The DCU Is Selling Genre, Not Spectacle
James Gunn's new DC slate sells genre, not spectacle. Why the strategy is the most interesting bet in studio filmmaking in a decade.
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Pop culture
He-Man was always a little bit ours. The new movie is finally in on the joke.
A blond barbarian in a fur loincloth pulls a sword from the air, shouts a magic phrase, and transforms into a bigger, oilier, more powerful version of himself.…
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The body that fights back: what a cartoon from the 90s understood about passing.
The first horror in "Feat of Clay" arrives in a mirror, long before any clay. Batman: The Animated Series opened its first multi-part origin with a washed-up actor…
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Superman is for everyone. That is, in fact, the entire point.
Last summer's Superman did the only thing the character has ever asked of him: he took the side of the people who were being told they didn't belong.…
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Aging out of the cowl: what Batman Beyond knew about the cost of being the strong, silent type.
Batman Beyond opens with one of the saddest images in animation: Bruce Wayne, brittle and alone, finally outmatched by a body that won't do the thing he taught…
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Richard Gadd Keeps Casting Himself as the Man Being Watched
Half Man arrived this spring. The anti-hero era never ended; it just learned to look at itself.
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Spider-Man was the first gig worker on television. We just didn't have the word for it yet.
A skinny twenty-something photographs himself nearly dying, walks five blocks to the only buyer in town, and gets lowballed by a man who profits from his peril. The…
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