PODCAST · arts
Make Mine Manga!
by Stephen Bradford
After years of staying in his superhero lane, John has finally allowed Stephen and Aldo to introduce him to the wonderful world of manga. Join him on his adventures as he learns to turn pages the other way from what he’s used to.
Episodes
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Episode 21: Men of Culture
Feels like it’s been ages, but we finally got back together to go over the next round of auditions. This month, the boys trial Green Green Greens, Tokyo Ghoul, and Food Wars, a series designed in a lab to, in equal parts, appeal to and repel Stephen especially. To find out which of the series…
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Fill-in: Manga, the Gathering
John is away for work, so Stephen and Aldo indulge in (yet another) fantasy hobby: dream crafting a Magic: the Gathering set to pander to their most weebish sensibilities. And, hey, if they can design one set, why not 4?
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Episode 20: Baku-Man I Wish I was Playing Magic
Blade of the Moon Princess joins the ranks of the manga we’ve actually read to completion (now numbering two). And the climax was… pretty good, actually. But was it really about the destination, or, as Cyrus the Poet says, is it the climb? Also, we still really like Bakuman.
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Episode 19: Shut Up, Dave-kun!
This week continues our trend of willingness to discuss anything OTHER than Blade of the Moon Princess. It’s not that we hate it, but we ARE still quite enjoying Bakuman, and Tim Curry just died, and… One Piece? What are you doing here?
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Episode 18: Talk no Jutsu
After what feels like a lengthy hiatus, we’re back to continue our journey through Bakuman and Blade of the Moon Princess. Both stories reveal big plot swerves, but which of those twists lands with a bang and which with a thud?
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Fill-in Issue: The Great Heist Draft
It’s moving day for Aldo, so John and Stephen fill in the schedule with a fun little game: robbery! We draft expert criminals, petty crooks, and the most obnoxious characters from movies, TV, and comics to see who can rob a fictional bank. Crime is bad. Don’t crime.
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Episode 17: Cup of the Tainted World
The Blade of the Moon Princess develops its world. The stakes rise, the cast expands, and the boys of the Make Mine Manga podcast find themselves questioning: do we even LIKE these people? Meanwhile, Bakuman continues to be good, in case you were wondering.
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Episode 16: Trying to Be the Big Spoon
It’s a tale of two Kaguyas on the latest installment of Make Mine Manga! The Legend of the Bamboo Cutter gets a sci-fi glow-up in The Blade of the Moon Princess, and a more earthly Kaguya tries hard not to fall in love in Love is War. Also: vehicular manslaughter in Yu-Yu-Hakusho! Only one of…
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Episode 15: Egregitity
This week, we say goodbye to Sakamoto Days after Stephen reads a chapter that actually moves his little heart. We also continue to flex our creative muscles by reading a book about creativity, which is almost the same as making stuff, right?
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Episode 14: Write an Essay, Get a Tweet
Neither technical difficulties nor the sniffoos will stop the men of Make Mine Manga from delivering a discussion on Bakuman and Sakamoto Days! The stakes are getting higher in both stories , the worlds are getting more expansive, and us? We’re in 100%. And also getting more expansive, but we’re...
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Episode 13: Baku Meet Cute
A day late, but we still have a quality podcast for you! After a successful audition, the boys of Bakuman have a new audience to impress: the fellows of the “Make Mine Manga!” podcast. How does Bakuman stack up against the other title were reading, the assassin slice-of-life comedy Sakamoto Days?
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Yu-Gi-Oh Nooooooo
In another round of auditions, the boys accidentally read the entirety of Tite Kubo’s Burn the Witch! That narrows the competition for the next round of reading quite a bit. Will the boys stick with Yu-Gi-Oh or Bakuman?
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Episode 11: Why the Penguin Has Depression
Between heartfelt conversations about parenting (or the aversion thereto) and which real life celebrities had cartoons about them, the boys manage to finish reading The Emperor and I and tackle the next leg of Sakamoto Days.
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Bonus: Make Mine Magic
For the upcoming “holiday,” Stephen and Aldo continue their pressure campaign to get John to waste… just so much money. This week, the apple of temptation is the introduction of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to Magic: The Gathering.
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Episode 10: They Both Molt
The boys’ adventure through Shonen Jump’s offerings continue. We manage to drum up quite a bit of excitement for the ending of The Emperor and I, and Sakamoto Days continues to delight and baffle. In between all the non-sequitors, there’s some good discussion to be had here.
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Episode 9: Sack of Spy Punches
We’re reviewing another batch of three of the best stories Shonen Jump has to offer. Which will win: the story of the reformed hitman who teams up with a psychic, the story of the active hitman who teams up with a psychic, or the story of a… one-hit man? Is there a psychic? Probably in future...
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Disturbed Can Shut Up About It
We close the book (for now) on Death Note - the manga so good we keep calling it One Piece for no apparent reason. As Light and L’s rivalry comes to an end, how are the boys feeling? And is The Emperor and I an adequate palate cleanser?
