Episode 153: Captain Michael Ironside of the USS Ironside

The Overthinkers tackle X-Men: First Class.

Peter Fenzel hosts with Matthew Belinkie, Mark Lee, Josh McNeil, John Perich, David Shechner, and Jordan Stokes to overthink X-Men: First Class.

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26 Comments on “Episode 153: Captain Michael Ironside of the USS Ironside”

  1. Rob #

    It’s lacking the steampunk angle that Belinkie was going for with James Watt, but –

    Perhaps the superhero scientist most motivated to fight against Robespierre would be Antoine Lavoisier. Dude was the preeminent chemist of the 18th century, did pioneering work on the nature of combustion, assembled a theoretical framework for chemistry like Newton had done for physics, and was guillotined in 1794 because he happened to be a nobleman and tax collector.

    Reply

    • shechner OTI Staff #

      Rob – that’s a great comment. I’ll add that Lavoisier was a high-ranking official at the French Academy of Sciences at the time of Marat’s (failed) application to study there. So, clearly there’s a grudge-match of sorts during the Purge.

      Lavoisier was also a noted educator–chemists pride themselves in being able to trace their academic lineages back to him in the way that WASPS look to the Mayflower.* So, I could see him as a sort of Professor X character, too. Or Professeur Iks, I guess.

      *-Though my lineage doesn’t quite go that route:
      https://webspace.yale.edu/chem125/125/history99/1General/genealogy.htm

      …Aah, freshman Orgo with J. Michael McBride. So many memories. Most of them stress-inducing.

      Reply

      • Rob #

        I would like to make a cognac-based, combustible drink, name it in his honor, then write a song about it called “Pass the Lavoisier”. Naturally, the music video would have to include a minute-long cameo appearance by Mr T. But there would also be chemistry and mob violence and guillotining.

        P.S. Mayflower material or not, Sheq, you’re an F2 of Jack Szostak, and even if that’s just “Physiology or Medicine”, you shouldn’t sell yourself short.

        P.P.S. Did I ever show you the McBridesque email I wrote to him at 3 AM after I thought I’d bombed the final exam? Unfortunately the email no longer exists on my current hard drive, but it exists in my own memory as the greatest of the many times I have made a complete fool of myself. And somehow I passed.

        Reply

        • shechner OTI Staff #

          The “Lavoisier” needs to use only one enantiomer of Tartaric acid, which is the Hipster-Chemists’ equivalent of being “Pasteurized.”

          Tangential side note: ever notice how many chromatographic terms make great Rapper and/or Trance DJ monikers? “Flow Adapter,” “Void Volume,” and “Stokes Radius” come to mind, if not “Immobilized Metal.”

          I’m not gonna’ touch “Three way stopcock.”

          My favorite McBride memory comes from a comment he passed during a midterm review session. He’d gone into great detail in responding to a student’s question about (I believe) the molecular orbital justication underlying regiochemically selective additions, and was clearing beginning to lose the class en masse. So he cut himself off, saying, “But that’s the sort of thing that only someone like me would find important.” He turned around to start writing on the chalk board, paused briefly and turned to face us once more, adding wryly, “…Then, of course, I’m the one who writes the exams.”

          In all my years as a student and teacher, I’ve never seen so much abject terror.

          Reply

  2. Jeremy Fogelman #

    Minor point of correction:

    The Angel character isn’t the one from X-3 (which was entirely ignored by the continuity of this film), but from Grant Morrison’s New X-Men run.

    See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_Salvadore

    Reply

    • shechner OTI Staff #

      Awesome. Lately I’ve begun to think of Spidey essentially as a stand-in for Stan Lee himself (…a Stan-din? *ducks*). Which is to say, his true super power is marketing. Here’s the Turkish comic book I was talking about:

      http://sugarplumblossom.blogspot.com/2008/10/spiderman-kneeled-down-for-muslim.html

      The title translates to “I’m learning to pray.” Apparently it’s published jointly by the Turkish Religious Works Administration and Marvel comics. Anything to make a buck. Or rather, ~72,000,000 Lira. :)

      Reply

      • cat #

        I think you should probably stick to unintentional puns. :)

        They do say that Joan Lee bears some resemblance to Gwen Stacy.

