Elseworlds Exchange: Comic Book Plagues

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Alright, let's get on with the show. Waiting down upon the underworld to smash gangland, scum, the friends of the unfortunate, enemy of criminal. In mysterious, all powerful characters, a problem to the police, but a crusade of law. Hey everybody, welcome to Elsewhere's Exchange, I'm Sal.

And I'm Joel. We're gonna be talking about viruses. I don't know why. I mean, it's not like it's topical or anything like that.

No, no, not at all. When inspiration strikes, you know, when it knocks at the door, you gotta answer. That's right. We're gonna be talking about comic book contagions or plagues or viruses.

The fictitious diseases that afflict our favorite superheroes throughout the multiverse. I'm very excited to talk about this because obviously we're living in a self-imposed quarantine right now. Ontario just, what does it declare to state of emergency this morning? Oh, excellent.

New Jersey did it a week ago. No, no, no. Canada's always behind the times for America, you know. Yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly.

But listen, before we get started, I want to say welcome to any of you who are watching this live. And if you were watching this for the first time live, and a special welcome for you because you probably didn't have a chance to do this before. I'm very happy to see you trying it out. If you want to sponsor a new episode, you can do so by making a super chat and asking a question, making a comment, putting it into the show, will we even organically answer your question, talk about it?

Here on the show live. If you're watching this after the fact, all you can do is watch it. But you know what, we'll accept that. That's totally fine.

So yeah, I got a big old list of viruses. I remember when I first got into comics, there was a glut of fake diseases. It was all the rage for a minute there, wasn't it? It was all the rage.

And I feel like it had to have been because of the AIDS epidemic. It was very popularized. It was co-opted by pop culture. And, you know, it was just it was a disease that was, you know, considering the 80s, relatively new and a death sentence when it first came about.

Unlike today, yeah. Right. And so I mean, it depends on how rich you are. Also that we're not all Magic Johnson.

Exactly. But it's manageable if you have the means. But it's but it's that kind of fear and that kind of, I don't know, international conversation had to have inspired fiction. And there's there's very few things now.

It's like, no, this will kill you, dad, even cancer, which used to be the oh, this is the worst thing. Now it's like, well, you know, we made some advancements now. It's still gonna suck, but your chances are better. Right.

Exactly. And of course, cancer, I think is still the number one disease in comics that they want to use when they want to hit you in the gut and make you feel sad. Because statistically speaking, we all either know someone who has had cancer. Maybe you've had it or again, you've probably seen a pretty sad movie about cancer.

Yeah, it's true. Everyone is affected by that. But we're gonna talk about fake ones. So when I we want to get to to Macabre to sad.

Yeah, there's enough heavy shit going on in the world with real diseases. Let's talk about some fake disease. Exactly. Exactly.

So let's talk about some fake diseases. One that reminded that I was reminded of the other day that I didn't get a chance to mention in our chat, but I did like throw in immediately. Was the Carrie Envirus? Yes.

Of course. Man, how did we forget Carrie Envirus? Yeah. I mean, like not just the fact that Carrie is a character.

Well, the character and the disease, which is interesting. Exactly. So we got to get into this. Okay.

So the first strain of the Carrie Envirus was a modified version of a serum created by none other than Miles Warren, the Jackal. Jackal added again. I know. He incubated it for five years inside the body of a clone and then that clone.

That was the first strain of the Carrie Envirus. But apparently like it has links through not just the character Carrie, but also the clone son, which is like real diseases. There are multiple strains. Right.

Exactly. I like this one because unlike some of the other diseases we're going to get into that are a little more popular. This one actually does have like mutations and strains and actually kind of behaves like a virus. And they've kind of run this run this into the ground, honestly.

I sure have. Although the last time that you may have seen the Carrie Envirus was that I think the clone conspiracy. Yes. I think the idea was that like if you were a clone resurrected, if you don't take the pill, you become a zombie.

You become a Carrie Envirus. Again, not a bad idea. I mean, you know, clone conspiracy has a lot of problems, but that's a creative idea. Yeah.

I think that like most Spider-Man villains are technically victims of some kind of fake virus. I mean, like you look at you could argue that the symbiote are a pathogen of one form or another. You know, the goblin serum is a it's transferable through blood. Yeah.

