Siskoid the Irredeemable Shag’s coverage of Marvel Team-Up continues with issue #150 (February 1985) by Louise Simonson, Greg LaRocque and Mike Esposito, starring Spider-Man and the Uncanny X-Men! It’s “‘Tis Better to Give!”.
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Relevant images and further credits at: FW Team-Up Supplemental
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Juggernaut was on the Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends” episode “A Firestar is Born.” He was voiced by the booming tone of William Marshall, a perfect piece of voice casting. Marshall is probably best known to people our age as “The King of Cartoons” on Pee-Wee’s Playhouse. He was great in the underrated Blacula and Scream, Blacula, Scream. He was also on the Star Trek episode “The Ultimate Computer” and the Man from U.N.C.L.E. episode “The Maze Affair,” one of my favorite episodes of that series. Ok, that is probably more than you wanted to know about Juggernaut’s appearance on Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends.
ah yes earth Wolverine is australian
Only halfway through but wanted to say that Peter had that wooden cigar store Indian for quite a while in the 70s and 80s. I would have to go re read but I seem to recall a story where he finally got an apartment (maybe the first one w Harry?) and they had a housewarming party where people brought strange decorations or something like that. Anybody re read late 60s early 70a Spidey lately?
I would like to see the X- Men meet The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles so they could chew the Mutants out for letting Juggernaut wreck the sewers. I also like Shag’s Justice League Detroit idea because Aquaman could meet Wolverine and be written by Claremont.
I remember Peter’s apartment having a construction yard spool that he used as a coffee table. I am sad I lived through college and early adulthood without it.
I didn’t realize this issue of MTU was the first appearance of Juggernaut’s backup helmet. I remember it distinctly in UXM 218 where Dazzler, Rogue, Psylocke, and Longshot battle Juggernaut in Edinburgh (a GREAT fight issue btw). In a nice bit of continuity, Rogue can’t tear his main helmet off by herself in that issue either, she absorbs his strength first and only then is able to. And the backup helmet is ripped off too, this time by Dazzler who only needed to use her lasers to cut the straps holding it on and rips it off herself, clearing the way for Psylocke to mind-blast and defeat him. So the backup helmet is only so useful.
As for why Juggernauts clothes don’t get bigger on him when he shrinks, I think those clothes were granted to him by the ruby. Magic clothes that somehow know to shrink when the power is shared. Though you then have to wonder why the ruby didn’t conjure a similar outfit for Black Tom.
Interesting this comic had Peter pining for his black costume, since the black costume escaping and coming after him would be the focus of Web of Spider-Man #1, the series MTU got canceled to make way for.
Web went through a pretty rough period of fill-in issues, but I liked a lot of it, especially once Peter David wrote it. I loved Peter traveling around with Joy Mercado on assignment for Now Magazine. The later Conway/Saviuk period had a lot of good stuff too.
I don’t remember where i first saw the X-men or juggernaut but I do remember having this issue as a kid. I always thought that was grown up comic cuz they were all so serious. Looking back now and you could replace each character with the cast of saved by the bell and you’d have an instant 90s PSA. “Zack and AC say Cool kids don’t do drugs”
Anywho, here’s to another stellar performance from the fine folks at Fire and Water and Happy thanksgiving to everybody who reads this
For a x-men cross over how about .
The x-men noir version meet the modern version. For a team up .
Along with the x-babies yes a triple x-men cross over vs the hand and sliver samurai.
In alternate universe.
Well done gentleman! You made this book sound a lot more fun than it actually is! At least, in my opinion anyways. I dislike this comic for numerous reasons. It was the last issue of what was my favorite Spidey title at the time. I liked the fact that MTU was for the most part separate from the continuity of Amazing Spider-Man. This was at a time when I couldn’t get to a comic rack on a regular basis, so I often missed 2 or 3 months worth of issues. With MTU, this wasn’t really a problem. Another reason was the guests. This was just before I started reading The X-Men, and I didn’t really know who they were, and let’s face it, this story doesn’t really help sell them. Finally, I found the book to be dull. The cover is bland, and the story focused too much on Juggernaut, a villain I barely knew. Spidey has far too little to do in the finale of his own series. I can confirm that in my experience, this story was very confusing and inaccessible to readers unfamiliar with the X-Men. For me, the last issue of Marvel Team-Up is a book that will live in infamy!!!!! (Plus Han Solo isn’t in it! Ooops! Sorry, that’s a whine for another podcast)
I’m glad to put this low point behind us and move on to whichever issue you guys visit next. Long live the memories of Marvel Team-Up!
Excellent show as always.
I think I knew about the Xmen vaguely but the Amazing Friends show was the first time I really saw them and what they could do. Pretty sure Spidey rips the helmet off in that episode so Prof X can put the whammy on them.
