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10/15/16 @ 6:03 pm EST
A Writer’s Commentary: Scott Lobdell talks Army of Darkness/Xena: Forever … and a Day #1, on sale now from Dynamite. Cover by Reilly Brown and interiors by Elliot Fernandez.  PAGE ONEI figured it was important to start the story at Xena’s lowest point ever. Her final battle, a dying Gabrielle in her arms… in part because it is so dramatic, but also because she is about to summon Ash Williams for help.And let’s be honest – if you are going to summon Ash Williams for help, things have to be pretty darn rock bottom! (I kid, Ash! I kid because I love!)One of the fun things about coming so late to the Xena/Gabrielle party is there is no need for “nudge, nudge/wink,wink” allusions to their relationship. I get to call her “life partner”, unambiguously. PAGE TWO AND THREEYep. Things are bad.Now, honestly, I would have preferred to use this two-page spread to establish that this village Xena was protecting has been devastated by these advancing hordes of Deadites – but the artist went in a different direction.In this version, there is no indication of a village at all… and as a result there is no sense of place, a sense of a risk that is greater than a risk to, say, Xena and Gabrielle.Also, while the coloring is gorgeous (this is the first time I’m seeing it) I have to say it adds to the “problem of place.” Rather than a village under siege with Xena as its last defender, this scene makes it seem like the battle it taking place in the pits of Hell itself.  But that’s the thing about writing, I’ll be able to adjust later in the series to make things clearer. (Or, honestly, who knows – I may be forced to abandon the idea of an overwhelmed village entirely for this scene to make sense in the larger context of the series. That is one of the strengths of being fluid… you can go with the flow.) PAGE FOUR AND FIVEStill no context.Again, I’m reading this for the first time. In black and white, it was easier to imagine background colors that would have made this feel like, say, it was outside, at night… on Earth. Our minds might have filled in the idea that this was an actual place under siege. But there’s that red again.Hmm… will definitely have to adjust my thinking re: village moving forward.On panels three and four: To me this is the great joy of writing Xena. Sure, you have drama, you have gods and monsters and epic battles… but more importantly you have the character and comedy that exists between Xena and Gabrielle. I love these two – and more importantly I love them together. PAGE SIXAnd here all my frustration with the artist over a sense of place dissolves away – because he really sells the back room of the S-Mart. With this single panel, we learn so much about Ash at a glance:We see his “world” is clearly much different than Xena’s world. This feels like a place where any of us might have worked over the years – the worn down mirror, the graffiti, those damned Employee edicts posted everywhere. (“Wait! I gotta wash my hands?! Thank god that sign is there!”)I also love how happy Ash is here: he is master of his domain, employee of the year again. He doesn’t see the graffiti or the worn mirror – he’s only concerned with that smiling visage of male confidence beaming back at him!  PAGE SEVENWell, we get some shelves here for a sense of place – I am grateful for that!(One of the things that always bother me in a comic is when we see a SIGN or a COMPUTER MONITOR that should have something written or projected on it and there is nothing there. [“Look at those security cameras! They show all those people sneaking over the fence!” Um, no. They don’t. They’re blank screens. We can see they are blank!”] Like, if we were watching a television show or a movie and someone walked down an aisle and there was a big blank sign there we would scratch our heads and wonder who puts up signs with no writing or images on them? I’ll have to be more aware of this in future issues when I get the lettering pages back.)There is Amber making an appearance! My muse! Eagle-eyed readers will recognize her from her cameo in IDW’s Galaxy Quest comic! Uh oh – I hope I won’t get sued now!(In my defense, that Amber was making out with Tim Allen! This Amber is about to make out with Bruce Campbell. So, really, it has to be two different Ambers who just share the same name! Lawsuit avoided!)There’s that red background again – which (to me) feels too much like the red from the previous scene. If I saw this coloring before now I probably would have asked for an adjustment here. PAGE EIGHTLove this page. Everything about it. Elliot Fernandez really knocked it out of the park here – and the coloring is gorgeous!While I probably could have gotten away without any reference to “enchanted summoning through time and space” because it is right there in the art… I didn’t mind punching it a little with dialogue because of what Ash reveals about himself in the dialogue.I love the fact that he’s pretty damned nonchalant about it – it has happened so many times already that he’s able to contrast the severity of this summoning against other times.It is that “Okay. This happened” attitude of Ash’s that I love. He takes the most outrageous things that happen to him in stride, but then gets so annoyed by some of the little things as we’ll see in an a bit.  