3 Short Paragraphs (Or Not): Superman

2025, James Gunn (Super) -- download

Well, I freaking loved that.

Like Kent, I wanted more, but unlike Kent I was not disappointed nor dissatisfied with what I got. After all, I was never a discerning Superman fan, and I was most definitely not a great fan of the Christopher Reeves movies, maybe just hints of childhood nostalgia. I was conversely  hugely disappointed with Man of Steel (wow, actually, only, three paragraphs) and therefore, not surprised I liked this movie more than any other previous cinematic version. It was already assumed, as a fan of Gunn, I would automatically like it, but.... wow, I really loved it. I had so much fun, I grinned during so many scenes, even the eye-rolling comic booky ones.

So, having not seen this in the cinema, and having already asked Kent (F2F) to go out of bounds from his post, I was going in with more or less a tempered expectation. I wasn't sure how I was going to feel about being dropped into an existing superhero world, one where we get zero explainer. Its not like I am unfamiliar with the Superman world, but considering Mr. Terrific takes majorly front seat in this movie, and I have a barely passing knowledge of him, I was wondering if I might be feeling overwhelmed. 

Nope. It all worked.

The movie begins with Superman's (David Corenswet, Twisters) first defeat of his career, being battered bloody by The Hammer of Boravia, the metahuman response to Superman's interference in the affairs of Boravia, after she tried to invade the lesser developed Jarhanpur. I am assuming a single punch sent him half way round the world to smash into the snows. Supes whistles for his dog and Krypto comes running, little red cape and all. Krypto is not a Good Dog -- he bounces on the injured Superman probably cracking a few ribs, before the barely conscious man convinces the dog to take him home. Home is the Fortress of Solitude which rises from the snow & ice of Antarctica, where Superman is welcomed by his robots, little capes and all. The robots help him heal by the light of the yellow sun.

Of course, Alan Tudyk voices one of the robots.

The Hammer flies into a trans-dimensional portal, which leads him to Lex Luthor's lair, because, of course, Luthor (Nicholous Hoult, Nosferatu) is behind this. Also, Luthor's henchmen, The Engineer (Angela Sarafyan, G20), tries to follow Superman into the Fortress, just as it is swallowed up by the ice again. How vexing for Lex!

All healed up, Superman flies back to Metropolis, where we meet the Daily Planet and Lois (Rachel Brosnahan, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel), and he puts on the glasses to become Clark Kent, the man nobody ever recognizes as Superman, and also the reporter who always seems to have a Superman interview, and also.... whoah, didn't see that coming, Lois's boyfriend. She knows he is Superman. She also is rather hard on the poor fellow about his political interventions, playing more than just a Devil's Advocate against what he saw as just Doing the Right Thing. Clark / Superman is more than a little annoyed she doesn't see it that way. They almost break up.

Hmmm. This is the age old commentary on superhero antics -- what gives these super powered yahoos the right to stick their nose into human affairs? Sure, everyone appreciates them stopping super villains, and evil alien invasions, and giant monster attacks, but when they interrupt purely human on human political agendas, is that crossing a line? There are some whiffs of Gunn's making political commentary here, without the movie actually saying anything concrete -- but someone has to stand up for What is Right.

There are also whiffs of social media and bot / troll generated outrage against Superman and his woke agenda.

Next, KAIJU FIGHT ! Lex needs Superman distracted so he tosses a lil cootie patootie creature into Metropolis which, just add water, becomes a colossal monster. That allows The Engineer (Angela) and Lex, and the mysterious Ultraman (who was also pretending to be The Hammer of Boravia) to break into The Fortress of Solitude, make quick work of the robots, take down Krypto (they hurt the puppy?!?!?!) and hack Superman's crystal computer, capturing an incomplete message from Kal-El's Dad Jor-El (Bradley Cooper, The A-Team). That can't be good. Back in Metropolis, Superman battles the kaiju with the help of a trio of other superheroes, officially unnamed but monikered by Green Lantern (the douchey version, aka Guy Gardner; Nathan Fillion, The Rookie) as "The Justice Gang". While Superman saves people, dogs and squirrels from being crushed by falling buildings and monster feet, he wants to stop the creature without killing it. But the Gang is more practical, much to his consternation, and they kill it. 

I wonder where they store dead kaiju, and whether Hannibal Chau helps.

So, not a political agenda based battle, and he saved squirrels, so should be an easy win on social media, no? No. Lex has translated Jor-El's lost message and (yoink; pull at collar uncomfortably) apparently Krypton Wanted Earth Women. Yeah, they may have tasked The Last Son of Krypton to come to Earth and be a shining example to the measly human beings, but part of that "shining example" was taking over and having a harem. Lex's real superpower, that of completely mastering negative publicity, takes over the hearts & minds of Metropolis, just like that scene in Spider-Man: No Way Home where someone splashes green paint all over Peter. Its an unrealistic turn of events, and yet given the world we currently (mid-2025 folks) live in, where people are accepting utter ridiculous, downright evil, situations as normal, its not entirely implausible. 

