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It’s not easy writing about kids’ stuff. “Don’t write about that,” say the grown-ups: “It’s for kids.” Then there’s the kids themselves. What will they think? They’ll probably think it’s cringe, tbh. But if you’re looking for the most authentic, zero-fucks-given scene, from any period in history: find out what the kids were into. Late 1980s? Raves in the English countryside. Mid-70s? Block parties in the Bronx. Early 50s? Comic books—worshipped by kids and condemned by adults for their violent content.

Now, kids are into Marvel—the biggest film franchise in the world—and the brutal rap sound known as drill. Both have irked grown-ups, with Marvel targeted by cinema snobs and drill suffering more establishment opposition than any music in history. But who says they’re for kids? London rapper Drillminister makes drill and he watches Marvel, and he’s old enough to be Mayor. Early last year I sat on his sofa, sharing a joint while a life-size cutout of Boris Johnson watched over us from the corner of the room with a Spider-Man hat on its head.

I asked Drillminister what music he’d grown up with. “Music with an oppressor just spoke to me,” he said. “It’s like… It’s like fucking Marvel. I love Marvel, because comics are based on society. People don’t see that though—they just see good and evil. But when you’re watching X-Men, you’re watching Martin Luther King and Malcolm X. Who are the X-Men? They were the Black people, the mutants, that weren’t accepted by society. You’ve got two leaders of the mutants. There’s Professor X: ‘We must be at peace and at one with the humans.’ Then you’ve got Magneto: ‘Fuck them man’s ting! It’s all about mutant tings.’ Who’s that? Malcolm X.”

This blew my mind, but he didn’t coin the interpretation. In Deadpool 2, after joining forces with Colossus and Negasonic Teenage Warhead, Ryan Reynolds says: “We’re the X-Men: a dated metaphor for racism in the ‘60s.” And Drillminister isn’t the only drill rapper who likes Marvel: Loski has a song called “Avengers”. The line “hammer like Thor” has been used by so many rappers it’s wound up on the UK drill subreddit’s ‘Most Overused Bars’ thread (RV, Pa Salieu, Abra Cadabra, Dezzie, Mazza, O’mizz and many more have broken the emergency glass on it; Chuck D even used it in 1987. There’s also ‘Batman - What’s The Score? (SpiderMan Diss)’, a drill parody created by the YouTuber ProdByWalks. Drillers even sound like Agents of SHIELD every time they mention “civilians.”

And, of course, many drillers hide their identities, using masks, balaclavas, or simply not revealing their real names. Homerton drill rapper V9 is among them. Last September, V9 released a song called “AVEN9ERS” with Unknown T and KO, and his Marvel-referencing bars included, “Leave him rootless like Groot”—aka the little wooden guy in Guardians of the Galaxy. The video to his single “Drip Drip” features comic book panels, onomatopoeic action scenes and Gotham-esque cityscapes. Plus, he wears a Deadpool mask. “Nah, Deadpool wears a V9 mask.” I was told he’d say this. Are Marvel films for kids? “Nah. Clearly they’re not just for kids. You gotta be a bit mature and that.”

Marvel films confront society’s greatest fears—big tech surveillance (Captain America: Winter Soldier), artificial intelligence (Avengers: Age of Ultron), genocide (Thor: Ragnarok)—while referencing things kids have never heard of, like War Games and Blockbuster. Drill’s violent bars, meanwhile, make it unequivocally 18+. So rather than being for children, perhaps it’s just that old white people don’t like them?

One old white person, the director Martin Scorsese, recently decided that Marvel films were “not cinema”, likening them instead to theme parks and “content”. Francis Ford Coppola piled in, and Ken Loach added that Marvel flicks were more like hamburgers than films. Aside from that being quite an odd thing to say, note that hamburgers are also popular among rappers (Kanye, Travis), as are theme parks (Stormzy, Travis). I ask V9 what he thinks of Scorsese’s comments, first checking he’s heard of him. “Yeah, yeah,” he says. “He bought the Wu-Tang album, nah?” That’s Martin Shkreli. Scorsese directed Wolf of Wall Street and Goodfellas. “Ohh… He’s just a hater. He’s old anyway! He doesn’t understand. You can tell he didn’t like Marvel comics as a kid.”