Can affect you in multiple ways. The lizard transformation is like could be considered a virus. I mean, they certainly treat it like that, don't they? I mean, heck wasn't there a whole silver surfer story where he found a planet covered in symbiote?

It's like, oh, there's horrible diseases. Fred got to stop it. Oh, yeah. Well, there's two of them.

There's the 90s one where silver surfer was like screw the symbiote. And then there's silver surfer black, where he was like, oh, this is a planet of sentient beings. I should talk to them. Like maybe it's maybe it's a good place for galactus to eat.

And then then they it's so good. Oh, yes, keeps, keeps crashing, but we're just going to keep going. That's good. What was it?

Let's do it in a super chance just to because I think somebody's going to Tony Elizondo says thanks for being you with looks like an exercising pair looking at himself in the mirror. Oh, thank you very much, man. I we got to make some custom ones of these. Yeah, you figure we would do in this show for how many episodes now?

Yeah. Yeah. I lost these with the on commissioning some exclusive house world exchange. You know, emotes that are like little characters that dance around.

I don't know. I'm in little dance in Joe little dance and said. Right. Riley says does the anti life equation count is carnage, revenge of a virus.

And I like the techno organic virus. Okay. Well, you said first up anti life equation. I wouldn't have considered it a virus, but if you read deceased, it sure became one.

Yeah, which they have actually named it's called anti living. Oh, but that is essentially the zombie of like virus. Well, yeah, good. I was going to say one great concept to turn the anti life equation into a zombie virus because it means Taylor didn't have to invent one.

He used something that was already in the universe and it's not only a physical virus. It's a computer virus too, because it's spread through technology. Oh, yeah. Well, it's it's a multifaceted virus, right?

Because you got the zombie outbreak virus, the one that turns people into zombies. You get to play with the anti life equation because of course, in like, I think final crisis, they unleash the anti life equation and then it controls the wheels of people. So technically does act like a virus, but in the seas, it's transferable through human contact or biting and through social media. So you got the technical aspect plus the bio aspect.

But then you also have the aspect where it turns out that the virus itself is sentient. Yeah. And is deliberately transferring itself because it like wants to spread like that hates life. Yeah, that's a pretty cool concept.

I really dig that it's a super cool concept and I think even George Romero would be proud to because it is an evolution on a lot of his ideas, where you know, zombie movies and apocalypse movies, you know, try and talk about culture. And I love the idea that it is spread through technology and screens and mankind is so boned because we are so surrounded by screens 24 seven. Exactly. No, I will give all the accolades to deceased for being a rock simple concept that is multifaceted and handled with grace and dignity.

Because it could have been so dumb, right? Oh, it's zombies, but for DC. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Oh, no.

With the name like DC, you're like, OK, well, you're clearly you're going for the fun. You're going for the lols. What do you mean? And then it's like, no, I we just had it's too clever a name not to use.

You ever wonder to in situations like this where it's like, how would I how long would I last in the deceased world if I live there? And honestly, I think you and me being youtubers being behind screens for work. I don't think Sal and Joel are making it. Nope.

This one guy. Nope. Immediately. I would be our we are zombies day one.

Yeah, day one minute one. He also mentioned is our cards are venom of virus are symbiotes viruses. I mean, they're symbiotes. They're closer to parasites.

Yeah, I think it's more that they're like a like a like a because viruses aren't technically alive. Like they're not a living being. They act and function like living beings because they spread and they reproduce, but they're not like an entity. You know what I mean?

Like they're they're about in any case now that's the best. Donnie Kate's is creating a new character that we can read about on free comic book day called virus. Yes. Yes.

That's right. Well, and there's also like there's the same toxin and there's the you can be infected by a symbiote because of course what was it in absolute cards? Everyone had who had carried a symbiote also had like a piece of them inside them, right? A little codecs, which again sounds a lot like a parasite.

Hell even that stupid Spider-Man venom crossover. What was that maniac and the made man where you know he basically gave it to all the different super villains and turned them into puppets. Yeah. I feel like symbiotes are more like I don't know like a tape worm.

They are a virus and the techno organic virus. I guess we'll transition into that the techno organic virus or T.O. Virus. Mm.

