Anyone else sick to death of superheroes, caped crusaders, and their ilk? I’ll never forget when I stopped actively reading comics as a teenager, things got too complicated and I had to read more and more books just to keep up. It’s not hard to connect the dots between that experience and the current landscape where the sheer quantity of superhero-related content is similarly overwhelming, so trying to convince you to go see a superhero movie right this moment is going to be a Herculean task. However, I am firm in my belief that James Gunn’s Superman is the movie you need right now. It’s a radical work of optimism in a world downright hostile to actual optimism.
Back in the summer of 2008 when The Dark Knight was released, it felt like the exact movie for that exact moment in America, and Superman feels equally suited to show us a way forward in our current chaotic moment. Opening text informs us that superheroes, or Meta-humans, have been a part of this world for three hundred years. Three years since revealing himself to the world as Superman, Clark Kent (David Corenswet) is facing a non-stop barrage of hatred caused by his intervention in a Eurasian conflict, saving lives in a battle of which America had vowed to remain neutral.
Tech billionaire Lex Luthor (Nicholas Hoult) has a personal vendetta against the big blue boy scout, desperate to find something to either sideline him for good or destroy his public persona as the savior of mankind. Meanwhile, intrepid reporter Lois Lane (Rachel Brosnahan) is desperate to discover Luthor’s true motives and save the (Super)man she might love in the process. There's also other Meta-humans tussling about like Green Lantern Guy Gardner (Nathan Fillion), Hawkgirl (Isabel Merced), and the absolutely terrific Mr. Terrific (Edi Gathegi).
This is a film that assumes you have, one, seen a comic book movie, and two, have a pretty decent handle on Superman’s story and the various related cultural ephemera surrounding it, i.e. we all know what Kryptonite is at this point. Gunn is so particularly good at mining those things we all know, stuff baked into our cultural DNA, and trusting that we’ll not only keep up, but enrich his story by bringing our own memories to it.
Now, don’t go thinking this is a radical reinvention of the genre, it’s a superhero movie through and through, but it’s not ashamed of that fact. Too many superhero movies have this urge to let you know that they’re aware this is kiddie nonsense. Emotional moments are almost always undercut in these types of films by some, “Well, that just happened,” style joke coming up in five seconds. All of Gunn’s previous comic book movies are guilty of this, but he has much better control of that dial, knowing when to undercut and when not to undercut.
Superman isn’t completely devoid of this, but nearly all of the comedy is borne from the characters and the situations, and never feels inserted to meet a joke quota. It’s also bright and colorful, reminiscent of classic four color comics and, most especially, Richard Donner’s 1978 film Superman The Movie. As much as 2006’s Superman Returns billed itself as the officially unofficial continuation of Donner’s Superman film(s), this captures the spirit of that film much more effortlessly.
The film has a prolonged action set piece at the end of the second act that’s perhaps too effects heavy and goes on a touch too long, but the film is otherwise very well paced. Despite all of this, the cast is by far Gunn’s biggest asset, with Corenswet having an assuredness and effortlessness not possessed by any previous Superman since Christopher Reeve did it first, five months before I was born. Meanwhile, Nicholas Hoult continues to prove he’s one of the most interesting actors around, and his petulant Luthor is another bravura performance from an actor who, you can tell, truly loves playing a villain.
That having been said, the highlight of the entire film is an early interview that Brosnahan’s Lois Lane conducts with her caped gentleman caller. There’s no special effects in this scene, just the power of well written and impeccably delivered words, and it’s more exciting than any extended sequence of punching. Anyone expecting Brosnahan to be a brassy broad in the mold of Mrs. Maisel will be happy to see her delivering a more subtle Lois Lane, full of self-doubt and pain from past failed relationships.
The rest of the supporting cast is outstanding, with Skyler Gisondo’s Jimmy Olsen being perhaps the single shrewdest piece of casting in the history of comic book movies. Another thing I appreciated about the rest of the so-called Meta-humans featured in the film is that they were all a natural part of Superman’s story and appeared in service of his and Luthor’s plots rather than feeling solely like cheap set-ups for future spin-off movies—which they undeniably are. But again, this is all par for the course, take a moment to enjoy the hell out of it when someone actually makes an effort to incorporate them into the story of the film I am currently watching.
There’s a ton of weighty themes flying around in the film, but at its heart, the film is mostly light and fun. It helps that it’s set in a world where the average Metropolis citizens are just acclimated to superhero battles happening in and around their city, but it never falls into self-parody. It’s two hours of fun at the movies, it doesn’t overstay its welcome, and you don’t feel obligated to head home and watch three HBO MAX shows to see what those other wacky superheroes are getting up to in their downtime. Frankly, that Gunn was able to work in those weighty themes at all is a miracle in and of itself.
There’s not a lot of comfort in being on the right side of history when it’s not history yet. It’s a painful position to be in, particularly when it seems like the other side is having all the fun. There’s pain and sacrifice and loss in the truth, but it’s worth fighting for, and Superman beautifully reminds us of that age old axiom. America doesn’t have a corner on Truth or Justice, not anymore, so thankfully Superman shows us what it looks like when someone is actually putting themselves on the line for those two things.
Header image via IMDb