PAGE NINESee? He doesn’t like being poinked!Time and space travel? Piece of cake.But do not poink him — a man has to have his limits! PAGE TEN AND ELEVENThe character work on this two-page spread is pretty awesome.(This is the same village that we saw was obliterated in the first scene – so that we got a sense here that we are only days away from the devastation about to befall these people, but… Okay, okay! I’ll let it go!)A man can only take so much poinking! PAGE TWELVE AND THIRTEENAnd here it is! The moment we’ve been waiting for: Xena and Ash on the same page, in the same place and time!I love how he is so excited to see her… even as she has no idea who the hell he is! (Ah, the fun of time travel stories!)I love how she easily dispatches him. (Yes, he’s one resourceful guy – but he’s not a warrior woman, and he hasn’t been fighting his entire life like Xena. He might be able to get a punch in here or there, sure, but he’s not about to defeat Xena. C’mon!)That said, I also love that Xena is content to hold him at bay with her sword and not run him through. She’s the best!  PAGE FOURTEEN AND FIFTEENAgain, Elliot really shines here on this two-page splash.The fury, the surprise, the determination… the fight to the draw that can leave the fans of both characters convinced their favorite would have won if the battle might go on a moment longer! PAGE SIXTEENWho else but Gabrielle can get the two of them to focus with a single word?!I love that seeing her in a state is enough to focus both Ash and Xena in a heartbeat – nothing is more important to either one of them in this moment.I also love being able to write the last panel on this page, where we see that Gabrielle is the voice of reason between these two. (Let’s face it – both Ash and Xena can get a little immature when defending their own honor. I think it is part of their charms.) PAGE SEVENTEEN AND EIGHTEENI’ll confess something here! If I could write an entire mini-series about these three sitting around a campfire, I would!But who would read it besides me?  PAGE NINETEEN AND TWENTYThe sign-painters arrived while Ash was trapped in the past!I’m a little confused by Ash’s expression on the last panel of page nineteen. It feels like the tie gag is a reference to his previous attempt at love-making having been interrupted. (If I had noticed this expression earlier, I probably would have adjusted the dialogue to reflect his expression a little more.) Maybe that’s only distracting to me. That was fun! Did you like it?! 07/25/26 @ 3:02 pm EST
Lanterns is stepping into the spotlight as one of the DCU’s most ambitious projects, and the past week has delivered the clearest picture yet of what James Gunn’s cosmic detective drama is becoming. With major reveals at San Diego Comic-Con, a full trailer drop, and new confirmations about cast, villains, and tone, the series has transformed from a mystery-shrouded production into a fully realized cornerstone of Gods and Monsters. HBO’s upcoming Lanterns series is officially positioned as a prestige crime thriller with cosmic stakes, blending the grounded tension of True Detective with the mythic scale of the Green Lantern Corps. The show follows veteran Lantern Hal Jordan ( Kyle Chandler) and newcomer John Stewart ( Aaron Pierre) as they investigate a murder in the American heartland—one that quietly spirals into an interstellar conspiracy. At SDCC 2026, fans got their first real look at the show’s tone and scope. The trailer, which premiered during the panel, confirmed a TV‑MA rating and showcased a moody, atmospheric world where Lanterns operate more like detectives than superheroes. The footage highlighted the uneasy partnership between Jordan and Stewart, the eerie rural setting, and the creeping sense that something far larger is unfolding just out of sight. The biggest surprise came from the villains. While Sinestro ( Ulrich Thomsen) appears in the series, he’s not the primary antagonist—at least not yet. Instead, Season 1 centers on the Manhunters, ancient robotic enforcers who have infiltrated Earth. One clip showed Hal interrogating a possible Manhunter disguised as a human, revealing that these machines carry nuclear‑level payloads and are quietly preparing for something catastrophic. The SDCC panel also featured a crowd‑pleasing cameo from Nathan Fillion, who introduced a new clip of his irreverent Guy Gardner, continuing the character’s thread from Superman (2025). Meanwhile, Laura Linney was confirmed to play one of the Guardians of the Universe, adding gravitas to the cosmic side of the story. Behind the scenes, the creative team is stacked: showrunner Chris Mundy ( Ozark), alongside Damon Lindelof and Tom King, with James Gunn and Peter Safran executive‑producing. Directors James Hawes, Stephen Williams, Geeta Vasant Patel, and Alik Sakharov round out a lineup built for prestige television. With its August 16, 2026 premiere on HBO and HBO Max, Lanterns is shaping up to be the DCU’s most grounded yet mythologically rich project—one that not only redefines the Green Lantern mythos but also sets up major cosmic threads for the films to come, including John Stewart’s confirmed appearance in Man of Tomorrow.  ...