Of course. I remember this came about or like at least in my cultural consciousness around the same time as the legacy virus. What was like people were using them intermittently and interchangeably and I'm like no, they're totally different things. Cable as a tech network and a virus is why he's half a robot.

Let the legacy virus is not that it's something else and there's different versions of the legacy virus which I try to remind myself before we started. Yeah, exactly. Man. So, okay, the techno organic virus I always had it connected with apocalypse.

But what do you remember about it? What do you know slash recall about this about the techno organic virus besides that like cables infected with them? I guess it'll kill him one day or something. I mean, mostly it's the warlock and magus stuff that I remember they know they're a carrier to that's what comes to my mind.

I'm like, oh yeah, there's like a fun mutant robot thing. You know, that's why he looks all weird and shit. Interestingly enough, because warlock is obviously a player in Hawks and Pocks and dogs. Yes.

I feel like this virus is going to happen again. Like we're going to get another. Like we're going to get some kind of clue into this again without a death because then you got the fainlangs connection. Two and we see in the future the fainlangs are like even bigger and even scarier than ever.

Exactly. I mean, the fact that apparently if you're infected by the techno organic virus, you can shapeshift. Mmm. So just maybe that's already a thing and the fact that you know warlock is kind of on the island, but kind of not on the island because you know, some people can see him and some people can't.

I think no one can see him. I think it's more like cyclops almost thought he might have seen him, but he's a secret. Ah, well, that's current. Yeah, true.

I don't get too far anyway, but yeah, but yeah, the techno organic virus. Did they ever solve that problem? No, no. And again, I think it was a matter of it was never a problem meant to be solved.

It was just meant to be like, yo, doesn't cable look rad as fuck with these robot parts. And yeah, yeah, he does. I honestly and truly believe that it was like, no, we generated this. We just needed to call it something because because when I handed in the drawing of cable, they said, why is he always have cyborg?

And they were like, no, he has an infectious disease. Oh, makes him have a cyborg. Oh, and there's pathos there because it's spreading. Oh, like, I don't know.

Okay. All right. I guess that'll be a problem for the next writer then to solve. Damn right.

What was it? Stuart McNally, you've been on the nose here. Hundlads, take care of everybody. I literally said the same thing when I pitched this.

I said, hey, is it too long to know? We do look contagious. The thing that made me think like, no, was when we came up with a list of five within the next 30 seconds. I was like, what was it?

Earth X, legacy virus, techno organic, the actual virus lantern, contagion, 16. No, okay. Yeah, we're doing a show. Like it was it was literally like a driving game.

It's like, you can't think of sex. Oh, wait, we thought of more. Yeah, exactly. Heartless fang, we're a step away from complete lockdown here in the Bay area of California, but I still got to head to work.

You guys stay safe. Listen, I honestly feel like this is the one time in your life currently and who knows in the future where you can get a pass where you can go, I'm not coming in. Yeah, what are you going to do? Like, no one knows what's going on.

I'm not coming in. I mean, and honestly, if you are if you are a risk, like if you live with the elderly, if you are older or if you have a compromised immune system, don't take those risks. Now, it sucks because it's hard to say like, Hey, I'm not going to take those risks. I work in retail and I live in like this one bedroom apartment and I can't afford rent without it.

I don't have an easy answer for you. My suggestion to be, I mean, like if I were in that situation, I would call my landlord and be like, what are you doing about it? Because he's not making any money either. You mentioned landlords.

I've actually had like my payment here for a while and the landlord just has a fucking showed up at the building. Okay. I'm like, okay, I guess I'm not paying you. Then if you're not going to show up.

Well, yeah. Now, what I would do, honestly, I would work out a deal with the person that with all of my utilities, like I call the power company, I call the cable company. Well, I'd probably cancel my cable or the very least downgrade. And I would call my landlord and be like, let's work out something.

Yeah. You know, because obviously this is an extenuating circumstance. There's not a lot of opportunity for that. You're not going to play this card every time.

Yeah. There's a plague going on right now. Clearly you're not going to want to leave your place. And again, you talked about living with the elderly again, like 90% of the people in this building that I live in are old people.

