It’s been a minute since we had a full-on Superman major motion picture with all the trimmings. And this new installment shows with each charming but self-conscious step. It’s like a very expensive and fragile antique has been brought down from wherever it usually hides and one hopes it survives the special occasion that summoned it from its crypt. Superman is like that. Also like the James Bond franchise. Just as you’re getting used to one Bond, they bring in a new model. What was wrong with Henry Cavill? He seems to have a lot of mileage ahead of him. Well, he’s 42. The new guy, David Corenswet, is ten years younger. But there’s no getting around the fact that the actual character goes back to 1938. And, some will argue, Christopher Reeve, in the role of Superman, along with Margot Kidder as Lois Lane, in 1978, will always be the gold standard. In fact, Corenswet seems to be channeling Reeve in a pretty big way. The same with the new Lois, played by 34-year-old Rachel Brosnahan. There’s no doubt that the producers were looking for a certain je ne sais quoi and Brosnahan has that world-weary Kidder vibe down. The script doesn’t bother with formalities with these two and has them all over each other back at Lois’s apartment within a few minutes after the first big action scene. They are so used to each other after dating a couple of months that they let loose with a mildly tense quarrel. It was something else. It made a baby cry in the movie theater I was at.
Now, some talking heads have made a big deal about Superman updating for the age of MAGA. And I think the producers tried to split things down the middle. They gave Clark Kent a new set of parents cut from a MAGA trope: more of a laid-back Southern flavor as opposed to a prim and uptight Midwestern reserve that was the original recipe. Clark was raised in Smallville, Kansas after all, not West Virginia. Anyway, that part is done with kindness. The other part could be hard for some hardcore Trump fans to swallow and that’s stuff like Superman duking it out with Lex Luthor with Superman saying things like, “Yeah, I’m an alien and I’m proud of it. I’m a real person.” and Luthor saying, “I don’t care. The government has given me permission to do whatever I want with you!” Your mileage will vary. You can’t avoid a little sprinkle of politics when you’re dealing with such a colossal cultural figure as Superman. Director James Gunn referred to Superman as an embattled immigrant and that alone has created a bit of a firestorm. Every era has its own Superman and so it goes.
But getting back to the whole idea of a major Superman movie. It does feel like the good china and silverware is being brought out. My harshest view would be that the whole thing feels as if its been embalmed in formaldehyde, lost somewhere in the mist of the 1930s up to the 1970s. Maybe that’s a good thing, the fact that this sort of thing is still being done. It’s a very expensive experiment in entertainment but I can only imagine no one is going to lose their shirt over this. It’s going to appeal to a lot of people but that just goes with the brand. It’s too tempting for too many people. And I think it’s mostly going to be older people too even though efforts are made to make these characters seem youthful. One clue to the tilt toward older viewers, I think, is how Lois and Clark are supposed to be such huge fans of punk music. The way they carry on about their devotion to the punk ethos makes them sound more like people twenty or so years older than themselves. And that makes sense given that 58-year-old James Gunn is the movie’s writer and director. But good for him! I think the love for a beloved subject carries over into one’s life in more ways than one. I’m good with that.
