Review by Tim Robins
WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD FROM THE START
Superman is great fun and deserves to be a tremendous success – go see it. Director James Gunn has given the DC Universe a new attitude, best described as “Naff-Punk”. But, as much as Gunn may want to give the middle finger to more po-faced versions of the Superman character, his film still has a disarming amount of heart.
He could, of course, easily have gone off the leash, as Superman’s dog Krypto does in the film, wrecking everyone’s plans and good intentions. Instead, the director dials back the irreverent ironies of his Guardians of the Galaxy movies and shows Superman in a new light – sincere and vulnerable.
David Corenswet plays Kal-El as wracked with existential angst. He must learn to be his own man, even if it means flying in the face of his Kryptonian parents’ expectations.
Corenswet’s Superman is often seen defeated, or nearly defeated, in a number of clashes with a ruthless Lex Luthor – who easily exploits the metahuman’s weaknesses. And he must turn to allies for help, often Krypto, and, sometimes, the Justice Gang of Guy Gardener’s Green Lantern, Mr Terrific and Hawkgirl.
The film’s large supporting cast are handled with aplomb. Green Lantern (Nathan Fillion) is abrasive and vainglorious. For example, creating giant hands, just to flip the bird to an invading army. Mr Terrific (Eddi Gathegi) is surface-level cool yet easily irritated, and Hawkgirl (Isabela Merced), shrieking as she goes into battle, is rewarded with one of the film’s best lines – “I am nothing like Superman!”
As for Clark Kent’s Daily Planet ensemble, those here for the Lois/Clark relationship won’t be disappointed. It’s played like a screwball comedy, while giving us a Lois Lane (Rachel Brosnahan) with a laser focus on news values. Gunn wisely uses the pair’s bickering to outline the characters’ different perspectives on Superman’s actions, while exploring other tensions in the relationship. Remember the Flash’s struggles with understanding brunch? Here, we get Lois and Clark arguing over which of them enjoys breakfast for dinner. Also, Skyler Gisondo plays the copper haired, freckle-faced Jimmy Olsen, re-envisioned as a suave ladies’ man.
But, of course, it is Nicholas Hoult’s Lex Luthor that commands our attention. Hoult, previously seen as Beast in the X-Men prequels, is almost unrecognisable as the preening, self-aggrandising and unashamedly bald Lex Luthor. Luthor, who makes for a petulant CEO with low self- esteem issues.
In a nod to Superman: The Movie (1978), Luthor is, again, joined by henchpersons Otis Berg and Miss Teschmacher. Eve Teschmscher is played by Sara Sampaio in a manner that jars with the rest of the film’s characters and is utterly funny. In Gunn’s world, the outre fits right in.
There’s a lot of laugh-out-loud moments in Superman. The one that cracked me up was getting to see Luthor’s meme farm of mechanical monkeys furiously typing out misinformation about Superman for consumption on social media.
Krypto is another comic foil. His antics punctuate the movie and are often entertaining, although I was never once convinced that I was watching a real dog rather than a CGI construct. That noted, I must say the film’s effects are fine. I did find Luthor’s pocket universe, and his prison for people who have crossed him, to be visually dull. I guess they were supposed to remind us of the Phantom Zone. Some effects, including a river of plasma, left me wondering just what was going on.
The film’s pace is hectic and demands you keep up. Everything is explained, from powers to motives to sci-fi nonsense, but you need to pay attention. The plot is straight forward: Luther wants to humiliate Superman and thinks he’s found just the way to do it when he decodes an hitherto unheard section of Jor-El’s message to his son. The message suggests Superman’s intended destiny is to rule the Earth as a dictator.
Gunn is clearly at ease with the comic book material. References to Stagg Industries, Lord Enterprises and, of course, Luthorcorp, establish a world shaped by private companies. The powers of the Element Man, Metamorpho, are used in inventive and threatening ways against Superman. There are also surprise guest appearances, which I’ll leave for you to be surprised.
The story is incredibly on-point in terms of Luther’s political machinations. I’m not sure how much of this was intentional, but we get to see the heavily-armed dictatorship of Boravia invade another, weaker, country while Luthor hobnobs with the Dictator, profits off the sale of weapons and pursues his own desire to be ‘King’.
In the light of the second Trump presidency, the film is positively audacious. A scene in which Superman is manhandled by authorities, placed in chains and disappeared to a tented desert camp is hard not to relate to ICE’s behaviour in America as the film’s appeal to see aliens not as invaders, but fellow humans. (Trump has tweeted an image of himself as Superman which, if nothing else, demonstrates a tin ear for the themes of this film and is therefore pant-wettingly absurd).
By now, there have been many versions of the character of Superman, and you are free to pick and choose which one you prefer. For me, Christopher Reeve was best as Clark Kent. Henry Cavill was stoic and steely as Superman, but the actor wasn’t treated well by the studio. In my opinion, Gunn understands comic book characters in a way the Salkinds and Snyder just didn’t.
Superman was once DC’s top- selling comic book character. As a child, I lapped up even the most ridiculous stories which worked with Superman but not for Batman (although I enjoyed those too).
I think DC’s writers knew that having a nearly invulnerable character engage in a punch up with a super villain every issue would be really dull. (As an aside, personally, I used to despair of some of Marvel’s UK’s weekly reprints of early Marvel tales, whose chapters cut down from their American originals such as Fantastic Four and The Avengers, seemed to contain nothing but fighting).
I have no idea whether or not Gunn’s Superman will kick-off a new DC cinematic universe, but I do know that I’d be happy to see these characters back again. Superman may not be the film you want, but it is a film that needs to be seen, even if only to believe.
Tim Robins
Superman is in cinemas now | Official Website
Dear reader, a review is an opinion. Other opinions are available, including yours
Head into downthetubes for…
• The Atlantic: What’s Brilliant about the new Superman movie by David Sims
Where previous Superman films have struggled to make the case for his exceptionality, the latest rendition of the hero finds a deft solution: It makes him just another guy in a cape.
• Superman’s British Comic Connections
• In Review: Superman & Lois (CW) by Tim Robins
• Superman and Batman variant covers (sort of) – from the 1950s!
- About the Author
- Latest Posts
A freelance journalist and Doctor Who fanzine editor since 1978, Tim Robins has written on comics, films, books and TV programmes for a wide range of publications including Starburst, Interzone, Primetime and TV Guide.
His brief flirtation with comics includes ghost inking a 2000AD strip and co-writing a Doctor Who strip with Mike Collins. Since 1990 he worked at the University of Glamorgan where he was a Senior Lecturer in Cultural and Media Studies and the social sciences. Academically, he has published on the animation industry in Wales and approaches to social memory. He claims to be a card carrying member of the Politically Correct, a secret cadre bent on ruling the entire world and all human thought.
Categories: Comics, downthetubes News, Features, Film, Other Worlds, Reviews, US Comics
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SPOILER ALERT:
don’t read my comment unless you have seen the film.
“Luther wants to humiliate Superman and thinks he’s found just the way to do it”
I don’t get why nobody else see this: he has a clone of Superman. Why bother with the rest of it?! For me the film was overfilled with what I call ‘CGI washing machines’ and neglected storytelling basics such as this. There was too much and I got bored by it, which given all that’s at stake feels hard to forgive. Gunn needs somebody with the guts to say ‘no’ to him in terms of excess. Not the Brave New World we need, just More of the Same.