07/18/26 @ 2:25 pm EST
There’s a running joke on the internet about how many movies are about trying to get Matt Damon home. The answer is four and Hollywood has spent over an estimated $600 million on this premise but they’ve made good money doing it. The real question is why are so many people interested in seeing him try to get home? In 1998 he was the titular Ryan in Saving Private Ryan and while it only opened for $30 million, it made $482 million worldwide over its theatrical run. In 2014 audiences flocked to Interstellar with a $47 million domestic opening and $764 million worldwide run. And just a year later he was stranded again in The Martian and the film opened for $54 million and made $630 million in theaters. This weekend Christopher Nolan is rolling out his epic adaptation of The Odyssey and in the lead role of a Greek soldier trying to get home to his wife he decided to work again with Damon… and other stars like Robert Pattinson, Anne Hathaway, Zendaya and Tom Holland to name a few. And the new film is looking to open at almost what all three films opened for combined. The film is expected to open for $120 million domestically making it the highest opener of 2026, but it’s doing just as well internationally and is expected to have a worldwide opening of $257 million, surpassing Nolan’s previous best with The Dark Knight Rises. Looks like Odysseus is going to beat Batman… maybe Nolan and Damon should team up one more time in a movie about Batman trying to get back to the Batcave. I mean, it's obvious people would go see it.  07/11/26 @ 2:32 pm EST
The pandemic affected most everyone in one way or another, but for actor Kyle Chandler it left him in a unique state of mind. The Friday Night Lights actor wouldn’t call it a depression or anxiety or even an agoraphobic reaction but rather a “strange haze in the air” that “kind of shook me up” and left him in ruminations. What got him out of it is his upcoming role as former test pilot and intergalactic space cop Hal Jordan in the upcoming HBO series Lanterns. Chandler talks about taking on the DC Franchise as "The old man upstairs said, 'Hey, I'm gonna give you a gift.' He threw me a bone, and I chewed that thing all the way through. Before I went out, I decided I'm gonna have fun. Damn the torpedoes." The veteran actor is paired with rising star Aaron Pierre as John Stewart in a prestige crime thriller likened to the hit HBO series True Detective. While the series has a cosmic origin, the approach to this first season at least is much more grounded as Jordan comes to investigate a murder in a small, midwestern town and brings along the new recruit forced upon him by his bosses, the Guardians. Stewart is the first recruit selected by the Guardians where all the other Green Lanterns were selected by the rings after the previous owner dies. Jordan doesn’t respond well to his new partner and that animosity carries over into their investigation. The series will take place in two timelines set ten years apart with the investigation starting in 2016 and then we see what is happening now. The series premieres on August 16th and while a second season has not been green lit yet, writer Christopher Cantwell ( Halt and Catch Fire) has been hired to work on scripts for season two… so DC Studios and HBO must like what they’ve seen. ... 07/04/26 @ 3:22 pm EST
Long before Lin Manuel Miranda took the Founding Fathers to Broadway with the Tony Award Winning Hamilton, the likes of Thomas Jefferson, John Adams and Benjamin Franklin sang about the birth of the United States of America and the musical led to an amazing musical called 1776. With this being the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, now would be a good time to watch this classic film that’s available on streaming services like Hulu and Tubi. The film adapts the celebrated musical by Peter Stone with an all-star cast that includes William Daniels ( Boy Meets World), Ken Howard ( The White Shadow), Howard de Silva ( The Great Gatsby) and Blythe Danner ( Meet the Parents). The film focuses on the days leading up to the Continental Congress debating and eventually declaring independence and gives us look at the chaos that existed leading up to the birth of the nation. While dealing with a serious topic, the film is laced with humorous moments and unforgettable songs while showing just how difficult it really was to get the thirteen colonies to agree and how different parts of the country had different priorities. Not too unlike the way the country is now. 1776 is entertaining and sneakily educational and I watch if every July 4th… which I’m doing as I type this article.  07/04/26 @ 3:00 pm EST
