Author Archives: Elana Levin

Andor season 2 & Anti-Fascist Movements in Star Wars & Our World (so far)

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Project Fulcrum

“The Empire cannot win. You’ll never feel right unless you are doing what you can to stop them.” Andor season 2.

Bridging the gap between Star Wars’ Andor and the real life history and theory of antifascist movements, organizer Anthony Vidal Torres from the Get Free movement and critic Klaudia Amenábar join me to cover the first two arcs of Andor season 2. 

Join Project Fulcrum: a Star Wars fan activism campaign fighting for freedom and equality in a country not so far away: https://www.getfreetogether.org/project-fulcrum

Read issue 2 of Nemik’s Weekly Manifesto https://bit.ly/NemiksManifestoApril24

Take Action:

Keep up with us:

Listen to Andor Season 1 Podcasts

James Gunn’s Creature Commandos with journalist Nicholas Slayton

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“Do you think this Eric Frankenstein is into crypto?”
“This Frankenstein probably invented crypto”
“Frank-coin?”

National security journalist Nicholas Slayton joins me to talk about James Gunn‘s DC animated series for HBO, Creature Commandoes. We’ve got gothic horror, geopolitics and an impressive soundtrack. This episode opens with a spoiler-free conversation on whether the show is worth your time before diving in for a conversation about those who the law does not protect, disability metaphors and more.

Nicholas Slayton is a Los Angeles-based journalist covering the “panic beat” — inequality, war, climate change and protests. He’s currently a Contributing Editor at Task & Purpose and has bylines in the New Republic, American Prospect and Motherboard.

Follow Nicholas on Bluesky https://bsky.app/profile/nslayton.bsky.social

Subscribe to his newsletter; Let’s Do The Panic Again

Follow ME on bluesky – https://bsky.app/profile/levin.bsky.social

X-Men X-Over with Referential’s Dr. Khaliden Nas

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A Team-Up with Referential Podcast‘s Dr. Khaliden Nas to talk through our feelings about the state of X-Men comics. The first half, taped in September covers the Fall of X and the end of the X-Men’s ‘First Krakoan Age‘. In December we met again to talk about the state of the X-Office and relaunched slate of X-Men comics under the ‘From The Ashes‘ banner. 

Follow me on Bluesky – @Levin

In This Episode:

  • Fall of X (also hear my earlier coverage of here)
    * From the Ashes (Spoilers starts at 47:46)
    * Kieron Gillen & Lucas Werneck Immortal X-Men, X-Men: Forever & Rise of the Powers of X
    * Gerry Duggan and Russel Daughterman’s Fall of the House of X, Hellfire Gala 3
  • Invincible Iron Man & Uncanny Avengers
    * Al Ewing & Luciano Vecchio Resurrection of Magneto & X-Men: Red
    * Si Spurrier’s X-Men Blue: Origins
    * Jonathan Hickman
    * Gail Simone & David Marquez Uncanny X-Men
    * Jed McKay & Ryan Stegman X-Men
    * Jackson Lanzing / Collin Kelly & Francesco Mortarino NYX
    * Eve L. Ewing and Carmen Carnero Exceptional X-Men
    * Solos!
    * No, we will NOT call Ide “Temper”
    * Democracy in the 2nd Krakoan Age
    * The End of Hope [Summers]
    * Kate Pryde and the gates as bi metaphor revisited
  • Reading Warden Ellis
    * Remembering Dr. Moira MacTaggart
    * Assimilation Or Unity
  • Marvel not understanding why Hydra!Cap failed but Gerry Duggan makes the best of it
    * #XSpoilers and fandom meta

    One more time, Krakoans. For the children!

Spencer Ackerman on Writing Iron Man

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Is Tony Stark a comrade? Spencer Ackerman, award winning national security journalist and author of the book “Reign of Terror: How the 9/11 Era Destabilized America and Produced Trump”, brings his knowledge of geopolitics, corporate power, and deep Iron Man lore to writing the new Iron Man series. 

This podcast is for folks new to the character as well as long time fans. We open with an overview of why I loved this series and a discussion of Spencer’s inspirations before delving into spoilers of the first three outstanding issues.

We’ve got: 

  • Busting anti-union thugs
  • Boardroom Warfare
  • Feats of engineering
  • Survivor guilt 

And some amazing pulls for bad guys that will please Iron fans and X-Men fans alike. 

Follow Spencer on Bluesky – https://bsky.app/profile/attackerman.bsky.social
Spencer’s Newsletter: https://www.forever-wars.com/ 
Elana Levin https://bsky.app/profile/levin.bsky.social 

Graphic Policy Radio: X-Men and the MLK Legacy Roundtable

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One of our most listened to episodes of Graphic Policy Radio discussed the X-Men and their use as an allegory of the civil rights, it covered the series throughout its many incarnations and writers. The discussion also veered into the depiction of minorities in “comic” entertainment and Marvel’s continuity. In honor of MLK Day, we present that podcast discussion.

Guests joining in on the conversation were:

  • Steve Attewell – A political & union activist, Steve holds a PhD in History from the University of California, Santa Barbara. He is the founder and writer of Race for the Iron Throne as well as The Realignment Project
  • David Brothers – David works for a comics publisher, blogs about stuff at 4thletter.net, & tweets about everything at @hermanos. Find his life story at iamdavidbrothers.com.
  • Gene Demby – Gene Demby is an American writer and journalist & the lead blogger for NPR’s Code Switch team.
  • Emma Houxbois – Emma is a queer blogger for hire out of Vancouver, BC most recently attached to Girls Read Comics. Follow her @emmahouxbois
  • Kendra James – a blogger who writes on race, comics, television & more for Racialicious, follow her @wriglied

You can listen to the archive above or go here and download it for on the go.

