Tag Archives: Cold War

Back to Slough House

Having recently read what may very well be my favorite Mick Herron novel so far, The Secret Hours, I was going to write one of Gotham Calling’s occasional pieces about spy yarns without pictures inside… Between this and catching up … Continue reading

Posted in SPYCRAFT & WARFARE | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Even more Batman movies without Batman – cult movies edition

I get a huge kick exploring various connections within pop culture, including the thematic and stylistic links between Batman comics and cinema. To be fair, many of the comics are quite open about their influences, to the point that one … Continue reading

Posted in WEBS OF FICTION | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

A couple of offbeat spy novels

When I’m not compulsively watching spy shows on TV, spy fiction tends to occupy a sizeable portion of my reading time, so I thought I’d share a few impressions on a couple of novels that approach the genre in very … Continue reading

Posted in SPYCRAFT & WARFARE | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

More thoughts on 21st-century spy shows: Cold War edition

When I wrote about the TV series Slow Horses, last month, I mentioned how one of the departures from the source novels was that the show didn’t take advantage of the potential of sleeper agents to act as metaphors for … Continue reading

Posted in SPYCRAFT & WARFARE | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Spotlight on the Unknown Soldier, 1997

After being absent from the stands for about eight years, in 1997 the spy/war comic Unknown Soldier got the Vertigo treatment. By then, the Vertigo imprint had come to specialize in getting edgy (usually British) creators to reimagine third-tier DC … Continue reading

Posted in SPYCRAFT & WARFARE | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Gotham Calling’s 120 Cold War movies – part 12

We’ve arrived at the end of Gotham Calling’s long-running Cold War cinema retrospective… And if you think depictions of the conflict were winding down in the final years, you’re in for a surprise. This is probably the bloodiest – and … Continue reading

Posted in COLD WAR CINEMA | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Frank Miller’s symbolic Superman

Although Frank Miller is best known for his world-shattering – and controversial – takes on Batman since the 1980s, he has been doing comics about Superman for just as long… and his approach to the Man of Steel is actually … Continue reading

Posted in WRITERS OF SUPERMAN COMICS | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Gotham Calling’s 120 Cold War movies – part 11

We are now entering the final stage of Gotham Calling’s mega-list of Cold War cinema… and we are firmly in Reaganite territory, including an obsession with foreign intervention along with a vigorous resurgence of nuclear panic. 101. Threads (UK, 1984) … Continue reading

Posted in COLD WAR CINEMA | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Gotham Calling’s 120 Cold War movies – part 10

The previous post in Gotham Calling’s tour of Cold War cinema had plenty of films about the conflict’s expansion to the Third World. Today’s installment extends the same motif, but it also gradually engages with one of the consequences of … Continue reading

Posted in COLD WAR CINEMA | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Gotham Calling’s 120 Cold War movies – part 9

This is the latest installment of Gotham Calling’s 12-part journey through Cold War cinema (if you’re only joining us now, you can find the previous installments here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here). It’s also probably the most … Continue reading

Posted in COLD WAR CINEMA | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment