Superman Gets a Lot Right (and Wrong)
This morning, my wife and I left our not-quite-two-week-old baby with grandma and went to the movies. We saw James Gunn’s first feature as co-head of DC Studios: Superman.
I will get to the review of that film in a moment, but first… For those who don’t know me, I’m a massive Superman fan and have been since I was a kid. I’ve talked about a lot of this publicly before, including in this episode of Out of Frame, which — while not my most popular ever — is one of my personal favorites:
I could go through my bona fides and talk about all the specific story arcs and treatments that I love like All-Star Superman, Superman: American Alien, Kingdom Come, Superman: TAS, the Fleischer cartoons, most everything by John Byrne, a ton of stuff by Geoff Johns and Scott Snyder, and more. I could show you pictures of my Superman art collection including prints and figures.
But the nature of comics like Superman (which has been around an astounding 87 years!) is that there have been innumerable writers and artists creating hundreds of different iterations of the character and each creator has a different take. And that means that no matter what I say about my status as a “fan”, there will always be plenty of people who have a different perspective or who will tell me I haven’t read enough and don’t know enough.
In order to set that aside, let me start this review by explaining why Superman is important to me.
Apart from being the first genuine superhero, I believe Superman’s longevity as a character comes from the moral core that has been embedded in these stories almost from the beginning (after Siegel and Schuster flipped their vision from villain to hero, of course).
The thing is, a lot of writers miss the key part of that story, and instead either focus on Superman’s "god-like” powers, sometimes outright turning him into a Jesus metaphor; or they focus on his “alien-ness” and write allegories about Superman the immigrant outcast.
Neither of these themes actually fit the character, however, and writers that go down either of those roads tend to write — in my opinion — the worst stories.
The problem with the first theme is that Superman isn’t Jesus, he isn’t perfect or all-knowing, and he’s not the son of god. He is exceptionally powerful, yes, but his power is also not the thing that makes him interesting or unique. Plenty of powerful characters are littered throughout the DC universe. Most — like Ultraman (who is also a major character in Gunn’s new film), General Zod, Darkseid, Doomsday, Mongul, Black Adam, BRAINIAC, etc. — are villains. There are also a handful of anti-heroes or at least somewhat neutral characters with immense power, such as Lobo.
So… Power isn’t really the defining attribute, and a kid who grew up in a moderate but essentially Christian household in Kansas (who is also not a narcissist) doesn’t view himself as God.
The problem with the second theme is that Superman fundamentally isn’t an immigrant. He was adopted as an infant and doesn’t even know anything about his Kryptonian heritage until he’s more or less an adult.
Yes, he has powers and abilities that set him apart from the other kids, but he isn’t isolated. He has friends and family, and people who genuinely care about him. Like other adopted kids, he often wonders about his birth parents, but as I’ve said again and again, the single most important part of his story is that his ship brought him to two wonderful parents who loved and supported him… and who taught him the values that were important to them.
Values like honesty, integrity, kindness, responsibility, and duty. Values like respect, hard work, individualism, and freedom.
Superman has all the power in the universe, but in his heart, he’s a simple kid from a good, loving family, who is just trying to do the right thing. And when writers lose sight of this, they miss what’s beautiful about the character.
To this day, Superman is one of the most aspirational characters in all of literature, not because any of us could ever hope to match his physical abilities — we’ll never be able to fly, or hoist mountains above our heads, or shoot laser beams from our eyes — but because we can all emulate his values and try to be better, more heroic people.
Now… With all that said, let’s talk about James Gunn’s Superman film. It’s brand new, so I’m going to avoid spoilers, but the headline is that I thought it was overall very good and an excellent representation of Superman as a character… however, it is not without its flaws.
The Good:
— Casting —
David Corenswet and Rachel Brosnahan are both phenomenally cast as Clark Kent / Superman and Lois Lane. They both fit their respective roles extremely well and they have exceptional chemistry together as a couple. Far more so than Cavill and Adams or Routh and Bosworth.
In fact, I would argue that the casting is quite good across the board.
Although I think the writing of his character could be better, Nicholas Hoult is an excellent Lex Luthor. Nathan Fillion was (unsurprisingly) the perfect Guy Gardner, Pruitt Vince as Jonathan Kent was exactly what the film needed, Isabela Merced as Hawkgirl is good (though she didn’t have all that much to do), and even the rest of the Daily Planet staff featuring Wendel Pierce as Perry White, Beck Bennet as Steve Lombard, Mikaela Hoover as Cat Grant, and especially Skyler Gisondo (from The Righteous Gemstones) as Jimmy Olsen were all a great fit for this film.
