What happened to the superhero? Put a hero from the early 2000s beside one from today, and it can feel like they come from completely different realities. They look different, talk differently, joke differently, and even seem to have different ideas about what being a hero means. Join Noah, a drama teacher, theatre director and huge superhero-film fan, to watch selected scenes spanning more than two decades of Marvel and DC, from Christopher Nolan’s Batman films and the evolution of the different Spider-Men to The Avengers, Deadpool and beyond. Together, we’ll trace how the superhero has evolved physically, psychologically and culturally, and ask what caused the transformation.

But underneath the costumes, explosions and superpowers is a surprisingly revealing story about us. Have audiences changed, forcing studios to create different kinds of heroes? Or have studios learned increasingly sophisticated formulas for creating characters that appeal to the largest possible audience? Why has humour become so important? Why do today’s heroes need different bodies, flaws, personalities and relationships? And has a genre that always relied on formulas become something even more carefully engineered and mass-produced? You’ll watch, compare, laugh, debate and discover how much popular entertainment can tell us about the society consuming it. No superhero-film knowledge is necessary, whether you’ve watched every Marvel movie or can barely tell Batman from Spider-Man, all you need is curiosity and an opinion.

Let's sit back with good friends and watch scenes from films which marked some of our childhoods, evolved with us, and, regardless of their perceived superficiality or depth (depending on how you see them), are a solidified part of the mutual popular culture we all share as a people. Let's watch superheroes and have a fun and deep discussion!

超级英雄到底经历了什么？把一个2000年代初的英雄和今天的英雄放在一起，你会觉得他们像是来自完全不同的现实。他们看起来不一样，说话方式不一样，开玩笑的方式不一样，甚至对“当英雄意味着什么”都有不同的理解。加入Noah——一位戏剧老师、剧场导演、超级英雄电影铁粉——一起看横跨二十多年漫威和DC的精选片段，从Christopher Nolan的蝙蝠侠系列、不同版本蜘蛛侠的演变，到《复仇者联盟》《死侍》等等。我们会一起梳理超级英雄在身体、心理和文化层面是怎么演变的，并追问是什么造成了这种转变。

但在那些制服、爆炸和超能力底下，藏着一个关于我们自己的、意外有启发性的故事。是观众变了，逼着制片厂去创造不同种类的英雄？还是制片厂学会了越来越精密的公式，用来打造能吸引最大范围受众的角色？为什么幽默变得这么重要？为什么今天的英雄需要不同的身体、缺陷、性格和关系？一个一直依赖公式的类型片，是不是变得更精心设计、更批量生产了？你会边看边比较、边笑边争论，并发现大众娱乐能告诉我们多少关于消费它的社会的信息。不需要任何超级英雄电影知识，无论你看过每一部漫威电影，还是连蝙蝠侠和蜘蛛侠都分不太清，你只需要好奇心和自己的观点。

跟好朋友们一起坐下来，看看那些标记了我们一部分童年、跟我们一同成长，而且不管你觉得它们肤浅还是深刻，都已经成为我们共同流行文化里不可分割的一部分的电影片段。一起看超级英雄，来一场有趣又有深度的讨论！