So yeah, exactly. So but thank you, Heartless Bank for hanging out with us. I appreciate it. Kevin Kruger, Runamier's Curse, the plague that killed Marchamena's planet.

Oh, but only some time. Yeah. Only in the 90s. Yeah, man.

I pull though. Nice. Nice. Good use of Runamier because all I remember of Runamier is Marchamena's are yelling it's in pain usually.

He used it like a curse, you know, like shock or he's like, great, Runamier. Look at the size of that ship. But yeah. I do love fake swear words.

Right. Yeah. But now, Runamier was the god of death and darkness in Marcham folklore. And apparently it was a telepathic plague.

See, I like that. That's clever. That's fun. As opposed to all the other times where it's like, oh, white Martians killed them all.

They're like, oh, yellow lanterns killed them all. Yeah. Oh, it's still a Martian. It was a mutated Martian that made the plague.

But they still plague. I, by the way, I think it's the first psychic plague we've got in our list. Yes. How do you get it?

Tuck. Fight apocalypse. Yeah. He'll give it to you.

I don't know. I hope a thing. Oh, my god. I was just thinking like in terms of docs, you know, with the death cult and how like apocalypse is in charge of everything or the very, he's on the quiet council.

He's he's fighting people. Mm hmm. What if he's like secretly infecting everybody with the. Oh, and that's his long game.

His long game is I'm going to take the phalanx and he's like, you all are all part of it now. Oh, shit. That's pretty hype. That that's like a year to reveal apocalypse is just in there.

Like, but didn't you realize all this time, Charles and Eric? Yeah, exactly. Like you two, the only ones I couldn't get near or something like that. I don't know.

But you know, Moira is fine because Moira doesn't live with everyone else. So Moira has to come out of hiding and reveal herself to the apocalypse. That'd be dope. I'm in.

Yeah. She comes out. She's got a big cable gun in here. Yeah.

There's a virus that I immediately came up with. I remember we were talking about it on the couch on back issues and I couldn't name it when Joel pitched this idea. I immediately came up with the name of it. Heat 16 was the virus that was engineered in a lab by the US government.

That was triggered with a dead man switch on Jason Wyn's heart in the spawn movie. Ah, that's a good one. But it is technically a comic book virus because they retconned it in to Curse of the Spawn number 13. Did they really?

Well, of course they did because of course when they were making the movie, they realized they didn't want to pay Rob Lydfield movie rates. So they were like, we got a retcon, the killing of spawn. So we're going to change it to Priest instead of Chapel and then we got to put Priest into the comic books. It's all cyclical.

It's all connected. I remember the Priest Chapel thing. I did not remember the Heat 16 thing that they actually worked it into the comics. That's cool.

Yeah. I mean, I don't know if it's cool, but it's really interesting. Listen, it's in the book and it only appears in issue 13 of Curse of the Spawn, which is terrible. Although I think it's Brazilian in that regard.

But yeah, Heat 16 horrible terrible virus. What it does is I think it melts you. I think it's like Ebola. No, it makes Ebola look like a skin rash.

I believe is what Martin Sheen says. God, Martin Sheen just chewing every piece of scenery in that role. Yeah, I hear his grandson was a big spawn fan and he was like, you've got to take the job. He's like, okay, whatever.

Wow. I don't know. I'm like, wow, Martin Sheen's this movie. Oops.

Look, I'm not going to be acting. I don't know what I'm going to be doing out there, but it's not going to be acting. Well, he's trying. I mean, like he's not trying hard, but he's showing up for work.

Makes Ebola look like a skin rash, man. That really tells you what time and place we were at there. We're like, what was the worst disease at the time of Ebola was kind of new and interesting, right? I mean, that would be outbreak.

The Motaba virus. Oh, yeah. Just literally just Ebola. But more terrible.

Scary your name, though. Yeah. Miao Nien says, Hey, Sal and Joel, is it me or plagues, diseases and viruses just another Tuesday for the X-Men? Yep, you are not wrong.

We were as we talked about this. It's like they have like five of the biggest most popular ones that came to our mind. Yeah, that being said, take care of you too, especially Joel since I hear Ontario just got hit hard. Well, they just put in the, what is it, a state of emergency where we had actually flown under the radar?