However, in terms of the supporting cast, I want to call special attention to Edi Gathegi as Mr. Terrific and Anthony Carrigan as Metamorpho, who were both major standouts. Gathegi’s mix of wry, biting sarcasm and take-no-prisoners intellect was really fun to watch; and Carrigan has always had an uncanny ability to bring pathos, while also being incredibly strange, which works beautifully for Metamorpho in this story.
There have been some rumors of a Mr. Terrific movie or TV series, and if Edi Gathegi continues on in the titular role, I’m absolutely here for it.
— tone —
This is arguably the first Superman film since Richard Donner’s that gets the tone of the character and the world right. As much as I appreciated Henry Cavill as Superman, Man of Steel was much too “gritty” and dark to really make sense for Superman. Plus, Snyder leaned heavily into the Jesus-metaphor that I strongly reject within Superman’s mythology.
And especially after Batman v. Superman and The Justice League, the whole universe that Snyder built felt a lot more like Injustice or some other elseworlds story that didn’t really feature Superman as any kind of beacon of hope or optimism. But that’s exactly what this film is: Bright, hopeful, and optimistic.
However… The best thing about this film is ultimately its…
— Themes —
Going in, I was concerned about this aspect of the film for a lot of reasons.
For one, as I noted above, tons of writers get this wrong. But also, given the enormous cast, the complicated plot, and current state of the entertainment industry, it seemed highly likely that Gunn would make this film an allegory for immigration or perhaps it would simply be so full of jokes and quippy one-liners that it had no gravity at all.
I got even more concerned at the beginning of the movie, when a scene made it seem as if Superman’s primary identity was the Kryptonian, Kal-El and not Clark Kent. In fact, a major plot point involves Lex Luthor discovering a message left to Superman by his biological parents, and the way this is framed is that this message is the most important thing to Superman. The premise of that whole plotline is that Superman sees himself primarily as an alien.
Running the risk of spoiling some important stuff, I was very pleased to discover that this was a bit of a misdirection.
In the end, the theme we’re left with is that Superman’s humanity is his greatest asset, and that the true source of his goodness is not his powers or where he came from, but rather how he was raised and who he was raised by. It is the love and strong values from his human, adoptive parents that made him who he is… not his Kryptonian heritage.
That’s incredibly important to me, and this film gets it right.
In addition to that critical element (and also unlike many recent entries into the superhero genre, including Snyder’s work), this Superman is absolutely committed to saving and helping individuals. He goes out of his way to ensure that even within the context of cataclysmic battles, innocent people are kept out of harm. This version of Superman embodies the kind of moral goodness and heroism that has been missing from most of our entertainment media for years.
This may be a bit cryptic, but if and when you see this film, pay attention to how Superman interacts with:
Krypto
Metamorpho
Jimmy & Lois (and all his other friends)
The Justice Gang (Maxwell Lord’s proto-JLA)
Civilians everywhere
Across the board, his goal is to protect people, even when a lot of the other people around him are solely interested in the fight and in several instances perfectly willing to kill or maim just to finish the fight quickly. As one example that isn’t a major spoiler, when Lex Luthor releases a monster that grows into a skyscraper sized Kaiju, Green Lantern, Hawkgirl, and Mr. Terrific are simply trying to kill the beast. Superman is the only one who attempts to not only stop it but do so without killing it — stating that he’d prefer to keep it alive so that they could learn from it, and perhaps take it to an intergalactic zoo.
For those who haven’t read the comics, there are many, many stories where we learn that Superman keeps his own zoo full of incredibly powerful “monsters” at the Fortress of Solitude (and also in space). He does this because these creatures are often innocent and behaving as they would “in the wild”, and although they must be stopped to prevent them from hurting anyone, they don’t all deserve to die. And of course, of all people, Superman is usually capable of achieving both goals at once.
One of my favorite moments in the film happens during the much-debated late night apartment scene.
***Minor Spoilers Ahead***
The whole scene is a bit of a misdirect insofar as the huge energy beams happening in the background have nothing to do with the main story and aren’t relevant to the plot at all.
