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Better Call Saul Season 3, Episode 2: Witnesses
The title of this episode of Better Call Saul is “Witness”, which is very fitting, since this episode in particular is about the act of watching and being watched. This is rich material, cinematically speaking… [more]
Star Wars Legacy: Young Jedi Knights When The Force Awakens
I remember watching Star Wars for the first time. My parents rented them from the now defunct-Hollywood Movies video store before we got our own VHS collection set. We got one movie a week and… [more]
We Are All Children of the Atom: Marvel’s X-Men Gold Controversy, the Qurʾān, and the Problem of Diversity
[Note: This article originally appeared on Mizan Pop on the 10th of April, 2017. Since its publication, Marvel has terminated Syaf’s contract.] The recent launch of the new comic series X-Men Gold has generated international controversy… [more]
Better Call Saul Season 3, Episode 1: “Victory”
The first image we see in the third season opener of Better Call Saul is the word “Victory”. This is such a literate show, so profoundly aware of the visual language of cinema and its… [more]
Samurai Jack: Aku’s Folly
I knew about Samurai Jack for a long time, but I never really got into it. It was just another cartoon that my brother and some friends were into that I just, at the time,… [more]
Why APB’s Revision of the Lessons of RoboCop Should Disturb You
APB is a new FOX series that focuses on Gideon Reeves, a Tony Stark character whose best friend is killed in a bodega hold up and as a result Reeves decides to use his maverick… [more]
On the Origin of the Sexes War: Jamie Delano and John Higgins’ World Without End
I found World Without End almost completely by accident, or rather, in a chain of events that led to a name and a title. It began when I finally read AARGH! for the first time.… [more]
The Incredible Burt Wonderstone: A First-Class Cult Movie
Everyone seems to have their own definition of what constitutes a “cult movie”. For my part, I’d define it as a movie in which the main narrative, the overall plot, isn’t very interesting, but there… [more]
When Shadow Returns: Neil Gaiman’s American Gods
For a while, I thought I had a horrible feeling why Shadow left America. If you don’t want any spoilers for either the book or the upcoming television series, please read no further. If not,… [more]
“…Without Doubt the Fullest and Truest Expression of Ethereal Genius…” Tragedy, Transition and Triumph in Providence #11
“…fantastic references to some plan for the extirpation of the entire human race and all animal and vegetable life from the earth by some terrible elder race of beings from another dimension. He would shout… [more]
Celebrating the 20th Anniversary of Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Twenty years ago, the landscape of television, drama and popular culture changed with the debut of Buffy The Vampire Slayer, created by Joss Whedon. Looking back at the first shaky season of what was then… [more]
Multiple Realities: The Hollywood Films of Paul Verhoeven
After making a name for himself in the Netherlands, Paul Verhoeven moved to Hollywood in the 1980s to work on American films. From that period through the 1990s Verhoeven directed a series of movies across… [more]
XX: Women in Horror, Horror in the Family
I will admit, I’ve been waiting for this film. Until fairly recently, I used to write for another online magazine that, in its last incarnation, was called GeekPr0n. I spent some years covering various comics,… [more]
What is The Power of The Dark Crystal?
Back in 2013, it was my intention to participate in what was called the Gelfing Gathering Author Quest: a contest in which the Jim Henson Company along with Grosset & Dunlap would chose a writer… [more]
A Look at Mark Millar’s Old Man Logan
Mark Millar’s Old Man Logan is a bold, gripping adventure comic set against a western-style post-apocalyptic background featuring once-mighty heroes clinging to the last vestiges of their former glory. It makes Chris Claremont’s Days of Future Past… [more]
Wrestling With the Cycle: Not All Men and “He” in Matt Fraction and Christian Ward’s ODY-C
In Part I of this article, “Not All-Men: On the Subject of “He” in Matt Fraction and Christian Ward’s ODY-C,” we looked at the presence and purpose of men and male characters in an almost… [more]
Remembering Bill Paxton
Bill Paxton was one of those actors who was universally loved. Always a welcome presence in any film (or, indeed, TV show), a reliable character actor with strength, vulnerability and charm, but what made him… [more]
Not All-Men: On the Subject of “He” in Matt Fraction and Christian Ward’s ODY-C
When I last wrote on Matt Fraction and Christian Ward’s ODY-C in my article She Made Them in Their Image, I was attempting to focus on the Sebex – the third sex created in a… [more]
Traversing the Plateau of Leng: To Read is to Be Read in Alan Moore and Jacen Burrows’ Providence
“So much of this is made of books, this Commonplace book….” – Robert Black, Commonplace Book, June 5th, 1919, Providence #1, p. 32 This article is strange for a few reasons. First off, it’s about… [more]
Steven Universe: What is The Answer?
It’s funny how something called “The Answer” are two artistic and emotional pathways that ultimately lead to the same place. Then again, perhaps it is more accurate to say that it is quite fitting. In… [more]
Spotlight on Steve Gerber’s The Son of Satan
Marvel Comics in the 1970s were, to put it mildly, weird. Now, I mean that as a compliment. The dizzying array of subgenres that the publisher expanded into during the decade is impressive. Explosive creativity on… [more]
Mad Love Meet Love is Love
A little while ago, I had the excuse to revisit the 1988 comics anthology AARGH! Artists Against Rampant Government Homophobia in light of more recent political events. In my article AARGH! RESIST! A Retrospective and… [more]
Celebrate Smodcast’s 10th Birthday with the Saga of Emo Kev
Every now and then, an artist happens onto that happy accident of inspiration, industry and style and creates something absolutely perfect. I’m sure when Kevin Smith started recording his “Smodcast” podcasts ten years ago today,… [more]
Until the End of the World – A Guide to Garth Ennis’s Comics: Hard Men with Big Guns
Talking about Garth Ennis’ comics means talking about war. Whether he’s writing about telepathic contract killers or monumentally depraved superheroes, odds of encountering a story arc set during World War II or the Vietnam War… [more]
Down A Dark Path of Bibliomancy – The Necronomicon in Alan Moore and Jacen Burrows’ Providence, Part 2
In Part I of “Down A Dark Path of Bibliomancy: The Necronomicon in Alan Moore and Jacen Burrows’ Providence” we looked at how Alan Moore incorporated and reinterpreted H.P. Lovecraft’s “History of the Necronomicon” and… [more]