I do think as comics became more of a collecting phenomenon and less disposable entertainment, the team-up books more difficult for the companies to deal with. Nerds like me (then) would want to know ‘where in continuity’ the team-up rested instead of just saying ‘wouldn’t it be cool of Batman teamed up with the Creeper’. Plus there is the easy opt-out month to month if you don’t care about the guest. Shame really, I learned all about the extended universe through the team-up books being covered on this show.
Peter’s apartment decoration is odd for sure. I remember an issue where he has a small fire and an over-sized stuffed dog gets singed. He throws it out only to have someone modeled on Len Wein (who wrote it into the spidey stories) see it in the trash and take it home.
And a bunch of hot girls want Peter to stick around and take their pics? And he leaves to fight the Juggernaut … an XMen villain!!! You need better priorities Pete. With great bikinis comes great responsibility.
Alas, fair Marvel Team-Up, we knew you when. That dejected corner box image of Spider-Man’s back tells it all. The time’s a-changing and all that.
My X-Men history is really complicated, as usual, but I was buying the book regularly around this point. The first stories would have been their guest appearance in a Spider-Man Treasury reprinting the Sinister Six annual. The all-new team I read in an issue from a Whitman 3-pack with the end of the Proteus story. That’s a crazy introduction to be sure. I did see some friend’s issues of the Byrne era here and there, and bought #150 for myself just as I was starting to collect new comics on my own. Between New Mutants and post Secret Wars, it was only a matter of time before they became a regular buy. I probably suffered from budgetary and spinner rack restrictions.
I first saw Juggernaut in Amazing Spider-Man #230, then Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends. I always loved that episode for revealing that Firestar was a former X-Man in the Spider-Friends universe. Also in that episode, they recreate a scene from issue #230 with Jugs pulling off the corner of a building with Spidey clinging to the top. Such a cool image.
As for this issue, I like parts about it, but it does lack some flair for a final issue. However, since #150 is an anniversary issue, it makes sense to have the X-Men, much like issue #100 had the Fantastic Four. I remember that Uncanny X-Men itself did a few issues with just these members like you both discussed, but it was oddly satisfying to me at least as a reader. It made the stories feel like they happened in real time. And I liked getting a focus on these members, especially Nightcrawler and Rogue. Gimme more of Kurt multi-bamfing any day!
Ok, here’s the proposal. Shredder and the Foot clan enlist the help of the Morlocks to hunt down their sewer-dwelling enemies, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. The half-shelled heroes are on the ropes, until Michelangelo happens across Kitty Pryde shopping downtown, who summons the X-Men to help her new friend. Although the more I think on it, the more all of the Turtles would bond with Kitty. Now if only we could work in some sparring between Raphael and Wolverine, too.
Dang it! I forgot to chime in on other team-up series. I personally feel that the 2007-2010 Brave and the Bold is the best series after the 80s. It’s worth noting that 2011’s Avenging Spider-Man which changed title to Superior Spider-Man Team-Up lasted a combined 34 issues, just one issue shy of the BatB series. And maybe you were talking about the 2005 Marvel Team-Up that lasted 25 issues. I do have a soft spot for Ultimate Team-Up even though it lasted a mere 16 issues, since I love Ultimate Spider-Man and gave that classic MTU feel by exploring the Ultimate universe in a dedicated series.
But in terms of sheer longevity, the clear winner is Scooby-Doo Team-Up, with a whopping 50 issues, lots of guest stars, and brought nostalgia for 1972’s New Scooby-Doo Movies with all of its team-ups! And I’m ashamed that I only thought of it from searching on this question instead of remembering on my own! So much fun!
The other one no one dare mention is Deadpool Team-Up.
This is one of the few appearances of the X-Men from this time period that I have not read and I will definitely be looking for it. A friend left an early copy of the All-New All-Different X-Men at my house when I was probably 6 years old, which introduced me to the team. They fascinated me immediately. I bought whatever was available at the newsstand (and at Waldenbooks at the nearest mall) for about a ten-year period that ended when I went to college in 1989. I picked the X-books up again a few years later not long before the Age of Apocalpyse. Then, I have searched out all the issues that I missed during my hiatus. So I now have everything (Uncanny X-Men, adjective-less X-Men, New Mutants/X-Force, X-Factor, Excalibur, Generation X, X-Treme X-Men) from Uncanny #167 to around the first of the Grant Morrison run in one form or another. Issue 167 was released the month that the X-Pansion of the X-Universe officially begam w/ New Mutants, which is my favorite comic book series ever.
Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays, Shag and Siskoid and everyone else at Fire and Water.
Ah, Leela… Wait! What were we talking about? Spider-Man and the X-Men?
Back in the day, I watched the X-Men cartoon show religiously, but never really got into any of their comic books. The one exception to that was Excalibur. Even in that case, I initially came to the book for Captain Britain, but I admittedly ended up staying for Kitty Pryde. Ah, Kitty… Wait! What were we talking about?
Thank you for another remarkable episode.