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Well, now we know for certain that Supergirl (2026) was a box office flop. Damn shame, that. I’ve loved the character since I was a kid, particularly in her adventures with the Legion of Super-Heroes (natch), and I was really hoping for something wonderful on-screen. I wish I could say that my opinion defied the wisdom of the crowds and that the movie was great, but alas its box office performance is probably a fair indicator of its quality. The movie’s just not good. Look, Milly Alcock is charming as all get-out and when she turns it on, she turns it on. Her Kara Zor-El has the makings of a great movie character, but the script hamstrings her with a series of incredibly jejune choices that don’t let her sing. Jason Momoa as Lobo is exactly what you would want and what you would expect. No quibbles here. Other than that… Yeesh. The cast in this movie is not good. David Krumholtz’s Zor-El is pretty good, but from the villains to the allies to the ancillary characters, the film is a dud. No shade on the actors — the script just doesn’t deliver for them. Even Krypto, whose shenanigans eventually won me over in Superman (2025), is dull here, spending most of the movie…lying down. The villain of the piece — the imaginatively named Krem — is right out of the Generic Evil Villain Handbook (1984 edition). Krem majored in facial piercings in college, with a minor in mustache-twirling. There is nothing even remotely interesting about this character. Nothing that makes him memorable or distinct. He and his crew of ne’er-do-wells just seem to like killing and torturing for the sake of killing and torturing. Oh, and they run a sex trafficking ring on the side because this movie is for…who? Seriously. Who is this movie for? My tween daughter is the prime audience for the girl power message…but seemed freaked out by the very casual asides about, you know, child sex slavery. Girls her age rounded up and called brides and… Like, really? Space Epstein and his pals? That’s what we’re showing girls? That if you don’t have super-powers you’re a victim from jump? OK. Sure. Look, this isn’t a full-fledged review. The time is long past for that. But I have things to say and this is my blog, so I’m gonna say them. Supergirl: Murderer So…that happened. Supergirl straight up murders a dude in cold blood. Right. Great. I agree philosophically that Krem is too damn evil to let live, and I also agree that Ruthye couldn’t kill him, thematically, AND I further agree that having him die incidentally or by his own actions would be a cop-out. But you’ve got Lobo RIGHT THERE! Come on! Imagine Kara is about to kill Krem. First she slashes him with the sword. “That’s for poisoning my dog! And this… This is for what you did to that girl!” And she swings… And Lobo photobombs the execution, slipping in and ripping Krem’s head off his shoulders. Laughing. “I didn’t think you’d do it!” he chortles. “And you know what? I still don’t! You would have pussied out at the last second.” “No! I was going to kill him!” Supergirl protests. “Well, now you’ll never know!” And Lobo rides off, laughing his Czarnian ass off. Of course, you can't fix this movie just by fixing its ending. A friend of mine who's a screenwriter told me that the movie is basically just the outline of a story, not a story itself, and that jibes for me. It very much has "And then this! And then this!" energy, a series of bullet points connected by...nothing. Look up out The whole movie was sold on a vibe. “She’s edgy!” And then her “edge” is…getting drunk and being sarcastic. Yawn. Seen it before. Like Dark Willow said: Bored now. The whole movie was paint-by-numbers super-hero sci-fi. Its color palette, its design, its entire aesthetic could have been plugged into almost any other super-hero movie. Krem and his crew looked like slightly more sinister versions of Griff Tannen’s gang from Back to the Future II. I kept waiting for something new and exciting and original and innovative, and the film kept shoveling slop I’ve seen a million times before onto my plate. Bleh. Needle Drops Stop it. Please. Just… Just stop it. Stop the goddamn needle drops, OK? I know this isn’t a James Gunn movie, but his fingerprints are all over it, and the needle drops just… Please. I’m begging you. Stop. The Good Was there good in the movie? Sure. Like I said, when she was allowed to be charming and charismatic, Milly Alcock brought the heat. And I was beyond thrilled to see Argo City in live action. I honestly never thought for a single second that Hollywood would have the guts to say, “Yeah, the planet blew up, but this one city survived…” They really adhered (mostly) to Supergirl’s comic book origins, and I’m both shocked and pleased. And hey — nicely done with avoiding the question of why Kara never told Clark his parents were doucherockets. She never knew them and she was born so long after they died that it probably never came up. Bonus points for Alura’s off-hand comment indicating Jor-El was slightly nuts, meaning all Kryptonians in the DCU aren’t/weren’t bigoted asshats. Just Superman’s dad. Which is still a problem, but not as big a problem. I really wanted to like this movie. Fortunately, it didn’t do anything fatal to the character, and I genuinely look forward to seeing Alcock in future DCU films. On to Clayface…

