Robin: What's In A Name?
In years gone by it seems as though every superhero used to have a sidekick - Green Arrow had Speedy (also known as Red Arrow & Arsenal), Captain America had Bucky, Aquaman had Aqualad and Aquagirl, The Flash had Kid Flash but no sidekick is more famous or more revered than The Boy Wonder himself, Robin. Throughout DC's continuity there have been SIX iterations of Robin and what I want to do today is focus on the four most well-known of these …
Cable aka Soldier X
Nathan Christopher Charles Summers' destiny was planned before his parents even met. Geneticist Mr. Sinister found that a union between the X-Men Scott Summers (Cyclops) and Jean Grey (Marvel Girl) would produce a powerful genetically superior mutant. Sinister hoped he could control such a mutant and use it to defeat his immortal adversary, Apocalypse.
Around this time Jean's form and consciousness was replaced by the reckless cosmic Phoenix Force while she healed from radiation poison in a cocoon at the …
X-23: Wolverine's "Daughter"
I haven't been this excited for a film in a long time. Wolverine is a huge favorite of mine and with the plot line seemingly having his “daughter” X-23 in it I thought I would provide background info on her origins, how she became the new Wolverine etc. With Hugh Jackman hanging up the claws after this movie he very well may die, as he does in the comic books. Having Dafne Keen, who plays Laura Kinney aka X-23 in …
The Green Lanterns of Sector 2814
My love of the Green Lantern(s) is no secret (partly because I think I mention it on every single podcast that we do) and it's a franchise which has had a bit of a rough time over the last few years. We don't need to speak about the 2011 film which caused so much hate and arguably derailed Warner Bros plans for a DC Extended Universe before it even got off the ground but the comics also featured a Rebirth …
The Hulk: Monstrous Origins
Since his inception The Incredible Hulk has been held up as an analogy for many things; the 60’s counter culture urge to rise up against repression – a reaction to the frustrations of war and the fear of nuclear side effects/ mutations and even a study on anger and justified violence. Stan Lee called the character ‘a golem’ in line with Jewish myth, and recalled Hulk as the Atomic Age Jekyll and Hyde. With so many dissonant personalities emerging over …
AI Comic Pod Awards 2016
As the year draws to a close, it seems only fitting to write one last article and it will sum up our recent 2016 Awards podcast and the accompanying Twitter polls as promised. A huge thank you to everyone who has taken the time to vote and share these polls, your engagement is so appreciated and there's been some great debate about these results which is what we want! We hope to do more interactive episodes like this in the future …
A White World: Diversity In Comics
When I started to think of the next article to write I kept coming back to the same topic in mind, diversity. While I’m a huge comic book geek, I always wondered why growing up I rarely saw anyone of color or different gender as lead characters. Hit me at a young age, it’s just not the real world we live in. I don’t walk out of my house and just see white people, so strange when most books are …
Wonder Woman and Feminism
Wonder Woman isn’t just a feminist icon, she is THE feminist icon. Crazy to say with the likes of Coretta Scott King, Maya Angelou, Oprah, Malala Yousafzai and Emma Watson as famous feminist icons in their own right among many others.
Wonder Woman wasn’t even the first female superhero created, Black Widow and Bulletgirl have that honor, but she was the first molded from a proto-feminist perspective. Created by William Moulton Marston in 1941, he saw female leadership as the …