Issue 16: Superman and RadioShack

What happens when you combine two of the biggest brands of the early 1980s? You get RadioShack's TRS-80 Whiz Kids comics, with special guest stars from the DC Universe. Marvel at snarky teens sassing the Man of Steel, then laugh at how he makes them perform complex math with mediocre computers!

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Episode 16 Transcript

Mike: [00:00:00] I used to go into an office, and when I did that, I had a dog that everybody loved and I baked cookies every day.

Hello, hello, hello, welcome to Ten Cent Takes, the podcast where we sell out as superheroes, one issue at a time. My name is Mike Thompson and I am joined by my co-host, the talk show host of terror, Jessika Frazer.

Jessika: Bwahahaha! I like when you give me nicknames that are a little mischievous and/or villainous, by the way.

Mike: I mean, villains are always the most fun.

Jessika: They really are. They get to do all the cool shit. 

Mike: Yeah. You need a strong villain in order to have a good story.

Jessika: Absolutely. 

Mike: The purpose of this podcast is to look at notable moments in comic book history. [00:01:00] They can be big or they can be small, but we always hope that they're interesting, and we like to talk about them in ways that are both fun and informative.

Today, we are going to be going back back back to the eighties and talking about the time that Superman sold computers for Radio Shack.

Jessika: Fucking sellout. 

Mike: Man, I don't. Can you blame him though? I mean, he was a reporter, like he needed the extra cash.

Jessika: That's true. That does not pay all that much, from my understanding 

Mike: Uh, speaking as someone who worked as a journalist for a decade, I can tell you it does not. 

Jessika: Confirmed, everyone. 

Mike: Confirmed. Before you freak out and think that you've missed an episode or that things are airing out of order, we are actually still doing the Sandman book club series, but we have decided to break it up, so it's not just one giant slog for people who aren't interested in Sandman. So that way there's a little something for [00:02:00] everybody, even as we're doing that prolonged experience.

So every other episode will be the Sandman book club. Before we get to that though. What is one cool thing that you have read or watched recently?

Jessika: Just last night, I watched the first episode of the Amazon Prime, let me just say it's 18+, animated series, Invincible. 

Mike: Hmm. 

Jessika: Have you seen that yet? 

Mike: I haven't, I read the comic for a while and I really liked it, but then it just kind of felt very repetitive. And also, I didn't like how the comic got very women in refrigerator-y.

Jessika: Oh, okay, fair enough. 

Mike: Like yeah. Um, I hear it's great. I just, it's kind of, it's kind of like The Boys where like, I read the comic and, and then when they announced they were making a TV [00:03:00] show, I went, eh don't know. I like, I'm not sure. I really want to see that translated to the screen and then it was great. And so I'm sure that Invisible will be great.

Jessika: I will be talking about The Boys later, in fact. 

Mike: Oh okay. Well, then.

Jessika: But for now, yeah, I know, spoilers. So for those of you who hadn't seen it yet, it's about a teenage boy whose father is a famous superhero and the kid himself has also potentially expected to get powers, which he, not spoiling anything, he does, and very early on in this episode.

And when this happens, his father starts teaching them how to use them properly, even though he seems a little disappointed, even, that his really did have powers, which was kind of strange, but we'll see where that goes. But what I really liked about this series, is that they make fun of our well-known superheroes with a character like Batman and one that's very much like Wonder Woman, et cetera.

And again, I don't want to give too much away, but the ending is [00:04:00] super intense, and I'll definitely be watching more of it tonight after we've finished recording this. 

Mike: Yeah. And I will say that the comic itself has moments that are shockingly intense too. And it's really interesting because there are these moments that feel very wholesome and playful, and then there are other scenes that are complete 180 and it's really, it's kind of whiplash. 

Jessika: That was how it felt in the show as well. So I mean, that translated definitely. 

Mike: Yeah, it's one thing that's actually really neat is that it's the guy who wrote the comic, Robert Kirkman, is also the guy who created the walking dead. 

Jessika: Hm. 

Mike: So, you know, dude knows how to write a hit. 

Jessika: Yeah.I guess so, huh.

Mike: Yeah.

Jessika: Well, what about you? What have you been reading or watching? 

Mike: You mentioned a couple of weeks ago that you had read the first issue of a series called Die, by Kieron Gillen. 

Jessika: Yeah. 

Mike: I'd heard about it. I thought it looked [00:05:00] interesting. And then you mentioning that, threw it back on my radar, and so I found the first three volumes on Hoopla and I wound up bingeing through all of them in a couple of hours.

And it's really good. I really like how it matches up a bunch of D & D tropes along with other things. And I just, I really, really enjoyed it. And so I want to say thank you for putting that on my radar.

Jessika: Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, absolutely. You're welcome. And I'll have to go on Hoopla and check out more myself because I'd been wanting to, I just haven't gotten around to it yet. 

Mike: No, shall we, uh, shall we mosey along? 

Jessika: Mosey let's do it. 

Mike: What do you remember about Radio Shack when you were growing up?

Jessika: Good old Radio Shack. Radio Shack was huge, when I was growing up.

It was [00:06:00] definitely a household name and it had a reputation that it carried most electronics related items that you may want or need to purchase. So just on my memory block here in particular, they used to carry a radio that was pretty easy to alter, to be a scanning radio, to use for ghost hunting.

And for a while, it was a great cheap alternative to buying something made for that purpose. And it was priced really low and like affordable versus like buying something that was made for that purpose. 

Mike: Mm.

Jessika: And I’ve trying to find one of those radios for years now, but honestly, it's probably a dead end at this point, and I should just pony up the money to buy actual ghost hunting equipment. I mean, honestly, I should probably, if I want it, like I'm a full ass adult, I can afford the expensive things, maybe. 

Mike: We have credit cards now, Jessika.

Jessika: Just charge it.I say I can afford the expensive things, like I really can, which isn't actually true. 

Mike: All right.[00:07:00] 

Jessika: I can afford the mid-level things. 

Mike: Yeah. I dunno. We used to have money and then we got air conditioning, and we're poor now.

Jessika: I'm safe. I'm squirreling it away, man. Trying to buy a house, it's expensive. 

Mike: Yeah. Especially where we live.

Jessika: I don't recommend it. Folks. 

Mike: Yeah, no, just.

Jessika: Just stay away. 

Mike: Yeah. Welcome to the Bay Area. The dystopian capitalist apocalypse.

Jessika: Everything is overpriced, and on fire. 

Mike: We're not making this up. Everything is literally on fire these days. 

And, and over priced, but that's just California in general. Yeah. Well, I mean, I had a similar experience to you, in different ways, but like, you know, it was the same brand awareness of Radio Shack. I didn't realize until I was doing the research for this episode, that Radio Shack is actually a hundred years old [00:08:00] as of this year.