Things go from bad to worse (I just read that Elmore Leonard demands you never use that phrase; I suspect he would cringe at most of my idiom laden writing), when Supes turns himself into the US Govt and they hand him over to Luthor for incarceration, who just happens to have a pocket dimension populated with anyone who has annoyed him: ex-girlfriends, ex-employees, meta-humans he couldn't control and failed experiments. Its like the storage facility from The Cabin in the Woods but morally worse; fewer literal monsters. Clark is controlled by Metamorpho (Anthony Carrigan, Barry), a meta-human who can assume the shape of any material, including Kryptonite. In turn, Metamorpho is compelled because they have his infant son. To drive home the point of Superman's helplessness, Lex murders one of his most avid admirers, an average Joe named Malik Ali (Dinesh Thyagarajan, Good Egg), in front of him. That cements it for Metamorpho and he engineers Superman's escape. Meanwhile, on the other side of the dimensional portal Lois has convinced Mr. Terrific (Edi Gathegi, Twilight) to help and they appear just in time to help the heavily weakened, but by no means down for the count, Superman.

OK, you are pushing the envelope now, on cliches, and [DAMMIT] you've got me doing it.

Terrific Lois ("DC Comics Presents") takes the slowly recovering Superman to his parents. Not his birth parents, obviously, but the Salt of the Earth adoptive parents: Martha & Jonathan Kent in rural Smallville, Kansas. These are the people who raised him, who imbued upon him a sense of right & wrong, who gave him his moral compass and established what he should do with his powers. But Pa Kent (aka Mush) reminds Clark that it was not his birth parents' message, not even their upbringing that made him what he is, but it was his choices. He chose to become a red & blue suited superhero who goes out every day to save people.

We love these Kents. No "Man of Steel" tragedy, no difficult choices, just a couple of down to earth loving, supportive people. But then again, we are biased in favour of Kents.

So, Superman has escaped and Lex is incensed, utterly enraged, and decides his best course of action is to sacrifice Metropolis by allowing his dimensional rift to start tearing the city in half. Even his cadre of loyal henchmen (who ARE these fucks anywayz; how can so many people be so complicit.... <looks southward> ... nevermind) are not convinced this is a good idea, as an unfettered dimensional rift will eventually want to eat up the entire city, planet, solar system, etc. But Lex knows that this will draw back Superman from where ever he is hiding. And probably because he just likes doing evil shit.

I am realizing, that I might be out of practice in doing these long winded, entirely unnecessary recaps, as its just not capture the "fun" of the movie. For example, no mention of Metamorpho becoming an acid, splashing the Raptors and presumably killing them. Great scene! Also, the social media troll monkeys. THE MONKEYS EXPLAIN OUR WORLD !!!

Meanwhile Eve (Sara Sampaio, Wife Like), Luthor's current vacuous social media obsessed girlfriend, is secretly in love with Jimmy Olsen ([!?!??!] Skyler Gisondo, Santa Clarita Diet) and willing to provide him evidence against Lex as long as they can hang all weekend. Alas, all the dirt that Lois requires for a pro-Superman anti-Lex story is behind the scenes in Eve's endless stream of selfies. I am not convinced telling the world some rather simplistic "Lex wants to run a country" fact would turn the tide of public support, considering his army of monkeys at keyboards.

While Superman punches it out with Ultraman, before tossing the clone of himself (!!!) into a black hole and flying back to Lex Corps to actually close the rift, the Justice Gang head to the Boravian border to deal with the once-again-invading army. Apparently the moral quandary of interfering with other country's affairs doesn't apply to them, but they probably don't care, and the world doesn't care as they are non-alien vigilantes. And murderers; Hawkgirl (Isabela Merced, The Last of Us) just drops the Boravian Prime Minister Ghurkos (Zlatko Buric, 2012) from a great height. More Gang than Justice. Metropolis is saved, Jarhanpur is saved, Superman's reputation is restored and Lex is arrested. Oh, and his prison is emptied. We end off the movie with a cameo from a drunken Supergirl.

I agree with Kent; there is sooooo much in this movie, it is almost overstuffed, but by taking the four-colour stripped down behavioural approach, Gunn has made the movie so utterly rollicking that you don't care if things don't always make entire sense. But even as he stuffs the movie to bursting with Big Details, he still has so many fun little details, like Malik Ali helping Superman out of a hole, or Superman saving a squirrel, or how he catches a falling building with his hands (it should just collapse around him, unless he spreads his gravitic flying power across the building's entire surface), or even utter mundane things like Lois parked in the roundabout outside the massive sprawling, and seemingly mostly empty Hall of Justice. I just enjoyed so much about the movie.

I think I need to go back for a rewatch already.