"The name's Gambit, mon ami. Remember it." X-Men thoughts, related to X-Men '97

There are spoilers for X-Men '97 in this post.

I was skeptical of the X-Men '97 program when I heard about it; I certainly didn't intend to watch it. Still, I was aware that buzz was growing online after its debut a few weeks ago and I thought... after all... what harm could it do?

X-Men '97 is a continuation of the X-Men animated program that aired on Fox Kids in the 1990s. I enjoyed the 1990s program for the most part - I found the animation a bit crude (especially after I started watching the Bruce Timm Batman series) but I won't deny I was thrilled to see a major Marvel super hero in animated adventures that were helping raise the X-Men's profile around the world.

Still, why bring it back? Why not put that passion into a new animated X-Men program that kids in the 2020s might be interested in, rather than appeal to old guys who should have better things to do than watch a continuation of a favoured kids' show from their youth? Haven't comics themselves suffered greatly from fans' unwillingness to age out of the hobby? I mean, the comics themselves already produced a sequel to the 1990s cartoon that was written by Chris Sims... and that's all you needed to hear about that.

Going in, I was prepared for a nostalgia fest (and it is; they indulge in a recreation of the 90s X-Men arcade game for no good reason other than nostalgia). I was prepared to cringe. I don't think I was prepared to like it.

There's a moment in the first episode that cemented it for me. The X-Men's Blackbird jet is destroyed mid-air by a Sentinel. The X-Men must then use their powers to save each other from falling to their deaths. That's a pretty standard set-up for a super hero comic action set piece (in fact, the all-new all-different X-Men team faced that scenario way back in their 2nd adventure, X-Men #95). It climaxes with Cyclops using his optic blasts to slow his descent, an unusual means of demonstrating his power and control.

I was reminded of the scene in the film Iron Man 3 where Iron Man rescued people falling from an aircraft. Not just because of the similarity of the scenario, but because it called upon the hero to be resourceful (and for the film to demonstrate clear visual storytelling). As I say, scenarios like these were pretty typical in the comic books I grew up with; I see a lot fewer of them now - action scenes where the characters use their powers in ways that are creative and make sense according to the situation they find themselves in; opportunities to test characters and demonstrate something of their capabilities and even personalities; a situation that calls for a good command of visual storytelling rather than characters posing at each other while talking.

In which Michael imagines a typical X-Men comic book storytelling conference:

Writer: "Ugh, an action scene. I don't want to write an action scene."
Artist: "Nor do I care to draw one."
Writer: "Path of least resistance: they pose at each other in a double-page spread. Reader assumes the fight happened between panels."
Artist: "Whatever fills the pages works for me."
Writer: "That reminds me, I need to fill a data page. Maybe I'll quote Orwell. Or present nothing but redacted text."

I don't wish to join the chorus saying that the X-Men comics haven't been very good since Grant Morrison left 20 years ago - there have been outliers. It's just, they were outliers - not usually the main X-Men title. For the last 20 years the comic book counterparts have been trapped in their own storytelling engine. Usually the X-Men seem to be either fighting each other, fighting a faceless army or fighting someone so powerful they're practically a deity. The franchise has felt unmoored to me - ungrounded. Claremont's X-Men comics set up a template many other writers could use; when he was shown the door, his successors proved they could keep the books going through imitating his formula. But after Morrison broke the engine (or perhaps, after "M-Day" broke the engine) the massive cast of characters seem to have meandered, trapped in a shrinking universe with fewer and fewer new stories to tell, instead going through worn out tropes (an X-Man betrays the team! but they're a popular character so the team will get over it eventually; an X-Man dies! but so what, no one stays dead; the team breaks into factions with different philosophies and even fight each other! big whoop, they'll all be friends again when the next writer arrives).

X-Men '97 reminded me that, yeah, the X-Men are fun. They're interesting characters to spend time with. They have unique personalities, they clash over particular matters, they have different fighting styles... and they have a colorful rogue's gallery of enemies who have an interesting set of personalities too (Mojo maybe not so much). X-Men '97 reminded me... man, it's not that hard to tell a X-Men story that feels like a proper X-Men story. They made me feel for these characters again; even killing Gambit stirred me, despite all the comics have done to treat death with indifference (the present Krakoa age in the comics abolished death as any other than temporary inconvenience).