Yeah, man. The X-Men have their share of viruses. I know that we talked about the techno organic one. We should mention MPOCs.

Yes, which is fairly new and kind of already forgotten. It's over. I mean, like the fact is they need to make up something. The idea of here being that, of course, if mutants get exposed to the Terrigian mist, they'll develop a disease that kills them.

They might as well called it the Fox disease. Again, you just move a couple letters around. You turn the P into an app. Yeah, they really should have done that just to be like, there.

We're killing the X-Men because Fox. That's what they came down with a bad case of Fox. It didn't like kill all that many people. It killed Cyclops, but only after the fact when they retconned it.

And it killed multiple men, I think? Yeah, kill multiple men. I think it affected what's that guy who could cure everything? A lickser?

A lickser. I thought it killed him after he cured it. But I don't remember that. I think Sunspot got it.

Dazzer got it. But they got better. They all got better. I mean, everybody got better.

Obviously, didn't affect him very hard because he's an elinchpin of the current roster of X-Men. I still cannot believe that. I'm going to save Gold Ball and make him very important. He's egg now.

He's amazing that he came with a nickname that made me miss Gold Balls. Yeah, I take it back. Rescue number one O, are there any positive viruses in comics? Like the one from Spider Island, which just stops the powers.

Yeah, that's interesting actually. I guess I would call it a disease that Miles Warren and the Queen invent that gives people spider powers. And then turns them into spiders. Pretty good for a minute there.

I mean, cable's not suffering too bad from the techno-organic virus, or at least he doesn't complain too much about it anymore and he gets cool robot parts out of it. I think it's because his powers keep it at bay or something. He's so powerful that he doesn't succumb. Right, right.

That makes sense. But his arm. Like, oh my God. Like Deadpool with cancer.

My healing factor keeps it at bay, but just makes me look extra crispy. Exactly. Exactly. But yeah, positive viruses.

I'm trying to remember. I mean, like, I've seen where Captain America's Super Soldier series used as kind of like an anti-toxin or as a cure for diseases. I've seen anti-fathom him. His symbiote became kind of vaccine.

Cool suit. Yeah, cool suit. But otherwise, I mean, like, I think with the name virus, you kind of can only get negative connotations from it. I mean, you know, they technically had comic books of this kind of counts.

Resident Evil when the bosses shoot themselves up with T and G-Birus. So long as you don't mind being a horrible Lovecraftian monster with eyes and tentacles, you take that as a positive. Unless you are Alice, in which case, the virus only makes you more super rad and awesome. There you go.

There you go. I'm not sure if you're going to be able to get the next one, which is exactly what Rescue asked about. So unfortunately, I'm not going to say no for now, but I'm sure I'll be correct in the comments. We just missed the cut off for that.

Magician, nothing to add to the conversation. I wanted to show a little support to the show. Love the comment you guys keep it up. Thank you.

Thank you. And good luck with your act. Yeah. Tilla Pesture the Bloodshot virus from Bloodshot Reborn.

There you go. It turns people into Bloodshots. Of course, it also makes them like puppets, but, you know. Up until then, you're doing all right.

Up until then. Yeah, you're pretty bad ass. You do get to look like a bloodshot, which is either good or bad depending on your, depending on what decade you were born in. Yeah.

Do you prefer the pale skin there and the red circle? Right. I mean, honestly, slightly iconic on the other chance. You look like a bloodshot.

But yeah, that's fair. Good call tell, Taylor. And timely. No one can go see the bloodshot movie.

Man, that's such a kick in the pants. Like, you know, man, I kind of wanted to do that because I was doing a video on the subject and I wanted to have like a little bit at the end where it's like, oh, and here's what I thought about the movie now I don't get to do it. No. You know, we talked about the Terrigian mists creating epochs.

What I immediately thought of was Earth X when the Terrigian mists basically turn everybody into or the Terrigian mists become such that it mutates and makes everyone on the planet into a superpower being. There you go. That's a good one. And I was like, wait a minute, the Terrigian mists, I guess, could act kind of like a virus in that it transforms you.

It affects your physiology. But hey, is that how that works? I mean, no, it sounds more like a bio weapon when you put it that way. That's true.

