106 - Misery 1 and King Spawn 35

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Fuck those angels. Let's do this. Good evening, and welcome to the Mal Bulls. This is regarding Spawn, the world's best spawn podcast. I am your co host, Jon Fisher. [00:00:44] Speaker B: And I am your co host, David Williams. And Johnny. Fuck those angels. [00:00:51] Speaker A: Fuck those angels, man. They think they're so tough. [00:00:53] Speaker B: They think they're so. With their big wings that are now shriveling up and dying and they're business and their things. [00:01:00] Speaker A: Yeah. The angels kidnapped granny Blake. [00:01:02] Speaker B: Yeah. Jerks. [00:01:04] Speaker A: That's no. That's no good. [00:01:05] Speaker B: Although if you. If you think about it, the. The angels are largely just so. They're just an army. So their. Their excuse is always that they're just following orders. And, man, fuck that. I hate a situation where you have to just do. [00:01:17] Speaker A: Because that means fuck God, is what you're saying. [00:01:21] Speaker B: Uh, firm enough stance. Yes. If there's one person at the helm of it all, then, yeah, absolutely. Fuck that guy. [00:01:31] Speaker A: Well, welcome, everyone. Welcome to regarding Spawn. [00:01:34] Speaker B: Yes, indeed. [00:01:35] Speaker A: Where each week we bring you two issues from Spawn's universe. Except when we don't. [00:01:40] Speaker B: But this week, we are. [00:01:41] Speaker A: But this week, we are. Yes. And only one of them features Mister Spawn himself. Because the other one is a special new title. [00:01:51] Speaker B: Yes, indeed. [00:01:51] Speaker A: A mini series by Todd McFarlane and Simon Kodransky. And it's misery. And I'm covering misery number one today. [00:01:59] Speaker B: It is. It is not a misery to read. I can tell you that right now. [00:02:03] Speaker A: No, it's fun. And it's got some cameos from a good friend. [00:02:06] Speaker B: Take it off, Johnny. Whoo. [00:02:09] Speaker A: Just take it off my hoodie. Because it's hot in the closet. [00:02:12] Speaker B: Because for some reason, he thought he was gonna be cozy. And he's got. He's wearing, man, he is. He's got the guns out. Sun's out. Guns out for the dying embryos of summer. [00:02:22] Speaker A: And then we got King Spawn 35. [00:02:24] Speaker B: So it's a double toddfather day. Very excited about that. [00:02:27] Speaker A: Double Todd. Father. [00:02:29] Speaker B: A modfather, a modern toddfather, a mod Farlan. A couple of good books. [00:02:35] Speaker A: Yeah, it's. I don't know. I feel like I don't have any, like, small talk. [00:02:39] Speaker B: I mean. What do you mean by you don't have any small talk? We gotta. [00:02:42] Speaker A: I don't know. Usually we talk for, like, ten minutes before we even talk about the books. [00:02:46] Speaker B: So we, you know, as we're. As we have been talking about the last few episodes, where we've got just a gigantic stack of new comic books to talk about, I would say that we have a gigantic stack to get through, but that implies that we don't enjoy it. So we got a big fat stack of comic books to talk about, and they just. They just keep coming. So we gotta. We're on this. This little catch up to make sure that we're not too far behind. We want to stay reasonably contemporaneous with the goings on in Spawn's universe. Just so that way, you know. [00:03:21] Speaker A: Absolutely. [00:03:22] Speaker B: We've hitched our wagon to the horse of Spawn, and we're committed. So we're gonna ride this hell pony. Where it goes, of the. How many did we say? Was it? 19 ongoing titles, give or give or take a couple. A good portion of them are mini series. Is mini cri mini series. Then, you know, those ones. Those ones are going to be here, and then they're going to be gone. But we got to make sure that we cover them so they're not forgotten. [00:03:51] Speaker A: And misery is a little different pace for spawns. Universe. Kind of more in line with the salmon Twitch books. I mean, there's a little bit of supernatural stuff, but it's pretty grounded at. [00:03:59] Speaker B: The very base level, because it's the exact same creative team as the Sam and Twitch team, so. [00:04:05] Speaker A: Exactly. That's what I'm saying. They feel very much of the same cloth. [00:04:09] Speaker B: It's very exploring these new avenues. That we haven't seen in the world of spawn to date. [00:04:17] Speaker A: Right. [00:04:17] Speaker B: Unless I'm missing something massive. And then you can just correct us by sending an email to regardingspawnpodmail.com dot. [00:04:25] Speaker A: I mean, there's the older Sam and Twitch comics, which are kind of ground level, but I think having the same artist also just makes them feel more linked in my mind. [00:04:32] Speaker B: Yeah, couple of good books. A couple of good books to read. It's a. It's an exciting time to love some spawn. Johnny, we've got an embarrassment of riches, and let's just. Let's just ride this wave until, you know, we ain't got no wave to ride no more. Because, you know, one of these days, we're gonna look back and be like, man, remember, we got, like, four spawn books a week. What the hell happened? [00:04:56] Speaker A: It's true. I mean, everything comes and goes. [00:04:59] Speaker B: You did four spawn books a week. You're going to be tired after that. [00:05:03] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:05:03] Speaker B: This is an amazing pace that they've set for themselves. [00:05:06] Speaker A: So we start with the COVID of misery number one, all the way back from June 2024. A bit of a. I've got the a cover. [00:05:18] Speaker B: I also have the a cover, the Donnagulio man. Those agulio covers are. They're beautiful. They've got a, like, a little bit of a soft focus kind of feel going on with them, and it's very good. It's especially good for, like, the amount of light that he put in this. It makes it feel so much more blinding that there's a little bit of fuzz on the edges. [00:05:43] Speaker A: It's cyan. Just, like, kind of in, like, a. [00:05:45] Speaker B: Fetal position, but we're not sure if. [00:05:48] Speaker A: She'S kind of all twisted and floaty. [00:05:50] Speaker B: Yeah. Not sure if she's actually laying down on the ground or if she's, like, just falling through the ether. [00:05:56] Speaker A: Her eyes are all white. [00:05:57] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:05:57] Speaker A: I think it's like. I imagine it's what she feels during her moments when she, like, touches people. [00:06:03] Speaker B: Yeah, I have a feeling that's kind of probably like. [00:06:05] Speaker A: It's kind of like a visual representation. [00:06:07] Speaker B: Of that, because she does end up awfully lost, it seems, every time she does it. And, boy, we'll get there, but I. Johnny, worst power ever, probably. [00:06:21] Speaker A: Yeah. Not great. [00:06:22] Speaker B: First power to have, at least. [00:06:24] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:06:24] Speaker B: Then there's also. There's also a b cover to this, too. That is a Todd McFarlane original, and it. Indeed, it. It definitely plays much more into the connotation of the title misery because it's. It's Cyan there, just, like, on her knees screaming at the heavens. [00:06:47] Speaker A: Yeah, she's got a really screaming out in misery. [00:06:49] Speaker B: She's got a really cool little spawn emblem necklace that looks an awful lot like a hunting trophy from an angel. So it would be interesting if the lore were to come around that Cyan had at one point bested an angel and taken their trophies. [00:07:06] Speaker A: That's just the top father putting in a little Easter egg. [00:07:08] Speaker B: Yeah, but we do know that they're trophies, and they do exist, like, in canon. [00:07:13] Speaker A: Yeah, but they're bigger. They're like hoops. They're like hoopier rings. [00:07:16] Speaker B: Well, I mean, they're probably. They're probably. You could probably Futz with the size of them. I'm sure, since they're