Many performers from the 1990s X-Men have reprised their voices, which is a little surprising. Cal Dodd's Wolverine sounds mostly the same, albeit weathered by age - although that kinda suits the character. I found Alison Sealy-Smith's imperious performance of Storm on the 1990s program off-putting (I think it drove me to dislike the comics version of Storm as well) but she seems to have a better balance now, less of the faux-Thor speech helps. The sheer number of returning performers is impressive considering more than 25 years have passed; even those who've aged out of their old roles have been recast into other characters for the new show.

For all that X-Men '97 is nostalgia bait for old men, I think new viewers might like it too; they'll probably have to watch the 1990s show first, though, and that might not appeal to them.

Radio Recap: Lady Esther Presents Orson Welles

As many of my "Radio Recaps" have indicated, I've been immersed in the old-time radio hobby for many years now. I'm still amazed when I discover a program that I didn't know about but feel that I should have known about. Such a program is Lady Esther Presents Orson Welles.

When I first heard an episode of Lady Esther Presents Orson Welles I was dumbfounded; I love Orson Welles' work and this came out during a particularly strong peak of his radio talent. How had I missed this series before? The answer is... we old-time radio hobbyists can be a little inconsistent. Depending on which radio log or archive you turned to, Lady Esther Presents Orson Welles was either categorized as Screen Guild Theater, Orson Welles Theater, Mercury Theatre or even Orson Welles Alamanac! But Lady Esther Presents Orson Welles is truly its own series that needs to be separated out from other (related) programs.

Lady Esther Presents Orson Welles ran just a few months on CBS - September 15, 1941 to February 2, 1942. This came after CBS' fruitful partnerships with Welles on the Mercury Theatre on the Air and the Campbell Playhouse, but shifted him from an hour-long format to a half-hour one (which became the typical length for his radio shows thereon). Like those earlier programs, the series featured adaptations of popular works, particularly a few to which Welles was very warm towards ("I'm a Fool" was one he'd done before; "the Apple Tree" and "the Happy Prince" would both be dramatized again). However, the series also looked ahead to the format he'd adopt in the Orson Welles Radio Almanac where he would recite poetry and randomly share odd facts from an almanac.

The first few Lady Esther Presents Orson Welles programs are particulary odd as they feature Cliff Edwards reprising his character of Jiminy Cricket from Disney's Pinocchio, appearing on the program as Welles' conscience, reminding him of things he should share with the listening audience. They're very bizarre asides and I don't think they're successful, but at least they demonstrate the playful side of Orson Welles.

Welles was joined by a lot of familiar voices such as Joseph Cotten, Ray Collins, Dolores Del Rio and the music of Bernard Herrmann. Some of the programs featured original stories, such as the very good "That's Why I Left You" by John Nesbitt concerning a man's fable as to why he left his wife. There's a terrific adaptation of Saki's "the Interlopers" and the very funny "Maysville Minstrel" by Ring Lardner. Fans of Escape will notice there's an adaptation of "Wild Oranges"; I'm not particularly wild about that story to begin with and I find Welles' adaptation a bit tedious - the Escape was at least trying to be a fast-paced action story, while the Welles adaptation is concerned with despair and heartbreak.

But the most historically interesting episode of Lady Esther Presents Orson Welles is one we don't currently have: the debut broadcast of Lucille Fletcher's story "The Hitchhiker" aired on November 17, 1941. Welles later performed in the famed Suspense version but it would be great to hear that missing broadcast.

Truly, though, as an Orson Welles and Mercury Theatre fan, I would be very happy to hear more from this series. The few fragments we do possess demonstrate Welles and his contributors at their best.

We have only a few full episodes of this program, although various short excerpts from episodes are in circulation which suggests full copies of those episodes might yet emerge. There's a very good collection of Lady Esther Presents Orson Welles at the Internet Archive.

Radio Recap: The World Adventurers Club

The World Adventurers Club was a 15-minute syndicated program released in 1932. It was an anthology program in which the premise was that a group of world travelers would meet together at their club. Soon after the episode start (and some barbershop quartet singing around a piano) the club members would prompt one of their number to share a story about their adventures, whereupon the drama would begin in earnest.

