Earnest But Overburdened, James Gunn’s Superman Can Barely Fit in Its Suit

James Gunn’s Superman is adequate but unnecessary. It is the first major motion picture for his DC universe scheme with WBD. It comes after the superhero wave seems to have crested, the comet flown through the sky, but that comet has a long, wispy tail. Superhero movies have gradually transitioned away from origin stories in their first outings, dropping fans right into action. Studios and creatives are apparently wary that audiences are weary, especially when the origins of heroes like Batman and Superman are already deeply entrenched in the zeitgeist. It’s a kid’s movie with some adult moments and lots of nerdy references, along with new interpretations of familiar characters, just as you would expect.
Our Superman (David Corenswet) is already saving civilians and preventing catastrophes when we meet him, in a relationship with reporter Lois Lane (Rachel Brosnahan) who knows he’s Clark Kent, and has aspiring Superfriends. Isabela Merced’s Hawkgirl (apparently a human version rather than a Thanagarian alien) is here alongside Nathan Fillion’s Guy Gardner/Green Lantern (Fillion has been portraying Hal Jordan/Green Lantern in cartoon movies since 2011), Edi Gathegi’s Mr. Terrific (the one of these with the most plot impact), and eventually Anthony Carrigan’s Rex Mason/Metamorpho. The characters might add another level of expectation to Superman’s responsibilities, dimension to his personal conflict, but their main purpose is to make the world feel further down the comic book fantasy road away from reality; like Black Adam but more narratively, thematically, and visually successful. The obvious overarching tension echoing from the Snyder movies with which this is in spiritual continuity is Superman’s role in world affairs. This Superman is thematically loaded, perhaps bloated, as James Gunn nearly avoids making a fifth Guardians of the Galaxy movie (after the main three and The Suicide Squad).
Like the Richard Lester/Richard Donner Superman II, this Superman includes Lex Luthor finding the Fortress of Solitude in the first act, though not the first scene. It also has Sara Sampaio reprising Valerie Perrine’s role as Eve Teschmacher, Lex’s assistant/girlfriend. As in Zack Snyder’s Justice League, Superman must team up to destroy an otherworldy threat from Lex Luthor (Nicholas Hoult, whose most interesting monologue is interrupted for comedic violence). As in Snyder’s films (and other Superman material), Luthor is perturbed about a superpowered alien, which weighs on American politics as government administrators have to manage a super-being intervening in world affairs according to his own moral compass. The film is over its head trying to depict geopolitical conflict analogous to ongoing wars in Palestine and Ukraine – while clear in its final declaration that those with power should protect those without, the use of fictional nation-states allows for ambiguity and obfuscation.
Superman wants to save absolutely everyone, struggling with the weight of responsibility he feels he was entrusted by his Kryptonian parents (Bradley Cooper’s Jor-El and Angela Sarafyan’s Lara), living up to the love and trust of his human parents (Neva Howell’s Ma Kent and Pruitt Taylor Vince’s Pa Kent), and trying to maintain his romance with Lois. The writing of Ma and Pa Kent feels at first like someone grasping at trying to depict salt-of-the-earth folks and ending up in an unflattering place, but there’s one very heartwarming scene before the pivot to the climax that works well. One thing the film has going for it is that Superman’s internal and external conflicts culminate in a sort of arc of positive masculinity for which Pa Kent is the central conduit.
Corenswet is endearing as a flawed, human, deeply optimistic and perseverant Superman, while Brosnahan is compelling as his scene partner and leading her own. Skyler Gisondo is the most prevalent of the rest of the Daily Planet crew and the one that functions as more than comic relief (though given neither space nor material to shine as he does in The Righteous Gemstones), but EIC Perry White (Wendell Pierce, able and inadequately deployed), Cat Grant (Mikaela Hoover, a Gunn regular as a character we see bounce around but don’t really know), and sports reporter Steve Lombard (SNL’s Beck Bennett) make up the other named staff.