give us a smoke break before every issue. It's really cool.

Justin Partridge (2:57)

You mean the pages?

Pete LePage (2:58)

Yeah, they gave us a double smoke break page. You know what I mean?

Justin Partridge (3:03)

Okay.

Alex Zalben (3:04)

They were like, go out and smoke and think about what's going on.

Pete LePage (3:06)

Yeah, they said smoke first, then read this. And I was like, you got it.

Alex Zalben (3:10)

You got it, Marvel.

Justin Partridge (3:13)

There are two oddly smoky pages. I thought this was great.

It's very much, we're thrown into a multistrada situation where there are vampires, there are empires, which are mutant vampires. There are humans, ostensibly, and mutants. And I was like, okay.

So, it's definitely a lot to contain, but I'm super intrigued by all the different stratifications. It upsets the basic X-Men premise of their hate and hated and feared and they have to save themselves and save humanity. Now it's like, oh, some of these vampires are bad. Some of them are better. Some are human, non-vampire mutants. Like it changes things up in a good way. And this was just a banger Cyclops issue, I thought.

Pete LePage (4:09)

Oh my god, dude, he was super douche it from the moment you saw him. He's like, legs? No, how could you?