Well, now we know for certain that Supergirl (2026) was a box office flop. Damn shame, that. I’ve loved the character since I was a kid, particularly in her adventures with the Legion of Super-Heroes (natch), and I was really hoping for something wonderful on-screen. I wish I could say that my opinion defied the wisdom of the crowds and that the movie was great, but alas its box office performance is probably a fair indicator of its quality. The movie’s just not good. Look, Milly Alcock is charming as all get-out and when she turns it on, she turns it on. Her Kara Zor-El has the makings of a great movie character, but the script hamstrings her with a series of incredibly jejune choices that don’t let her sing. Jason Momoa as Lobo is exactly what you would want and what you would expect. No quibbles here. Other than that… Yeesh. The cast in this movie is not good. David Krumholtz’s Zor-El is pretty good, but from the villains to the allies to the ancillary characters, the film is a dud. No shade on the actors — the script just doesn’t deliver for them. Even Krypto, whose shenanigans eventually won me over in Superman (2025), is dull here, spending most of the movie…lying down. The villain of the piece — the imaginatively named Krem — is right out of the Generic Evil Villain Handbook (1984 edition). Krem majored in facial piercings in college, with a minor in mustache-twirling. There is nothing even remotely interesting about this character. Nothing that makes him memorable or distinct. He and his crew of ne’er-do-wells just seem to like killing and torturing for the sake of killing and torturing. Oh, and they run a sex trafficking ring on the side because this movie is for…who? Seriously. Who is this movie for? My tween daughter is the prime audience for the girl power message…but seemed freaked out by the very casual asides about, you know, child sex slavery. Girls her age rounded up and called brides and… Like, really? Space Epstein and his pals? That’s what we’re showing girls? That if you don’t have super-powers you’re a victim from jump? OK. Sure. Look, this isn’t a full-fledged review. The time is long past for that. But I have things to say and this is my blog, so I’m gonna say them. Supergirl: Murderer So…that happened. Supergirl straight up murders a dude in cold blood. Right. Great. I agree philosophically that Krem is too damn evil to let live, and I also agree that Ruthye couldn’t kill him, thematically, AND I further agree that having him die incidentally or by his own actions would be a cop-out. But you’ve got Lobo RIGHT THERE! Come on! Imagine Kara is about to kill Krem. First she slashes him with the sword. “That’s for poisoning my dog! And this… This is for what you did to that girl!” And she swings… And Lobo photobombs the execution, slipping in and ripping Krem’s head off his shoulders. Laughing. “I didn’t think you’d do it!” he chortles. “And you know what? I still don’t! You would have pussied out at the last second.” “No! I was going to kill him!” Supergirl protests. “Well, now you’ll never know!” And Lobo rides off, laughing his Czarnian ass off. Of course, you can't fix this movie just by fixing its ending. A friend of mine who's a screenwriter told me that the movie is basically just the outline of a story, not a story itself, and that jibes for me. It very much has "And then this! And then this!" energy, a series of bullet points connected by...nothing. Look up out The whole movie was sold on a vibe. “She’s edgy!” And then her “edge” is…getting drunk and being sarcastic. Yawn. Seen it before. Like Dark Willow said: Bored now. The whole movie was paint-by-numbers super-hero sci-fi. Its color palette, its design, its entire aesthetic could have been plugged into almost any other super-hero movie. Krem and his crew looked like slightly more sinister versions of Griff Tannen’s gang from Back to the Future II. I kept waiting for something new and exciting and original and innovative, and the film kept shoveling slop I’ve seen a million times before onto my plate. Bleh. Needle Drops Stop it. Please. Just… Just stop it. Stop the goddamn needle drops, OK? I know this isn’t a James Gunn movie, but his fingerprints are all over it, and the needle drops just… Please. I’m begging you. Stop. The Good Was there good in the movie? Sure. Like I said, when she was allowed to be charming and charismatic, Milly Alcock brought the heat. And I was beyond thrilled to see Argo City in live action. I honestly never thought for a single second that Hollywood would have the guts to say, “Yeah, the planet blew up, but this one city survived…” They really adhered (mostly) to Supergirl’s comic book origins, and I’m both shocked and pleased. And hey — nicely done with avoiding the question of why Kara never told Clark his parents were doucherockets. She never knew them and she was born so long after they died that it probably never came up. Bonus points for Alura’s off-hand comment indicating Jor-El was slightly nuts, meaning all Kryptonians in the DCU aren’t/weren’t bigoted asshats. Just Superman’s dad. Which is still a problem, but not as big a problem. I really wanted to like this movie. Fortunately, it didn’t do anything fatal to the character, and I genuinely look forward to seeing Alcock in future DCU films. On to Clayface…

#Booktour #everyhunterishunted #ihuntkillers #booksigning

There is no definitive science on what causes a serial killer — nature? nurture? — but surely the fact that Carl Eugene Watts nearly died as a child from meningitis plays into his later depredations. Before his brush with death, he was apparently a normal child. Afterwards, he began having dreams of torturing and killing women and girls. Crucially, these dreams did not bother Watts — he enjoyed having them. At some point, dreams weren’t enough. As a young teen, he beat a customer on his paper route, and in college he lost his football scholarship and was expelled for stalking and assaulting women. He went to a new college and escalated from assault to outright murder. Unlike most serial killers, Watts did not only “hunt” close to home — he traveled all over Michigan to find his victims, and when he later relocated to Texas, he drove out of his way to Houston to find more. Also unlike most serial killers, Watts did not hunt within his racial group; most of his victims were white. Eventually arrested, Watts was primed to be paroled early due to a legal technicality. Prosecutors essentially begged witnesses to come forward so that they could charge him with something — anything — to keep him in prison. The tactic worked and a new case saw him sentenced to life in prison, where he died in 2007 of prostate cancer. (This piece comes from my newsletter, which goes out monthly. For more stuff like this, and to get it first, sign up here!)