Jessika: What? How?

Mike: Yeah. It was founded in 1921 by these two brothers, Theodore and Milton Deutchman. They set up a mail order business and a single retail location that was focused on providing parts for ham radio, which was a field that was still pretty new back then. And they wound up doing pretty well for a while, but they basically were bankrupt by the early 1960s. But you know, like 40 years is not a bad run.

Jessika: Yeah. 

Mike: And then they got acquired by the Tandy corporation in 1960 for $300,000. Up until this point, Tandy had been this leather goods company and they were looking to basically get into the business of appealing to hobbyists, which they felt Radio Shack would be able to do.

So, in order to do this, Tandy basically performed a complete overhaul of the unprofitable company it had just acquired, and the Wikipedia page has a really solid [00:09:00] summary of what happened.

Jessika: Tandy closed Radio Shack's unprofitable mail order business, ended credit purchases, and eliminated many top management positions eating the salespeople, merchandisers and advertisers. The number of items carried was cut from 40,000 to 2,500, as Tandy sought to identify the 20% that represents the 80% of sales and replaced Radio Shacks handful of large stores with many little holes in the wall, large numbers of rented locations, which were easier to close and reopen elsewhere if one location didn't work out. 

Mike: Yeah. So basically they were just going for a strategy that made Radio Shack into a much leaner, more nimble operation, which that's like the goal these days, those are kind of the golden buzzwords, but they were actually trying to do that. Charles D. Tandy, who was the guy who actually ran Tandy corporation back then, said that they were [00:10:00] basically not looking for the guy anymore, who wanted to spend his entire paycheck on the sound system, and instead they were looking for customers who wanted to save money by buying cheaper goods and then like improving them through modifications and accessories.

So now they were really appealing towards nerds, and aiming at kids who are going to like work on stuff for the science fairs. And honestly it, it worked. I mean, when I was growing up Radio Shack was that store you went to, when you needed some small part a replacement, there was always one nearby.

And even if they didn't have a name brand part, they usually had an off-brand version of whatever you needed. And, I never went there thinking that it was going to break the bank. It was always a fairly affordable thing.

Jessika: Yeah. Agreed. I can think of like four different locations where they had a Radio Shack, just like in our area here. 

Mike: Yeah. And I mean, like, I grew up in San Francisco in the eighties, and they were all over the place.[00:11:00] 

So now, what's interesting is that the whole rise of personal computers happened to coincide with this period of success for Radio Shack.

The late seventies was when personal computers with microprocessors started to actually be a thing on the consumer market, but typically if you wanted one, you had to build them from a kit. Like you, you physically had to, like, buy the kit and then assemble it, following the instructions, which, I mean, I'm not going to lie. That is terrifying to me.

Jessika: That is terrifying. And it's total nerd shit too. They were right. 

Mike: Right. Fucking nerds.

Jessika: Nerd bait.

Mike: Radio Shack actually wound up introducing the TRS 80 in 1977. And it was a game changer for the company because it was one of the first pre-built computers. And it was simultaneously backed by a national retail chain. 

It was this super basic computer that sold for $600, which adjusting for inflation is like $2,700 nowadays. [00:12:00] 

Jessika: Holy shit. There's no way. There's no way the average family is like, let's get one of those right away.

Mike: No, it was, I mean, you know, this was for people who were super enthusiast, or had a lot of disposable income, which the middle-class used to have back then. 

Jessika: Different times. 

Mike: The salad days. But yeah, so the TRS 80, even though it had a fairly high price point sold like hotcakes, like gangbusters. I found this book and it's called, Priming the Pump: How the TRS 80 Enthusiast Helped Spark the PC Revolution, by Teresa Welsh and David Welsh. It has this really interesting history about that point in time, which, I mean, I'm not going to lie,

I was waiting for her to be really dry, but it's full of a lot of really personal stories and anecdotes and it's cool, I really dug it. Basically, when they started manufacturing this computer, they were only expecting to sell 50,000 units. There's this great quote, talking about how [00:13:00] much of a surprise the first TRS computer sales were.

Jessika: Both Charles Tandy and John Roach may have been skeptical about such a large. But it turned out to be an underestimation. When the first anniversary of the products came, the company found the, had sold many more than the prediction and taken a whopping 250,000 orders for TRS eighties. Most of them still undelivered. Actually we've seen various numbers in different sources, so we can't verify this number, but they certainly sold considerably more than 50,000. Don French said they received a number of threatening phone calls from people who demanded delivery of their TRS 80 right away. Ooh!

Mike: Yeah, so after this huge success, they then ended up following the TRS 80 with the TRS 80 Color in 1980. And basically the first TRS computer was kind of like a full, complete unit with a built-in monitor and everything. [00:14:00] The TRS 80 Color, in turn, was just the computer itself, and then you would plug in a color TV instead of using this built-in monitor. The TRS computers wound up selling well enough that Radio Shack really leaned hard into the computer business, and they even started offering computer camps for pre-teens in the early eighties, which was kind of an extension of that mission that they wanted to appeal to kids who wanted to excel at science fairs, because I mean, you know, those were the new nerds. So if you want to learn more about the TRS computers, by the way, there's this really great site called MatthewReadsTRS80.org.

That helped me kind of learn about a lot of this stuff. I'll put it in the show notes, but it's really kind of an interesting walk-through, this particular venue of history. Anyway, this was the high point for Radio Shack, to be perfectly honest. By September of 1982, the company had more than 4,300 stores just in America and [00:15:00] more than 2,000 independent franchises and towns that were not large enough to have a company owned store. So, for comparison, there are fewer GameStops worldwide today than there were Radio Shacks in the early eighties. 

Jessika: Wow. 

Mike: Like, I realized that GameStop has been having a rough go of it lately, but there's still a lot of them around.

Jessika: Yeah. Huh.

Mike: And during this period of unmitigated success, that's when the Whizkid's started to show up in comic books. The early eighties were right around the time when computers were starting to get a lot of prominent, you know, quote unquote roles in media. If you're listening to this and you want to learn more, there is a site dedicated to media prominently featuring computers and storylines, and it's called Starring the Computer, that tracks stuff like this all the way back to the fifties. It's an incomplete list, but it's really interesting, and they have a whole section devoted to Tandy computers.[00:16:00] Like, I remember there was an episode of Murder, She Wrote very early on where she moves to New York and there's this whole plot about how she's gotten a computer to write her novels on.

And then evidence is falsified with a modem. It's really interesting. And you know, the computer was this suddenly viable object that could play a part in people's everyday lives and could serve as a driving narrative device. But as far as I can tell the first time anyone made comics specifically focusing on educating people about personal computers was when Radio Shack started to do these comic books.