It is more like a bio weapon. But if you read the current Marvel's X book, they're treating it like it's a virus. They're treating it like you can cure it. Like it's affecting only a certain percent of the population.

So in that regard, I think it's a good, happy medium. It's a little bit of both. And also, I guess an updating where it's like, well, here's what we thought about pandemics when we first wrote this and here's what we know about it now. Exactly.

By the way, read Earth X. It's great. Is that not good? That's cool.

I was waiting to hear a good recommendation and you did have a good recommendation. I really like Earth X. If you love it, you'll enjoy. You might enjoy the two sequels.

I was like, I'm good and didn't need the other ones. Here's a good one too. I see your Earth X virus and I raise you the hourman virus and see one million, which was also machine and also affected computers and also affected people. It kills you at the end.

It just kills you. Which again, it's kind of funny what's called the hourman virus when it takes 24 hours to kill me. I just like someone mentioned hourman and something. Right.

It's just branding. You know, I got to call it the hourman virus despite the fact that it takes 24 hours to do anything. That's funny. I was going to say something about that.

Oh, it's the lack of creativity. Like I want to do a virus, but I don't want to think about what it does, where it comes from or how to do it. Like there is a virus that affects people. What does it do to them?

Eh, it kills you. It's why some of the best zombie movies in works, the disease goes unnamed. Right. Yeah, or they don't treat it like a virus.

I think 20 days later, they were like, oh, it's a virus. The rage virus. Which by the way, hilarious. They're like, it's a virus.

No, you don't just show monkeys bad things on a TV and it creates a virus. Well, apparently it does. That's stupid as hell. Yeah, yeah, it is.

The movie is baller, but that sucks. That reasoning is very stupid. Uh huh. What was it actually apropos of zombie viruses?

I guess we could talk about Marvel zombies because they have a virus. They call it a hunger virus. An interesting take on a zombie virus too where you're not always brainless all the time. Exactly.

Now, I don't like Marvel zombies. I think it's really bleak and miserable. But I do appreciate the time taken to be like, okay, here's what I want the virus to do. Here's how I want to affect people.

Here's a story I want to tell. Here's my angle on it. Right. But yeah, hunger virus.

It's right by biting. It's just a zombie virus. We're calling it. But it is technically a virus called the hunger virus.

It's pretty solid. I dig that. Ooh, here's another one from DC. The eye pollen degenerative disorder.

It's called the disorder, but it's a virus from Trans-Metropolitan that thing. That makes you lose all motor control. It's basically like Alzheimer's meets Parkinson's. Right.

Right. Okay. Yeah, that's a key virus. It's a good creation.

It's different. Yeah, different. Original and also horrifying. Yeah.

Very horrifying. Where it's like, nah, you know, I'll become a zombie. I won't care. Yeah, losing all my motor function and cognitive skills.

I'm going to care about that. Exactly. No, pass. What was it?

I can't believe. So we talked a little bit about the legacy virus. I guess we should talk a little bit more about it just to kind of like round out the legacy virus because there's like three strains of legacy virus. They treated it kind of like like like mutant AIDS.

Mm-hmm. And then we affected mutants. It was like it only affects us so obviously no one cares about trying to solve the problem. No, yeah, really.

Famously, Eliana Rasputin was a contractor of the legacy virus. I have the issue where she dies. It was really not dies, but it goes to a coma. Yeah.

It's a really baller. It's a great issue. And then of course, poetically, Colossus and Jackson with the virus. I love it because I was trying to explain this to the guys and they were like, that's so stupid.

And I'm like, no, it's really like heartbreaking. It's really cool. But they just couldn't get around at the idea that like it needs the cure needs to interact or the mutant physiology in order to become airborne and contagious and like you're everybody. Yeah.

But I'm mutant has to die. And so Colossus injects himself with it and sacrifice himself, I guess because like, you know, in deference to his sister who also has to be a big moment for his character to. Well, big moment because they were like, I don't know what to do with this character anymore. I guess I'll kill him might as well kill him.

We made him a Magneto villain and whatever, but it didn't really matter. So I guess we'll just kill him. Yep. There you go.

Easy. Yeah, by the way, I like the issue. I wish the art was a little more like mature. I guess it just it looks very 90s.

Yeah. But cool. It's cool. I like it.