With Supergirl underperforming at the box office there is a rush to point fingers… as often happens when it comes to big studios like DC, Marvel and Star Wars. Will there be similar handwringing with the latest Minions film coming in about $17 million below it’s expected opening… probably not. But The Hollywood Reporter has exclusive details about what happened with the Milly Alcock project that seems to pit director Craig Gillespie against James Gunn and the studio. The criticism of the film varies with complaints about the editing, the musical choices, the depth of character for the villain to the changes from the source material. The new report focuses on a few of those and talks about the test screenings happening back in March of this year. Gillespie was given free reign on his film until test audiences had their say and the best the film was able to do was score in the 60s. This led to the studio getting involved and creating their own cut of the film. Gunn brought in Guardians of the Galaxy editor Fred Raskin to re-edit and Jeremy Slater of Godzilla X Kong to work with screenwriter Anna Nogueira on a few new scenes. Then Gillespie’s original cut, edited by Tatiana S. Riegel from Cruella, and the new cut were both shown to audiences to see which would faire better. Neither film stood out too much with the studio version scoring about two points more than Gillespie’s. While the director’s cut came in about 11 minutes longer and scored higher on the villain and the music, two things complained about in reviews, the overall score favored the studio cut and it was chosen to be the theatrical release. Though reports don’t say what the specific scores were, it does say the highest score reached among all the testing was only 70 out of 100. While this may sound like a behind-the-scenes struggle and signs of studio interference, things like this happen all the time in Hollywood with the goal of putting out the best film possible and had the film had a higher opening, this probably wouldn’t be news at all. An on-line movement is now building to have the “director’s cut” released even though a handful of people claim to have been in the audience for the Gillespie cut and claims that the film isn’t that different than what was released to theaters. Perhaps the deleted scenes will be included on the Blu-ray release.  ... 06/27/26 @ 4:07 pm EST
DC Studios and Warner Bros. Animation used this week’s Annecy International Animation Film Festival to signal a broader push into animation, unveiling three new series built around some of DC’s most recognizable characters. The slate includes Absolute Batman, Joker: Laugh Riot, and Krypto, each aimed at a different corner of the superhero audience. The boldest announcement may be Joker: Laugh Riot, described as DC Studios’ first anime series. Produced with Sola Entertainment and directed by Yasuhiro Aoki, the show imagines a Gotham where Batman has been murdered and the Joker hunts for the killer who robbed him of his greatest obsession. That premise turns the usual Batman-Joker dynamic inside out, pushing the Clown Prince of Crime into uneasy detective territory. Absolute Batman adapts the recent comic by Scott Snyder and Nick Dragotta, reimagining Bruce Wayne as a working-class hero rather than a billionaire crimefighter. Snyder is expected to serve as executive producer and showrunner, while Dragotta will produce. The series’ “no manor, no money” approach positions Batman as a more grounded figure facing wealth, power, and corruption from the outside. Rounding out the lineup is Krypto, a children’s animated series centered on Superman’s loyal super-dog. Developed by C.H. Greenblatt, the project gives DC a lighter, family-friendly entry alongside the darker Batman and Joker titles. Together, the announcements show DC Studios treating animation not as a side lane but as a flexible creative engine. From anime to kid-focused comedy to a radical Batman reinvention, the Annecy slate suggests DC is betting that familiar icons can still feel new when placed in unexpected formats and tones.  06/20/26 @ 2:31 pm EST
How well is Supergirl going to do in theaters? It’s really hard to say, especially if you are reading on-line takes. Since the tickets were made available for presale, the opening projections have moved all over the place with initial thoughts being between $40 - $50 million, then after a few really positive days it jumped to $60 - $75 and has bounced higher and lower to where now they’re saying $50 - $60. The film is set to open against a popular Toy Story 5 that will be on its second week and likely to stay at the top of the box office if it has an average second week drop. Bottom line the expert seem to be having a hard time locking in on this one. What about critics’ thoughts? The film was screened for reviewers and while originally embargoed until next week, the studio lifted the embargo for reactions a week early and now you can see what they thought. Not their full reviews, but their short initial reactions and if you look online most sites are claiming they’re “mixed”… unless you go into the comments and read them yourself. Even sites like Deadline are saying that yet of the reactions they list, the positives outnumber the negatives three or four to one. There is consistent praise for Milly Alcock, Jason Momoa, the action and the heart of the film. The villain is often called bland and the pacing gets called out, but to call it mixed is a stretch. The problem is that like everything in life, film coverage has become political. Sites use negative headlines to get attention and with DC Studios particularly you have a split fan base between what is happening now and those that prefer the previous films… which means that narrative gets created to further their own cause. The truth is, Supergirl will struggle a bit with a film like Toy Story 5 going against it, the character is not popular on her own and is a derivative of a bigger character and in a lot of ways, the previous incarnations, while entertaining, did nothing to make the character stand on her own. Regardless of how it does, there will be a narrative claiming success and another claiming failure. The only way to judge the truth is to see the movie yourself and decide… but that’s really how we judge all movies isn’t it? ... 06/13/26 @ 2:25 pm EST
