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Ben Affleck Will Hang Up His Bat-Cowl After The Flash
Batfleck is officially not long for this world. In an interview with the Herald Sun, Ben Affleck confirmed that The Flash will be his last time in the batsuit—and said that filming scenes for The Flash...
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Hello There: On Selina Kyle’s Apartment in Batman Returns
Welcome to Close Reads! In this series, Leah Schnelbach and their guests dig into the tiny, weird moments of pop culture—from books to theme songs to viral internet hits—that have burrowed into our...
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DC’s League of Super-Pets Understands that Keanu Reeves Should Be Batman
With all respect to Robert Pattinson, whose Batman I have yet to experience: This is the Batman we deserve. This is the Batman we need at this particular moment in time. This is Keanu Reeves as Batman,...
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The Batman Is All Vibes, and That Might Work for You
We’ve had an ample amount of time to get hyped for Matt Reeves’ The Batman, since the film has been in the works in some form or another for nearly a decade now. The director turned over, the lead...
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Promising Young Woman Is the Gritty Superhero Movie I Always Wanted
I came to Promising Young Woman a little late—after it won an Oscar, long after most of The Discourse around the film had already died off. About ten minutes in I knew I loved it, and hoped it could...
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You Can Now Legally Watch Hundreds of Movies and Shows On YouTube for Free
Looking for new sci-fi or fantasy things to watch for free? YouTube has got you covered. Today, YouTube announced (via SYFY WIRE) that they were offering movies as well as full seasons of shows to U.S....
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Sad Bangers/Sad Bats: On the Music of Matt Reeves’ The Batman
Welcome to Close Reads! In this series, Leah Schnelbach and their guests dig into the tiny, weird moments of pop culture—from books to theme songs to viral internet hits—that have burrowed into our...
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The Dark Knight Invited Us to Embrace the Chaos
I had a minor epiphany during my most recent viewing of Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight (2008): Despite the posters prominently featuring Heath Ledger’s Joker, despite even the film’s own name, The...
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Vengeance Is Mine, Sayeth the Bat — The Batman
From August 2017 – January 2020, Keith R.A. DeCandido took a weekly look at every live-action movie based on a superhero comic that had been made to date in the weekly Superhero Movie Rewatch. In this...
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James Gunn Says He Will Write the New Superman Himself
We’re not in the same Metropolis anymore, Toto. Back in October—a whole two months ago—Henry Cavill announced both that he was leaving The Witcher, and that he would be returning to the DC fold as...
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Six More Bizarro Made-for-TV SFF Movies That Actually Exist
About a year ago, I wrote a piece for Tor.com that generated more comments than any other essay I have contributed to the site in my seven years here. I wish I could say the article was a cogent...
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Amazon Studios Is Getting Animated With the Caped Crusader in Two New Series...
Holy animated Batman news! Amazon Studios announced today that it has partnered with Warner Bros. Animation to bring us not one, but two new shows along with a feature-length project. The first show,...
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Five SFF Characters Who Could Have Greatly Benefited From Therapy
Towards the end of Issui Ogawa’s 2003 The Next Continent we learn something about Tae Toenji’s true motives in establishing a moon base. I briefly noted this revelation in my recent moon base essay and...
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More Powers, More Problems: The Logistical Challenges of Superheroes
Decades of playing tabletop superhero role-playing games has often drawn my attention to certain mundane challenges faced by the superheroes and supervillains. In fiction, the spotlight can be kept...
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“Nice Outfit!”— Batman (1989) and Batman Returns
In the twenty years between the cancellation of the Adam West Batman TV series and the release of the Michael Keaton Batman movie, there was a significant backlash against the campy, goofy...
View ArticleTen WTF-Did-I-Just-Watch? Episodes of SFF Television
We are, for the most part, creatures of habit. It’s not an absolute—even the most circumspect of us will occasionally feel the urge to break out of our norms, to seek the novel and, occasionally, the...
View ArticleThe Last Ten Decades Represented in Ten Classic Science Fiction Cartoons
I’m going to take a contrary position here. Here we go: It’s conventional wisdom that science fiction and animation are two forms ideally suited for each other. Makes sense—the unbounded palette of the...
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No Jokers, No Masters: Birds of Prey and the Emancipation of Harley Quinn’s...
I didn’t expect to love Birds of Prey so much, but I’m currently sitting on my bed in a gold lamé jumpsuit, eating a breakfast sandwich and pretending my cat is a hyena, so here we are. On the surface,...
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The Batman’s New Batmobile Is Giving Fans Mad Max Vibes
A new Batman movie means a new Batsuit and a new Batmobile (not to mention, of course, a new Batman), and director Matt Reeves has been feeding fans bite-size sneak peeks at his redesigns on Twitter....
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About Time: Fashion and the Space-Time Continuum, an SFF Met Gala
Every year, the Metropolitan Museum of Art hosts a large fundraising gala in partnership with Vogue to celebrate the opening of the Costume Institute’s themed exhibit. Dubbed “fashion’s biggest night...
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