Review: Wonder Man, “Matinee” | Season 1, Episode 1

Welcome to our accelerated coverage of Marvel's Wonder Man, because I committed to covering it because realizing they were being dumb about it for some reason. Anyway, Caroline's reviews of the eight episodes will be spread out over the next week—as always, this first review is free for all, but $5 will get you all of the subsequent reviews.

Whenever I can, I like to go into a movie or TV show knowing absolutely nothing about it. And thanks to Marvel’s steep decline in cultural relevancy lately, that’s been surprisingly easy to do that with their latest Disney+ “Spotlight” offering. I knew exactly three things about Wonder Man before diving into this assignment: It stars Yahya Abdul-Mateen II in his third superhero role after Watchmen and Aquaman. It’s been long delayed after filming started pre-strike and wrapped up way back in April 2024. And there was some sort of meta Hollywood aspect to it. Beyond that I hadn’t even watched a trailer to get a sense of the show’s vibe. So it was a genuine delight to dive in and discover one of the most tonally unique TV pilots Marvel has ever delivered.

While a brief opening flashback to a cheesy 1970s superhero movie called Wonder Man suggests the show might be another WandaVision-style pastiche, it’s actually a different version of the 1970s that creators Destin Daniel Cretton (Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings) and Andrew Guest (Brooklyn Nine-Nine) are interested in here. The key to Wonder Man’s tone comes when struggling L.A. actor Simon Williams (Abdul-Mateen) and Liverpool-born former fake terrorist Trevor Slattery (Ben Kingsley) cross paths at a movie theater matinee. They’re there to see Midnight Cowboy—the X-rated, Oscar-winning 1969 film about two struggling hustlers who form an unlikely friendship. And more than anything, Wonder Man has a kind of grungy, character-centric New Hollywood ethos on the brain.

Though Trevor’s story continues on here from Iron Man 3, the “Marvel One-Shot” All Hail the King, and Shang-Chi, the hook isn’t really “watch Kingsley and Abdul-Mateen play MCU heroes and villains.” Instead, it’s “watch them play two weirdo actors.” In fact, drop a few explicit mentions of superpowers and you could easily imagine this as a prestige half-hour entertainment-industry dramedy in the vein of Atlanta or Hacks or The Studio.

That’s a particularly interesting use of Abdul-Mateen, who for a while seemed destined to join Idris Elba in the “promising actor who’s now mostly known for being hot” department. Though he had a real breakthrough moment after the debut of Watchmen in 2019, he’s struggled to recapture the zeitgeist in blockbuster projects like Candyman, The Matrix Resurrections, Michael Bay’s Ambulance, and those aforementioned Aquaman movies. But Wonder Man is here to remind us that he’s more than just a pretty face.

In fact, the most impressive thing about this premiere is how effectively Abdul-Mateen walks the line between “smart, affable striver” and “insufferably self-indulgent asshole”—a familiar archetype for anyone who knows any IRL actors. It’s incredibly charming to watch him psych himself up for his small role on American Horror Story and then sweep in with just the right level of deferential confidence to meet his director and co-star (Twilight’s Ashley Greene playing herself). I was even kind of onboard with him trying to give his three-line part some kind of sense of specificity.

The trouble is, Simon just doesn’t know when to quit. His “questions” about the role become more and more ridiculous, his sense of self-importance more frustrating. By the time we’ve watched him basically hijack the set from a female director, it’s hard to tell if we’re supposed to even like him at all. How does anyone this myopic even get through the day, let alone a career? I actively cheered when the producer fired him. As Simon’s agent later tells him, “I think you’re one of the most talented people that I know. But there’s a lot of talented people out here who are not pains in the ass.”

And yet, even despite all that—there’s something about Simon that remains kind of seductive too. As with a lot of actors, the fact that he’s hot and tall and confident and articulate (if terrible at reading social cues) has a certain kind of innate power. And, above all, his passion for filmmaking seems incredibly sincere. When he cites a deep cut from someone’s filmography, it’s not just to flatter them. He’s filled with a genuine sense of, well, wonder about everything from the direction on Castle Rock to Dustin Hoffman’s method acting to Trevor’s turn as Edgar Allen Poe in a single episode of a 1970s TV show.

In Midnight Cowboy terms, he’s very much the handsome himbo Joe Buck to Trevor’s squirrelier Ratso. But where that movie is rooted in a Texas vs. New York culture clash, Wonder Man is interested in a different kind of cultural dichotomy. Simon is a very American actor—one who obsesses over backstory and character psychology and giving himself an experience that feels meaningful. Trevor, however, is a classically trained British stage performer. (His King Lear was the toast of Croydon, after all.) He bases his work in the text, he doesn’t take himself too seriously, and he’s first and foremost interested in giving the audience an experience that feels meaningful. Simon sees acting as a fraught wrestling match, Trevor sees it as living truthfully in the moment.  

And the fact that I’m talking about all of that rather than the reveal that Trevor has been hired to track down Simon by some kind of shadowy organization is part of what makes this show so intriguing. Though I’m not sure I totally felt the magic of the moment Simon nails his Wonder Man remake audition by finally getting out of his head (I almost wish we’d heard the cheesy original monologue again just beforehand for contrast), the idea of a show this devoted to the niche nuances of acting is a welcome departure for the increasingly generic MCU.

Based on this episode alone, I have no idea what Wonder Man wants to be as a superhero show. (We learn that Simon is apparently superpowered, unstable, and incredibly dangerous.) But as a show about actors, it immediately feels fully formed in a way I’m not sure I’ve seen since Barry. That might not be for everyone. But, then again, the MCU hasn’t felt like it’s for everyone in a long time now. If the tradeoff for monoculture dominance is specific, nuanced character work, I’m all for it. 

Stray observations

• Welcome to Wonder Man coverage! I’m excited to dive into this one with all of you and very curious to hear how this premiere hit for those who went into this show with higher expectations than I did. (I wrote this recap before all the positive season reviews dropped.)
• Between the Hollywood satire and the MCU connections, I suspect there are going to be a lot of Easter eggs on this show. For instance, we see a banner for Rogers: The Musical on the backlot where American Horror Story is filming, while Trevor ends his movie theater phone call by saying, “Give my love to Uma.”
• There are tons of great shots from Cretton here, but I think my favorite is the close-up on the Hollywood sign that pulls way, way back to reveal movers at Simon’s apartment. That car-mounted shot of Simon speeding to his Wonder Man audition while conning his way into an audition spot is also incredible.
• I’m assuming we’ll return to Olivia Thirlby as Simon’s ex, but their breakup is filmed in wide shots that could potentially be hiding some weird ADR rewrites too.
• I already love Zlatko Burić as Wonder Man’s eccentric Oscar-winning director Von Kovak, who’s got a bit of a Werner Herzog vibe to him. Between this and Superman, Burić has had quite the superhero supporting role run lately.
• In addition to an NDA, Simon is asked to sign a “Doorman waiver” signifying that he doesn’t have superpowers.
• “Where have I seen him before?” / “Pretty sure he used to be a terrorist.”