Penny Men

Welcome to The Penny Men: Cracking open the adamantium vault and immediately getting sidetracked inside it!

In this episode, Ben, Gregory, and Tom kick off a “Rogues Gallery Roll Call” focusing on the world of the X-Men—specifically the villains who define the franchise as much as the heroes do!

What starts as a structured breakdown of iconic antagonists quickly turns into a free-associative mutant philosophy seminar with jokes, detours, and occasional comic book accuracy!

The crew dives deep into Magneto as both ideological foil and recurring almost-hero, unpacking his shifting portrayals from world-conquering villain to Holocaust survivor shaped by trauma, mutant separatist, reluctant ally, and occasional full-on war criminal depending on the writer’s mood!

Along the way, they:

• Debate Professor X’s moral gray zones
• The MLK/Malcolm X parallels in mutant ideology
• And the X-Men’s infamous tendency to turn every villain into a future teammate!

From there, things escalate in classic Penny Men fashion:

• The unstoppable force of Juggernaut enters the chat (and cannot jump, canonically)
• Black Tom becomes part plant
• And Sentinels loom as the towering symbol of humanity’s robotic fear response to mutants!

The discussion frames them not just as enemies, but as reflections of the same core question: what happens when groups decide the only solution is control?

Also featuring:

• X-Men lineup confusion
• Brotherhood of Mutants relationship maps
• Marvel vs. Capcom trivia
• Existential toy nostalgia (yes, the Sentinel action figure with flying limbs gets its flowers)
• And at least one moment where the podcast threatens to become an architecture podcast again!

It’s part character study, part comic book archaeology, part late-night “wait, does Juggernaut have knees?” energy—and entirely The Penny Men!

The Penny Men continue their journey through the bizarre depths of Superman’s rogues gallery, leaving behind the famous villains and diving headfirst into radioactive weirdos, magical nuisances, and whatever exactly Lobo is supposed to be!

This episode covers the physical powerhouse villains like Parasite, Metallo, and Doomsday, while also somehow finding time to discuss evil Phantom Zone cats, a kryptonite-powered dog, and a cowboy outlaw with a robot horse and alien laser guns!

The gang breaks down;

• Why Parasite is one of Superman’s most dangerous enemies
• How Metallo keeps reinventing himself every decade
• And why the famous “Death of Superman” storyline mostly boils down to two guys punching each other until editorial says stop!

Along the way they explore:

• Silver Age oddities like magical books from space
• Superman revenge clubs
• And villains whose entire motivation is “your existence is medically inconvenient for me”!

Meanwhile, the animated series gets a surprising amount of love with discussions of:

• Livewire
• Volcana
• And how the 1990s cartoons quietly created some of Superman’s best modern supporting villains!

Also featured:

• Malcolm McDowell robot body horror
• The strange appeal of Maxima
• And why James Gunn apparently dug deep enough into Superman lore to resurrect Lex Luthor’s horrifying protoplasm experiment!

Additional topics include:

• Why every alternate dimension conveniently weakens Superman
• The tragedy of being a supervillain named “Master Jailer”
• Comparisons to Rogue and Multiple Man
• The merits of Black Adam
• And the realization that Silver Age Superman comics may have contained every possible idea anyone could ever have!

Equal parts comic book history lecture and three friends desperately trying to remember obscure alien names from 1978 comics!

The Penny Men finally tackle the impossible question: does Superman actually have a good rogues gallery, or are people just thinking of Lex Luthor and calling it a day?

Ben, Gregory, and Tom spiral through decades of comic history discussing why Batman and Spider-Man villains get all the love while Superman’s enemies quietly hide giant robot skull ships in the background!

Topics include:

• The psychology of Lex Luthor
• Why baldness is the ultimate comic book evil
• The Silver Age tendency to solve emotional trauma with psychic powers
• Whether Brainiac is secretly scarier than every movie villain combined
• And the tragic destruction of Planet Lexor because Lex absolutely could not stop hating Superman for five minutes!

Also discussed:

• Monkey sidekicks
• Planet of the Apes crossovers
• Richard Pryor accidentally replacing Brainiac in Superman III
• Why nobody in comics can recognize Clark Kent
• And the continuing search for the exact number of iconic Flash villains before you hit Rainbow Raider territory!

A surprisingly thoughtful discussion about ego, morality, and power occasionally interrupts the important business of yelling about bottled cities and “space cancer”!

Then your Penny People hosts move beyond the household names into the strange wasteland of:

• Phantom Zone criminals
• Forgotten Silver Age weirdos
• And characters who sound intimidating mostly because they have short, easy-to-pronounce names!

Tom attempts to explain why General Zod became Superman’s third most famous villain despite barely doing anything in many of the comics, while the group debates the difference between loving comic Zod and loving the movie version from Superman II!

Along the way they stumble into discussions about:

• Evil Kryptonian cousins
• Incomprehensible alien names
• And how every Superman adaptation quietly rewrites the mythology!

