YOU MIGHT AS WELL CALL IT A SUPERMAN ORIGIN STORY

I'm enjoying how you have become the resident Superman news champion, Rappe.

I just sense a need for people to come on here, and scream about Superman on a Friday night.

Great, more and more scenes where Superman mopes around the skyline looking like a wounded little bitch instead of just getting the fuck on with the business of being a superhero. Only this time, more baby fat and Lana Lang! Yawn.

Edit - Nevermind, should have read the entire article. Silly me, question was answered in it.
But...I still don't think something focusing on the early days of Superman would be a bad thing. I'm not talking about the origin stuff (Krypton, Smallville, etc.) but having a quick 5 minute origin montage in the credits, then get to the present with a fresh faced Superman ready to take on the challenges that come his way. I don't think he meant that we'll get a 30-45 minute recap of the Krypton / Smallville stuff. I think he meant they are going for a Superman in the early days approach or something like that.

Elisabeth Rappe, I applaud your work, for all the...Super, News Updates! While people 30+ do not need to see the...Origin of Superman, there are younger viewers who have not heard of him, or only know about the not so...Super, teen of...Smallville, which is nothing compared to the best of what Superman offers in...Richard Donner's Superman or Lester's Superman II.

Yeah, I never expected to get an older wiser Superman movie, not if they're planning on franchise. At any rate, early days doesn't equate to origin necessarily.

For example, Burton's Batman is set in the early days of Batman's career, but it never pulls the origin story card. Sure it alludes to his motivation and his origin, but it never rolls out the Donner Superman/Raimi Spider-Man game.

That quote is nothing.

Beautiful write-up, Rappe. You are dead-on.

If DC/Warner had half a brain, they'd have hired Bruce Timm as their Kevin Feige/Avi Arad.

Let's face it: the script is going to change dramatically and age-adjust based on what big name they get to play Superman. The number crunchers are probably blaming Superman Returns' lack of success on the fact that Brandon Routh was unknown. If George Clooney walks in tomorrow and says he wants to play Superman in Kingdom Come, then guess what - that's what we'll get. If Robert Pattinson says he wants to play Superman in "Young Superman and Jimmy Olsen in: Monkey Trouble!" then guess what - that's what we'll get. The general public don't know who Nolan or Snyder are, and don't care what they think about stuff like, "storylines" and Watchmen killed the idea that fidelity to the original comics was lucrative.

Totally agree with Park, as soon as he leaves Smallville there is plenty of room to play around with good stories. Nice write-up indeed.

Oh shit its the fucking hero's journey again.

Everybody run!

Elizabeth, you are the Bee's Knees.

While I don't like the origin story idea, I did like the sound of a Superman who travels the world as a backpacker, searching for meaning in his life. As long as they don't dwell on origins and get right to Super heroics in some Mumbai slum, perhaps it could be worthwhile

Really? Unicef Superman's World Tour or Clark Kent: The Movie holds little interest for me.

I'm sorry but that premise, Snyder's comment plus rumors of what the screenplay contains, sounds dull and pointless.

BTW, more Elizabeth Rappe pieces please. She's the bees knees'.

I think one or two kind of gritty down to earth yet super powered confrontations in a slum could be neat

I definitely would need to see him in the suit fighting larger than life foes* by the movies end though

*not necessarily talking about the more sci fi villains from SM's rogue's gallery, a dictator or an entire army or something would be an appropriate threat for him to face IMHO

Wasn't one of the beefs about Returns that it didn't have enough super-heroics? Now they want to go back to Superman figuring out if he even wants to be Superman? Yeah, that'g gonna make people happy.

When I hear that he's going to be globe trotting in anonymity as Clark Kent trying to decide if he's going to be Superman, I have to assume that means scenes where he's confronted by heinous evil doing like orphans being attacked or something and has to bust out his super powers to save them

Kind of like D9 with a man instead of a mech suit.

I think that movie (the one I picture in my head at least) sounds cool

I agree with most of what you said, but when the trailer comes out and states it's from Chris Nolan - the director of "The Dark Knight" and "Inception" - most people will know who Chris Nolan is. Snyder is a little bit of a different story, but I guarantee you Warner Brothers will be pumping out the Chris Nolan brand name as much as possible prior to Superman's release.

Honestly, that's like a James Bond movie where he's arresting jaywalkers.

