Spawnography

Technically, all of the arcs in this era could be called "Set-Up" but this is the only one that is. George and Pierce dive into issues 35 and 36 and they're pleasantly surprised. The book has a bit of gas and Todd is really building toward something here! There is some solid family drama amongst the overall world building and Greg Capullo's art is really rounding into shape.

Violator's back, baby! And this two-parter really has it all! Spawn's greatest foe returns with a vengeance, tensions mounts between Terry and Spawn, we check in with Sam and Twitch following Twitch's injuries, the angels, the night people and Jason Wynn. George and Pierce get into the nitty gritty surrounding some of the motifs present in the art as well. The letters column are ripe for disucssion, too as one fan takes Todd to task for Todd's handling of race in his book. Did we go on a few too many tangents? Maybe. We'd apologize but our hands are tied.

What happens when the two best Spawn podcasts join forces?! Well, you get a double dose of devilish discussion about everyone's favorite Hellspawn. We welcomed John and David from Regarding Spawn to discuss the Spawn: Blood Feud miniseries, the joy of diving into Spawn as adults, and just how we all ended up with Spawn podcasts in the first place. Come for the Spawn of it all and stay for the tangents about Muppets and Shakespeare. That's what's you're really here for, right? Big thanks to John and David for joining us! You can give them a listen here: https://open.spotify.com/show/5NXUkGAdMWcP5dfGXLYWL2

Spawn Across America continues in issues 31 and 32 as Al makes it back to New York City and faces off against a brand new Anti-Sp... I mean, Redeemer! Todd McFarlane dives a little deeper into the moral implications of Al's actions to this point while Greg Capullo's art continues to evolve and impress. Plus what does it mean that Al Simmons is "destined to be The One?"

Following Spawn's swing by Elysium, he finds himself thousands of miles from home and the Toddfather takes a couple of issues to tackle some important social issues - abuse and racism. Now is Spawn the book to be tackling these issues? Can comic book superheroes ever effectively talk about problems that they can't fix with punching? Does Spawn do a lot more harm than good in these cases? Your hosts will get into it.

The dream of the Bad Girl 90s is certainly alive in 1995's Angela miniseries by Neil Gaiman and Greg Capullo. But despite the sometimes leery and lurid aesthetics, this story is a lot of fun! It's Angela's 100,000th birthday and the only present she's getting is going on trial for high treason! So her friends do what any friends would - they get a witness for her defense - Al Simmons. George and Pierce lead you through the rom-com highs and lows of this Spawn by way of Nora Ephron miniseries as well as dig into a very special letters column answered by Gaiman hinmself.

The Curse makes his debut as we see Todd McFarlane continue to develop as a writer while Greg Capullo really starts coming to his own. He's delivering art work that is in great conversation with Todd's earlier work on the series but still stands on its own. George and Pierce dig into some of the themes of a fanatical villain like the Curse as well as express some excitement and relief that Terry, Wanda and Al finally have something of a confrontation. As always, there's some fun stuff in the letters column, too!

Spawn makes a friend... sorta! Files are exchanged! Those pesky angels are up to something, too. We're back with a couple of little self-contained stories that help expand the Spawn world a bit. Marc Silvestri joins the book for issue #25 during Image X month when each of the Image creators guested on each other's books. George and Pierce probably get a little too deep into comparing and contrasting the computer coloring in issue 25 to our regular coloring team of Steve Oliff and Olyoptics but hey, what's a podcast for if not drilling down into minutaie? Spawn goes full on Wile E. Coyote in one issue before we get some emotional whiplash in the second. And in the letters, Todd gives us an explanation for why there is only sometimes swearing in the Spawniverse.

He's not the Vindicator or the Victimizer or the Vaporizer or the Vibrator or the Vegematic! He's the VIOLATOR! George and Pierce dig into Alan Moore's 3 issue miniseries that explains some of what ol' Violator is up to during "the Hunt" arc and this time they've got a guest along for the ride. You may have seen his work on Psycho Goreman, Beast Heart Strikers or Boom!'s WWE comics. Comic book writer Lan Pitts joins your regular Spawnographers to get to the heart of this weird little mini and have a few laughs along the way.

Our favorite Sicilian cyborg celebrity assassin is back and he's out for Spawn's blood! That's right, Overtkill has returned! George and Pierce cover Spawn issues #21-#24 which were released before Spawn #19 and #20 and feature some fallout from that arc with Houdini or maybe some fallout from Spawn/Batman? We'll get into it. But many forces in the Spawniverse are converging as Vito Gravano (aka Tony Twistelli), the CIA, Jason Wynn, Sam & Twitch, Terry Fitzgerald and Spawn are all thrust into each other's path! Plus we get into an interesting letter in the back matter and look forward to where the book goes from here!