Tim Blake Nelson has always been interested in the “superhero movie phenomenon,” and it’s not just because he’s starred in a few of them himself. The Captain America: Brave New World actor was at the forefront of Marvel’s ascension to world domination, with his appearance in 2008’s The Incredible Hulk. And over the past two decades, he witnessed the explosion of superhero movies into our cultural consciousness.
“I was interested in why that occurred and what it said about us in America in particular culturally,” Nelson tells Inverse in an interview ahead of the release of his new novel, Superhero (out in bookstores now from Unnamed Press). “And so I just wanted to write a novel that took place in this very specific milieu, but used that to address much larger cultural issues and fractures in our country.”