probably made from necroplasm. You could probably be like, I want you smaller so I can put you on a ring, or I want you big so I can have earrings or. [00:07:33] Speaker A: Make a belt buckle. [00:07:35] Speaker B: Yeah. Can you imagine? There's just like. There's just like the. In heaven, there is a dive bar of people who dress up like cowboys and have just their big fucking belt buckles with their spawn hunting trophies on them. Yeah, there's that one guy who's rigged up a bottle opener on the back of it. So that way he's always just like, when you need it, I'd go to the heaven dive. [00:08:00] Speaker A: Yeah. There's also a sea cover. Actually, it's a blank. There's a blank cover. [00:08:03] Speaker B: Ooh, I didn't realize that's a, that's an interesting, that's an interesting because none of the other number ones have had a blank cover, have they? [00:08:12] Speaker A: Yeah, I don't know. [00:08:13] Speaker B: I think I mean, I think maybe a couple of them have in the past, but none of the, none of the newest slate that I can think of. [00:08:22] Speaker A: Yeah, I didn't think so either, but, yeah, according to cover price, it has a blank one. [00:08:26] Speaker B: Interesting. Interesting. I mean, it seems, it seems like a very good idea to have, you know, the beginning of a series. You can have, you know, there's a world yet to discover within the world of misery. And, you know, if you've got the blank cover, if at some point later in the series, you find something that you really love for it, I mean, that's that's worth the price of a blank cover. You go to a convention, get somebody to draw on it for you, the thing that you like from later on. I'm a big fan of the blank covers. I don't have the follow through to actually get them done up real nice. So it's kind of wasted on me if that's the COVID I end up with. But the concept itself is solid. [00:09:11] Speaker A: Yeah. It's interesting how it's turned its own little side kind of industry of people remarking and doing covers. So we popped this cover open. [00:09:21] Speaker B: Yes, indeed. [00:09:22] Speaker A: And we got the credits. Script plot by Mister Todd McFarlane. [00:09:27] Speaker B: Mm hmm. [00:09:28] Speaker A: Art by Simon Skodranski, color by FCO placentia. Letterings by Annworld Design. We already covered the covers. [00:09:36] Speaker B: Sure did. [00:09:37] Speaker A: Creative director is Todd McFarlane, and editor in chief is Thomas Healy. [00:09:41] Speaker B: Yes, indeed they do. [00:09:42] Speaker A: And we open in New York City with an exact time. We know the Todd father's right in this. [00:09:47] Speaker B: There's no 06:27 p.m. no question. This is toddfather from the gate. These are some pretty good pigeons that Simon's been drawing for us. [00:09:57] Speaker A: Yeah, they are. [00:09:58] Speaker B: And the pigeons. The pigeons in Chicago, at least they do be having a good time around rush hour. It seems like there's a lot of, like, lunch places in the loop that around about rush hour time, after they've closed their shops, will bring a whole bunch of old bread out and just, like, dump it down the sidewalk. And so the pigeons know when this bread is supposed to come, and so they just wait. They just, like, lazily circle. And then once the bread drop happens, they just, like, descend upon the street corners of the loop. And it's. It's wild. It's a fun thing to see. I like a pigeon, Johnny. [00:10:37] Speaker A: Do they feed it for the birds or just putting bread? [00:10:39] Speaker B: Yeah, they're doing it. They're doing it for the birds. [00:10:42] Speaker A: They. [00:10:42] Speaker B: They, like, they. They grind it up so that way it's in real small pieces. So it's obviously not just general bread for the public. It's very specifically for the birds, which is also quite a big flex because any single instance of feeding pigeons in Chicago is a $500 fine. So if you have a swarm of pigeons coming after the breadcrumbs you've just sprinkled, that's. That's a lot of monies. You know how many comic books you can buy with that? [00:11:12] Speaker A: That's a big flex. [00:11:14] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:11:15] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:11:16] Speaker B: But anyway, pigeon talk aside, we're open on New York City and we're at one of these street corners where presumably there are no breadcrumbs yet. And it's just a dude waiting at the crosswalk listening to some tunes. Johnny, the crosswalk sign goes from don't walk to walk. Dude steps off the curb, looks to his right, and the next thing we know, Johnny hit by a car. That man has been run over in the crosswalk. The blood pool coming out of him is making the title misery, part one. What a terrible way to end the day, Johnny. [00:11:52] Speaker A: And that's just kind of an instance, the way it ties into the story is it just makes this woman who's trying to get Jenny, he's trying to get home, makes her late. [00:12:00] Speaker B: Yeah, it makes her very late. Makes her. She doesn't get out of there until at least 45 minutes later, which severely, severely, what's the word? Looking for? Pushes back the time that she gets home. So. Absolutely, man, nothing's worse than sitting in traffic or having an issue on your commute home. Yeah, it sucks. There's always living in a city with transit and taking that public transit, especially a rail based transit. There's always the unfortunate. The unfortunate individual who feels that this is their time to leave the earth. And, man, you've never heard so many people say such terrible things about somebody they've never met than a jumper who makes the train stop for like 3 hours. I mean, help exists. Call or text 988, please. If you have any of those thoughts. Don't jump in front of a train. That's terrible. But also terrible is, man, you would think that there would be some sympathy from people on the train for somebody that happens to, but not when they're trying to go home. Absolutely not. [00:13:15] Speaker A: Now when they're trying to get home, they turn. [00:13:17] Speaker B: They turn vicious when anything keeps them from being able to get home. Like even the. Even the conductor just getting off the train to go to the bathroom real quick, oh, mandy almost starts riots. But all that to say yes, when. [00:13:32] Speaker A: You gotta go, you gotta go. [00:13:35] Speaker B: Man. That would. If that were to happen Jurassic park style on my commute home, I would be very, very frightened of ever leaving my house ever again. It's got dinosaurs on the loose. But Tangent aside, this incident has stopped traffic, and Ginny is unable to leave from where she is until 47, 40 minutes after she's supposed to, which doesn't get her home to Staten island until 812 pm. Todd Frost. [00:14:10] Speaker A: 812. [00:14:11] Speaker B: 812. That's a very late time to be getting home. [00:14:15] Speaker A: Yeah, that sucks. [00:14:16] Speaker B: That does suck. That sucks real bad. And Ginny gets home and she gets inside and she's greeted with a tableau of just darkness. And, you know, her husband and her children just sitting there at the table. She's apologizing, but her husband says, we've been waiting for dinner. First off, this man's a jerk. [00:14:39] Speaker A: Yeah, he's an asshole. He's gonna make his kids sit there and, like, we're gonna wait. [00:14:42] Speaker B: Yeah, you could've, like, called in a fucking pizza or, like, made some chicken nuggets from the freezer. Come on. Bad dad. Bad dad award. But that's the very least of his bad etcetera awards. She's like, hey, man, as soon as I knew I was gonna be late, I sent a text. And what the fuck else is she supposed to do? She's supposed to fly over the traffic. He doesn't give a fuck about her text. What a jerk. Then he sends the kids to their rooms and then engages in some domestic violence, which I feel we need to take a firm stand here, Johnny, and just make sure everybody knows we're anti domestic violence. [00:15:23] Speaker A: Yes. [00:15:24] Speaker B: