I’ve been reading comic books since I was a wee sprite. So I’ve been following the medium long enough to spot weird patterns and trends. Here’s one that continues to trouble me: The barely believable moral code of supervillains. Ever notice that — whenever a villain has a chance to kill his super-hero nemesis — the [...]
Coyotes in the City Daniel Kalder: “Stan Lee went to Hollywood where he spent three decades failing to score any big movie deals; Jack Kirby died embittered at his treatment by the firm; and Steve Ditko turned to publishing bizarre Randian tracts in tiny print runs. By the 1990s, Marvel was fuelling a weird spectator [...]
Marvel Comics used to produce a comic book series called “What If…?” The basic premise: The book’s narrator, Uatu, a member of a race of lifeforms called Watchers, speculated on how the Marvel Universe might be different if certain key events were played out in alternate fashion, e.g. “What if Captain America Had Been Elected [...]