        Reply

        • shechner OTI Staff #

          Yeah, I don’t know why I’ve been so punny lately. I guess it could be worse. I could spontaneously break it into Capital Steps-esque musical political satire.

          *shudder*.

          Reply

  3. cat #

    I don’t have a lot of knowledge of this subject but I get the impression that some of the female characters have problems written into their characters. Do you think that a character to be changed to fit a more modern sensibility/sense of greater gender or racial equality/etc. or is there some obligation to remain faithful to the source material?

    Reply

  4. Acez13 #

    Cavlin and Hobbes 21st century reboot: Calvin and Jobs, Calvin has iMaginary friends.

    Reply

  5. Timothy J Swann #

    I enjoyed this film a lot, found McAvoy completely captivating (was having a minor McAvoy season having watched Atonement earlier this week) whilst being abundantly away of the ethnic/gender problems. I’m not sure I’m happy with myself for that.

    Reply

    • Lee OTI Staff #

      “I enjoyed this film a lot…whilst being abundantly aware of the ethnic/gender problems.”

      I’ll go one step further and say that in spite of its ethnic/gender problems, it does a pretty good job of using the X-Men as an allegory for the ethnic/gender problems we face in the real world.

      I think that some of the other podcasters, particularly McNeil, would say that those ethnic/gender problems undermine the movie’s social message to the point that it’s not effective, but I was able to shelve those concerns and give the movie the benefit of the doubt. In other words, sometimes when the black guy dies first, it’s just that the guy who dies first happens to be black.

      (I know what you all are thinking now: who are you, and what have you done with the Lee that nitpicks everything for coded racism and lack of minority representation?!?)

      Reply

      • Timothy J Swann #

        I was having this discussion with my father re: Michael J. Fox in The Good Wife. He is a character with Parkinson’s who uses it to his own advantage. I posited three stages of minority characters – 1st, the caricature, (there then comes a gap where the minority is ignored), 2nd, the right-on PC portrayal, and 3rd, complex characters who have their whatever as part of their character but aren’t limited by it – the writers aren’t afraid, in this case, of writing a Parkinsonian character who cheats at law by using his condition, because the respect they give to him is that he’s a complex character, rather than the pseudo-respect from pussy-footing around the issue.

        I don’t know if X-Men has really crossed into level 3 here, but you could argue that Darwin is a character whose power is adaptability, whose personality is cunning and loyal, and this combination gets him killed, oh, and he happens to be black.

        The above comes of course from a middle-class white guy, so, have some salt with it.

        Reply

        • Gab #

          There is also the lawyer with the baby that used being pregnant and then later being a mother to try getting sympathy. I find it interesting that the judges never see through MJF’s shenanigans, but often end up seeing through hers. I think that’s more a reflection of society, not the writers’ own prejudices or misunderstandings, though.

          Reply

      • Lee OTI Staff #

        I saw X-Men for the second time yesterday, mostly with an eye towards the movie’s identity politics.

        Interestingly, the black mutant (Darwin) is treated precisely as I described above–a mutant who dies for his fellow mutants who just happens to be black, with no explicit nods to race—with one very interesting exception.

        In the scene after Shaw’s attack on the CIA compound, he tries to recruit the young mutants to his side by saying that they could either be “slaves” or “kings/queens.” Upon mentioning “slaves,” the camera cuts to Darwin. It’s hard to write this off as coincidental because when he mentions “queens,” the camera cuts to Angel, the female flying young mutant.

        Did anybody else catch this and have thoughts on it?

        Reply

        • Gab #

          Only saw it once, but I cringed at that slaves v. queen thing and totally noticed the people the camera focused on. Call me ignorant, but I can’t tell precisely what race the girl playing Angel is, but Darwin saying “slaves” at least was so hit-you-over-the-head. So the line and editing thus made him dying first a little hard for me. But I did see it as MOSTLY a dude dying for his friends and not necessarily the black character getting killed first- I think because it wasn’t a random, pointless thing, not remotely arbitrary. I can’t remember how much he’s talked about later in the movie, but I imagine that if done right, a sort of, “For Darwin!” thing could have been rather moving and uncheesy/trivializing (and thus making his sacrifice feel less like sacrifice and more like killing off the black guy first).