It's no good. It's no bueno. [00:15:27] Speaker A: No. [00:15:28] Speaker B: It's a heavy start to this comic book, Johnny. [00:15:32] Speaker A: It is heavy. It's a misery. It's just heavy. It's like you get the guy run over and then you go right into this and the kids are watching it. It's just. And then you see at the very last frame before it cuts away that this guy has a badge. [00:15:44] Speaker B: Yeah, that he's a cop. [00:15:46] Speaker A: Then we get a very upset Terry Fitzgerald. [00:15:48] Speaker B: Yes, yes. And he's having an argument with Cyan, his daughter, about. She's like, I'm out of here, dad. I'm leaving. And he's like, where the hell you gotta go? A mad but yet fabulous Terry Fitzgerald. Look at those eyebrows he's got, Johnny. Do you think they grow like that naturally, or do you think he shapes them? [00:16:08] Speaker A: Oh, he probably plucks them. [00:16:12] Speaker B: They, like, accentuate his. [00:16:14] Speaker A: Grr. [00:16:16] Speaker B: His anger. Cyan is upset with Terry's kind of just. She sees his. He hasn't gotten very far on finding out who killed I. Who's. Who killed Wanda Blake. And she's just kind of sick of it. And he's like, what am I? What? Um, Cyan's not taking any of his. Any of his excuses. [00:16:42] Speaker A: She doesn't think it was an accident. [00:16:43] Speaker B: No, no. I mean, we know. We know for a fact it wasn't an accident. Yeah. [00:16:48] Speaker A: Terry's like, I don't know. It's like, come on, Terry. Duh. He's like, why would anyone want to kill her? It's like, well, spawn. [00:16:54] Speaker B: Everything like, uh, the downfall of the Malbolge. Of the Malbolgia, Washington. This directly links to Wanda Blake. [00:17:04] Speaker A: Yeah. Lots of people. [00:17:05] Speaker B: Yeah. So Cyan is just very, very, very upset. And, you know, we see she has, like, a little shrine to her mother with what I assume is the perfume Wanda used to wear, which looks an awful lot like Chanel number five, which. Which tracks. That's about the. That's about the. The scent that a woman of wonder Blake's age would wear. Terry. Terry keeps coming up with more excuses, trying to make what he's done in the past seem like the only thing he was able to do. Instead of taking this time to maybe, you know, examine his fault in certain situations, which, you know, we all kind of get there at some point. Unfortunately, you know, we, uh, we like to think that we're making all of our decisions, you know, for ourselves with the best interests of a lot of people in mind. But sometimes. Sometimes you're just like, ugh. This is. This is the choice I made. I don't have a good reason for having made this choice. And then you try to spin a good. A good excuse for it, and he's doing very bad at that. Johnny. While he's, uh, you know, trying to come up with a couple of excuses for. For some of the accusations that Cyan is throwing at him. She just, whoop, whoop. She goes transparent. She disappears. [00:18:28] Speaker A: Johnny, she uses her powers to disappear. Yeah. [00:18:31] Speaker B: And the terror is like, wait, where did you go? Where did you go? And, you know, Cyan's got that. That good. That good comeback. I'm here, daddy. Been here the whole time. You just couldn't see me. Just like when I was growing up. And then she reappears, and Terry is like, I don't know what you're talking about. It's like, have you not been paying attention, Terry, come on. [00:18:55] Speaker A: I'm different. She says goodbye to her siblings. [00:18:59] Speaker B: So this must be pre Terry getting shot. [00:19:02] Speaker A: Yeah, probably. [00:19:03] Speaker B: I would assume so. Cyan says goodbye to her siblings and gets in a cab and says, I know where I'm going. I got a plan. [00:19:12] Speaker A: She has a soho. [00:19:13] Speaker B: Obviously not a very good car ride for her. Long streaks of mascara. I'm crying in the back. And she goes into a coffee shop. And, you know, Cat calls the barista because the barista is her friend Johnny. [00:19:30] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:19:32] Speaker B: So this is her plan. [00:19:33] Speaker A: Just wait around them to close up. [00:19:35] Speaker B: Yeah. To meet up with her friends and hang out with them. [00:19:38] Speaker A: They're just catching up and stuff like that. And they go down to the subway. [00:19:41] Speaker B: Yes, indeed. [00:19:42] Speaker A: I get some jerks. [00:19:44] Speaker B: Yeah. Speaking of speaking about the train. Geez. Geez, these guys fucking suck, man. These guys. These guys should go in front of a fucking train. [00:19:52] Speaker A: Yeah, these guys actually should. [00:19:54] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:19:54] Speaker A: Especially considering what they do. [00:19:56] Speaker B: Yeah. They're pieces of shit. So they're just, you know, they're kind of being, you know, just obnoxious on the train. No, really. No harm, no foul side for the fact that, you know, they're being jerks. But as soon as the train stops at the next station, Cyan and her friend are like, we're good. We're getting off. Let's go. Unbeknownst to them, the jerks have followed them off and followed them down the station. And, man, this is a site. This is a site for sore eyes. Jaihatjani. I would love for them to public bathrooms in the CTA again. [00:20:37] Speaker A: Yeah. Cyan has to go to the bathroom, and there's a public bathroom. [00:20:40] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:20:41] Speaker A: In the station. [00:20:42] Speaker B: It would be wonderful. I mean, obviously, the people who use them abuse them more than they should. But let me tell you, there are certain times where there's nowhere else to go, and you're having to sit on the train, and it's like, it's the worst. The worst. But, yeah. So Cyan's in the bathroom, and her friends just, you know, piddlin on her phone, waiting for Cyan to get back out. And the creepozoids come back up, and they save some foul things. Some very foul things. So Cyan's fringe. Do we know what her name is yet? [00:21:15] Speaker A: Jenny. [00:21:15] Speaker B: Jenny. I thought Jenny was. I thought Jenny was. [00:21:18] Speaker A: Oh, Jenny's the other one. I don't know. She said it earlier. I don't fucking know. [00:21:21] Speaker B: Yeah, it looks like she hasn't said it yet. Like, I know she says it, at least in the second one, the second issue. [00:21:28] Speaker A: And Cyan comes out of the bathrooms, like, leave her alone, because they're like, the dude, like, grabs her. [00:21:33] Speaker B: Yeah. Cause she kicks him in the nuts after he says the foul thing. And then he grabs her, and Cyan comes out to break it up. And the two creepy guys who aren't holding Cyan's friend are like, do you want to make something of it? Then the assault gets even worse. Um, yeah, it continues. It's real bad. [00:21:57] Speaker A: Cyan's had enough. [00:21:58] Speaker B: Cyan is fighting back. [00:22:01] Speaker A: He punches a dude and slams a dude into, like, the fucking. [00:22:04] Speaker B: Yeah, into the wall, like, into a pillar. And she grabs. She grabs the guy who is currently assaulting her friends, who still apparent, I guess, apparently has his hand on his zipper, is able to pry him off of her friend, and the guy turns around and punches Cyan in the face. [00:22:24] Speaker A: Our friend's name's Brooke. Brooke, run. Good help. [00:22:27] Speaker B: Okay. What a place to just drop that in, man. But, yeah, this dude punches Saiyan in the face, and then she's down on the ground. And as he starts just pummeling her, pummeling her, pummeling on her. And in the midst of the pummeling, she's able to get her hands on him in such a way that her power kicks in. And we get this first sort of experience of what Cyan's power is and why it is probably the worst power to have, because it brings up all of the worst, like, the most traumatic experiences or, like, the worst parts of a person's life that live in their memories, makes it replay within their mind with all of