Star Trek Lower Decks: The Final Season

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“I love that Star Trek continues to change and adapt. And that includes an animated comedy show,” John Arminio. 

Film critic and lifelong Trekkie John Arminio joins me to say farewell to Lower Decks, the animated Star Trek series we’ve grown to love.  

We open with a spoiler-free conversation about how this show won us over. You’ll have plenty of warning before we enter a full spoilers, in depth conversation about the series’ final season. 

Listen to John speaking about Voyager on Mission Log, the Official Podcast of the Roddenberry Foundation.https://www.missionlogpodcast.com/1159-2/ 

Listen to his film podcast Popcorn Eschaton https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/zebras-in-america/id1220264878 

Read his comics reviews and metal memes at https://www.instagram.com/quasarsniffer/ 

Join me on Bluesky @ Levin https://bsky.app/profile/levin.bsky.social

And stay tuned for an upcoming episode of Deep Space Dive where cohost Sarah Daniel Rasher and I will discuss the Lower Decks/Deep Space Nine crossover episode. 

Batman: Caped Crusader with Leslie Lee III of Struggle Session

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“Batman spends more time fighting the cops than helping them” – Leslie Lee III

“The most corrupt Gotham Police Department of any Batman media” — Me…and I am here for that! 

Animated Batman is some of the best Batman. Does this new series from legends like Paul Dini, Ed Brubaker, and Greg Rucka deliver?

Leslie Lee III of the leftist culture podcast Sruggle Session returns to talk about Batman Caped Crusader‘s aesthetics, politics and reinventions. 

Looking for ways to volunteer this election? There’s https://keyboards.forkamala.fyi/  for keyboard warrior and I’m happy to connect folks to virtual phone banking or text banking opportunities –especialy ones supporting grassroots orgs, fighting voter suppression or working on local races. You an ping me https://bsky.app/profile/levin.bsky.social or even (for this purpose) https://x.com/Elana_Brooklyn  We all can do something to fight fascism (even if you’re reading this after the election). 

“A Chinese James Bond” The Manchurian with writer Pornsak Pichetshote

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“less about, China versus America.. what he really believes is the power of community”. Award winning co-creator of The Good Asian, sak Pichetshote returns to talk about his visonary new project for Image Comics: a series of five one-shot comic books titled The Horizon Experiment. Each has a unique creative team inventing an original protagonist from a marginalized background set in genres such as horror or espionage, or inspired by icons like Indiana Jones or John Constantine.

Pichetshote’s entry in the series, The Manchurian, is more than a James Bond who “just so happens to be Chinese”- he is a spy whose identity is core to the narrative. There’s also Finders/Keepers from Vita Ayala and Skyler Partridge in which a Boricua archaeologist returns an artifact from a museum to the people from whom it was stolen.

The Manchurian, with artists Terry and Rachel Dodson is out now as is The Sacred Damned and more on the way from creative teams that bridge comics, literature, film and television. 

Here’s my 2021 convo about The Good Asian with sak Pichetshote and Alexandre Tefenkgi.

Join Heroes4Harris this Sunday

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Hulk Smash Donate

This Sunday, join forces with the Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), a slew of SURPRISE celebrity guests known for playing heroes on screen, and tens of thousands of superfans across the country for a star-studded Heroes For Harris pre-debate livestream event!

The event takes place Sunday at 4pm Eastern!

If you’ve lived to see the day that democracy heroes Adam Schiff and Alexander Vindman talk with Inigo Montoya from the Princess Bride (Mandy Patinkin) about why Kamala Harris must defeat real-life villain Donald Trump, you want to attend this event.

If you can’t even imagine actors from Batman The Dark Knight (David Dastmalchian) talking politics with Bill S. Preston Esquire from Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure (Alex Winter) and Tennessee Three hero, State Sen. Justin Jones, you want to attend this event.

Emceed by comedy powerhouse Baratunde Thurston – with cameos by some of the most legendary climate and labor activists in the country, the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, and lots more – Heroes4Harris is an event you don’t want to miss!

Join this roster of fictional and real-life superheroes to understand the stakes of the Harris vs. Trump debate on ABC two days later and how we can each inspire our communities to become #Heroes4Harris in the fight for a brighter, more just future.

If you have less political friends who love superheroes, and who could use a boost from the Hulk and others to get more involved in this election and watch Tuesday’s debate, please pass them this!

Kieron Gillen: X-Men Forever and The Power Fantasy

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“The philosophy that leads to AI is the same philosophy as 19th Century imperialism and colonialism,” Kieron Gillen. Writer Kieron Gillen returns to reflect on the end of his time contributing to the X-Men’s First Krakoan Age and the start of The Power Fantasy, his new series with Caspar Wijngaard for Image Comics. 

Subscribe to Kieron’s delightful newsletter (especially if you’re into TTRPGs) https://buttondown.com/KieronGillen

ICYMI Kieron and I spoke about the start of Immortal X-Men back in 2022  https://bit.ly/ImmortalX 

We spoke about his previous comic with Casper, Peter Canon Thunderbolt in 2021 https://bit.ly/DieCanon 

He’s one of my favorite guests (and favorite writers) so you’ll enjoy these! 

Psst hang out with cool comics folks on BlueSky — I’m @ Levin https://bsky.app/profile/levin.bsky.social 

Kieron is @KieronGillen https://bsky.app/profile/kierongillen.bsky.social

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