OF JUSTICE PANEL 1: Batman in the Batcave, pulling on one of his gloves. CAPTION: The time has come. PANEL 2: Pulling on the other glove. CAPTION: The Kryptonian has gone too far. And I am the balance. PANEL 3: He picks up a gadget from a table. CAPTION: I am the night! PANEL 4: Close up on his eye. The gadget is in the foreground, glowing green like kryptonite. CAPTION: I respect his powers, but I do not fear them. CAPTION: With preparation, I can accomplish anything… PANEL 5: He puts the gadget in his utility belt. CAPTION: And tonight, Clark… CAPTION: Tonight, what I accomplish… PANEL 6: Awesome panel of kick-ass Batman, teeth gritted, fists clenched, ready for war. CAPTION: Will be your humility. PANEL 7: Blinding light. SOUND EFFECT: FWASH! PANEL 8: Batman in same stance as in Panel 6, but his expression is one of “oops.” His armor and such hangs off of him in burned threads. We can see he’s wearing boxers that have bat-symbols on them. PANEL 9: Space, in orbit around Earth. Superman hovers there, arms folded over his chest, a bored expression on his face. A wisp of smoke from one eye tells us that he just used his heat vision. SUPERMAN: That was easy. SUPERMAN: Next? 

Rick Veitch’s Swamp Thing 1989 continues apace, now up to its third issue. This series is an eighties-comic slap across the face, in the best way possible. Veitch’s love and respect for the DC Universe of the day is evident in every panel, and his ambition is equally on display. The story is a little uneven by modern standards, but in 1989, it would have firmly cemented Veitch as one of DC’s most prodigious talents. (This piece comes from my newsletter, which goes out monthly. For more stuff like this, and to get it first, sign up here!)

I never really queried IHK — I was established by then and was able to discuss it with the editor. So I don’t really know how to advise you here, but I wish you the best of luck!

😂

Glad you’re enjoying it! And yeah — Jasper has grown up a bit, hasn’t he?

If it’s good enough for Mitch, it’s good enough for you!

Disclosure Day is Stephen Spielberg once again grappling with existential questions of family, isolation, and expanded consciousness, treading similar ground as Close Encounters of the Third Kind and E.T., but this time in our monumentally, well, fucked-up modern world. The result is big and blockbuster-y, of course, but also uneven. Still, the thrust of the story overcomes its bumps and potholes…and Colman Domingo is a goddamn revelation as Hugo, to the point that I find it difficult to watch him in anything else now. He is so good in this movie, playing a character type we rarely see. You can truly believe that this is a man who has had his psychic computer rebooted and upgraded by his experiences, that he walks in our world, but no longer sees it as the rest of us do. An Oscar-worthy performance, I promise, executed with small touches and glorious subtlety.

https://vromansbookstore.com/event/2026-07-09/barry-lyga

In support of voting rights and Romancing the Vote, I am auctioning off 10 signed copies of Time Will Tell! Please consider contributing!

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It's true!

Over at The Nerd Daily, I wrote about the power of nostalgia on both creator and audience...and what it has to do with Every Hunter is Hunted. In part: Killers was, without a doubt, the most successful book of my career. It landed me on the New York Times bestsellers list and to this day, I still get requests to blurb “dark YA.” When I typed the last words of the last book, I felt like I was finished. But something funny happened. Go check out the whole thing at The Nerd Daily!

Over on Crimereads.com, I wrote a piece about heroes in therapy. Gee, I wonder what sparked that??? Titled "Trauma Talk: 4 Mystery Novels and Series Where the Protagonist Gets Therapy," the piece looks at four different mysteries/thrillers where the main character getting therapy is a major component of the story. Not a throwaway. Not a scene. A big piece of puzzle. I wrote this because therapy is an enormous part of Every Hunter is Hunted. When I first started writing the book, my wife casually said, "I feel like there could be a therapy component to this story." And I laughed because I already knew that Jasper's ongoing therapy would be huge in this book. In some ways, it's the whole point of the book, really. Here's a little nibble at the piece: Long gone are the days of Marlowe and Chandler, when private eyes medicated their wounded psyches with a quart of middling whiskey and an appreciative leer at their femme fatale clients. In the past, our heroes’ traumas would rate a mere mention if anything all, a flashback at most. Let’s face it—all of these people should be in therapy, plumbing their own depths with the same verve they apply to solving mysteries. Check out Crimereads for the whole thing!