Are highly time-sensitive ads that major a part of the mix?

There are a few of their short cartoons where that’s really worth saying, but otherwise it’s mostly fairly heavy-handed.

(The writers have the sudden horrible realisation that it was *unboxing* that teens love.)

her romantic opposite keeps doing odd things like dodging passersby on the sidewalk, or never speaking to anyone but her, or vanishing and materializing without warning

“Experts”, “Newbies” and “Would be Experts if they’d read the text pieces at the back.”

Also, the film’s already open in most major international markets, and in some it’s on its second week. There’s not much more room to grow.

a giant green room that is torturous to be in

I think it’s possible to see that Lee paired with artists other than Kirby or Ditko didn’t tend to come up with as many strong concepts, and Kirby without Lee didn’t have the same down-to-earth characterisation in his work (I haven’t read enough solo Ditko to compare). Which gives some idea what part of the final story…

I don’t think Xavier was clearly specified as an old man at that point — his lack of hair matches a stereotype of more highly-evolved future humans as well as male-pattern baldness. (His inability to walk also matches the stereotype.) He isn’t drawn with other clear marks of age early on.

If you want a history centred on Marvel as a company instead of Lee, I’d suggest Sean Howe’s MARVEL COMICS: THE UNTOLD STORY as a supplement or alternative to this.

This probably means Warner isn’t pursuing the idea of a Green Lantern film at the moment (though on the other hand, they have been trying to make a Flash film while it’s on TV.)

Kofun and Haniwa

She’s non-binary in both the “not a girl” and the “not a robot” way.

Chapter 2 was a bit heavy on using living corpses as its monsters, really.

Really it’s fairly goofy they were taking the doors’ promises at all seriously.

“....turns out the crossbow is because he wants to play Hawkman now.”

I’ve watched some of the anime, and the change also seems to communicate the characters’ personalities more strongly — Nishikata (the boy)‘s nervousness is played up, and Takagi (the girl) is shifted more towards innocent-looking deadpan.

Whedon used a fairly similar concept in the Runaways arc he did. It seemed shoehorned in there, so maybe he already had this idea on the back burner at the time.

Jan Svankmajer’s Little Otik? (Based on a different story, but close enough.)

To be followed by the new spinoff, Junior High.