And I think that's just because it was such a new thing, especially on the personal consumer market, because, you know, up until recently computers had been these huge things that took up buildings on their own. 

Jessika: Yeah. And they had to be, like cooled, professionally, and I mean, it was just this whole thing. 

Mike: Yeah. I mean, there [00:17:00] is a movie right now on Disney plus called The Computer That Wore Tennis Shoes. 

Jessika: Oh, yeah!

Mike: A very early Kurt Russell, and it's one of those things where the whole he's in college and he winds up getting shocked, I think, and there's this whole thing, this computer gets basically downloaded into him. So he has the processing power and knowledge of this computer, but they show you the computer and it like, it is a giant monstrosity of a thing that takes up, I think, an entire lab. 

Jessika: It does. I remember that movie.

Mike: And I mean, our phones, these days are more powerful than those. So RadioShack started making comics in 1971. They were putting out a series of educational comics called the science fair story of electronics via the Radio Shack education comic book program. But, then in 1980, they pivoted and they started giving away these new comics in stores.

You could also, [00:18:00] if you were a teacher, you could send in a request to Radio Shack on school letterhead and get a free pack of 50. 

Jessika: Oh, wow.

Mike: And yeah, like, you know, they were really pushing that hard because these comics were educational, but they were also advertisements. 

Jessika: Very much so. Oh, that was something I messaged you earlier,  was like, wow. I was reading just an ad there, wasn’t I? 

Mike: But, I mean, I will say they were, they were educational. 

Jessika: Yeah, absolutely. 

Mike: Yeah, so the Superman Radio Shack giveaway comics starred the aforementioned Whiz Kids, Alec and Shanna, along with their teacher Mrs. Wilson, but for the first three issues, which were published in 1980, 81 and 82, they also starred Superman and other characters from the DC Universe. 

Jessika: I need to correct you for a second, because you said Mrs. Wilson, and it definitely was Ms. Wilson. 

Mike: Oh, I'm sorry. That's right. 

Jessika: It was Ms. Wilson, and I think that will come into play [00:19:00] later. 

Mike: That is true. She did not have a ring on her finger.

Jessika: She did not. She looked a little close to all the superheroes that waltzed right up in there, half naked into her classroom. 

Mike: I mean, can ya blame her?

Jessika: No, she was hot too. 

Mike: Right? We're going to talk about each of these specific issues, but first up is the Computer That Saved Metropolis, which was published in July of 1980. So, even though this was a promotional giveaway, DC committed some pretty serious talent to the book. The first two issues were written by Cary Bates, who was this long-term writer for DC.

He wrote a ton of action comics, Superman, and the New Adventures of Superboy, as well as being the head script writer for the live action Superboy series in the 1980s that we discussed a couple episodes back. 

Jessika: Totally.

Mike: He also worked as a script writer for various cartoons, including Gem and Gargoyles. 

Jessika: Oh, hell yeah. 

Mike: Right. [00:20:00] But then also his name might sound familiar to some people listening to the show because we mentioned him on the New Guardians episode where, it turns out he wrote issues two through 12 of the New Guardians.

The art for this issue, meanwhile, was handled by Jim Starlin and Dick Giordano. Both of them are pretty big deals too. Starlin became a big name in comics during the seventies. He garnered a lot of acclaim for his cosmic space opera stories. He co-created characters like Shang-Chi and Thanos.

Giordano in turn was an artist who had recently come back to DC comics and was serving as the Batman editor at the time. He actually got promoted shortly after this to be the company's managing editor in 1981. And then he was promoted again to executive editor in 83, and then he stayed with the company until the mid nineties when he retired, after his wife died.

And then, aside from being a giveaway issue, this comic actually ran as a backup story in the July, 1980 ssues for Action [00:21:00] Comics, Legion of Superheroes, House of Mystery and Superboy. So Superman schilling Radio Shack computers, and forcing children to perform complex math for him, and definitely, probably schtupping Ms. Wilson, like, I think we need to agree that, that those two totally smashed.

Jessika: Oh, absolutely. And I have my theories about her and Supergirl as well. 

Mike: Yeah. Yeah. 

Jessika: They had a moment. 

Mike: Right?

Jessika: We both took the same picture of that same shot and I sent it to you and you were like, no way.

Mike: I thought that was so funny. 

Jessika: Don't worry, we’ll post that one. 

Mike: I, oh God. Like, I just, that was great. It was like great minds think alike. But yeah, all of this is officially a canon part of DC comics lore, which is wild. Like [00:22:00] 

Jessika: It's bat shit bananas. 

Mike: Yeah. Now weirdly it looks like this is the only issue that actually made it into other DC comics. So, you know, the other two or their own standalone things. And aren't officially cannon, I guess.

All right. How would you describe the 1980 issue? The Computers That Saved Metropolis?

Jessika: Well, these were like both very advertisey and complex at the same time in their narrative, which was interesting. So, this first one, I'm going to give you a little bit of backstory about these bitches. I say these bitches, because I'm going to be talking about a whole classroom full of children. So I obviously really like children. I have a bachelor's in French and everyone's like, you should teach. And I'm like, no, I shouldn't. 

Mike: Oh, oh no. Let's talk about that for a sec. I majored in history my first time through college, and everyone also said I should teach. And I was like, I fucking hate [00:23:00] children. I worked at Disneyland it poisoned me again. And don't get me wrong. I have, I have two stepchildren now. I love them. I would die for them.

They're great. But kids in general, not a fan. They're sociopathic little monsters.

Jessika: Mm hmm. So the comic starts off with Superman doing patrols around Metropolis, and apparently he just does that. And he just jets off to a sixth grade classroom at the whim of Ms. Wilson. 

Mike: I have my own theory about this.

Jessika: Oh my goodness. He's supposed to be a guest teacher about computers, apparently. Like, First of all, for some reason, along with his super abilities, he's also a super computer genius. And is he accredited? Like is he allowed to be teaching students? 

Mike: No. Okay. There, there are two things to discuss here. So you have [00:24:00] to remember that Superman from the Golden Age through the modern age was largely a weird sci-fi series where the main character was this alien who had all these powers that constantly changed. There wasn't really any editorial control until they streamlined it with Crisis on Infinite Earths.

But on top of that, he was generally shown to be an amazing genius, like just whenever they needed it. But ,he built the Superman robots. He. I can't remember if he made the Phantom Zone Projector or if the Phantom Zone Projector was on artifact from Krypton, he was constantly trying to restore the city of Kandor, which was basically shrunk down to the size of a bottle, and it was a Kryptonian city, to restore it to its full size. Like in that issue of Super Boy, we read, he like put all those chemicals together and created the pools that granted the dogs, various powers. 

Jessika: Yeah, no, I guess you're, I guess he's always been [00:25:00] smart. 