The stories related in the World Adventurers Club were set around the world - in Africa, Russia, Europe, sometimes in the United States itself. The cast were never identified but you can recognize a lot of familiar early radio performers in the recordings, such as Hanley Stafford, Gale Gordon and Frank Nelson.

The program is hampered by being an early program, made before sound effects were fully utilized. Exotic locales on radio really depend on audio effects to bring them to life, but World Adventurers Club seemed only able to create the sound of wind or gunshots, precious little else.

But the program's biggest drawback is its very premise. The adventurers have an unmistakably colonialist air about them. The people in the places they visit are very much "the other." And there's plenty of stinky racism to be found all over the series. In the episode indicated as #1, "the Headhunters of Papua," the protagonist-narrator of the story declares early on, "We didn't have to depend upon natives and that was a blessing as I never can get black boys to work hard for me." In another episode the protagonist distrusts his guide because the man is only half-white and therefore treacherous - which, indeed, he is. Another episode is centered on how all Chinese men want to kidnap and control white women. It's noxious, even for its time. There are only a few episodes where the adventurers are pit against nature and the elements - usually they fight with whoever the locals happen to be. In one episode a black man sacrifices his life to save the protagonist, who goes on and on about how noble he was; the only way a non-white character gets any props in the series is by dying for his "betters."

I wanted to like The World Adventurers Club because I have a love for world-spanning adventure tales (Escape being radio's best such program). But I can't simply say the World Adventurers Club is a show "of its time." Even in 1932, it would have been recognized as encouraging racist old tropes.

You can hear the Old Time Radio Researchers' collection of the World Adventurers Club at the Internet Archive.

SIM Canada Page Has Resumed!

I'm please to state that I am once again online with a SIM Canada page; going forward, my mission work in Angola will be alongside my wife Bethany and the new page therefore covers both of and discusses our 2023 plans to work in Angola. visit our SIM Canada page here!

Radio Recap: Tales of Tomorrow

Science fiction for adults broke into the mainstream in the 1950s and on the radio, the major networks each made attempts at the genre in early 1950. However, CBS' Beyond Tomorrow lasted only 3 weeks; Mutual's 2000 Plus and NBC's Dimension X each lasted 1 year; it wasn't until NBC's X Minus One arrived in 1955 that at last a science fiction program for adults settled in for a lengthy run.

Yet in the middle of those programs we have Tales of Tomorrow on ABC. Tales of Tomorrow is one of the rare instances of a television program being adapted to radio; the television version ran on ABC from 1951-1953. It was early science fiction, broadcast live. Many episodes still exist and although they're crude, Tales of Tomorrow retains some affection among science fiction fans as a pioneering piece of television science fiction. The radio version of Tales of Tomorrow popped up during the television version's final year. ABC ran the series only briefly from January 1 to April 9, 1953. It was sponsored by Galaxy Magazine, who had previously sponsored NBC's Dimension X (and later X Minus One).

The series was hosted by Raymond Edward Johnson as "Omentor." Johnson was, of course, the original host of Inner Sanctum Mysteries which gives the program a bit of campiness. The frequent use of trombone music also seems to suggest that ABC wanted the show to be received as a light-hearted program. A lot of familiar radio actors such as Leon Janney and Lawson Zerbe appeared in the productions. The list of episodes are (surviving episodes underlined):

1. January 1, 1953: "Made to Measure" by William C. Gault
2. January 8, 1953: "The Biography Project" by Dudley Dell
3. January 15, 1953: "Betelgeuse Bridge" by William Tenn
4. January 22, 1953: "The Other Now" by Murray Leinster
5. January 29, 1953: "The Stars Are the Styx" by Theodore Sturgeon
6. February 5, 1953: "Syndrome Johnny" by Katherine MacLean
7. February 12, 1953: "The Unimars Plot"
8. February 19, 1953: "Watchbird" by Robert Sheckley
9. February 26, 1953: "Inside Earth" by Poul Anderson
10. March 5, 1953: "The Moon Is Green" by Fritz Leiber
11. March 12, 1953: "Martians Never Die" by Lucius Daniel
12. March 19, 1953: "The Girls from Earth" by Frank M. Robinson
13. March 26, 1953: "The Old Die Rich" by H. L. Gold
14. April 2, 1953: "Morrow on Mars"
15. April 9, 1953: "The Drop" by John Christopher

Episodes with authors were adapted from stories in Galaxy Magazine; the two without authors appear to be original works.