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A Little Less Conversation, a Little More Kill
That’s a series wrap on All You Need is Kill - a first for this podcast adventure. Which, considering the length of the popular shonen manga series, isn’t all that surprising. We talk about AYNIK - the good, the bad, and how it compares to the Yotsuba arc of Death Note.
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Episode 6: The Plot Thiccens
Join us for an hour where the boys editorialize about current events, sexiness in comics, and the relative strengths and weaknesses of black and white vs. color art. Also, we talk about Death Note and All You Need Is Kill in there, too.
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Episode 5: Penguin and Chill
Well, the boys have committed to Death Note for the long haul, but it’s time to commit to a new series as well. There stories are on the ballot: The Emperor and Me, All You Need is Kill, and Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure. Can a cute penguin stand up against the ultraviolence of an alien invasion or a...
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Episode 4: 4Kids Death Piece
After meeting Usopp and getting into… a whole lot of discourse, we say goodbye to One Piece (for now?). But we can’t quite bring ourselves to quit Death Note yet, especially now that things are getting so… interesting. Aaaaaaand cue Ryuk eating an apple.
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Fill-In: Roll for Initiative!
Well, poor Aldo came down ill over the Thanksgiving holiday, so John and Stephen take a moment to reminisce over their history with the current hottest pastime: tabletop roleplaying games!
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Episode 3: That Pirate Boy Ain’t Right
In episode 3, we continue our exploration of One Piece and Death Note. We continue to marvel at the surprises and moral complexities of the latter, and we laugh as the former shows us how one man can kick another in the sensitives in new and exciting ways. Also, we try to avoid getting flagged by...
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Episode 2: Maybe Batman Was the Villain All Along
We continue our journeys through the worlds of One Piece and Death Note. We contemplate the morality of murder and the practicality of holding a sword in your mouth. You know, deep philosophical stuff.
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Episode 1: Welcome to Make Mine Manga!
I’d like to say we workshopped a better title than this, but we clearly didn’t. John, Aldo, and Stephen embark on a new journey into the world of manga! This week: we trial three chapters of four different stories to get a feel for the landscape, and we select two to stick with for an additional...
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God Raptured My Brain - FINALE
All good things… In light of the highly disappointing (and frankly cowardly) behavior of Marvel’s parent company Disney in the face of government pressure, we’re… done? After this episode, no more Marvel comics. We’ll be back next month, twice monthly reviewing manga instead. But before we go,...
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The Brute that Shouted Love at the Center of Aldo
Well, the boys must be feeling angry. I’m sure there’s no reason identifiable in, say, literally any current events, so… it’s the Hulk this week! Three different brief Hulk stories, including the marriage of Bruce Banner, as well as the Hulk’s first true love! …no, we certainly are still very...
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Stay Away from Microwaves, Kids
The Superhuman Registration Podcast celebrates back to school season with another visit to Strange Academy, followed by a field trip to Avengers Academy. Magic! Mayhem! Teen drama and angst! The stuff dreams are made of. I mean, the kind of dreams where you aren’t wearing pants and forgot to…
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Assistant TO THE Omniversal Menace
The Age of Apocalypse has ended, and we’ve turned our sights away from anything mutant related to focus instead on the new Ultimate universe (well, new-ish) and the Donny Cates run on Thor. After spending so much time with Marvel’s mutants, will we have anything to talk about now that we’ve moved...
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Apocalypse is a Vibe
And we’ve finally arrived - the end of the Age of Apocalypse. We read the final stories making up the mega event, and we finally, FINALLY rank the the story on the official superhuman registry. How does the event rank?
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Stay Home and Be Sad For Free
Boy, we’ve been wandering through this dark alternate universe for what feels like months now. Will we ever find our way through this endless Age of Apocalypse? Well, almost. The conclusion will be next time, but for this week we have to tackle X-Man and Amazing X-Men. And we will talk about…
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Another Moody Cyclops
Our tour of the Age of Apocalypse continues! This time, we look through the mirror darkly at Factor X, X-Calibre, and Generation Next. As we do, we ask ourselves the question: is this all TOO dark? But only briefly, cuz we still weirdly seems to be having a good time of things.
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New Whitest Thing I’ve Done
Almost since the beginning of this podcast, Stephen has looked for a way to have the boys review the classic 90s event comic, the Age of Apocalypse. Finally, we decided to rip the Band-Aid off and just dive in. We start this week with Legionquest, and we’ll make our way through one book at a time...
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Fill-In: Wizard’s 100 Greatest Villains
Since John’s away, Stephen decided to break out an old issue of Wizard magazine - that giant of pop-culture reporting back in the early 2000s - to spark a conversation with Aldo over who the best villains of all time are. How well do these takes from 2006 age?
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King, Kang, Mojo
No, it isn’t a crossover between malefic monkeys King Kong and Mojo Jojo. Rather, we’re exploring some curious side stories featuring everyone’s favorite villains. Kang! Kingpin! Mojo! …well, Stephen likes Mojo.