          Reply

  6. Caroline #

    As far as the film’s treatment of history goes, I was sort of bothered by the way Kevin Bacon was able to dictate policy by intimidating one military official in each government. For example, the scene in the Dr. Strangelove room where they decide to definitely put missiles in Cuba – that seems like the kind of thing you might run by the President. Kennedy got to make his famous tv speech, but Khrushchev and Castro didn’t get to show up at all. I understand that including them in a major way would have been a very ill-informed distraction, but shouldn’t someone have said, “I’ll take this to the President,” or “He has the ear of Khrushchev, we just need to convince him.”

    Reply

    • Timothy J Swann #

      If I were trying to justify it, they both seem to go to convocations of generals, maybe both sides were balanced between hawks and doves and Shaw picked the most manipulable opponents to placing missiles in the satellite nations.

      Reply

  7. Redem #

    Ray Wise in the movie second time I see him in playing a goverment official in something about WWIII, mutants, mind reader and the soviet

    Reply

  8. Gab #

    Initial thought: Whoda thunk Professor X would be a ladies man? And with the same line every time, too…

    Ah, Professor F., you totally took my parallel with the mutants and comparisons. I was thinking of that the whole time I was watching the movie. Different factions like that are common, and I’d argue necessary, in social movements. The radicals push the envelope further than the moderates would on their own, but the moderates keep credibility for the overarching goals and reign in (at least some of) the crazymakings.

    Reply

    • Gab #

      Crap, I wasn’t done with the podcast before posting that…

      Continuing:

      They picked and chose what they’d take care of in terms of continuity. I think mostly they ignored Wolverine, but yes, some other things were explained away. Frost, for example, was surreptitiously re-imagined. And yeah, forgot who mentioned it, but they did indeed open the third with a story where the two guys seem to be on the same side, but I for some reason feel like there was actually somewhat of a competition between the two men, as in they both got there at the same time and were trying to recruit her to their respective camps. I could be wrong, and probably am- haven’t seen that one in quite some time, after all. Anyhoo, point: That could just be another thing they’re ret-conning or changing. I mean, I don’t see how Havoc could be Cyclops’s brother, unless he’s his much, much older brother, for example.

      I was pretty angry about the eye-candy thing. I just… UGH… I mean, Moira stripping down like that right after we meet her…? And I know Mystique gets it on with a LOT of people in the comics, but the way she tries to escape her feelings of rejection by one man by lying naked in another’s really got to me, too. I could go on and on, here…

      Reply

  9. Timothy J Swann #

    Incidentally, Storm DID cameo in this film, though not played by Halle Berry, in the Cerebro sequence, there was a woman with her distinctive hair/skin combo, possibly, though don’t quote me, it was a very short moment, with her mother.

    As for the Hitler Hands (this was a nickname I got during my moderately successful debating career on account of my vigorous body language during my speeches) displayed by Magneto, throughout the rest of the movie, he has a different, two handed pose, both low down by his body. This would suggest that the pose was indeed intentional.

    Reply

    • Gab #

      I thought I was going crazy with the Storm cameo, and the people I saw it with didn’t notice it themselves! I feel less nuttery now. :)

      Reply

  10. James V #

    Was interested in the comments on how the women are portrayed in this movie and the overt sexuality that was used. Now as a warm blooded male the film was a triumph by the costume designer in that he managed to convince January Jones to wear her outfit. But parts of the way women are portrayed in this really bugs me.

    So the opening sequence in the club. Do all female CIA agents wear lingerie on stake outs as standard? or was this a special event as knowing that infiltration might be needed to get in to the club taking off ones clothes is the easiest way to do that? If that is the case surely the partner would know about it.

    Also this is the early 60’s right, anyone else think that all the lingerie worn looked remarkably modern? This is the era of the original playboy bunnies right, which generally while tight kept the torso much more covered than what is now considered sexy. Was it just all for the young boys who will watch this movie?

    Not really having a complete knowledge of he comics is Raven simply attracted to every Mutant? Obviously she is attracted to Beast when she meets him, yet attempts to sleep with Magneto and we all know she gets with Azazel to create NightCrawler.

    If you are a mutant with wings (no matter how well you disguise them) is stripping really the profession to go into? Especially as you clearly hate the way the patrons of the club look at you, when you think you are vastly superior to them.

    Reply

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