ENG 2610 Fall 2024 - Nooney

The superhero is a ubiquitous figure in contemporary American cinema. Films such as Spider-Man: No Way Home have made billions of dollars, and specialized streaming services like Disney+ have made a nigh-infinite stream of comic book superhero content available for viewers. How did cheap newsprint strips for children develop into our contemporary superhero monoculture? What are the implications of a media form that is constantly adapting and re-adapting decades-old stories?

This course focuses on the cross-pollination in technique and subject matter in mainstream comic books, prestige graphic novels, and cinema in order to answer these questions. Almost a century before the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the comic book was frequently adapted and reinterpreted into film, radio, and television, then reinterpreted back into comic form. This semester, we will survey the development of the graphic novel through the development of its cinematic adaptation, beginning with film serials of the early twentieth century and progressing towards the contemporary comic book movie.