Mike: Yeah. But then the other thing is that Superman is a little bit too earnest in this issue. Like, he shows up exactly on time. And then he is clearly trying to impress these kids to make a good impression with Ms. Wilson. And everything about this reeks of a dude who had a one night stand and is now desperate to hook up again.

So what he's doing is he's trying to prove that A) he is reliable and B) he is good with kids.

Jessika: Yep. No, that's totally how it felt. 

Mike: I'm not speaking from experience.

Jessika: Oh, so anyway, Superman creepily knows all the students' names, I guess, because he used his x-ray vision to look at the teacher's seating chart, even though that's not how x-rays work. That's always bothered me. I'm sorry, we don't have time for this. 

Mike: [00:26:00] Thomas Edison would like a word.

Jessika: Seriously. Also, I have to mention that the whole class was bored as fuck even after Sups flew in. And I don't know about you, but every kid I knew, wanted to know about computers and have a turn on the computer when we got them in the library at school or when someone got one at home. 

Mike: Oh, yeah.

Jessika: So the idea that one of the kids in his class is being dismissive of the whole idea of not doing normal schoolwork and just doing computer class instead with fucking Superman of all people. It's just ridiculous. 

Mike: Oh yeah. And that kid actively shit talked Superman repeatedly. 

Jessika: Oh, he’s a shit heal. Oh. And he still gets to be the fucking like, protagonist. Fuck.

Mike: Oh, it was so funny. I like, my favorite was when he beats Superman at a math problem later on and like the shit talking starts immediately, and I'm like, my dude, this is possibly not a good move to irritate a guy who could literally vaporize you with a [00:27:00] glare.

Jessika: That's just it. That is just it. Yeah. No. Why would you try to piss this guy off? And then Shanna's like, Ooh, Superman. You better tell him. I was like, dude, Shanna, you, you need to shut the fuck up immediately and not goad this situation. 

Mike: You know, that was probably the most realistic part of this entire comic, because speaking as someone that lives with an 11 year old, they are shit stirrers.

Jessika: Oh my gosh. So, Supes takes the kids up to the roof because of course he does, and he proceeds to give the class some very long-winded exposition about the history of computers and their size and what they do and how they've evolved from the first computers, and moving into how they're used in society today from space travel to transistor radios, which what a time capsule of a callout. 

Mike: [00:28:00] Yeah.

Jessika: This whole thing was a whole time capsule. 

Mike: Yeah. Very much is.

Jessika: Of course, there was also some lovely product placement throughout and some not-so-subtle comments on affordability versus common household items. Tangent that always cracked me up to say, this computer is less expensive than a TV. Well, okay, but maybe I need a TV and I don't need a computer. They do vastly different things, or they did at that point. 

Mike: Yeah.

Jessika: It kind of reminds me of saying like this China set costs less than a month of gross. Okay, well, I need to eat and I don't necessarily need a China set, so. 

Mike: Yeah, I mean, he was hard selling those kids.

Jessika: Oh yeah. He was like, you should ask your parents to go out and buy you one. 

Mike: Yup.

Jessika: So, of course, Supes hears with his super hearing a tornado and he like jets the fuck out of there. And, he defeats it by [00:29:00] blowing the wind or something like that. And then he feels all sick and shit, and comes across a villain named Major Disaster who, you know, just as his name implies, causes quote unquote natural disasters like there's floods and shit. It was a little ridiculous. 

Mike: Yeah, he was always kind of like a C- to D-list villain who would use weapons and equipment to make natural disasters. My knowledge of this character is hazy at best, but I think eventually he gained the ability to manipulate probability. He didn't appear a lot and he's been dead for a while, I think. Cause I remember him showing up as a zombie in Blackest Night.

Jessika: Oh. 

Mike: But, I mean, I remember reading this stuff and I was like, this is kind of a cool, like off-the-wall villain. I dig him. You know, I certainly liked them a lot better than other villains that I've seen in Superman books where it's like, you know, generic alien warlord number five.

Jessika: Seriously. Well, and when I read the name, Major Disaster, I was like, [00:30:00] same, girl. So, of course Superman needs the help of these children that he like, makes them perform these, like, high-stress situational calculations on the computer for him. Instead of like asking the adult he's banging in the room.

Mike: I mean.

Jessika: Honestly, come on, like, get the adults involved, like, Alec and Shanna don't need to save the day. They're supposed to be in sixth grade, even though they look way older than that.

Mike: Like, yeah, they looked like kind of like eighth or ninth graders. Like they were a little bit older, it seemed. 

Jessika: The second one, they looked older than that, they looked like they were teenagers in the second one, for some reason, I was like, what's that? And then the third one, they got young again. And I was like, I don't know what's happening with you guys, but.

Mike: Yeah. I mean, I will say that I was willing to believe that Alec was in sixth grade just because he had that awful fucking bowl haircut that like. 

Jessika: My brother had that. 

Mike: Right. Yeah. But [00:31:00] when did he stop having it?

Jessika: No, no, you're right. Probably after he was like in, probably after middle school. 

Mike: Yeah. It's, you know, it's that thing where suddenly you realize, oh, I can go to a barber instead of having my parents cut my hair. 

Jessika: Oh. So the kids basically do a bunch of calculations, and they double check each other's work by doing the same calculation on two separate computers that Supes and flown in prior and just left there. Apparently. 

Mike: Yeah. And there's a whole thing about how Major Disaster had knocked out all the other computers in town, but he didn't know about these two personal computers because personal computers were a new thing. And that's the other reason that they're the ones who were performing the calculations and then they're on radio headsets with Superman providing this information.

Jessika: I still say you're in a school that has way more adults than just the one standing in that room, and even that one's not involved. So.

Mike: I mean, well, and the other thing is that the math equations that he's throwing at them are like this jet is falling out of the sky at this speed. [00:32:00] The wind is this fast. They're going at this angle. How fast do I need to go to catch them without doing damage to the plane or the people inside. And it's like, first of all, of course, yes, as you said, it's high stress, but second, like I still don't know how to do that math equation. I don't know how these sixth graders did because they looked like they were in a pretty shitty school that Superman made worse at one point when he liked tunneled up through the floor and just left a giant hole.

Jessika: He was like, I'll fix that later. 

Mike: Sure you will, sure you will, Clark.

Jessika: It's awful. Uh. So he finally of course finds the villain, defeats him, whatever. Then the kids are hailed as heroes and as a reward, I guess they get to be at a Radio Shack commercial about the computers they used. I mean, cool. I guess. 

Mike: Yeah. It was kind of a, a, meh ending, but, but yeah. Like, I dunno. Did you [00:33:00] like the issue overall? I'm curious.