If you know X Minus One you'll recognize a few episode titles from that series. I'm afraid those episodes that we can compare don't come off very well for Tales of Tomorrow. For example, "the Old Die Rich" was adapted on both shows; the X Minus One version features a protagonist who is forced to travel into the past to help a scientist amass a fortune through bets and investments. When he's brought back to the present and feels hungry he realizes since food can't be brought through time, the scientist intends to starve him to death. That's a great revelation in the radio drama, but it doesn't play as well in the Tales of Tomorrow version. In that series (which is much more faithful to Gold's original Galaxy story) the protagonist comes back from the past, then agrees to journey into the future to perform a heist. Once in the future, he quickly meets people who know all about the scientist's plans and tell him how to defeat the scientist. It's much less interesting than the X Minus One version because the protagonist lacks agency, requiring other characters to explain the villain's plot and what the stakes are; I much prefer the X Minus One version, where the protagonist surmises the stakes on his own.

But that's not to dismiss Tales of Tomorrow entirely -- "The Other Now" is a particularly good drama about a man whose wife dies in a car accident; the grieving husband soon discovers there's an alternate timeline where he was the one who died and becomes obsessed with piercing the void into the timeline where his wife still lives. I also enjoyed "Watchbird" in which mechanical constructs are built to police crimes but cause all kinds of new problems because they don't understand nuances.

You can hear the 7 surviving episodes of Tales of Tomorrow at the Old-Time Radio Researchers' Library.

RIP: Trina Robbins

Comic book writer and artist Trina Robbins died yesterday, aged 85. She was the partner of comic book artist Steve Leialoha.

I didn't begin to take notice of Robbins until after I became a Sax Rohmer fan and went hunting for an adaptation of his novel Dope that was serialized in Eclipse magazine and Eclipse Monthly. Robbins was the artist and adaptor of Rohmer's story and I found her art very appealing - intended for a mature audience, but drawn with simple lines evocative of Dan DeCarlo or Herge.

In time, I learned Robbins was a major historian in the comics community, especially in highlighting the history of female protagonists and female comic book creators. When Marvel began offering a number of anthologies with all-female creative teams (such as Girl Comics), Robbins was involved in those works which I felt lent them credence and continuity.

Rest in peace, Ms. Robbins.

Radio Recap: Beyond Tomorrow

Beyond Tomorrow was almost a triumph in radio history... but for some reason, it failed to launch.

Beyond Tomorrow was a CBS program produced by William N. Robson (Escape and Suspense), with consultations from John Campbell, the publisher of Astounding Science Fiction and would-be kingmaker of the science fiction genre. The series produced a pilot broadcast of "The Outer Limit" (under the series title Beyond This World), a story which Robson had just produced for Escape in February 1950 then broadcast just 3 episodes in April of 1950. From a certain perspective, Beyond Tomorrow was a spin-off of Escape. The three episodes were:

1. April 5, 1950: "Requiem" by Robert A. Heinlein
2. April 11, 1950: "Incident at Switchpath" by Theodore Sturgeon
3. April 18, 1950: "The Outer Limit" by Graham Doar

As John Dunning put it in his book On the Air, Beyond Tomorrow "almost became radio's first science fiction series for adults." It had great promise behind it - one of radio's top producers, participation from one of science fiction's great magazines and stories of top caliber. Yet it fizzled.

I'd like to hear the story behind this - perhaps somewhere it was stated why CBS didn't continue with the program. It seems like one possibility is that the same month Beyond Tomorrow launched, NBC started their terrific program Dimension X. Perhaps radio audiences had enough fascination with science fiction to support one radio anthology program, but not two.

You can hear the 3 episodes of Beyond Tomorrow at the Internet Archive.