I think the idea is you have to activate the power to activate the virus or something. Yeah, yeah. It's very comic book. Oh, yeah.

No, it works. And I liked how they actually did wrap it up because forever, no matter what X-Men book you're reading for a time, you can't get away from that frigging legacy virus, which I guess is good. I guess it's kind of the point. They were like trying to make the national conversation about like, there's this, don't work.

There's this thing out there that is like, that is like a sexually transmitted disease that's hurting you affecting marginalized groups and no one's doing anything. Exactly. That is so clever and effective. I'm like, man, I like that and I'm glad it's over.

Yeah. But I wish they'd refer to it. You know what I mean? Yeah.

Because once they were over with it, they were like, well, we're done with that period in our lives is over. Let's never talk about it again. My favorite thing with the legacy virus is a blink and you'll miss a thing in the ultimate alliance video game, you do like little side objectives and then at the end of the game, they're like, oh, you did this side objective, which means you fixed this thing. I think like in level one, if you grab a suitcase from the Shield Hell Carrier, it's like, oh, you grabbed the research on the legacy virus.

That means when it happened, they were able to cure it. Good job. What? Yeah.

You did that one thing and you saved mutant kind because you were able to cure the legacy virus. I'm like, fuck, that was really easy. Apparently they should have just grabbed this suitcase. Yeah.

Yeah. Maybe you would get a new video game, if you love checking out levels. I also wonder if that was like a snide little comment here where it's like, man, you know, the CIA totally has the cure for AIDS, but they'll never let you have it. Where it's like, you know, Shield totally had the cure for the legacy virus, but they'd never let the mutants have it.

I think that's exactly right. I mean, maybe not in the video game, but definitely in my heart of hearts, I know they had a cure for the legacy virus. And I know you didn't need to kill Colossus to do it. Yeah.

Ooh, here's a fun one here. The many Green Lantern, both heroes and villains who are living diseases, Lezel Pond, who was a super evolved smallpox virus, who's intelligent and sentient and has a ring, and then and the villain that they defeat Despolitus? Yes, Despo Telus. There you go, thank you.

Yes, who is literally a virus. Like he is under the micros, he's a large version of what a virus looks like under the microscope. Yup. Super cool concept, super outside the box concept.

Very green lantern. Yes, and I love the idea that like they're so big they can't affect you. Yeah, like they can't infect you because like, they would be able to infect like a large scale being, like they could infect Mogo. Yeah, yeah, that's fun.

Yeah. CJ Levin, Hey Sal, coming to you live from lockdown in T-neck New Jersey. Stay safe, my friends, stay safe and stay home. Drink fluids and monitor your symptoms.

We'll do man and you too. Everybody else out there listening to CJ, he knows what he's talking about. Yeah, stay safe everyone, wash your hands 20 seconds. That's right, that's right.

I am constantly washing my hands. I got my, you know, stuff, what is it? Hand sanitizer here at the office. But yeah, wash your hands 20 seconds under hot water.

When you leave, when you come back between meals. Yes, I'm washing my hands and I'm wearing gloves when I have to go out too. I'm seeing more of them out, but I'm not going out. So, you know, a fallen angel, XO, what about the doomsday virus, which is a thing now?

Apparently, yes, breaks my heart and I hate it. But yes. I forgot about that. That was the thing.

Yeah, that happens. And it could have been a thing they left alone, but then Scott Snyder was like, Hey, what if there was a evil Batman about the doomsday virus? Yeah. Well, didn't he like make it in that version to make himself become a big badass doomsday monster?

Yeah. Where before it was just something else, where again, again, they clearly started with the drawing where it's like, well, what if Superman became doomsday? Yep. Well, what if anything?

Why that? Like what a Spider-Man to turn inside out? Like, well, you don't need to do everything that ever existed under the sun. Like what does Superman became doomsday?

Who gives a shit? That was like a year's worth of story that went through like all the Superman books. I can't believe it. I can't, what a hard time to be a Superman fan.

Tell me about that. Can you imagine? Like you're reading Superman, you're like, I'm in, I'm all in. I'm gonna buy all 52 of your books.