Jessika: It got really in the weeds playing up the computer aspects, which okay. I get it. You know, again, I get it. This is an advertisement, but dude, snooze fest, I put it down a few times and had to pick it back up, during those computer exposition parts. And you know, I'm slightly bothered by a vague plot line, but all in all, like it was, it was fine. 

Mike: Yeah.

Jessika: To use your line. 

Mike: Yeah. I mean, reading through it, some of the computer history stuff I thought was actually pretty interesting 

Jessika: Yeah. Yeah. 

Mike: Like, when they went up on the roof and he was saying, you know, so the space that we're sending in actually is the size of what computers used to fill. And yeah, it does get a little too in the weeds because they're trying to get a little too much exposition in there at the same time. I felt like overall it walked a relatively fine line of providing action that was kind of [00:34:00] interesting. And, and the plot line of, oh, well, yeah, his powers were on the fritz because there was microscopic kryptonite particles in the tornado and he inhaled them when he was getting ready to blow it out.

Like, I thought that actually was surprisingly well thought out for basically a licensed advertisement. You know, this was, this was effectively a full length version of one of those like hostess, Twinkies ads that they used to do. 

Jessika: Right? 

Mike: Yeah. But like, I didn't hate it. I found it charming.

Jessika: It had its moments. 

Mike: Yeah. I'm not going to lie, I found the undeniable sexual attention between Superman and the kid's teacher really entertaining.

Jessika: Yeah, definitely it was palpable. I thought it was even funnier too, that the kids were even, like Ms. Wilson, how do you know Superman? 

Mike: And she doesn’t answer!

Jessika: And she was like, She like side eyes.[00:35:00] How do I know Superman?…Biblically. 

Mike: Well, and that was the funny thing was when we were talking about this ahead of the episode, I was like, so yeah, they, they totally smashed, right? Like, like that's not up for debate.

Jessika: No, it's really not. It happened. 

Mike: All right. let's move on to the next issue. So. Clearly, this was a successful marketing tool because in 1981, DC and Radio Shack released a brand new book that was called Victory By Computer. So this time the main story was illustrated by a couple of legendary artists.

There was Curt Swan and Vince Colletta. Coletta started as an artist and anchor from the Silver Age of comics. He frequently collaborated with Jack Kirby who is known as, you know, the king of comic books, and a lot of folks considered their run on Thor to be the definitive take on the character. 

Kurt Swan's involvement, on the other hand, is especially noteworthy. [00:36:00] He is considered by many comic book artists to be the Superman artist. He started penciling Superman and Superboy comics in the late forties. And he didn't stop until DC put them out to pasture in the mid eighties because they were rebooting Superman via Crisis on Infinite Earths. 

Arlen Schumer, who's this major comic book historian, says Swan penciled over 19,000 covers and pages of interior art for Superman comics. 

Jessika: Whoa!

Mike: Yeah. Like again, they were putting some serious talent behind these books.

Jessika: They were pumping out a lot of content, to be fair. 

Mike: Yeah. How would you summarize Victory By Computer?

Jessika: We find ourselves, yet again at the elementary school, I put in heavy quotations of kids that look like they're about 17 years old, this issue. So Shanna and smartass Alec are back at it. This time, Supergirl joins the class to [00:37:00] teach them about the pocket computer. What a fucking throwback. 

Mike: Like, that's something that we need to explain. Like the pocket computer was, basically kind of like a smart calculator that could perform basic functions and had a little keyboard in there. And I don't know how much they sold for, but they couldn't have been cheap.

Jessika: I can't imagine so, yeah. Well, and by the way, at this point in the scene where Supergirl pulls out, her pocket computer, she pulls out of a pocket on her cape. So canonically, there are pockets in the capes.

Mike: Yeah. They can't get them on the rest of their costume, but they can get them in their capes. 

Jessika: Which means that there's just stuff like weighing down the cape, so it shouldn't even be moving like it does. 

Mike: I remember in an early issue of Superman, the eighties series that John Byrne was doing, there is a bit where he stops by a balloon vendor because he's got a drone pursuing him and he winds up like [00:38:00] thinking, oh, it's lucky that I always carry a few spare dollars in like my belt buckle because he had that yellow belt back then, which side note I miss the yellow belt.

I don't know if it's back, cause I haven't read any Superman comics for a while, but they got rid of it for quite some time. Like, I mean, you know, it's the Henry Cavill look now or it's the full blue suit. I miss the red trunks in the yellow belt.

Jessika: Yeah. the good old days.

Mike: Yeah.

Jessika: So Supergirl decides to use her super powers to show the class they are able to find information on the TRS 80’s as fast as she was able to find it, like physically with her super powers looking for it. And it was like, okay, sure. 

Mike: Yeah. 

Jessika: When an odd comparison, but fine. 

Mike: Yeah, it was really weird, there was a bit where they, like, it almost felt like they were hacking into the newsfeed of, I think the Daily Planet to get headlines, even though I'm sorry, but like, come on really, you think that a [00:39:00] print journalistic outlet is going to have top of the line technology back then come on.

Jessika: No they're not putting any of that into a computer. They're still handwriting everything. 

Mike: Yes. I think back then they were still using, the electric typewriter that had like the built-in, it was quote unquote memory, but it was, you know, not really.

Jessika: Not as we know it now, at least. And there was some definite sexual tension with Ms. Wilson at Supergirl as well. We will post the picture. Um. 

Mike: Right. It's this whole bit where Supergirl is like, oh, don't worry. I'm a school teacher in my secret identity. And I'm like, I don't know. Like, Are you just trying to impress her with this? What's the end goal of revealing this crucial information about your secret identity, Supergirl?

Jessika: I know, right. She's just trying to connect with another human. She's like I'm also a school teacher. We should talk about it over dinner sometime. 

Mike: And then maybe move in together after three weeks of dating, and adopt three cats.

Jessika: Oh, my gosh. So, Super girl basically [00:40:00] teaches the class and then she I'll bet she just left those fucking pocket computers too, because you know, just like Superman just left the computers there. He was like, have fun kids. 

Mike: Okay. Yeah, but here's the thing, like, you really think that some middle school kids or elementary school kids, however old they fucking are. You really think that they're going to sit there and try to steal the computers that the literal alien gods from other planets dropped off and taught them about?

Jessika: Oh, I'm not, I'm not worried. Oh, that's funny. Yeah, no, I'm not worried about them stealing it. I'm just like Superman just apparently has like the extra spending cash that he can just like drop off two computers to a school and just like fuck off. Like really? 

Mike: No, I mean, I, I viewed it the other way of just like, they're like, they're not worried about it. They're like, yeah. We'll, we'll get those back. Don't worry. 