We’re just weeks away from the release of the first Supergirl movie in over 40 years and with ticket presales well underway, experts are making their projects on opening weekend. After the initial sales started happening, most sites were predicting anywhere from $45 to $55 million domestically, but after a few days of higher-than-expected numbers, some sites have adjusted up to as high as $60 to $77 million. This would put the Milly Alcock lead film right in line with the last few Marvel Studios films (except Deadpool and Wolverine). While there has been some debate, Deadline claims the film’s budget is $175 million and the breakeven point would be around $315 million. Other sites claim it’s as high as $425 million globally to call it a success. Only DC Studios and its co-heads James Gunn and Peter Safran know what would make this film a success for them, but with trying to rebuild a franchise that had been pretty much run into the ground with underperforming films like The Flash, Aquaman 2 and Shazam 2, having a film that makes most of its money back and is a critical and audience success could be more valuable. Coming off the success of last year’s Superman film, DC is hoping that Craig Gillespie’s vision will continue to excite fans and keep building the new DCU to higher and higher heights. The success of this film and this universe may be driven more on word-of-mouth than box office numbers and the studio appear to be confident enough in the film that they have already had media screenings over two weeks before the film’s release. Yes, there is still an embargo so they can have those reviews come out closer to when the film is in theaters, but you can probably tell the way the project is being covered whether or not it was well received.  ... 06/13/26 @ 2:01 pm EST
A new rumor is shaking up what fans are expecting from The Batman Part 2. On the same day that writer/director Matt Reeves posted that filming had begun, insider Jeff Schnieder posted about how everything we knew about Sebastian Stan’s role in the project was wrong. Sites had been reporting that Stan would be playing Harvey Dent/Two-Face and while that had never been confirmed by Reeves or DC Studios, people took comments from Stan as confirmation such as how he would be playing, “multiple roles” as a hint at him playing the split-personality of the Batman villain. But the new report claims that Stan is not Dent but rather the serial killer Victor Zsasz and actor Bryan Tyree Henry would be playing Dent. Other insiders have some out since and claim to have collaborating information. Zsasz is an interesting character, a killer who notches a mark on his skin for every kill. He’s been portrayed in live action a couple of times including on Gotham and in the Birds of Prey movie but has never been the main focus of a story. This would match up to Reeves saying that the film would be exploring a story never done in film before. It doesn’t really match up to Stan’s comment about “multiple roles” or reports that he was already working with make-up to figure out the look. Reeves is not confined by what is in the comics so he could make major changes to characters, even to the point of making Zsasz a divergent personality of Harvey Dent that manifested prior to the acid attack causing Two-Face to emerge. It’s also possible that Schneider’s information is slightly off and instead of playing the serial killer, Stan could be playing Charles Victor Szasz who is also known as Victor Sage or The Question. How’s that for a twist? The bottom line here is that Schnieder is hearing this from an insider, and it has not been confirmed by any official source and I wouldn’t put it past film studios to start leaking false information to protect a movie that is just starting to film. I think this one stays in the, “take with a grain of salt” category and we wait to find out more.  ... 06/06/26 @ 2:40 pm EST
DC Studios and their co-head James Gunn have talked about a lot of potential series and films with some of them being mentioned and then sort of forgotten about. One of those seemed to be Paradise Lost, a Wonder Woman prequel series showing life on Themyscira before the birth of Diana. Though after its initial mention, the project hadn’t been talked about in a while and someone asked Gunn its fate. Gunn insisted the project was still in the works and now we are seeing some possible confirmation. Back in 2024, two names were attached as writers on the series Kira Snyder and Janet Lin and now, according to the WGA website, both are set to work on Paradise Lost for 2027-2028. Snyder is known for writing and producing on The Handmaid’s Tale and The 100 while Lin has credits on Bridgerton, Cursed, and Bones. There has been talks recently about trying to fast track a new Wonder Woman film and while there is no confirmation, rumors persist that the character may debut in Man of Tomorrow, so seeing Paradise Lost finally moving forward would make a lot of sense.  |