the, like, somatic experience stuff hyped up at ten times the intensity. [00:23:18] Speaker A: At ten times the intensity. [00:23:19] Speaker B: But also that Cyan has to experience all of those as well, which, I mean, it would be a great power if you just forced people to relive all their worst memories at the worst possible time. But to have it happen to you as well. Oh, boy. Oh, Boyden. Oh, but it's so. It's so bad that she blacks out. This is. This is a great two page spread. This kind of. [00:23:44] Speaker A: Yeah, it's awesome. [00:23:45] Speaker B: Degradation into just like a pencil sketches. Pencil sketches. Oh, man. It is. It's great. [00:23:53] Speaker A: Cool. [00:23:53] Speaker B: It's great. And then later, later we got Cyan. She's, you know, she just went through an experience and she. She looks like it. She's answering some questions at a police station. And we see almost immediately that it is Jenny. She. Of the first couple of pages. Jenny is a cop. We also see in the background a couple of boys who having a good time at one of their expenses. Sam has spilled coffee all the way down. I love it. I love it. But so Cyan's interview is going. And, you know, Cyan's being intentionally vague. Maybe at some points not even intentionally vague. She's just kind of doesn't know. But she knows she wants to get out of the situation. So it's just like Mehdeh. A struggle happened. And so Jenny's there being like, yeah, I wanna. I wanna. I wanna make sure that we do right by you. You know, she's being a good person. Trying to. Trying to use her position as a police officer to make the world a better place. And that's nice to see, you know? [00:25:19] Speaker A: Yeah. But then Cyan notices on her desk that her badge got a blood spot, has blood on it. [00:25:27] Speaker B: And Cyan excuses herself so that way she can formulate an escape. [00:25:36] Speaker A: And we get classic going to the bathroom routine. [00:25:40] Speaker B: These two pages bring back into full effect the Lucasart style common area that a lot of stuff goes through. Because this is the exact same police station that Sam and Twitch files started in. And there's just people wandering around. And now we're seeing it from another side. And it's just like it's this common hub that's connecting all of these different stories. That's fun. I like that. I like it when they do that. [00:26:10] Speaker A: And then we get intersecting, we get Twitch coming by after Cyan goes to the bathroom and disappears. [00:26:16] Speaker B: Yeah. She does her transparency. And then as she leaves the bathroom, she walks right by Ginny and Twitch's conversation where they're literally talking about her as if she's not there. Ginny says, I don't know, but this one feels kind of personal. And fully understand that given what we've been presented with in this comic so far, Jenny's hoping for a redemption, like a vicarious redemption, by being able to help cyanide. She can't for. For reasons she can't fix her own situation. So at least she can make it better for other people. Jesus Christ. This issue is so fucking heavy. Jenny. [00:26:57] Speaker A: It's bleak, man. [00:26:58] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:26:58] Speaker A: It's hard to do, like, a jokey spawn caucas about it. [00:27:00] Speaker B: Oh, man. But, yeah. So Cyan exits the police station and makes herself visible again, grabs an ubere, takes it to 417 Arthur Avenue, whereupon. [00:27:16] Speaker A: She grabs a taxi. My friend, she's supporting the old ways. [00:27:19] Speaker B: Oh. But she says taxi. But the only taxi there is an Uber. [00:27:23] Speaker A: Maybe he's both. [00:27:25] Speaker B: I don't know. [00:27:26] Speaker A: How do you know it's an Uber? [00:27:27] Speaker B: It says Uber on the side of that red car. [00:27:32] Speaker A: Okay. [00:27:34] Speaker B: Unless there's another car that we don't see, which is a possibility. [00:27:38] Speaker A: But she doesn't know how Uber works. [00:27:40] Speaker B: Cause. Yeah, and, like, you. I don't know. But anyway, so she gets out of the. Out of the car. [00:27:47] Speaker A: What Uber driver puts Uber on the side of their car? It's one of those crazy ones. You get into one. It has, like, 20 signs that they printed on the inside. [00:27:55] Speaker B: The fun one is always the. The one. You get in one. And, like, the side of the car says, lease car for Uber drivers or Uber Lyft. And it's like, man, that's like a nested series of debts to get into just to try to. Hopefully, man, the whole system is fucked up. Yeah, man. We don't need to get into that. I don't have the energy to do that. But anyway, Cyan gets out of this Uber cab. Uber taxi starts walking up to this house that she's had them take them, too. And she's greeted on the porch by our favorite, the one, the only, Miss Granny Blake. [00:28:39] Speaker A: Granny Blake. [00:28:40] Speaker B: And Cyan's like, how'd you know it was me? Granny Blake's like, I. I will never forgive her. The forget the way you walk, ever. [00:28:49] Speaker A: And then a little bit of irony. Visually, she's really beat up and says she's great granny. I think everything's just, like, perfect. [00:28:57] Speaker B: And then we get a. [00:28:58] Speaker A: Not true. [00:28:59] Speaker B: Yeah, then we get a spawn skull. And a good spawn skull. Not a lot of back matter in this one. There's an image classics ad, and then the Diablo four action figures on the back. [00:29:10] Speaker A: Looking pretty cool. [00:29:13] Speaker B: Pretty dope. [00:29:14] Speaker A: Love me some Diablo four. [00:29:16] Speaker B: And that's misery number one, Johnny. [00:29:19] Speaker A: There it is. Misery number one. [00:29:22] Speaker B: Not a lot of fun times in this one. [00:29:25] Speaker A: No, it lives up to the title. It's pretty heavy subject matter. And it's a lot of. Just, like, raw violence. [00:29:33] Speaker B: It's good. But it's, you know, hard to, like you said, make a jokey spawn podcast about. Next up, Johnny, we got Kingspawn number 35. Another Todd McFarlane joint. [00:30:08] Speaker A: Yep. [00:30:10] Speaker B: As always. We gotta start with the covers, don't we? [00:30:14] Speaker A: It is from. Also from June 2024. [00:30:17] Speaker B: So, yeah, these would have been potentially even same week if it could have. [00:30:22] Speaker A: It could have been. [00:30:24] Speaker B: I don't remember that far back. But, yeah, there's two covers. [00:30:29] Speaker A: There were a lot of double, triple, and quadruple spawn weeks in the last few months. [00:30:32] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. Oh, and the occasional dreaded no spawn week, which is the worst. So cover a is the Kevin Keene cover, which is the one I have. And it's, you know, it's spawn doing. [00:30:47] Speaker A: That's what I got, too. [00:30:48] Speaker B: It's Spahn doing his Spider man impression again. It's slightly more batmany than normal because he is on a gargoyle, but it's still. I would consider it more of a Spider man pose than any Batman pose. We got the big, big moon in the background. [00:31:06] Speaker A: Yep. You can see some craters on it. [00:31:08] Speaker B: Yeah. Some good spawn brooding on the. On the roof action. And then. Johnny, cover b is a little bit of. A little bit of a teaser for a change, that is currently going on in the Kingspawn books. Well, maybe not so much a teaser since he was the interior artist for the last one, too, for 34. But the COVID b is by Jason Sean Alexander. [00:31:36] Speaker A: Yeah, it's pretty great. Yeah, it's like a really cool spawn face. [00:31:42] Speaker B: And he's got a little flame hat or flame crown on. It's real good. If the. This would be. If the movie king Spawn had already come out in the nineties, this would probably be the perfect vhs sleeve. Good covers, both of them. I kind of wish I had gotten that Jason shot and Alexander one. [00:32:03] Speaker A: Yeah, I was about to say that. I wish I would have gotten that one, but I like the kevin keen also. [00:32:07] Speaker