Jessika: Oh, so Supergirl apparently gets asked to go on [00:41:00] patrol by Superman and she spots something fishy. And so she goes to check it out, but it was a trap, of course.

Mike: Yeah, but I mean, it wasn't even a very good trap.

Jessika: Is a stupid trap. It was like, if you're a superhero and you happen to get curious, because you happen to be going near this location, maybe. And she like fell right into maybe a four foot by four foot hole in the ground.

So I'm not really sure how that worked either. They just were like, nah, she's going to fall right here. 

Mike: Yeah. Like she fell through the skylight after getting hit with like a blast of red sun radiation, or whatever it is. 

Jessika: You know what it was, they used their TRS 80 to calculate where she was going to fall. So she gets stuck in what's basically like, it's like a lounge. It's like somebody's living room, and they have a computer there with a phone. So it's like, they weren't even trying that hard to keep her [00:42:00] there. 

Mike: No, it was, it was absolutely the, like what a seventies swinger house looks like in all the movies that we see now where you're just like, oh, oh, okay.

Jessika: It basically had a conversation pit. 

Mike: Yeah.

Jessika: Yeah. So of course, she remembers the phone number from Ms. Wilson's classroom.

Mike: Yeah, because the rotary phone had the phone number printed on the front of it, because that was a thing that used to happen.

Jessika: I feel like that's a little more explaining than she needed to give. I think she is making up for the fact that she just knows that number by heart. 

Mike: I was going to say, I think she really wanted to get Mrs. Wilson's phone number, and then it just happened to actually be helpful in a way other than getting her a date.

Jessika: Gosh, Ms. Wilson, man. And canonically bisexual? Question mark?

Mike: I don't see why not. I think we can, I think we can [00:43:00] officially declare it.

Jessika: Someone's going to @ us, I hope they do. So at any rate, she gets in touch with the class. She makes them do all these weird wacky calculations, has some get in touch with Superman. And by the time Superman gets there, like she's gotten out of it because she also used the computer to find out that there were like underground tunnels. And so she's like, I'll just walk out of these tunnels. 

Mike: Yeah, basically it turns out it was like an old mob hide out and the students were able to look up some articles, which again, like, I don't know, because I was born in 81 and I don't have a good idea of what computer and internet adjacent technology was like back then. But they apparently look up articles about this hideout that got busted and they learned from the articles that there were underground tunnels that. Whatever, it was dumb, they don't even show her getting out. It was dumb.

Jessika: No, she's just like walking out afterwards and Superman’s, like, [00:44:00] oh, I was here to save you. And she's like, I just took the tunnels dude. And then like the bad guys are just, they just happened to be driving by. So they were like, well, let's just go get the bad guys. What do you think? It looks like, oh those are Lex Luther's dudes. Let's just go get the bad guys. 

Mike: Yeah. And there's a whole thing where like, Lex Luther has announced from jail that like Superman is going to break him out and it's a much looser plot than the first issue was. Like the first issue, there was like, I felt like a much tighter story, you know, in between the educational bits, this one, it felt like they were kind of stretching to figure out a way to connect all this stuff.

Jessika: For sure. Yes.

Mike: Yeah. Yeah. So I think we can safely say that this was not our favorite of three books.

Jessika: No, this one was so ridiculous. I mean, I loved the heavy, heavy [00:45:00] gay overtones.

Mike: I mean, when do we not love the heavy gay overtones? Come on.

Jessika: It's the agenda after all: brunch for everyone. 

Mike: Yeah. So like, do you have any final thoughts on this, or should we move on to the last of the three books?

Jessika: Ugh. That's just once mosey. 

Mike: Okay. All right. So 83 was when we got the final book, which is the Computer Masters of Metropolis. So, this time Paul Kupperberg wrote the script for the comic. Kupperberg, he's not exactly a household name in terms of comic books, but he is actually pretty prolific. He's written over a thousand comics during his time as a writer,

including the first appearance of He-Man and then he wrote the subsequent Masters at the Universities for DC. Yeah, like, you know, so I've read some of his stuff and I didn't even realize it. Also like, this is actually my favorite factoid about him. He served as the senior editor of the Weekly World News shortly [00:46:00] before it got shut down in 2007.

Jessika: What?

Mike: Yeah. And like that automatically makes me like the dude, because the Weekly World News was one of my favorite things when I was in college, and because I was so good at Photoshop in high school and college, and I was interested in journalism, but I also love the weird stuff, I actually wanted to apply to the weekly world news for a job just for like a little while.

And be like, yeah, like I Photoshop pictures of bat boy. Like, I really was hoping that that would be a thing, and then they shut down right after I graduated college and broke my cold black heart.

Jessika: It's a damn shame. 

Mike: But yeah. So, meanwhile, the art was handled again by Curt Swan and then he was also assisted by Frank Chiaramonte. Chiaramonte was Swan's regular anchor on the main Superman book from 1978 to 82. And then this is one of his last books that he worked on because he died really young in January of [00:47:00] 83. He was only 40 years old. Like. 

Jessika: Oh. 

Mike: Yeah, it's really weird too. I was trying to figure out what happened and all I could find was that just, he died young. But, he was regarded pretty well and he worked on a lot of stuff. So I think if he hadn't died, he probably would've, you know, gone on to great things.

But the Computer Masters of Metropolis doesn't have a publish date other than 1982, which means it came out less than a year before his death, because he died in January of 83. 

Jessika: Oh, dang. 

Mike: Yeah. All right. So what happened in the Computer Masters of Metropolis? 

Jessika: So, those are some lucky kids studying at whatever outskirts elementary school this is. Cause it's not in Metropolis proper, it's like in the suburbs of Metropolis somewhere. 

Mike: Yeah. You know, it's superhero-adjacent to the city.

Jessika: Yeah. Yeah. Right. And again, not sure why Ms. Wilson seems to be on really, really [00:48:00] friendly terms with all the superheroes in the area, but Wonder Woman shows up to take them to the World's Fair, which of course is being held in Metropolis. 

Mike: Yeah. Which I mean, okay. Why, why not? 

Jessika: Exactly. Meanwhile, Lex Luther was salty about being denied entry for an exhibit for the World's Fair because the organizers didn't want to encourage his villainy. 

Mike: It's so good. It's so good.

Jessika: And so Luther decides to try to blackmail a way in, but that didn't work. So, of course he decides the thing to do is to threaten, to like completely destroy the fair, and ultimately creates another red solar radiation trap. This time, luring Superman into a room, rigged with explosives and bathed in red solar radiation, dun, dun, dun. So once again, there are computers in the room, I think, so. So he reaches out to [00:49:00] Alec and Shanna who are told that Wonder Woman should also be at the fair and to page page her. And she's basically like, okay, why are children paging me right now? But finds out that Superman is being held at the plantarium.