Instead, it’s a key relationship moment between Lois & Clark that comes after Lex Luthor infiltrated the Fortress of Solitude and absconded with Krypto the Superdog. Without going into too much detail, Lois asks Clark why he’s going to go challenge Luthor to get the dog when he knows its a trap, and he talks about how Krypto “isn’t even a very good dog” (and he’s not), but that he won’t leave him scared and alone in the hands of a madman.
I love moments like that, because it reveals Superman’s underlying character. He values all life, sees the good in everyone, and doesn't believe that his immense power gives him the right to do irreversible harm to anyone unless absolutely necessary.
And finally, still on the subject of theme, the A-Story involves a debate about the extent to which Superman should be allowed to unilaterally insert himself into geo-politics. The film opens with Superman having recently taken sides in a war on the other side of the world, between two fictional nations. He asserts that the Barovians were unlawfully and immorally invading a neighboring country called Jarhanpur, and that the leader of Barovia is lying about his intentions. While this is largely true, the question of whether or not Superman’s actions were justified and helpful remains.
If you’ve seen the trailers, this is what Lois and Clark are arguing about when Lois “interviews” Clark.
It’s an interesting theme to explore with Superman, but frankly, it’s not explored in very much depth in this film and eventually it totally disappears because the whole situation turns out to be mostly a ruse engineered by Luthor anyway.
That part doesn’t work very well, in my opinion, and it ends up being a bit of a thematic dead end. However, I think that’s a great segue to get into…
The Bad:
— There’s a LOT of plot —
Frankly, this movie is pretty frenetic, and it zips through so many different plot beats and scenes that it’s hard to remember what’s happening half the time. Unfortunately, the film’s lighting-fast pacing makes it easier for Gunn to paper over the fact that Lex Luthor’s plan is… well… kinda stupid.
Again, I’m not trying to spoil anything here, but Lex’s plan is so ridiculously convoluted that it requires numerous contrivances and a pile of dumb luck just to work at all. Worse, I think all these plans and schemes betray some really muddled motivations. In some instances, we’re led to believe that Lex wants land and resources, in other moments he wants political power, in others he wants to take petty revenge on ex-girlfriends for personal reasons, and while he explicitly claims that he wants Superman dead, when he has the opportunity to achieve that goal, he just imprisons him and leaves him alone to escape instead.
There’s just a lot of stuff with Lex Luthor’s plans that make no sense at all once you think about them for a few minutes, but the movie is constantly jumping from one action beat to the next so you don’t have much time to connect those dots in the moment. I have long been a fan of James Gunn’s, but — and I honestly don’t mean this to be rude — he’s not exactly an intellectual, and if there’s one adage about writing that I think applies here, it’s that it’s impossible to write a character smarter than you are.
Alas, this isn’t what I really expect from a Superman’s “smartest” villain.
I think the film would be better, and Lex Luthor would be a more menacing villain, if the plot was streamlined a lot and if Lex’s involvement in the Barovia / Jarhanpur conflict was more of a mystery. But I don’t actually think the plot is the biggest problem here. The real issue is that with so many characters and plot beats happening in the film, there’s no actual time for audiences to really get to know anybody.
— Not enough character development —
Off the top of my head, this film features the following significant / named characters:
Superman / Clark Kent
Krypto
Lois Lane
Jimmy Olsen
Cat Grant
Perry White
Steve Lombard
Lex Luthor
Otis Berg
Eve Tessmacher
The Engineer
Ultraman*
Jonathan Kent
Martha Kent
Mr. Terrific
Green Lantern / Guy Gardner
Hawkgirl
Metamorpho
Rick Flagg, Sr.
Plus there are brief cameos for Maxwell Lord, Peacemaker, and Supergirl. Oh, and there’s a Kaiju and an interdimensional being threatening Metropolis at various points in the film, and their origin is also a mystery.
James Gunn is very good at handling ensemble casts, and I will say that Superman is the main character throughout and the film never totally loses focus or spends too much time on side characters. However, with such a gigantic cast of significant players, there’s absolutely no time whatsoever to give the audience any depth.
Other than her role as a reporter and love interest for Clark, we learn almost nothing about Lois.
Where did Green Lantern, Hawkgirl, and Mr. Terrific come from? Other than being told that their team has been funded by Maxwell Lord… Not sure.
What is the history of Jarhanpur and Barovia? Pass.