B: Yeah. All right. You know what? [00:32:09] Speaker A: Spawn's got a nice, long face. [00:32:11] Speaker B: Yeah. I like a broody spawn. Broody spawn is real good. So we gotta crack this puppy open, Johnny. Open it up. We got credits. The script plot by Tom McFarlane. Got the art as, again, by Jason Shawn Alexander. Colors by Ivan Nunez, lettering by Andrew, design. The second double and world designs episode we've had going on. Interesting. [00:32:37] Speaker A: There you go. Wow. [00:32:40] Speaker B: Recovered the covers. [00:32:41] Speaker A: It's almost like they do most of the spawn books. [00:32:44] Speaker B: It's almost like they do almost. Exactly half of them covered the covers. Created director Todd McFarlane and editor in chief Thomas Healy, previously King Spahn. After rescuing Granny Blake, Spawn has decided to hunt down those responsible for putting her in danger. They say, they say you don't tug on Superman's cape or you don't, you don't spit into the wind. You don't tug on Superman's cape, you don't pull the mask off the old Lone ranger, and you don't fuck around with Granny Blake, Johnny. Those are the rules. [00:33:16] Speaker A: Vaughn will get you. [00:33:18] Speaker B: Those are the rules. [00:33:19] Speaker A: He'll blow up your whole damn building. He'll get a rocket launcher and come. [00:33:22] Speaker B: Get you after he pulls your fucking teeth out. [00:33:28] Speaker A: Little flyers. [00:33:29] Speaker B: Oh, jeez. After he throws a vampire head at you and everything. Geez. [00:33:35] Speaker A: But he's just like, it opens me saying sorry to Granny. Sorry she had to go through this. [00:33:40] Speaker B: And she's like, you ain't nothing to be sorry about. You didn't do any of this. She's like, you were literally my salvation. She says, you've always been my angel. I'd like to think that she, like, forced him to eat some food that she made. And it was like, granny. Granny, no, she's like, I'm cooking, damn it. [00:34:01] Speaker A: I don't need to eat. I'm dead. [00:34:03] Speaker B: So, so granny Blake is, is like, I want to go. I'm gonna go lay down for a little bit. Um, and so Al tucks her in, gives her a little kiss on the forehead, and then steps outside and says. [00:34:15] Speaker A: Gentlemen, he's got some friends waiting. And it says, basically he's hired them to watch over Granny Blake. [00:34:21] Speaker B: I don't think this is back at Granny Blake's house. This is definitely different from some different safe house, the place we just saw. So after Al gets these bodyguards in place, he goes and wanders around to a meeting. He goes to a meeting he had previously this real creepy, this real creepy guy shows up and says, you look like shit. [00:34:45] Speaker A: Yeah, this is really creepy. Zoom in on. Find out his name is Jester. I looked online and I couldn't find him referenced anywhere else, so I don't think he's a old character. Coming. [00:34:55] Speaker B: Oh, nice. [00:34:56] Speaker A: You always got to be aware of that. [00:34:57] Speaker B: Yeah, he's got this, like, crazy fucking scarf that's got, like, a mind of its own. [00:35:05] Speaker A: He's kind of nosferatu esque. [00:35:07] Speaker B: Yeah, he's like, he's like Nosferatu decided to go to art school to get a poetry degree. Kind of exactly what he looks like. [00:35:16] Speaker A: Yeah, pretty much. [00:35:20] Speaker B: He's one of these powered individuals who is neither angel nor demon because he does a little bit of. I bet you angels and demons are feeling a little irrelevant these days. So he still has his powers. However he had received those, probably. I would assume he's probably a vampire, given the. [00:35:40] Speaker A: Yeah, I'm assuming he's a vampire. He kind of looks like one. [00:35:43] Speaker B: Yeah, that might be. That might technically be spatial profiling, but we're here. We're doing it. Yeah. So Al's like, hey, we should team up. Also, if you do something for me, I could do something real big for you. Can you do something for me? And jester's like, yeah, sure. Yeah, sure. I can do that. I can watch this lady for you. And Al was like, hell, yeah. Well, then I'll get the angel you need. And the jester's just like, fuck, yeah. Just like, rips his shirt, huh? [00:36:12] Speaker A: Yeah, fuck those angels. Let's do this. [00:36:15] Speaker B: And then after he rips his shirt off, al is like, okay, awesome. I'm gonna leave. I'm just gonna say this. And Jess was like, wait, what? I just ripped my shirt off. We gotta do something. [00:36:28] Speaker A: We gotta do something crazy. [00:36:31] Speaker B: I'm still doing it. But when I reread this, I just laughed so hard when they were just, like, having their. Their quiet, very serious conversation. And then when they agree to a plan, jester's just like, fuck this shirt. Get rid of it. [00:36:48] Speaker A: Every time you agree with somebody, you gotta rip your shirt off. [00:36:51] Speaker B: His wardrobe budget must be outstanding. Al is on his way to go get the angel that he has promised Jester. Then we cut to a fancy lad eating some food, talking on the phone, being like, hey, my food's getting cold. I gotta go eat it. His name is Romero. And this bald man, who looks a little bit like Trevor from Iron man three, pulls up and sits down next to him, obviously is some sort of tough in the local underground. [00:37:26] Speaker A: I think they're all angels. [00:37:28] Speaker B: That would make sense. I didn't know if he was, if this bald guy was an angel, or if he was just like. Yeah, he meant a guy in the know who's just a really tough mortal or. Anyway, from what we're seeing so far, he looks like a man I don't want to fuck with. So he's got a. Yeah, he looks pretty tough. Steely gaze. Uh huh. [00:37:50] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:37:51] Speaker B: And they're talking about, you know, they gotta get it. They gotta get their hands on some spawn, Johnny. They're just like us weekly. They're like, I gotta get my hands on some spawn. [00:37:58] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:38:00] Speaker B: Can you imagine? This is what we look like when we talk about what we talk about. It's so serious. Dressed in suits. So we cut from that conversation to some. A drug deal going down and drug deal going down. [00:38:17] Speaker A: People are buying a gram or something. [00:38:19] Speaker B: The buyers are not excited that 1 gram has cost them $40. [00:38:23] Speaker A: Pure robbery. [00:38:24] Speaker B: Yeah, that's inflation. Welcome to my world. So you're paying or nothing. I like how the very next panel is one guy's like, price was a bit high. That's what I said. Then they're like, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on. We gotta use this gram that. We just. [00:38:41] Speaker A: Let's do the drugs. [00:38:43] Speaker B: Then they turn a corner, and Al Simmons is just sitting there, and he's like, so was it worth $40? [00:38:50] Speaker A: They just go, go fuck yourself, Spawn. That's hilarious. They're just like, God damn it, Spawn. [00:38:55] Speaker B: Leave us alone. The one guy is, like, flipping spawn off directly, and the other guy in the back is just, like, flipping off the world. Yeah, he's like that, uh, that meme of, uh, the third place. Just, like, fucking, like, flipping everybody off, popping the champagne, drinking it straight from the bottle, pretty much. [00:39:15] Speaker A: Spawn doesn't take any of that shit. [00:39:17] Speaker B: Wrong answer. Meaning you're either cocky, stupid, or high. Maybe all three. They're feeling a little cocky, Johnny, if you know what I mean. [00:39:27] Speaker A: Spawn kicks him. He kicks him so hard, he vomits. [00:39:29] Speaker B: And then the other guy, who watches his friend get kicked so hard, he vomits, just, like. Does a real quick from the $40 grams. But he's got, like, a whole ass panel. And there's, like, 20 eyes in that sniff there. [00:39:45] Speaker A: He has a big old sniff. He does the whole gram. [00:39:48] Speaker B: