Bonus: Superman

[00:00:00] Hello everybody, welcome back to the Film Buds Podcast, and my name is Henry. This is a bonus episode covering Superman from 2025. It is directed by James Gunn, stars David Cornswet, Rachel Brosnahan, Nicholas Holt, Alan Tudyk, Grace Chan, Bradley Cooper, and the synopsis is, Superman must reconcile his alien Kryptonian heritage with his human upbringing as reporter

[00:00:27] Clark Kent. As the embodiment of truth, justice, and the American way, he soon finds himself in a world that views these as old-fashioned. I did see this one back when it came out, and there was a lot of anticipation for it, considering that James Gunn had had huge success with the Guardians of the Galaxy films, and then The Suicide Squad, and it had already been known at this point that James Gunn was running the new DC Universe as opposed to Zack Snyder.

[00:00:56] I've talked about Zack Snyder plenty over the years. I'm a big fan, but I'm also a big fan of James Gunn, so I was looking forward to this. I had seen David Cornswet in Pearl, which he's very good in. At least on Letterboxd, the fan base for this, the viewership is quite high, bigger than I was even expecting. It's James Gunn's most popular movie as well on there. I know the reviews were solid. Box office-wise, I think it managed at least decently. It didn't flop

[00:01:26] or anything. Before anybody gets upset, I do like this movie. I'm not nearly as crazy about it as I was hoping I would be after two viewings every time I go in wanting to love it, and it's just not there yet. Of all of James Gunn's comic book films, it would be second from the bottom with Guardians of the Galaxy 2 being my least favorite. Good things first, David Cornswet is great as Superman. I think Henry Cavill will always be my favorite just because that was kind of my first introduction

[00:01:54] to the character, but he fits the young, more immature, still learning kind of hero. And I know for some odd reason there are people who are so opinionated about liking one universe better than the other. As in, oh, I love the Snyderverse movies, I can't watch this new one, it looks lame. Or vice versa. Of course, it's fine to have a favorite, and I also love the Christopher Reeve original one,

[00:02:19] but all in all, I just find debates like that to be really pointless. Crypto the dog is a great addition. I don't care if the dog is CG, I think it looks great, and it's fun to have that human-dog relationship. With the Snyder films having the exact opposite kind of tone, I think the vibe of this one really works, and how they discuss that kindness is the new punk rock because we are in an age where people seem to be getting meaner and meaner, and having this character who is only trying

[00:02:48] to see the good side of everyone and bring everyone together no matter what is a really important thing to have. But actually on that note, one other thing that just made no sense to me was how some people said that they had issues with James Gunn presenting Superman as an immigrant, or as an immigrant story. Pun intended here, I don't know what planet you think you're from. I don't know how you could think that Superman is not an immigrant story. I mean, it's a guy whose home is destroyed,

[00:03:15] his family is killed, and or dies for him. Their last wish, their last action, is sending him off to another world to have a better life. When he gets there, he is different from everyone else. Everyone in the world around him is unsure if he's a threat, or a friend, and he has to convince them otherwise. And not only that, but since he's become a celebrity, every action that's even remotely

[00:03:38] in the gray area is seen as violent, as dangerous to the rest of humanity. And that's the case in the Christopher Reeve one. That's the case in Man of Steel. That's how it is in pretty much every single Superman comic that I've ever read. I don't know if that's just the heat of the political climate messing with people's brains, or people just trolling online about that. The look of all the creatures,

[00:04:03] the monsters, very James Gunn-esque, kind of creepy, dark, gross, has a little bit of that horror vibe. Some negatives though, sorry to all the super fans out there, it just is what it is. Typically, I really like James Gunn's writing. I think his dialogue is very clever and very funny. His character work is strong. But in this case, and then with Guardians 2, I don't even know exactly what it was about it.

[00:04:29] Maybe it was more of a direction problem, an editing problem. But I found so much of the dialogue, a lot of the conversations to be really grating. For example, there's one towards the beginning between Superman and Lois, where he's giving her an interview. And as it escalated into this argument, it just didn't sit right with me, kind of left me with a bad taste in my mouth. And then there were others throughout the movie that were the same way. And by far the biggest

[00:04:57] problem with dialogue is, as much as I love Nicholas Holt, I like the character of Lex Luthor. I couldn't stand when he was commanding the robot who was fighting Superman. He just kept on yelling out things like, 1A, 31B, 94J. That stuff was so, I'm sorry, it was so stupid. And it came across in a goofy way that was not a good thing for me. I wish that they had just shown that on a computer

[00:05:24] screen or something, like the different commands, as opposed to him yelling it. Because honestly, the more loud and angry he got, the worse it was. And I couldn't wait for them to cut away to somebody else. If you feel differently, or if you feel the same about that, please do let me know. I don't know if I'm in the minority there. With James Gunn's style, and you could almost compare it in a way to Zack Snyder in this way, but he definitely likes to show a team being formed, especially if they're

[00:05:52] like oddball, misfit characters. And you see that in Guardians and in The Suicide Squad. What I took issue with Superman is that it's called Superman. It's not Justice League yet. This is the first film where we are being introduced to this new version of the character. And I felt like there was so little time actually getting to know Superman and spending time with him. Most of them were in

[00:06:15] action scenes. And within that, there was so many other characters. I hated the Justice Gang. Nathan Fillion's character, like that stupid haircut. The guy floating around on the chair, so terrible. I liked Isabella Merced, but even her costume design just wasn't really working for me. And maybe if they had been introduced in a very minimal way, and then moved on, and we didn't see them for another movie or two until there was an actual team-up movie, that would have been better. But say what you will

[00:06:44] about Man of Steel, but that movie is called Man of Steel, and it's about him. He's mostly on his own for the most part. And then same thing with Christopher Reeve in the OG. I liked all of the Daily Planet sequences, and I was hoping for the first time we would have had much more time with him as Clark Kent. Also, the Cat Grant character played by Michaela Hoover. The performance was fine, but how they dressed her, and I'm not super familiar with her in the comics, but it was almost

[00:07:13] too obvious that they're playing her just for eye candy. You spend no time with her. You don't even know what her role is. She's just kind of there in the background. I don't know how publicized this was beforehand, but I didn't know that Bradley Cooper played Superman's dad. And spoilers here, the message from his parents to him, which part of it was lost in transmission, and it comes across

[00:07:38] at first as very positive, but then his parents actually said something very negative about the human race. I didn't mind the cinematography as a whole, but I think it was a mistake to have the movie so brightly lit, because all of the CG looked more flawed than I think it would have if it had been a little bit darker. Like, a lot of it looked very cartoony. That alternate universe thing that he went into, I thought that looked great, but then more so in the city when there

[00:08:07] were monsters attacking, I didn't love the look of that. The Superman clone-like enemy that Lex Luthor creates towards the end, that had sort of a Winter Soldier feel, but I liked that. The introduction of his parents, his human parents, that was one of the best parts. And even though in Man of Steel, they were also grounded, kind, country people, I think in this it was done even better. They just

[00:08:31] felt so homely and forgiving and welcoming of Clark. The theme was very good, although sorry, I think Hans Zimmer's score for Man of Steel is better, a little bit more dramatic, more energizing. The sequence at the end when Clark is picking up Lois and they're twirling in the air, that was fantastic. And then him relaxing in the last scene to this montage of his childhood. Heavy three and a half out of five.