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What You Love Sucks
Two thirds of our little group have never played Marvel Rivals. Will the comic adaptation (tie-in? advertisement?) convince them to join the bandwagon? We’ll find out right after we check in with where we left the Runaways last time in Miami. Look, there’s no real theme connecting these two…
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That’s Barely a Name
The Marvel Mangaverse is one of the weirder artifacts of early-2000s comicsdom. Is it a back-issue bizarrerie, or a buried gem? Also, Iron Fist was one of the stars of the post-Civil War Marvel universe. How does this Fraction/Brubaker hold up today?
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Dave-agar Boltagon
It’s the joke that won’t die! When Medusa appears in the replacement roster for the FF, of COURSE we see it as an opportunity to dunk on our favorite weird superhero name. Also… Star Wars! You know Star Wars, right? But do you know Star Wars comics? Even if they are just the movie again? It’s the...
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Fill-In: MCU Top (and Bottom) Five
With the others out of commission, Stephen takes the bold stand of declaring that some of the MCU films aren’t very good, while others are pretty great. Yes, we’re still talking about this in 2025. Come for the bad takes, stay for the regrettable takes.
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Nunchucks from Betsy Ross’s Femurs
Well, none of us are feeling particularly patriotic at the moment. Luckily, neither is Cap, which makes Ta-Nehesi Coates’s “Captain of Nothing” an appropriate read for the moment. ”Cosmic Cooties,” featuring both Moon Girl AND Devil Dinosaur, is less timely but still satisfying. Join us for the...
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Distinct Lack of Scuttlebutt
With the earth looking so bleak these days, we turn our eyes to the stars… only to see the Annihilation Wave headed for us? What the crap, stars?!!? It’s Annihilation: Scourge and the origin of Spider-Woman on this week’s Superhuman Registration Podcast!
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Okay Boomer…ang
Way back in 2014, the Superior Fors of Spider-Man took the world by storm. [checks notes] Excuse me… I’m reading here that they got up to a lot of mischief and… peed themselves a lot. [clears throat] Awkward. Anyway, how do their adventures hold up in 2025? Let’s sit down and give it a read.
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We Are Legion, We Are Dumb
We continue to slowly make our way through a pair of critically-acclaimed series: The Mighty Thor and The Immortal Hulk. Both arcs today deal with themes of superheroic theology, which excites the heck out of Stephen. But are the stories any good? Let’s rank them and see!
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This Sweater I Don’t Like
For the holidays, we each picked someone out and gave them a single issue story that we thought they would like/find interesting to discuss. Then, of course, we all met up to talk about them! Happy holidays! See you in 2025!
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Days of Future Daredevil
After a 2014 publication revealed some significant gaps in our Marvel readings, we plugged a couple of them in a double-feature, including Daredevil: Born Again and Days of Future Past. Bottom line: these are good books. But to find out just how good, you’ll have to listen!
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Hulk Has a Ball Peen
There’s nothing to fear but fear itself, the saying goes. But is Fear Itself even worthy of fear? That’s the question the boys have to face tonight as they read the main event and the tie-in, Hulk Vs. Dracula. Don’t miss it!
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Fill-In: Our Top Ten Tops Your Tops
Poor Aldo’s taken a sick day, so Stephen and John provide a bit of banter over the best Marvel stories as chosen by Marvel readers… in 2014. How has their selection of best Marvel stories aged? And why is ours better?
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Keith Fight Me, Doom Demands It
Happy Halloween! And, like every Halloween, we’re bringing you a factory sealed and packaged treat full of Marvel Zombies and other spooky stories. No razorblades here - we promise! This season, in addition to tackling Marvel Zombies Supreme, we’ve got the recent Darkhold Saga - a Twilight...
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Fill-In Issue: The Anime Episode
When John’s away, Aldo and Stephen will play. And the game they play is “Which Marvel characters would make good guest stars in classic anime?” John’s presence never really deters the weabiness from coming forth, but be warned: this episode is just a LOT of anime.
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A Story for You Heathens
After we continue our journey through Superior Spider-Man, we realize that we’ve hit a real milestone. It’s our 300th story… with a twist so devilish you’d think we were reading One More Day again! Alas, it’s not to be… It’s potentially worse? Really? That can’t be right. After all, how bad could...
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does Make Mine Manga! have?
Make Mine Manga! currently has 100 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Make Mine Manga! about?
After years of staying in his superhero lane, John has finally allowed Stephen and Aldo to introduce him to the wonderful world of manga. Join him on his adventures as he learns to turn pages the other way from what he’s used to.
How often does Make Mine Manga! release new episodes?
Make Mine Manga! has 100 episodes. Check the episode list to see recent publication dates and frequency.
Where can I listen to Make Mine Manga!?
You can listen to Make Mine Manga! on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts Make Mine Manga!?
Make Mine Manga! is created and hosted by Stephen Bradford.
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