Immediately afterwards, Al Simmons cuts off both his arms. [00:39:53] Speaker A: I know. Oh, boy, that's gonna be quite a trip. [00:40:00] Speaker B: Guy's like, oh, bleed to death. And Al Simmons says, yep. But do you want to lose your legs first too? [00:40:07] Speaker A: It's like, well, I mean, it doesn't really matter. [00:40:09] Speaker B: This is some hard negotiation tactic here, Johnny. Man. This makes. This makes a. You know, the reports of waterboarding seem mild in comparison. Yeah. [00:40:24] Speaker A: Just cutting arms off. [00:40:25] Speaker B: Yeah. Then while. While Al's continuing to threaten this man and to try to get some information out of him, he starts laughing. Laughing. Probably because he just snorted that whole gram of whatever it was. He's laughing. He's saying, he, he, he. And that's because during their kerfuffle here, a whole bunch of angels have snuck up on Al Simmons, and they are armed to the teeth. We got a. Yep, there's a cool. [00:40:51] Speaker A: One in a mask. [00:40:53] Speaker B: Yeah, it looks like it's a member of the court of Owls from Batman. We got kind of. Yeah, we got Henry Rollins with a mohawk there. Guy with some dreadlocks in the background. We got bald Guy with the mask who looks kind of like he belongs to. And the house of slaughter from something is killing the children. And then a dude with a, with a very, a very difficult to sharpen knife in the very front and says, we've been looking for you. [00:41:22] Speaker A: And then all hell just breaks loose. [00:41:23] Speaker B: He looks a little bit like Rob Halford from Judas Priest. Yeah. Yeah. They all, we get some Todd tactics. [00:41:29] Speaker A: Talk as they're fighting. [00:41:30] Speaker B: They all just like, all at once, they just jump on Aldoushen. [00:41:35] Speaker A: It's like the burly brawl in the matrix revolutions. [00:41:39] Speaker B: Trying to remain stealthy. I like how stealthy is in quotes. What do you mean? What do you mean? [00:41:44] Speaker A: He gives him Todd tactic talk. It's basically like they can't call for help. They can't use guns. They gotta use quiet weapons. Cause they had to leave guns behind. [00:41:52] Speaker B: Yeah, but that since they have to be so quiet, they basically know, a, they can't call out for help and b, that unless they made prior arrangements, no backup is gonna come. So there's, there's some, the outcome of. [00:42:06] Speaker A: The fight will be final. [00:42:08] Speaker B: There's some good, good. Some good back and forth, you know, Al kicking some people to the ground, some people are. And then dodging out of the way of a sword attack, but then getting put in a headlock and getting a couple of kicks done to him. And then eventually Rob Halford, guy is throwing his knife. [00:42:26] Speaker A: He gets spawned right in the back. [00:42:28] Speaker B: Right, right there. And then as, as Al's laying there on the ground, um, you know, they're trying to come at him with their axes and their, their spears. And they've got their weapons lifted above their heads. And Al takes the knife from his back and just gas right through the guy's head. Oh, boy. [00:42:50] Speaker A: Just down through the chin all the way through. [00:42:52] Speaker B: All the way through. And then the guy behind catches the other weapon. Yeah. The guy with the lance he takes or his spear. He takes the spear from the guy and hoists him by his own petard. Johnny, he stabs him with his own spear. Yep. [00:43:05] Speaker A: Stabs him. [00:43:06] Speaker B: Um, and then, and then as that is, uh, as that, as soon as that happens, somebody comes by with a sledgehammer and just John henrys him across the face. [00:43:15] Speaker A: Smacks him in the face. [00:43:17] Speaker B: Boy. Yeah, boy, that can't feel good at all. Um, and then, you know, Al runs away up a ladder to the roof. And there's people, like, shooting little tranquarts at him. And then once he gets to a spot that he can rest, he's just like, whew. [00:43:33] Speaker A: Whew. [00:43:34] Speaker B: Ah. And then the dude with the dreadlocks comes back, and he's like, ah, he forgot about me. [00:43:42] Speaker A: He's got some crazy angel armor. [00:43:44] Speaker B: Yeah, it's. It's real wild. And he's got, like, this serrated machete that. That looks so dangerous, Johnny. If. If I were to hold on to that machete for, like, 3 seconds, I would somehow end up with. With cuts all over my body. [00:44:03] Speaker A: Yes. [00:44:04] Speaker B: That is not something very dangerous. Al Simmons and this guy just, like, start duking it out, and then we immediately cut from action of fight to just this little poindexter guy sitting over a heap of robot stuff, poking around, doing one of the chin scratch, doing some welding, you know, trying to perfect his. Whatever he's doing. We're not sure what it is he's doing. We just know that he's trying to make it perfect. [00:44:37] Speaker A: I googled this guy, too, and I couldn't find anything. I don't know if he's a previous character or not. [00:44:41] Speaker B: Jeremy Stratton. [00:44:43] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:44:44] Speaker B: Yeah. I don't know either. [00:44:45] Speaker A: I googled Jeremy Stratton spawn. I couldn't find anything nice. [00:44:48] Speaker B: And then while he's. While he's in the middle of trying to perfect his. Whatever his. His thing is, his door just. His door is opened. Somebody says, jeremy. Oh, it's Al Simmons. Al Simmons says he needs Jeremy's help. [00:45:03] Speaker A: He's beat the hell. [00:45:04] Speaker B: Al Simmons is not looking very good. He's looking worse than monolith did on the COVID of his own comic book. Jenny, look. [00:45:12] Speaker A: Beat to hell. [00:45:13] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:45:13] Speaker A: His green necroplasm blood everywhere. [00:45:17] Speaker B: His cape, scarf is just shredded. He's obviously limping. He's only holding himself up by the fact that he is in a doorway. [00:45:29] Speaker A: And that's where we end it with spawn at a low position. [00:45:31] Speaker B: Yeah. And, Johnny, we got some spawning grounds. We got tamail bag Johnny. [00:45:36] Speaker A: Yep. [00:45:37] Speaker B: Uh huh. [00:45:38] Speaker A: First starts off with some art that Thomas Healy saw at the Phoenix fan. [00:45:42] Speaker B: Fusion that was given to him by an artist at Phoenix fan Fusion. [00:45:47] Speaker A: So, Chris, it's a classic cologne. [00:45:50] Speaker B: Yeah. Chris Rubsky. Rybsky Rubsky. [00:45:56] Speaker A: Rubsky. [00:45:57] Speaker B: Chris R. We'll call him Chris R. And it's the clown. But it's classic clown. It's too many teeth. Clown. Look at him. Got so many fucking teeth. [00:46:08] Speaker A: Tea holding a spawn pog or. What's he holding? [00:46:10] Speaker B: It looks like. [00:46:12] Speaker A: Is it a spawn button covered in blood? [00:46:14] Speaker B: It's it's. It's a spawn emblem that says spawn sucks. So I'm going to assume it's either a pog or a button. [00:46:22] Speaker A: Can't believe you can read that. Hey, man, you got great eyes. [00:46:26] Speaker B: That's a. That's what I. That's what I get for being the younger coach. [00:46:31] Speaker A: Yeah, sure. [00:46:32] Speaker B: I'm so much younger than you, Johnny. My eyes aren't as old as yours. [00:46:38] Speaker A: Then we get a letter from Adam M. Who's really impressed by issue 350. And I thought it was heart racing. So keep up the good work, he says. [00:46:46] Speaker B: And Thomas says, hell, yeah. This is good shit. Glad you like it. And then we. Then we get a longer leather, long for. Very long for contemporary letters page. [00:46:57] Speaker A: And this guy says he got into. His name is Matthew, and he got into spawn by collecting spawn pogs, spogs. [00:47:03] Speaker B: Hell yeah. [00:47:04] Speaker A: And basically, it's a story about how Todd McFarlane was super supportive of him when he saw him at the fan expo and told him to keep at it. So he came back and showed him some art and got him to sign