Speaking of Wu-Tang, V9 shares a spiritual lineage with Ghostface Killah. The rapper, aka Tony Stark, made a cameo in Iron Man (though the scene was cut) and embodies hip-hop’s deep connection with comic books. From Grandmaster Flash to Giggs, hip-hop—like comics—is “the language of the outcast made good”, as former Source editor Selwyn Seyfu Hinds once said.

Marvel’s outcast lingo is big in drill, too. “Beautiful people never know who to trust,” says Drax the Destroyer in Guardians… Vol. 2, sounding like Digga D on “Trust Issues (I’m Joking I Trust My Mum)”. Later, in the same film, Rocket the raccoon accuses Peter Quill of having “issues”; Quill points at his evil maniac dad, Kurt Russell, and shouts: “Of course I have issues! That’s my freakin’ father!” Spider-Man, Iron Man, Hulk, Captain Marvel and Deadpool are among those in the Marvel multiverse who—like many drill rappers—have complicated or nonexistent relationships with their fathers. UK drill godfather LD has even said, “Dads ain’t needed.”

V9 doesn’t go in for the analytical stuff too tough. He might even think it’s cringe. I ask if his alter-ego lets him get away with exaggerated lines like “Ching a man’s nan for backing her grandson” (“DMC 2.0”). He laughs so much at this he has to pause the conversation to tell his mate what I’ve asked him. “Nah, that’s real. You can put that in still. That’s real life.” Whether he’s joking or not, he’s a funny guy (“Strap up, wrap man like a condom” is another V9 bar). Marvel combines action with hilarity as well. In Ragnarok, Karl Durban’s cockney executioner Skurge runs out of bullets, so attacks an onrushing opp with his bald head. Quality. And Jeff Goldblum’s Grandmaster—the oppressor—wincing at “the s-word” (slave), insisting his weird little assistant say “prisoners with jobs” instead? That’s a chef’s kiss worthy of Salt Bae (grownups: Salt Bae is like half-chef, half-meme. Hard to explain. Dw too much).

Marvel and drill also thrive on moments that give you chills. That first bass drop on Tion Wayne and Russ Millions’ No. 1 smash, “Body”, has a similar spine-tingling effect to Ragnarok’s climactic battle sequence, where Thor and co wet-up paigons three at a time to the sound of Led Zeppelin “Immigrant Song”, before Anthony Hopkins says “Asgard is not a place… It’s a people.” It’s like Star Wars but with special effects that make Attack of the Clones look like The Mighty Boosh (kids: the Boosh was like a deliberately naff fantasy comedy. Hard to explain. Dw too much). Which isn’t to say Marvel is perfect (and drillers aren’t saints either lol). The comics were accused of homogeneity in the ‘60s, and the films aren’t much better, lacking characters—main characters—who aren’t handsome white guys. After Chadwick Boseman’s death, how will Black Panther be remembered: historic turning point, or anomaly?

In fact, Marvel needs more hip-hop. Some of its musical sequences are unreal, but imagine a world-saving Avengers clash set to, say, “Let’s Lurk”: “Still pulling up, no messing”—Hulk looms out of the sky and crushes a hundred guys with a fist—“67, my brothers”—Quill, Gamora and the gang roll through in the Benatar; then, as Giggs’ verse comes in, maybe that’s when Captain Marvel rocks up? I dunno. Just an idea. V9 is yet to get the call about Deadpool 3, but says “if Marvel come knocking, I’m out the door, in my boxers and my mask. Hopefully after this interview they’re shouting me, do you get it?”

In the ‘90s, Ghostface Killah’s cohort, the RZA, met with Marvel maestro Stan Lee to discuss a potential collaboration. As Abraham Riesman writes in his revelatory new book, True Believer: The Rise & Fall Of Stan Lee, Stan was challenged on associating with a violent rap group like the Wu-Tang Clan. Stan replied: “If they’re popular with young people, I don’t mind being associated with them.”

“It not only spoke to the young people of my day and later,” author Walter Mosley once said, as quoted in Riesman’s book, “but it also helped to form them, to release pressures and tensions that the older generation had no idea existed.” Whether the older generation likes it or not, those same tensions are now being released through drill.