Issue 113: The Future of Hollywood – Out now!

The walls are caving in on Hollywood as we know it. The time to keep calm and carry on is over. There’s a major studio merger on the horizon that could lay waste to the current Hollywood landscape, especially if anti-trust laws – intended to prevent corporate monopolies – are not brought into force. Tech companies are desperate for Hollywood to legitimise their AI wares, wilfully blind to the fact that thousands would lose their livelihoods in the process. And not to mention that the places we go to to consume art will quickly be filled with auto-generated slop that has ripped off existing art forged by human hands. 

Yet it’s not all doom and gloom, and any sense of anger or injustice should be couched in a feeling of hope. Yes, people are still going to the cinema to watch movies, and young people are taking up the mantle more than most. Cinephelia and movie consumption are on the rise, with people more than ever wanting to enter into creative discourse around the beauty and joy of movies. And we’re in a moment where two filmmakers weaned on YouTube have made zeitgeist-smashing features in the form of Obsession and Backrooms.

In this issue, we take a look at where Hollywood is and where it’s headed, at problems and solutions. The issue covers themes of Hollywood’s romantic iconography in 2026; systemic misogyny and fallen female actors; strategies from an insider to fix Hollywood’s many ills; a look into the crystal ball to see what small-screen viewers have ahead of them; and a celebration of filmmaking craft and how the behind-the-scenes artisans are fighting to have their skills recognised. All presented to you via the best film writers and illustrators on the block. Happy reading! 

On the cover…

For this cover we have created a spinning wheel of doom intended for use by Hollywood studios heads and which offers creative ideas for the future. Nick Taylor, an illustrator and graphic designer based in Nottinghamshire, draws on the ephemeral and tactile qualities of vintage design and pop culture for this cover, exploring sign-writing, graphic iconography and vintage textures in a retro-futuristic fashion. Elsewhere in the issue we showcase new illustrated work by Ariadna Sysoeva, Graham Corcoran, Yu-Ching Chiu, Stéphanie Sergeant, Emma Zanelli and Hazel Mason.