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Movies

Dark Humour in “Kingsman: Secret Service”

Happy Sunday, everyone! A little bit of academic writing never hurt anyone, so today I’m posting yet another one of my old essays I wrote for a film class back in university. The essay focuses on Kingsman: Secret Service (2014), offering an academic view on the use of dark humour, satire, and self reflexivity in the film, and how it created a successful movie. Enjoy! The British-American movie Kingsman: Secret Service, directed by Matthew Vaughn, is characterized as an “action-comedy spy film”, starring Taron Egerton, Colin Firth, Samuel L. Jackson, and Mark Strong. The film both embraces the classical Hollywood…

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Books

Is the Joker Really a Villain?

I’ve recently found myself in the mood for non-traditional forms of literature, specifically graphic novels and this got me onto thinking about one of my favourite characters in comic book history: The Joker. Real name unknown, the Joker is probably the ultimate supervillain from the Batman universe, a mastermind criminal with a slightly bizarre aesthetic, but hey, I’m not going to judge. One of Batman’s earliest foe, the Joker has developed alongside the hero, taking on layers upon layers to create the entity that he is today: a mysterious, intense, terrifying and genius killer. Knowing all this, I am still…

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