it, and he told him to submit it to his editor. [00:47:17] Speaker B: Yeah. So I'm going to assume that the picture listed is the original art he did when he met Todd in the late nineties and not the piece that he brought back to show Todd that he had kept it up. And it was. [00:47:38] Speaker A: That's what I was thinking, too, was. [00:47:40] Speaker B: To be submitted for a cover, because, well, I mean, let's just say that probably, if they're going to put it in the letters page, they're probably not going to put it on the COVID with any real haste. So that's. That's a good sign. That's a good sign. I'm excited to see what Matthew's cover looks like. We're gonna have to keep our eyes focused on those cover artists and see if there are any. Matthews and Thomas Healy says this year is gonna be crazy. He's right. [00:48:08] Speaker A: He's right. It is crazy with Swan. [00:48:10] Speaker B: Yeah. It is an embarrassment of spawn riches. Need more spawns universe. Johnny. Hmm? [00:48:17] Speaker A: After today. [00:48:18] Speaker B: No, you're good. You're good for at least a week. [00:48:22] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:48:23] Speaker B: Well, the. [00:48:24] Speaker A: For those of you hear me complain the last few episodes, this is our second episode today. I love to complain. I love to drive David crazy keeping. [00:48:31] Speaker B: Them from Star wars outlaws. I get it. I get it. I understand. I'm trying to get you there. [00:48:37] Speaker A: We're getting close. We're getting close. [00:48:39] Speaker B: Then there's the image classics ad, and then Pacific Rim is our toy ad. [00:48:43] Speaker A: Again, nice comic included. [00:48:45] Speaker B: I wonder if it includes issue number three or if they just like the COVID of number three. But it could be. [00:48:51] Speaker A: That'd be funny. Just number three. [00:48:53] Speaker B: It's just a random, a random issue. Hey, man, sometimes random issues, tales from the drift. [00:48:58] Speaker A: So they're probably standalone. They're probably standalone if they're tails from. [00:49:04] Speaker B: The drift like the Star wars used to do something like that in the old days, Star wars tales. Tales. There was a, there was a Star wars tale by Garth Ennis and I, John McCrae, who, one of my favorite creative teams ever. They did hitman. They did a run on the demon for DC. They did a not appropriate for everybody series called dicks about just two irish wasteoids who are private detectives and they're very bad at it. Um, that's great. But, um, they also did one of those Star wars tales about. It was one of the stormtroopers that gets immediately killed upon entering the Hammerhead Corvette at the beginning of, uh, Star Wars 1977. Star Wars a new hope. There we go. Um, and like, he was, he was a, he was a nasty man. He was a yemenite badass as far as within the stormtroopers and, you know, kind of that, that. Very good at being a soldier. I had really no conscience kind of thing. And then fucking steps onto this. Steps onto this goddamn plane and Princess Leia shoots him right in the head. It was great. It was great. [00:50:31] Speaker A: That's awesome. [00:50:32] Speaker B: Yeah, I think it's, I think it's called the trooper. If you're looking for Star wars tales, I've got it around here somewhere. I can throw it at you sometime. But you know, man, Johnny, it's the dog days. You know, the dog days, the dry, the winding down. I guess the dog days are over, aren't they? Ooh, shit. [00:50:52] Speaker A: Dog days are over. [00:50:53] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, I guess we should probably rate them before they go too far. Don't, huh? Should rate those dog days. [00:50:59] Speaker A: Yeah. It's time to rate the puppies. First up we had the very dark and serious and violent misery. Number one. [00:51:10] Speaker B: This is, this is the dog that you have to separate from everybody else because it's a little, a little much for. [00:51:21] Speaker A: Yeah. Well, I mean, I love Simon Kardansky's art. [00:51:25] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:51:25] Speaker A: It could ran Simon Kraderansky's art. I think it's really good for this. And Sam and twitch, it just sells the ground levelness of it. [00:51:34] Speaker B: Yeah. It very possibly makes it so much heavier. Just this sort of very realistic, very gritty. Very. It's much easier to like, feel like this art is taken from real life than most comic book art. So it really sells that. The emotional stakes, I feel. [00:51:59] Speaker A: Yeah, it does. It's quite an emotional issue. It's got domestic violence. It's got, like, assault. [00:52:05] Speaker B: It's got. Getting run over by a car, some heavy stuff. [00:52:08] Speaker A: Getting run over by a car. [00:52:10] Speaker B: It's got. Yeah. [00:52:11] Speaker A: Spilling coffee on yourself, man. I like it. I think it's a good start to the story. It's just interesting. A different pace than a lot of the other books. I see Todd McFarland's, like, stretching himself, so that's good. And, you know, I've heard the other issues, but reading this, I was excited to see where it was gonna go. And kind of curious about how Cyan will tie into our ongoing spawn universe. So, like I said, I love the art. I'm gonna give it four pigeons out of five. [00:52:39] Speaker B: Ooh, nice. It's good. It's very good. This is. This kind of fucked up shit is the kind of shit that the toddfather is very good at writing. I wonder. I guess that means that a lot of. A lot of spawn isn't fucked up enough, which is kind of strange. But the toddfather is very good at writing fucked up shit. Like, especially fucked up shit that could reasonably happen. That's obviously his wheelhouse when it comes to writing. I don't know how you discover that that's what you're good at, but I'm glad that he did. There's a lot going on in this first issue as a miniseries. You don't want too much to go unanswered after a first issue. Just because it won't be much time to tie everything up. But I think it lays out a good level. There's a couple of. I'm not entirely exactly sure what way it's going to go there. There are a couple of ways that I think it could go. Which is. Which is good, because we don't want it to be too obvious. That's never any fun. Yeah. And the art. Art is excellent. I am gonna give it. I am also gonna give it four. I'm gonna give it. I'm gonna give it four Wanda Blakes on the Uber cab window. [00:54:05] Speaker A: Okay. On the Uber taxi. [00:54:08] Speaker B: It's. A. Cyan is missing her mom. But also this examination of, like, we've gotten a little bit. We've gotten a little bit of what Cyan's power is in that. That initial king spawn arc series. And it didn't seem anywhere near as bad as this. And it's good Lord, how they're going to make this a power that she can use for good is going to be. [00:54:39] Speaker A: I'm not sure how. [00:54:40] Speaker B: Yeah, man, that is. It's some heavy. It's some heavy shit. It's some heavy. [00:54:46] Speaker A: Some heavy shit for Swan. [00:54:47] Speaker B: Yeah, it's good, though. It's good, though. I'm enjoying it so far. The second. The second issue was pretty good, too. [00:54:53] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:54:55] Speaker B: Yeah. It'll be fun to see where it goes. [00:54:57] Speaker A: The next up we King Swan 35, which is Ireland. You know, like we were saying a couple weeks ago, I think that this style of King spawn story paired with Jason Sean Alexander works really well. I mean, obviously, he's good at the street level vampire stuff. I mean, that just makes sense with Philadelphia and everything. But I'm starting to get back into king spawn a little bit. Like, it just picked up a little bit when the artist changed. Not to say anything about Javier Fernandez. It's just he's better for that style of Sean Lewis that was, like, more grandiose and cosmic. [00:55:33] Speaker B: I agree with that. [00:55:34] Speaker A: And this works really well for where the story is now. I like