The episode also wanders into broader comic book territory, including why some eras of DC continuity fit together like puzzle pieces while others feel like three different people trying to explain a dream they barely remember!

Expect side tangents about:

• Bronze Age comics
• Obscure supervillains
• Comic book power scaling
• And the eternal comic reader struggle of remembering whether a villain was genuinely important or just appeared in a cartoon once!

Equal parts comic scholarship and complete derailment, this episode asks the important questions: how many Superman villains are actually iconic, and how many are just bald guys from space yelling at each other?

The Penny Men return from the wilderness to discuss comics... probably!

Along the way they:

• Uncover the TRUE meaning of the Larry Bird Rule
• Pitch a McDonaldland battle tournament
• Accidentally map the multiverse of Captain N (again!)
• And contemplate the psychological damage required to watch every single Looney Tunes cartoon in chronological order!

Eventually, the conversation actually reaches its intended destination: a deep dive into The TOON Treasury of Classic Children's Comics — the massive collection of Golden Age kids comics edited by Art Spiegelman and Françoise Mouly, featuring forgotten classics from the 1940s through early 1960s by legends like Carl Barks, John Stanley, Sheldon Mayer, Walt Kelly, and Basil Wolverton!

Also discussed:

• Smurf lore
• Public domain superheroes
• Muppet archival projects
• Herman’s Hermits
• Dead Milkmen
• Jimmy Dean
• Wolfman Jack
• The Fox and the Crow
• And the existential horror of committing your life to cataloging obscure media!

Featuring:

• Ronald McDonald power scaling
• The Larry Bird Paradox
• “You can’t have these comics”
• Why Sugar and Spike deserve respect
• The secret history of Red Tornado
• A thousand Looney Tunes and no escape
• The Smurf cinematic universe
• Several things that may not be true!

The Penny Men: preserving pop culture continuity one derailed conversation at a time!

The Penny Men continue their Saturday morning cartoon programming war—and Ben unveils the full master plan behind his Alien Animal ‘90s Alternative Action Block! 🛸🐭🦈

Starting with a lineup of deep cuts and cult favorites like:

• Men in Black
• Rude Dog and the Dweebs
• Space Ghost
• Banana Splits
• Wildcats
• Sheep in the Big City
• Biker Mice from Mars
• And Wacky Races!

Ben doesn’t just program a single morning—he engineers a six-season broadcast strategy!

Shows rotate in and out as their runs end, bringing in replacements like:

• Eek the Cat
• Street Sharks
• Cowboys of Moo Mesa
• Time Squad
• Whatever Happened to Robot Jones?
• And the under-the-radar gem Mad Jack the Pirate!

Along the way, the guys dive into:

• The long legacy of Ninja Turtles-inspired animal action shows
• Why Biker Mice from Mars might secretly be a comedy
• Cartoon Network’s weirdly high-brow late Cartoon Cartoons
• The strange fate of Fox Kids shows during the Pokémon era
• And whether kids in the ‘90s had to make impossible choices between shows like Batman: The Animated Series, Tiny Toon Adventures, and Transformers!

Finally, the hosts start comparing their dream TV blocks head-to-head to determine the ultimate channel lineup!

Would you stick with Felix the Cat, flip to Masters of the Universe, or stay loyal to the Alien Animal ‘90s Alternative Action Block?

Grab your bowl of cereal and start channel surfing!

Welcome back to The Penny Men’s Saturday Morning Cartoon Programming War! 📺🥣

Last week Tom threw down the gauntlet with his dream cartoon lineup—but now Ben and Greg step up to the network executive desk to pitch their own blocks of animated glory!

Greg spins up “Gumby’s Wheel of Cartoons,” a four-hour journey through animation history hosted by Gumby and Pokey themselves! The wheel lands on everything from early theatrical classics like Out of the Inkwell to Jay Ward favorites, Hanna-Barbera mysteries, the bizarre Skatebirds, and a run of ‘90s cartoon brilliance!

Along the way the guys debate the philosophy of cartoon scheduling, the importance of wraparound hosts, and whether Sky Commanders can survive going head-to-head with X-Men!

Then Ben unveils his contender: The Alien & Animal ‘90s Alternative Action Block—a lineup packed with strange creatures, cult-favorite series, and the weird energy that made ‘90s action cartoons unforgettable!

Also in this episode:

• A deep dive into cereal lore (Golden Grahams vs. Trix vs. Captain Crunch) 🥣

• The surprising horror elements of The Real Ghostbusters 👻

• Why Tiny Toon Adventures might secretly be college-level comedy

• The strange world of live-action Saturday morning hosts like Banana Splits and Skatebirds!

Three hosts! Three networks! Only one Saturday morning survives!

Which block would YOU watch?

