To celebrate the release of Man of Steel this month, we’re going Superman mad. Check back daily for Superman-related reviews.
It seems like I’ve spent far too long comparing Superman: The Animated Series to its direct predecessor, Batman: The Animated Series. However, it’s interesting how radically different Bruce Timm structured of the two shows. Batman came and went off the air with episodes that could only barely be described as a pilot and a finalé. On Leather Wings featured a Gotham still coming to terms with Batman, but it wasn’t an origin story. Judgment Day teased the possibility of closing Harvey Dent’s arc (and maybe killing off some recurring bad guys), but it didn’t offer too much else in the way of closure.
In contrast, Superman: The Animated Series opened and closed with two large-scale multi-part episodes designed to bookend the show, opening and closing the character’s arc. While Legacy doesn’t feel absolutely final, with plot points leading directly into Timm’s Justice League television show, it does offer a fitting end for Superman: The Animated Series.
To celebrate the release of Man of Steel this month, we’re going Superman mad. Check back daily for Superman-related reviews.
Superman Unbound is a little disappointing. These direct-to-video animated films can offer brilliant and energetic takes on established comic book characters and stories. The recent two-part adaptation of The Dark Knight Returns and the animated version of New Frontier come to mind. However, Superman Unbound seems to be just treading water, offering a fairly generic Superman story with no real insight into the character and his world.
To celebrate the release of Man of Steel this month, we’re going Superman mad. Check back daily for Superman-related reviews.
It’s always fun to compare and contrast Superman and Batman, partially because they are two of the oldest and most iconic superheroes in popular culture, but also because the lend themselves to contrast. Superman is all smiles and primary colours, while Batman is shades of grey and shadows. It’s fun to see the worlds of the two superheroes overlap, if only because they are so radically different in tone, atmosphere, mood and content.
While World’s Finest brought Batman and the Joker to Metropolis to play with Superman and Lex Luthor, Knight Time sees the Man of Steel substituting in for an absentee Batman in Gotham.
To celebrate the release of Man of Steel this month, we’re going Superman mad. Check back daily for Superman-related reviews.
Silver Age comic books are, by their nature, different from modern comics. It’s more than just evolving social norms, or even shifting artistic sensibilities. There’s a massive world of difference between a fairly average comic written in the mid-sixties and a similarly average comic produced today. While I’d be reluctant to describe the comics contained in Superman: The Man of Tomorrow Archives, Vol. 1 as “great” or “brilliant”, they have a certain charm or novelty to them. They feel alien and unique, as if offering a raw and unrefined sample of a mood that Superman has been chasing for the past two or three decades.
While I don’t think Batman was as well-served by the sixties as he was by later decades, there’s a surreal innocence to these comics which speak to Superman as a character. These are the comics that probably inspired Richard Donner’s Superman film, and though artists like Al Plastino, Curt Swan or Dick Sprang might not have drawn a Superman who resembled Christopher Reeve, it’s very easy to imagine him fitting in among these stories quite easily.
To celebrate the release of Man of Steel this month, we’re going Superman mad. Check back daily for Superman-related reviews.
I actually quite liked Flashpoint. I can accept that the event had its flaws. It was a less than ideal set up for a radical shift in the status quo and a significant proportion of its tie-ins were absolutely terrible, but these are problems that seem inherent to any big “universe-altering comic book event.” However, despite that, I liked the idea of viewing the DC universe “through a glass, darkly.” Seeing familiar, but distorted reflections of DC icons cast as terrifyingly cynical nineties anti-heroes.
By positing that any world inhabiting these grim anti-heroic substitutes was severely broken, Geoff Johns was able to reaffirm the idealism of the Silver Age. Contrasting DC’s stable of iconic heroes to their darkened reflections allows us to take stock of what is really essential to them as characters. Project Superman provides a glimpse at an alternate version of Superman, one raised under very different circumstances. It dares to ask what is the essential ingredient in making Superman the character we know and love.
It’s a deeply flawed three-issue story, and can’t measure up to Brian Azzarello’s superb Batman: Knight of Vengeance, but it’s still a fascinating look at what makes Superman into Superman.
To celebrate the release of Man of Steel this month, we’re going Superman mad. Check back daily for Superman-related reviews.
Although it was quite clear from The Last Son of Krypton that Superman: The Animated Series was going to be quite a different beast than Batman: The Animated Series, there were times when the show borrowed a trick or two from its older sibling. Particularly early in the show’s run, there were a number of “villain origin” episodes which seemed to emulate the more successful villain-centric stories from Batman: The Animated Series.
Fun and Games, the origin episode for Toyman, could easily have been adapted for the other show with a minimum of fuss. It was probably too similar, and a demonstration that Timm’s approach to Batman couldn’t be expected to work perfectly for Superman. Feeding Time and The Way of All Flesh are two single episodes designed to introduce two of Superman’s second-tier bad guys, the Parasite and Metallo.
While they retain a stronger sense of serialised storytelling than many of the Batman stories, there’s a very clear attempt on the part of the writers to humanise and almost empathise with these villains. The Way of All Flesh is probably the most successful, in part because Metallo has a great hook for writer Stan Berkowitz to mine, in part because he’s an interesting villain is his own right, and in part because it does this without seeming too much like an attempt to copy Batman: The Animated Series.
To celebrate the release of The Man of Steel this month, we’re going Superman mad. Check back daily for Superman-related reviews.