this issue. It's fun. Like, you get the guy ripping his shirt off, you get a fun fight in the alley. Like, Jason Sean Alexander's art has a bit of whimsy to it. [00:55:47] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:55:48] Speaker A: Like, when he cuts the guy's arms off and, like, I don't know, it's just a little goofy, which was fun. [00:55:54] Speaker B: It's very weird because it's also a very gritty style. [00:55:58] Speaker A: I like how they're, like, punk, like, dark looking. It's not what you'd expect, but I like what Jason Sean Alexander did with the angels. [00:56:05] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:56:05] Speaker A: I'm gonna give it 4 grams. $40 grams. [00:56:09] Speaker B: Hmm. Four dollar, 40 grams. What do you think it could be? That was a $40 grams, because, I. [00:56:15] Speaker A: Mean, if you're going to sniffs it, it's got to be cocaine, right? [00:56:18] Speaker B: Yeah. Or. Yeah, I think that's mostly what you can sniff. I think you can. [00:56:23] Speaker A: That's a lot of cocaine, though. [00:56:24] Speaker B: I feel like that is a lot. That is a lot of cocaine. And I think a gram of cocaine would cost more than that. [00:56:30] Speaker A: Way more than $40. [00:56:31] Speaker B: Yeah, I think you could. I think certain kinds of meth you can snort, or either that, or you can snort all meth. This is. This is me not knowing about drugs. [00:56:43] Speaker A: Hey, it seems like we know a little more than the Todd father did with those prices. [00:56:46] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, if. Yeah, I think you can snort heroin, but I also think a gram of heroin would cost more than $40, but. [00:56:53] Speaker A: Yeah, also, if you store heroin, it's like what happens in pulp fiction. Like, it's bad. Like, it's, like, dangerous. [00:56:58] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, heroin, period. Kind of dangerous. [00:57:04] Speaker A: Yes, kind of dangerous. [00:57:06] Speaker B: Yeah. We've said before that sometimes spawn gets very heavy and you need a little bit of levity to help keep it going. And misery number one, we got the background. Sam and twitch. Just Sam being a messy boy. That. That helps because that issue was heavy. Lightens it up a little bit. Like you said, javi Fernandez's art is incredible, but isn't. I wouldn't call it full of levity, but Jason Sean Alexander's art is dark and creepy, but yet has more of that. That cartoony feel to it. So, yeah, it works, right? Well, I like it. This was. This was a good one. This is a good one. I'm also gonna give it four. I'm gonna give it four face skin, shoulder pads that this one bald angel has right here, the one with the axe. It's literally a face. It's a face that's been skinned off of a head. He just puts it on his shoulder. That's fucked up bad, dude. That's a real bad dude. [00:58:22] Speaker A: Yeah. Excited to see how long we got Jason Sean Alexander on there because it's really nice having him. [00:58:28] Speaker B: Yeah. When's killadelphia coming back? Maybe it's. I don't. I don't know. Well, speaking of good issues, Johnny, we should probably cover a couple of more good issues, you know, in about a week, don't you think? [00:58:41] Speaker A: Yeah, I think so. [00:58:42] Speaker B: I think so too. So I got two from the stack of new books here. We got next week, gunslinger number 33, Sami Twitch case files number four. Very exciting. We accidentally messed up our. Our flow by doing a Rhett city without a Sam and Twitch case file. Now we're just gonna. We just gotta deal with our decisions, Johnny. [00:59:08] Speaker A: Just gotta go with it. [00:59:09] Speaker B: Gotta go with it. So that'll be fun. That'll be fun. It'll be. It's another double McFarlane week. [00:59:15] Speaker A: Yep. [00:59:15] Speaker B: It'll be a good time, though. Very excited about that. That's gunslinger number 33. Seven. Twitch case files number four in between. [00:59:24] Speaker A: Now and then, if you wanna find some fun stuff on the Internet. [00:59:27] Speaker B: Yes, indeed. [00:59:28] Speaker A: We've got someone for you to follow in our weekly shoutout this. [00:59:32] Speaker B: This week. So this weekend I. We've gotten a little taste of their work at the back of King Spawn and the spawning grounds. It is so Chris Ryub, Chris Ribski and his Instagram handle is Chrisribsky art. That's c h r I s r y b s k I a r t. Kris Ribski art. And Johnny, this ain't the only bit of spawn art he does. [01:00:02] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, he's got a bunch. [01:00:03] Speaker B: He's got spun out the wazoo on this thing. Absolutely. It's some good shit. And he also, you know, he's doing. He's doing a lot of the things that we like to say to see a lot, you know, a lot of the other non spawn comic properties that we like. [01:00:19] Speaker A: We got leatherface. We got some evil dead. [01:00:21] Speaker B: He's got, if you scroll down far enough, he's got some pinhead. He's got, he's got Sam from trick or treat. [01:00:31] Speaker A: Nice. [01:00:32] Speaker B: He's got the crypt keeper. He's got, he's got Wednesday Adams. He's just got all manner of spooky shit going on here, and it's real good. You should definitely follow him. This shit is us. [01:00:42] Speaker A: Give him a follow. And while you're following him, make sure you give us a follow regarding spawnpod on Instagram. Drop us a line either there or at our email regardingspunpodmail.com. and if you want a question to be answered for this week, I would just say kind of like I did last week, where I asked how you thought of the new entry of Monolith. How do you think the new entry of misery, was it a little too serious for you? Do you like the kind of different direction? Or is it just what do you think of it? Because it is a little bit of an outlier in the spawns universe right now. So just curious what people thought. [01:01:20] Speaker B: Also a wild entry point if that's where you're going to enter spawns universe. A better entry point than monolith number one, I think. Yeah, because, like, if you don't know anything going into misery, that's fine. Most of the people are introduced in misery. [01:01:40] Speaker A: Right. [01:01:41] Speaker B: Overall, a better book, for sure. [01:01:44] Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. [01:01:45] Speaker B: But also, still just a wild place to start. Maybe don't start there. Maybe start somewhere else. But if you did start there. [01:01:53] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:01:53] Speaker B: What you think? Don't forget to listen to some Lonnie bones music. He does our music. He does his own music. Google Lonnie Bones. Lonnie with a y, not an ie. Lonnie Bones music. [01:02:06] Speaker A: And please remember to rate, review, and subscribe and let everyone know about the show. [01:02:11] Speaker B: Yep, maybe. [01:02:13] Speaker A: And all will be good. [01:02:14] Speaker B: Maybe put up some of those lost dog posters only said, have you, have you heard this podcast? Please call and then a number if you have. Man, we should put some of those posters up, Johnny. Or we could just go into the panera, go to the bulletin board and just stay. Have you heard this podcast poster? [01:02:38] Speaker A: That's grassroots. All right. [01:02:40] Speaker B: Do you have the little tabs with the regardingspawnpodmail.com on them? Send us your thoughts. Yeah, don't forget to tell people we live in. Well, we continue to be heard because you tell other people about it in the interests of getting Johnny to the Xbox expediently. [01:03:04] Speaker A: Mm hmm. [01:03:05] Speaker B: I have nothing more to say. But may this course be with you. [01:03:08] Speaker A: And also with you. [01:03:09] Speaker B: Hell yeah. [01:03:10] Speaker A: Hell yeah. Alright, I'm out of here. I'm gonna go all the way to canto bight and all the fun planets you can visit on Star wars, outlaws from Ubisoft, now on Xbox and PlayStation Five. Maybe we'll get a commercial money from that.