Marvel Showbiz satire is refreshing
Simon Williams (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) may have superpowers, but he doesn’t want to be defined by them. The LA native believes he has a higher calling than using his abilities – a vaguely defined skill set that involves destructive energy blasts – for the greater good. Simon may share a universe with Captain America and Black Panther, but he has no interest in emulating them. Simon, you see, was born to act.
“Wonder Man” is the second Marvel Studios series, following 2023’s “Echo,” to air on Disney+ under the Marvel Spotlight sub-banner. The shingle is meant to indicate lower-stakes and more character-driven stories; “Wonder Man” follows HBO’s “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms,” which takes a similar approach to the “Game of Thrones” franchise. Amid mounting signs of Marvel fatigue at the box office, the pivot is an overdue correction. With ‘Wonder Man’ the strategy is also paying off.
The title ‘Wonder Man’ does not refer to the nickname Simon adopts while fighting crime in a mask and cape. Instead, it’s the name of an ’80s superhero movie that inspired Simon’s love of the pictures as a child, a passion he inherited from his late father. How superhero media fits into a world where Iron Man and the Hulk are well known to audiences is clearly not of great concern to co-creators Destin Daniel Cretton (the director of 2021’s “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings”) and Andrew Guest (who also serves as showrunner), and goes largely unnoticed throughout the season’s eight episodes. This isn’t “The Boys,” where meta-commentary on blockbuster fare amplifies a biting, cynical satire.
Simon’s dreams of making it big, on the other hand, are completely genuine. In that sense, “Wonder Man” is closer to “The Studio” – another showbiz parody that comes from a place of palpable affection. (In addition to walking the walk by filming in Los Angeles, an increasingly rare practice, and casting famous guest stars as themselves, both series stylize their title cards to resemble those of a New Hollywood film.) The show’s main connection to mainstream Marvel history is Trevor Slattery (Ben Kingsley), the actor hired to play fake terrorist the Mandarin as the red herring villain of “Iron Man 3.” When Trevor and Simon meet by chance at a repertoire screening of ‘Midnight Cowboy’, the two forge a friendship based on shared ambitions. Trevor may be able to help Simon get out of his head and counter the self-destructive overthinking tendency that gets him fired from a potential big break, but he would never tell him to give up the daily grind of rejection and self-taping.
For insurance reasons, super-powered individuals are not allowed to work in entertainment, a rule with a tragicomic backstory explored in a mid-season flashback. That means Simon must hide his powers, a secrecy that takes its toll on those closest to him – but Trevor has a secret too. His performance in Mandarin landed him in jail, so Trevor made a deal with the government’s Department of Damage Control, an agency charged with holding “enhanced” individuals accountable. Trevor’s handler, Agent Cleary (Arian Moayed of “Succession”), has set his sights on Simon for reasons that are never really explained. What matters is that Trevor and Simon are both always acting, even when there’s no camera in sight.
A reboot of “Wonder Man” helmed by visionary director Von Kovak (Zlatko Buric) gives the plot its momentum, with Simon and Trevor playing the roles of the hero and his best friend, respectively. But as with Bill Hader’s “Barry” — another tale of intergenerational friendship between actors doomed by deceit — the platonic chemistry is the real appeal. Abdul-Mateen and Kingsley make their characters as ridiculous as they are romantic, spurred by a motivation more intimate and individual than saving the world. When Trevor calls his calling “the most important thing anyone could ever do with their life,” the phrase is meant as a joke. It’s also easier to understand than the latest CGI MacGuffin pulled out to give Marvel stories a vague semblance of structure. Superheroes don’t have to defeat great evil. Sometimes it’s enough to make them more relatable like us.
All eight episodes of “Wonder Man” are now available to stream on Disney+.
