Black and Snerdy welcomes actor, playwright, director and music artist Le’Asha Julius for a bonus episode as Ode (@thatsod.e / @thatsod_e) and Mo “Kid” Licorish (@licorishislegit) trace a career that runs from the Duke Ellington School of the Arts and SUNY Purchase to NPR’s Tiny Desk with The LOX. Le’Asha explains how the hip-hop duo Quincy Vidal started with classmate Caleb Eberhardt when DJ equipment proved too expensive, and what opening for Kendrick Lamar and Talib Kweli taught her about respect. The conversation moves to Black Thought’s School of Thought program at Carnegie Hall, where imposter syndrome met one very specific note about articulating a fast verse, and then to the Tiny Desk session with Jadakiss, Sheek Louch and Styles P. Le’Asha also names home as the truest place to recharge between plays, tours and an upcoming trip to Greece, and explains the difference between following the heart and following anxiety.

Then comes a punishing round of This or That built on Black music icons: Aaliyah vs. Mýa, Teddy Pendergrass vs. Luther Vandross, Aretha Franklin vs. Patti LaBelle, Stevie Wonder vs. Prince, and Michael Jackson vs. Beyoncé. Along the way, Le’Asha reveals she went to elementary school with Mýa’s little brother, once ran into Aretha, and has performed at Paisley Park, while Ode picks Beyoncé despite a childhood spent double fisting Michael Jackson’s HIStory. In What’s Making Us Mad, Ode addresses the Cornell and LSU sexual assault cases and the victim blaming that followed, and Mo takes aim at unleashed dogs on Flatbush Avenue. The episode closes with Goo Punch from My Brother and Me, JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure Fridays, and Le’Asha’s plans to finish a new play and album, with more on Instagram at @leeocious.

Find Le'Asha on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/leeocious/

Find her on Youtube here: https://www.youtube.com/@TheLeeocious

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Ode (@thatsod.e / @thatsod_e) and Mo “Kid” Licorish (@licorishislegit) welcome Percy (she/they), a comics, gaming and literature devotee whose fandom began with Sailor Moon and grew through years of high school fandom blogging. Percy explains how New X-Men made Quentin Quire a favorite mutant, while Mo stands up for Beast and Ode claims Mystique and Storm. The conversation moves through DC’s Speed Force, Mo’s gloriously overbuilt Dungeons & Dragons backstory, Percy’s towering reading backlog, Call of Duty, Cardcaptor Sakura and a Sharon Draper book Percy wants on the big screen. Percy closes the interview with advice for anyone intimidated by decades of comic continuity: ignore the retcons, pick a character, grab a reading guide and just read.

In Pop Topics, Black and Snerdy celebrates Debbie Shields, the Bed-Stuy owner of Confessions bar who went joke for joke with Conan O’Brien on SubwayTakes, then weighs the reported news of Jay-Z headlining the Super Bowl halftime show, from Reasonable Doubt turning 30 to Ode’s prediction that Beyoncé drops Act III at the game. Disneyween revisits Hocus Pocus, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Halloweentown, Twitches, Under Wraps, Tower of Terror and Don’t Look Under the Bed, and Percy refuses to let anyone slander Belle. Big Mad covers Percy’s call to vote, the George Washington Bridge killing of Con Edison worker Koran Irvine and the charges against retired NYPD detective Victor Romero, and Mo’s tribute to Looney Tunes voice actor Eric Bauza. The episode ends on Black joy with 3-year-old soccer phenom Nevada and JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure going weekly, and Percy can be found at @krakoais4luvrs and @evangelinedovie on X, genosha_is_forlovers on League of Comic Geeks, and @persephoneyyyy on YouTube.

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Ode (@thatsod.e / @thatsod_e) and Mo "Kid" Licorish (@licorishislegit) welcome Kai Grayson to a Black and Snerdy bonus episode, a screenwriter, producer, cosplayer and pro wrestler whose credits include Work It Out Wombats!, The Creature Cases and Genevieve's Playhouse. Kai arrives with blue hair from her Mollymauk Tealeaf cosplay from Critical Role's The Mighty Nein and traces her path from Altadena to Emerson College, London and Tokyo. She credits Over the Garden Wall with turning her from a would-be director of Narnia-style fantasy films into an animation writer. She also describes having her own experiences edited out of scripts and being let go from two shows about Black families.

The conversation moves to the ring, where Kai explains how a joke about late friends became Kai Maintenance, a mean janitor who debuted at Dyke Day LA and earned a standing ovation at her first in-ring show. She names Toph from Avatar: The Last Airbender, Jade Cargill and Nyla Rose as dream tag team partners and talks about Roles for Initiative LA, her D&D live play improv show. Two games follow: an anime and video game trivia round covering Ouran High School Host Club, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood, Jujutsu Kaisen, Gurren Lagann, Persona 5 and Baldur's Gate 3, then Emoji Me, Senpai with Gojo, Tanjiro, Nezuko, Link and Sora. The closing segments cover The Legend of Zelda concert tour, New York bureaucracy, subway etiquette, and Halloween cosplay season.

Kai Grayson's Linktree: linktr.ee/kaigrayson

Connect with the Snerdy Crew:

Watch, Listen, or Sponsor the show: ⁠https://beacons.ai/blackandsnerdy⁠⁠