#Cartoons #SaturdayMorning #Animation #90sCartoons #Podcast

This week, Ben, Gregory, and Tom travel back to the golden age of cereal-fueled television to build their dream Saturday morning cartoon blocks!

Remember when cartoons only existed between 8 AM and noon? When you had to wake up early, guard the remote, and pray your show wasn’t up against something better on another channel?

Armed with the entire history of animation, the guys each draft eight cartoons to fill a four-hour block—from vintage classics to ‘90s powerhouses and beyond!

Strategy matters: you need the right show to wake kids up, the right show to keep them from flipping the channel, and a big closer before the inevitable noon-hour Looney Tunes takeover!

Along the way they reminisce about:

• TV blocks like One Saturday Morning, The Disney Afternoon, TGIF, Adult Swim, and Toonami
• Debate the chaos of pre-streaming TV scheduling
• And recall the true tragedy of childhood: waking up too late and missing the first cartoon!

Pour yourself a bowl of Waffle Crisp, sprint to the couch before the theme song starts, and decide for yourself:

Whose cartoon block wins the ratings war?

We made it! 120 episodes of The Penny People Podcast—and to celebrate, we immediately forget to do a retrospective and instead spiral into cartoon voices, deep-cut Hanna-Barbera lore, and whether any animated character has ever had an original voice!

Is Yogi Bear just doing Art Carney? Is Fred Flintstone just Jackie Gleason yelling at a rock TV? And how many characters are secretly just doing Bert Lahr?

From there, things escalate (as they do) into a passionate defense of Men in Black: The Series as one of the most unexpectedly dark and well-written cartoons of its era—standing shoulder to shoulder with X-Men: The Animated Series and Spider-Man: The Animated Series!

Also in this episode:

• The growing list of podcasts we keep saying we’ll do (and absolutely will… someday)
• A surprise deep dive into The Prisoner and why it might break Ben’s brain
• A detour into Matinee, William Castle, and the lost art of movie theater gimmicks
• Tom casually revealing he’s watched every Universal monster movie like it’s no big deal!

No structure! No plan! Just 120 episodes of momentum!

We wouldn’t trade it for a single penny!

Part two of The Penny People Explain the History of Comics somehow begins with Andy Griffith, detours through Rebecca, and ends up mapping the entire DNA of superhero archetypes!

Ben, Tom, and Greg set out to break down the Justice Society… and instead spiral into a loving, exhaustive taxonomy of comic book heroes:

• Alien strongmen
• Lab-made science guys
• Magic artifacts
• Ancient gods
• Spooky mystery men
• Robots
• Pulp vigilantes
• And everything in between!

Along the way:

• John Carter vs. Superman
• Green Lantern’s “is it magic though?” problem
• Hawkman’s eternal continuity nightmare
• Batman as a Shadow remix
• And why taking power pills maybe isn’t a great long-term plan!

If you’ve ever wondered where superheroes actually come from—or how POGs, radio dramas, and Golden Age comics all connect—this is your people, explaining everything, enthusiastically, and slightly off the rails!

It starts with a gripe! Ben doesn’t like variant covers—but connected covers? Those he can get behind!

That complaint spirals into a full-blown comics epic as Tom, Greg, and Ben crack open Justice League Spectacular #1 (1992), debate the morality of selling the same issue five times, and relive the excesses of foil covers, second printings, randomized posters, and peak-’90s X-Men nonsense!

From there, the conversation swerves into: Robins!

• Tim Drake vs. Dick Grayson
• Training with Lady Shiva
• Miniseries confusion
• Animated series betrayals
• Batman’s ever-expanding family
• Corporate mandates
• Warner Bros. trademarks
• Why Robin has to exist, who he’s really for, and whether Batman works better alone!

Strong opinions are expressed! Damien is politely rejected!

Then the scope widens—a lot! This is the Justice Society / Justice League / All-Star Squadron episode… but not the one you already heard!

The Penny Men dig deep into the Golden Age origins of superhero teams, tracing DC’s lineage back through:

• Pulps
• Radio dramas
• Dime novels
• Wartime paper shortages
• And the accidental invention of the shared universe!

They break down the original Justice Society lineup:

• Why some heroes were “honorary members”
• How multiple publishers shared characters before DC even existed
• And how kids writing letters helped shape comic book history!

Along the way:

• Why the Justice Society is the blueprint for all superhero teams
• How archetypes like Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman emerged
• The evolution of comic book “Ages” (Golden, Silver, Bronze, Dark, Modern… whatever we’re calling this now)
• The rise and fall of genres like horror, romance, and Westerns
• The Comics Code Authority and how censorship reshaped the industry forever
• And why comics have always been “dying,” yet somehow keep surviving!

It’s a sprawling, funny, occasionally argumentative tour through comic book history—from cheap pulp paper to mythological superhero pantheons—told the only way The Penny Men know how: loosely structured, wildly informed, and powered entirely by love for the medium!

Connected covers optional! Deep lore mandatory!