I'm gonna read Superman, I'm gonna grade Superman on Earth. I'm in. You read it and you're like, what the fuck is this? Superman was so easily ignoreable during that era.

Complete. So ignoreable, we're just gonna make him go away. Yep, we sure did. I guess we'd be remiss to you if we didn't bring this one up.

TS-19, which is the official designation for the zombie virus in the Walking Dead. Oh, yeah. I remember Pikmin saying he was, we were gonna say where it came from. Which I don't think they ever did.

I'm reading it right now in the wiki. I'm shocked they even gave it a name. I know when I was reading it, which was like the first hundred odd issues or everything that I knew. Yeah, I didn't even know they gave it a name eventually, but they did.

Yeah, I like the idea of them naming it because it's like you have to. Like it's so awkward to call it like the incident. Before people go, that sucks, stop doing that. Give it, give it a proper name.

I still remember when, was it Kirkman told the story that originally he pitched the whole thing as an alien plague that's in the West. Oh my God. Where it's like, oh yeah, it came from space and aliens are readying Earth for an invasion. This was just so image would pick it up.

Cause like we're not gonna do a regular zombie book. Yep, Kirkman is just not gonna do it. No, but aliens though, he lied out his ass and by the time two volumes were done, they were loving it and then he never had to give a reason. Exactly, I never had to do the alien thing.

And he didn't. Yep, which is kind of amazing and let that be a lesson to all you young writers out there. Don't be afraid to lie. Ha ha ha.

It's such a harsh lesson, but I'm not gonna refute it. Super comic fanboy 16, I don't know if you touched on this already, but I liked Jeff Johnson's reinvention of the Amazovirus. Oh yeah, that was a fun little arc there were instead of being a elf man robot. It makes you sick, but also gives you powers.

Yes, the patient zero, amazo patient zero of a metahumid virus. Yeah. Yeah. And Batman had powers for a second.

He could scream like a bat. Yeah, great, great idea. I didn't read that. It was a fun story.

This was during that brief time when Lex Luthor was actually on the Justice League. Oh, okay. Yeah. So he actually buckles down and tries really hard to cure it.

And this is like the height of his, no, I'm a good guy. I'm gonna use my big brain for good. I'm gonna cure this disease. Yeah.

Now this has, this is also the flip side to the remember when Lex Luthor invented not a disease, but a thing to give people metahumid powers. Oh yeah, vaguely. And then turned it off while they were flying and killed them with both of them. Oh yeah, that was a good moment.

Yeah, that was awesome. 52, 52. Hey, Aaron Koval, first time watching this live because the craziness going on in the world with the Coronavirus right now, I reread Batman Endgame. Hey, cool.

Hey, I hope you enjoyed it, man. I enjoyed it. I liked it. It was, you know, it has moments, Snyder goes off, but you know, Theodores is how about pestilence, the virus elemental from Brian Cave on Swamp Thing or the Amazovirus?

Well, we just talk to him as a virus. But yeah, I don't, I didn't read Brian Cave on Swamp Thing. No, neither did I, but that sounds cool as fuck though. Yeah, we do have it in the office.

And I should at the very least give it to Tiffany because she loves literally everything Brian Cave on writes. So, I mean, while we're talking about Swamp Thing, the divided, which are like, you know, another parlament made of small, tiny cells. And also I'm going to assume viruses too. Oh sure, yeah.

We'd be in geeky jail animated Wonder Only virus or Tereogen Mist. I think he's talking about the Justice League episode where that evil Amazon created a virus that was basically like an all-man, remember that? Yes, I do. Man, that is a great, I like that episode, but man, I forget it existed entirely.

It's a good concept. I like that an evil Amazon tries to make all the men in the world sick. That's pretty, it's pretty solid. Even Alien Man, even freaking Martian Man Hunter got sick.

Yeah, Paradise Planet, I'll take it. That's a cool idea. Great concept. I'm sure it's a comic.

And Tereogen Mist we talked about a couple times, but yeah, I would consider the Tereogen Mist a virus. It's more like a, like a, I guess a plague. I don't know. You know, there's a book that reminds me of it very much.

Crap, what is it? Australia and the After Nuclear War. The Stan, no, not the Stan. No, although in the Stan comic book slash novel, Captain Trips is the flu virus.