Lex Luthor’s backstory and motivations are weak or outright non-existent — although we do know that he’s managed to amass a large team of employees who all seem to be fully bought in to his anti-Superman mission for reasons that are never explained. Eventually, Superman states that Lex’ motivation is “envy”, which I guess is true, but it’s a very “tell-don’t-show” moment in the film because we get so little time with Lex Luthor outside of him barking orders to underlings in the middle of executing his dastardly plans.
Also, because his character lacks any depth, I ended up questioning a lot of his choices — such as allowing Miss Tessmacher to be anywhere near the top-secret elements of his operation. She’s introduced as a vapid, selfie-obsessed Instagram girl, but other than the fact that she’s dating Lex, she has zero role in any of his plans and no skills that would help him.
So why in the world would a super-genius villain allow her to know what he was doing or be in the room when he admits to wrong-doing?
There’s just a lot in the film that makes it hard to take this version of Lex Luthor seriously, even though I think Nicholas Hoult did a great job as an actor in the role.
At the end of the day, I suspect that Gunn’s familiarity with the source material led him to assume that he could write a movie stuffed with characters and everyone would just know who they all are, what they can do, and what they care about. Who knows, but I have to bet that anyone who is not as familiar with the lore as I am would be a bit lost.
I’m sure we can all nitpick more elements of the film, but I think that brings me to…
Final Thoughts
James Gunn’s Superman isn’t a perfect film, but I do think that it gets the character of Superman exactly right, and it establishes the new DC Universe as being much more vibrant and shaped by writers and artists like Grant Morrison, Jim Lee, John Byrne, Geoff Johns, Neal Adams, Bruce Timm, and Frank Quitely than the dark, heavy Frank Miller-inspired style that’s dominated the Snyderverse and even inspired some of the Christopher Nolan films over the past 20 years.
It’s exciting to me that the film is doing well at the box office, because I want to see a much more hopeful, optimistic, brighter, and more fun version of Superman than we’ve seen in years.
In spite of an over-stuffed story that could have used a lot more time on character development, I think it’s undeniably a better interpretation of the Superman character than we got in Superman Returns, Zack Snyder’s Justice League, or Batman v Superman.
It’s a bit harder for me to judge this film against Man of Steel, because — in many ways — they’re polar opposites. Where Man of Steel is dark and gritty, this is bright and hopeful. Where Superman in Man of Steel is somber, mopey, and riddled with self-doubt amid religious symbolism, this version features a Superman who does not question the moral goodness of using his powers to defend individuals from people who would do them harm — regardless of the personal cost.
However… Where Man of Steel features a complex, fleshed-out, and impressively scary villain in Michael Shannon’s General Zod, this film features a paper-thin Lex Luthor cut out who isn’t actually all that scary or smart.
Ultimately, I think I would argue that Man of Steel is a better film on its own merits in some respects, but James Gunn’s Superman features a much, much better Superman and is setting up a universe that’s going to be a lot more interesting and fun long term.
And finally, I’m sure many are wondering if I think it’s “better” than Richard Donner’s Superman: The Movie?
Wellllllllllll… A lot of you are gonna hate me for this, but I’d argue that it is. I know that I’m in the minority here, but I’ve never been a big fan of those films. Yes, Christopher Reeve absolutely embodies the character — both as Superman and as Clark Kent — but the films themselves were mired in production hell, they had campiness dialed to 11 thanks to Alexander and Ilya Salkind’s horrid influence, I think Margot Kidder was a terrible Lois Lane in general, and the great Gene Hackman was wasted on a comically stupid version of Lex Luthor.
Hate me for that take all you want, but there it is.
Now… The last thing I’ll say here is that I’ve been down this road before when Man of Steel came out. When I wrote my review of that movie, I praised it in general though I was not blind to its many flaws. In the final analysis, however, I was very positive about the film and excused some of its character and lore-breaking elements because it was being presented as the story of how Clark Kent actually reveals himself to the world as Superman, as opposed to being a Superman that is well established.
My hope with that film was that Snyder would build on the character in a sequel, no longer being insecure and doubtful about his role and instead embracing his heroism in a positive and hopeful way. Unfortunately, that didn’t happen. Instead, we got Batman v Superman, which further wrecked the character and then the mess that was Justice League, which did even more damage.
So with this film, I’m going to be a bit more cautious. I think you should definitely see it if you like this sort of thing. I think it’s a great representation of Superman and I’m looking forward to seeing this cast in future films with James Gunn and Peter Safran’s DC Universe. But there’s still time for all this to go off the rails, so I hope they really are careful about how to proceed.