by Hudson Moura
With Wonder Man, Marvel appears to attempt a meta variation on its own formula: rather than opening with spectacle, the series opts for backstage access—industry, role-making, and the muted violence of the Hollywood system. On paper, the idea is not absurd. Following Simon Williams, an aspiring actor in Los Angeles struggling to launch his career, alongside Trevor Slattery, an aging performer whose glory days seem long behind him, offers a potentially rich framework: two opposing trajectories, two forms of precarity, and the same dependence on the casting economy. The whole narrative crystallizes around an internal project—the remake of the superhero film “Wonder Man” by director Von Kovak—which becomes the object of every projection, frustration, and compromise.
The problem, however, is one of pacing and mismatched expectations. After four episodes, the series feels less like a superhero show than a long prologue that keeps announcing itself without arriving. We still have not seen, in any meaningful way, Wonder Man’s powers, nor the momentum of action the title suggests. The first three episodes focus almost exclusively on the drama of an actor trying to “make it”—a familiar dynamic, sometimes accurate, but here stretched to the point of stagnation. The fourth episode, centered on a secondary character (“Doorman”), plays like a detour: instead of deepening the main arc, the show disperses its energy, and the narrative engine loses tension.
And yet Wonder Man is not without moments that work. The opening scene, in particular, is a sharp miniature about ego in the film world: a temperamental actor tries to rewrite everything, interfere with the staging, and impose his “genius” at the expense of the collective—until his participation is simply canceled. The sequence captures, with some precision, how one can “burn bridges” in an industry where reputation travels fast and collaboration functions as currency. It is one of the rare instances where the series turns satire into incisive observation.
The main asset remains Ben Kingsley: his Trevor Slattery brings comic energy and a kind of jaded lucidity that animates otherwise inert scenes. Thanks to him, there are genuinely priceless moments, in which the series regains a biting lightness and a sense of timing that often eludes the rest. Kingsley seems to understand that a backstage series only holds if it can generate spectacle out of language, posture, everyday humiliations, and small strategies of professional survival. Here, almost single-handedly, he raises the temperature.
What remains overall is the impression that Wonder Man season one functions like an appetizer delaying the main course. With eight episodes, the series sometimes feels as though it is setting up a “real” show—an eventual season two—rather than building a fully satisfying first season. This permanent prelude can be read as a gamble (establishing characters before the superhero gears kick in), but it carries an obvious risk: if “nothing happens” for too long, the promise stops being suspense and becomes absence.
Ultimately, Wonder Man intrigues more through its intention (shifting Marvel toward industry satire and social comedy) than through its execution at this stage: too slow, too scattered, and still lacking the center of gravity its title announces. The main actor (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) also lacks energy and charisma. For now, Ben Kingsley salvages scenes, and a few satirical flashes justify curiosity; but the series will soon have to decide whether it wants to be a Hollywood chronicle or a superhero series—and, above all, whether it is willing to finally deliver the event it has been promising since its interminable prologue.
Streaming available on Disney+
Rating: 2.8/5