She lassos the whole damn building and whips it around and it somehow deactivates the red solar radiation beam? Question mark?

Mike: I don't know, man, I was pretty checked out when I was reading this. Like. They reused a lot of the same stuff, too. Like the same art where they were showing the computer chip, getting threaded through the needle, the bit where the kids are all walking on the giant demo version of the TRS, 

Jessika: Oh, and those kids were being very nice because they acted surprised and very impressed to see that same damn exhibit for a second time. 

Mike: Yeah. Which previously had showed up in the last issue. And I mean, like, it was a lot more exposition this time around too. 

Jessika: It was. 

Mike: [00:50:00] Anyway, sorry.

Jessika: No, not at all. So Superman escapes and they catch Luther and the day is saved. And the end scenes were particularly silly. The mayor I'm assuming goes to thank Wonder Woman for saving the day. And she's like, but also these children, who just happened to be standing on the stage, like right behind her anyway, like the mayor, just, wasn't going to say anything about those kids on the stage, too, apparently.

And they had a computer on stage with them? They were like, and this is the computer, let it hold the key too. And you got to know that like both Wonder Woman and Superman have to have entire rooms dedicated to the key to Metropolis that they get every time they save some damn building or something, they’re all like, chuck another one in there. No, no, no. You kids keep that one. 

Mike: It's fine. I've got 12 at home that are much nicer.

Jessika: They're hanging on a wall around in a study. 

Mike: They just use them as like coat racks.

Jessika: [00:51:00] So Alec and Shanna, once again, saved the day, I guess. 

Mike: Yeah, I mean, this was actually my least favorite of the three comics, because again, it was recycling art or, or using very similar art. It was making a lot of the same points, but it felt a lot more telling, not showing. And while I was really happy to see Lex Luther being next level petty, which, these days, you know, Lex Luther is a billionaire CEO, scientist who also has like armies of underlings performing super science for him that he's able to utilize. He's basically he is a more- 

Jessika: Jeff Bezos. 

Mike: Yeah, He is He is a, I was going to say, he's just, he's a more nakedly transparent, Jeff Bezos. 

Jessika: Oh, you actually were going to say that. I'm sorry. I stole that right from out from under you.

Mike: [00:52:00] No. I mean like it's, I'm sorry, like Jeff Bezos exploits his workers and use the money that he got from that to take a rocket ship and play astronaut, which side note, one of my favorite things about that entire story is that NASA at the last minute redefined, I think it was NASA, redefined what constitutes the definition of an astronaut, so he couldn't get an astronaut patch or pin. An astronaut pin, I think.

Jessika: Which, again, the level of petty, but this is what I need. This is what I need to see, because it can't always be fucking Lex Luther winning. 

Mike: Yeah. But anyway, like I really appreciated that we got to see Lex Luther being a super villain goon, like very flamboyant, flying around with his own little personal jet pack or jet boots, whatever they were like, they were like, it was like little rockets that he had attached to like his. I'm I'm struggling to remember if it was on his boots or on his waist. It was one or the other, right?

Jessika: Yeah, I think it was [00:53:00] on his, I think you're right about the boots. And then he also had those fancy power gauntlets. 

Mike: Yeah. And I mean, the other thing is back in this era, Lex Luther actually had a couple of different costumes that he wore that were very colorful and over-the-top, and it was like green and purple. So it kind of was that, that Joker color motif again, you know, it was really striking. And so he had that outfit of kind of the purple and green spandex that we saw in this issue.

But then he also had this really baller set of green power armor that he used to really make Superman's life miserable for awhile. Like I said, after 1983, Radio Shack stopped with the Superman comics, but they didn't actually stop making comics. They kept on doing these comics with the Whiz Kids, but they instead moved over to Archie comic publications. I haven't been able to find out why the partnership's stopped.

There's very little actual [00:54:00] documentation about these comics outside of a bunch of articles saying, oh yeah, they happened. Like they were a thing. They were dumb. And then pretty much all I've been able to find otherwise is people selling them. Cause there's still a lot of them around. And if you're looking for a fun piece of comic book history, these aren't very expensive, even in mint condition.

That said the Tandy brand was starting to fall out of popularity by 83. For some perspective, it's estimated that Tandy controlled up to 60% of the personal computer market in the late seventies, which is like an astronomical market share.

However, and this is from an article by a guy named Ron White, that he wrote for a magazine called 80 Micro in 1987, and you can now find it on a site called Vintage is the New Old, and we'll put this in the show notes again, Tandy's market share was down to 25% by 86. So it's a pretty fast fall from grace.

Jessika: Yeah. 

Mike: And then, even though Archie was publishing the comics, [00:55:00] none of the Archie characters actually showed up in any of these books with the Whiz Kids, although Radio Shack did publish Archie in the History of Electronics separately. 

Jessika: Oh.

Mike: Like, yeah. But based on that, my guess is that Radio Shack was looking to save some cash and Archie was probably a much better deal. I'm guessing it costs a lot more to license DC superheroes than it does to just make a comic without any big name characters.

Jessika: Oh, I am sure. 

Mike: Yeah. And then shortly after Archie took over the publication duties, the TRS computer line got rebranded to the Tandy computer. So it makes sense that the comic was rebranded from the TRS Whiz Kid's to the Tandy computer Whiz Kids. And that's actually, when I first became aware of this whole venture, because Nostalgia Alley, which is the local retro game store up in Petaluma, has a copy of one of the Tandy Whiz Kids comics on the shelf behind the counter.

And so I [00:56:00] spotted that one time and I was talking to Jason, the owner, and he let me check it out for a couple of minutes. And that's when I started looking into this whole thing, which, per usual, led us down a rabbit hole.

Jessika: Love these rabbit holes of ours. 

Mike: Yeah, they're fun. Anyway, the Tandi Whiz Kid's comics kept on coming out until 1992. And based on what I understand, they featured the Whiz Kids solving crimes, using Tandy computers and other Radio Shack products. I haven't read them. I do really want to track down a copy of the Computer that Said No To Drugs though.

Jessika: Who was offering computers drugs? They are expensive!

Mike: I, I don't know. I'm really curious about everything about that.

Jessika: Hey man, you want to hit this? It's just a fucking computer. And it's like, what are you talking about, dude? 

Mike: Oh, I'm having flashbacks now of that episode of, uh, Futurama where Bender gets hooked on electricity.

Jessika: Oh, hahahaha. [00:57:00] 

Mike: They keep on referring to it as jacking on anyway.

Yeah. But the early nineties were when things really started to go downhill for Radio Shack and they never really stopped, because stores like Best Buy and Walmart just started to really eat their lunch. And then, it got to the point where they've had to declare bankruptcy twice in the past five years or so.