Comic book nostalgia is a funny thing, particularly when it comes to dealing with continuity. There’s a tendency to suggest that modern comics have lost their way, to suggest that modern reboots – both “hard” and “soft” – represent a break from the past and a gimmicky attempt to fix problems that are greatly exaggerated. However, while past reboots might not have enjoyed the same publicity as Flashpoint or Crisis on Infinite Earths, it is interesting to note that comic book creators have been reworking a retooling their creations for quite some time.
Indeed, almost every comic book character has been reimagined a couple of times before settling on their most successful portrayal. Sometimes those changes happen gradually – Superman’s evolution from a man who could leap tall buildings to a man capable of juggling planets – but others were quite sudden. The issues collected here, under the title Kryptonite Nevermore, represent one shift and decisive attempt to consciously “reboot” or “retool” Superman as a character, recognising that sometimes it’s necessary to do some radical reworking to update an existing concept.
To celebrate the release of Man of Steel this month, we’re going Superman mad. Check back daily for Superman-related reviews.
As a Superman story, For Tomorrow leaves a lot to be desired. It’s a disjointed narrative that rapidly shifts through a variety of scenarios, while characters drift in and out (and back in again) in a way that feels convenient at best. There’s hardly the most logical of progressions here, as we move from one story into another. For Tomorrow feels like it has the ingredients for at least three Superman stories that would be quite interesting on their own, instead of being forced to fit together as one plot.
On the other hand, as a meditation on some of the themes and implications and characteristics of Superman as a character, For Tomorrow becomes something far more fascinating. Writer Brian Azzarello would hardly be my first choice to write a Superman story (indeed, he’s almost too cynical to write Batman), but he very clearly has some fascinating ideas about the character and his world. Truth be told, For Tomorrow is often more intriguing than satisfying, which makes it hard to recommend, but is still worth a look for those willing to excuse a somewhat hazy plot to get to some meaty ideas about Superman.
It’s safe to say that I’m somewhat skeptical of a new live action Superman movie, particularly after the mess that was Superman Returns. That said, I’m growing cautiously optimistic about Man of Steel. The latest trailer helps, and it seems that David Goyer and Christopher Nolan (and Zack Snyder) have hit upon some of the character’s core themes – particularly the idea that Superman is more of an aspirational figure than a guy who can hit things really hard. The new trailer offers glimpses of the supporting cast. Amy Adams sounds pretty great as Lois Lane, not that there was any doubt. It’s also nice to see the wonderful Michael Shannon in full-blown villain mode. Although it looks like Zod will swear vengeance against the House of El again, Shannon’s performance looks to be a completely different tack from Terrence Stamp’s iconic performance. And that’s a good thing, as much as I love Stamp’s Zod.
Anyway, check out the trailer below, and let me know what you think.
The new trailer for Man of Steel has arrived and… I’m actually pretty excited about it. I’m a pretty big Superman fan, although I’ll admit that the character can be very tough to adapt. While Batman lends himself to all manner of interpretations, the Man of Steel is a lot harder to get a handle on. Batman is – despite being an orphan billionaire – much easier to relate to than an alien from another world. It’s hard to write a character who can do almost anything, and tough to emotionally invest in a hero who can shrug off bullets.
And, yet, despite that, I am cautiously optimistic about this Man of Steel, if only because it seems to grasp something about the character – something that Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy understood about Batman. These truly iconic characters are important for what they say about us, and our culture. It’s fun to watch Superman smash alien ships and fly into the sun, but what does his appearance suggest about the world he inhabits. Can we trust him? Can he trust us? Nolan grasped that Batman was about hope in the face of despair – the notion that one man could make a difference and ascend to the status of myth. It seems, based on this trailer, that Man of Steel is about optimism and faith.
The CGI looks grand, but it’s the personal stuff that I responded to. The moment where Clark confesses that his father worries about him. He’s the strongest man in the world, impervious to bullets, and yet Jonathan Kent fears what the world will do to his son – that somehow they might “reject” him, and that would be worse than any physical harm that could befall the child he raised. That’s a fascinating (and strangely natural) hook. There’s something very human about a father’s selfish desire to put his child ahead of the greater good.
When Clark flat out asks his father if he should have allowed those kids to die, Jonathan Kent selfishly replies, “Maybe.” It’s a strangely natural moment, and it feels organic for a father to place the security of his family above the greater good. It doesn’t make Jonathan seem shallow or cynical. It just makes him seem a bit more real. And, naturally, Superman is about transcending that sort of understandable selfishness. With great power, to quote another iconic hero, comes great responsibility, and the heart of Superman suggests that if a man were to find himself gifted these incredible powers, he would use them for the betterment of mankind rather than keep them locked away for personal gain.
There’s another nice moment where Clark asks Lois if she thinks the world is ready – because Superman is a concept that can’t work without absolute trust. If the character can’t be trusted by the world at large, then he loses any moral authority. Unlike Batman who exists as an underdog and can work outside the establishment, the nigh-all-powerful Superman has to be wary of being portrayed as an alien fascist imposing his will on a less powerful mankind.
Superman Returns didn’t realise this and eroded away Superman’s moral high ground, turning the character into a spoilt and entitled teenager with the power of a god. Superman Returns was a disaster and more of a horror movie than a superhero film. It’s not about creating a world that immediately accepts Superman, but in recognising that he has to convince it of his worth. Superman’s real victory isn’t pounding Zod into a skyscraper, it’s convincing people to believe in him. After all, Superman is the very embodiment of optimism, the notion that – were a man suddenly able to fly and deflect bullets – he would use his powers to make the world a better place. If we can believe in the basic goodness of Superman, we can believe in our own capacity to do the impossible.
If Man of Steel can embrace the character without a hint of irony, I think we might be on to something.
Amazing.
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