Like they also declared Nick Cannon as their chief creative officer around the time of the first bankruptcy. Yeah. And now they've been bought by some shady sounding company out of Florida. So the brand is still around, but it's not really the company that we grew up with. And I don't know, I'm honestly not sure what's worse, like partnering with Nick Cannon, or being this pale reflection of your former glory. They both sound pretty bad.

Jessika: Yeah. 

Mike: But yeah, that's the story about Superman, and how he wound up acting as a computer salesman for [00:58:00] a couple of years. You got any final thoughts?

Jessika: So I'm just shaking my head over here. Like my nostrils are flaring. 

Mike: How was that different from any other conversation I lead though?

Jessika: I literally prepare myself for these, cause I'm like, all right, you can get angry, but don't get too angry. My secret is I'm always angry. 

Mike: Dun dun dun.

Jessika: Hmm. So you know, it's really interesting to see how very far we've come since these issues came out in the early eighties. Like, we're sitting here on small laptops, I've got a phone and a tablet right here in front of me as well, and you and I are basically sitting across from each other, having a conversation, even though we're not even in the same physical location. 

Mike: Yeah.

Jessika: It blows my mind how amazing things like high speed trains and basic information [00:59:00] searches seemed back then, when they're so commonplace now. Like, I seriously Google everything. I would be nowhere without Google. 

Mike: Yeah. My career is because of the internet.

Jessika: Yeah. Yours, yours sure, is absolutely that’s, yeah. That's a wild thing to think about too. And it's also wild to think about how much more advanced technology has become even in just, I had to do the calculations 40 years time, which I about had a panic attack when I mathed that out because. Ha ha ha. We're almost 40.

Mike: Yep. Actually this episode is going to air right around the time that I'm going to be turning 40.

Jessika: Yup. Happy birthday, to Mike. 

Mike: Thanks, I hate it. 

Jessika: No, Yeah. Right. At least you're not my mom giving my dad a [01:00:00] vulture piñata for his 40th birthday.

Mike: No, Sarah has declared that she wants my 40th birthday to be a super soft birthday, which if you've ever watched Letterkenny. 

Jessika: Yes! I was hoping You were going to say that. There has to be a unicorn. 

Mike: I know, I think it's going to be put on hold until we're all vaccinated, but we might do a belated super soft birthday.

Jessika: Yeah, okay. I figured you guys are going to have a family super soft birthday. But, if you want to have a super soft after birthday, when things clear up, I am, I am there and I will be eating some lovely pink frosted cupcakes with you. 

Mike: You’re on, big shoots.

So we are now at the point of the episode where we're going to wrap things up with our Brain Wrinkles, which is when we discussed the one thing that is comics or comics adjacent that we just can't get out of our head. So you want to start things off?

Jessika: Oh sure. [01:01:00] As I promised, I just finished watching the latest season of The Boys, which is season two. Holy shit. Holy fucking shit. That show is bat shit wild.

Mike: Yeah. 

Jessika: And what's been sticking in my head is the abuse dynamic between Homelander and mean, anybody he deals with, really?

Mike: I was gonna say, everybody?

Jessika: Yeah. And it's so interesting, cause as he was growing up, he was taught that not only is he more powerful than any person, he has been told that he is special and is entitled to do whatever pleases him. Which is really scary to see him manipulating others, using fear as a motivator to encourage them to comply. And honestly, the reason it scares me the most is just the powerlessness that these people, and most often women, are terrified into just following through with Homelander’s whims. 

Mike: Yeah. yeah. There's a lot of really [01:02:00] uncomfortable moments in that show. But I like the show, which I didn't expect.

Jessika: Well, I do like that it's putting a spotlight onto that dynamic, cause that's a dynamic that we show is very one-sided, usually a little victim blamey. 

Mike: Mmhmm. 

Jessika: You know, why didn't she just leave kind of a narrative, which we all know it's not that easy. 

Mike: Yeah.

Jessika: And I think this is a really good example of why it's not that easy, in a very powerful way. And, it does remind me of people who are stuck in abusive households or relationships and are in different ways, powerless to leave their situations. So, hopefully it sparks some conversation. 

Mike: Yeah.

Jessika: Well, but what about you? 

Mike: Mine is also TV related, but it's not quite as topical as your thoughts. So, I actually was trying to show my stepson[01:03:00] some X-Men cartoons the other day. And as we started to watch the first episode of Wolverine and the X-Men, he started to ask me all these questions about who the different characters were, because they basically start the show off assuming that the audience knows who all of the X-Men are, because at the time when it launched, the X-Men were a major brand, and then Disney acquired Marvel right before this.

And then, they kind of made mutants personas, non grata, and, the mutants have not been featured in Disney programming up until the point where basically for the past 10 years, major media representation for kids of characters, like the X-Men, aren't all that common. And so it was just kind of a really thoughtful moment for me, where I realized I had to start them over from the beginning with an earlier X-Men cartoon, where he gets all these introductions. And I think there's going to be this generation that is going to grow up learning who the X-Men are a lot later than a lot of us [01:04:00] did. Like I knew all of the X-Men by the age of nine and I suspect.

Jessika: Oh, yeah.

Mike: Yeah. And so I think it's going to be really interesting to watch a generation of teenagers discover the X-Men really for the first time outside of, you know, Wolverine and Deadpool, because everybody knows who they are.

Jessika: Yeah, of course. Hm.

Mike: But yeah. 

Jessika: That's wild. 

Mike: Yeah. It's kind of one of those surreal moments of realization. Yeah. 

Jessika: Hmm. 

Mike: So, in two weeks we will be back with our next installment of the Sandman book club, which is going to be volumes three and four. And then until then we'll see you in the stacks.

Thanks for listening to Ten Cent Takes. Accessibility is important to us, so text transcriptions of each of our published episodes can be found on our website. 

Mike: This episode was hosted by Jessika Frazer and Mike Thompson written by Mike Thompson, and edited by Jessika Frazer. Our intro theme was written and performed by Jared Emerson Johnson of Bay Area Sound, our credits and transition music is Pursuit of Life by Evan [01:05:00] MacDonald, and was purchased with a standard license from Premium Beat. Our banner graphics were designed by Sarah Frank, who you can find on Instagram as @lookmomdraws.

Jessika: If you'd like to get in touch with us, ask us questions, or tell us about how we got something wrong, please head over to tencenttakes.com or shoot an email to tencenttakes@gmail.com. You can also find us on Twitter; the official podcast account is tencenttakes. Jessika is jessikawitha, and Jessika spelled with a K, and Mike is vansau, V a N S a U. 

Mike: If you'd like to support us, be sure to download, rate and review wherever you listen. And if you like, what you hear, tell your friends.

Jessika: Stay safe out there. 

Mike: And support your local comic shop.

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