That's a good point. I bet that it says specifically, "From the director of The Dark Knight and Inception" Those sneaky bastards.

Princess Kate has routinely terrible ideas when it comes to properties she knows nothing about, but in all fairness Superman used to engage in all manner of mundane shit back in the 40s (gambling rings, bookies, crooked boxing promoters, and crooked orphanages and so on).

Haha god, those early strips seem downright fucking cruel when she superpunches loan sharks and shit.

Granted, but is that what you want to pay $10 to see on a movie screen?

I have no problem with people disliking my idea, I just don't think they actually understand it. I said "D9 with a man instead of a mech suit", meaning swarms of underpowered human oponents getting utterly obliterated by the alien powers of the last son of Krypton. The action could be really crazy, even if Nolan and WB draw the line at Superman turning people into a fine red mist. Sort of like Iron Man saving the village in IRON MAN, only with Superman, better action and a bigger budget

Anyway, that's my final attempt to explain it

The best one is where he helps a boxer who was the victim of crooked promoters get another chance at the title. Superman does this by training the boxer while simultaneously disguising himself as said boxer beating all of the would be opponents until he gets to the top and the match for the title, he then switches places w/ the now well-rested and prepared fighter allowing him to fraudulently win the title. Superman, whatta guy.

No, not at all, it was just a historical observation.

But it's not a vulnerable human inside a breakable piece of machinery you're talking about. It's bullet-proof, super-powered Superman. Even at his most vulnerable in the comics, an Indian street gang would hardly be any kind of a challenge to him, and if there's no threat to him, there's no stakes for an audience to be involved in. It'd be fist-fight porn, the Burly Brawl with more color.

That sounds more like:

Christopher Nolan presents: Gus Van Sant´s Paranoid Superman.

Well that's why you have the 'Christopher Johnson' plot device there in the scene; (be it an orphan, a school, Lois Lane ETC) something that SM has to work to avoid destroying when he fights back, even as the bad guys madly try their best to unload their arsenal at Kal El

That "Superman deciding on whether he wants to be Superman or not" plot description came straight from IMDB, just so you guys know. It's my guess that the people that broke that "story" simply were sloppy. I doubt a Snyder Superman film would be introspective to that degree. I mean, this is coming from Goyer. He'd be the one to have him punching robots and having Superman tossing out one-liners before that, methinks.

Me in a theater in 2012:

"For fuck's sake... put down your backpack and PUNCH SOMETHING!!!"

Didn't Goyer and Nolan have BATMAN doing essentially the same thing? Wayne traveling the world anonymously, trying to find himself? Doesn't seem that far fetched IMHO

Just sounds like a Whicker's World version of Superman II to me. Well, they've remade Superman the Movie already, so why not?

The problem is that Clark Kent doesn't even need to ask the question whether he should become Superman or not. That idea of super moral responsibility was instilled in him throughout his upbringing by the Kents. Bruce Wayne had to find out the hard way.

Yeah, I was being a bit silly with the one-liners crack, but my main point is that the original story essentially ran with a plot description from IMDB (not the most solid source in the world). Now, maybe they did get that from a trustworthy source who really knows what they're talking about, but I wouldn't set that story description in stone yet. Could be wrong, though.

I don't even necessarily disagree with you, but didn't Wayne's father teach him the same thing? That's what the monorail scene was about

And, when we grow up, don't we all sometimes question what we've been taught and come to our own conclusions about our responsibilities and values?

Fair point.. if the only source is IMDB, that's shoddy reporting

Wayne wasn't traveling the world on a moral quest, he was learning from the inside.

From the beginning, after he throws the gun away, his moral statement is clear as fucking glass.

First: you're right about Thomas Wayne & that theme of communal responsibility is an interesting piece of the Batman puzzle, but for Superman, the topic had been properly covered in 1978.

Second: If people are interested in Clark Kent's dull as dishwater "will he/won't he" adolescent Supes dilemma, they can watch Smallville.

I guess they are making the movie for today's teenagers though who have grown up without that story of SM being told in their lifetime

Anyway, I definitely see what you guys are saying, I'm just trying to look at the positives that could result from the plot description we've been given.

The one thing I can imagine being a hurdle for Clark in regards to him deciding on whether or not to become Superman is the idea that he's scared of the slippery slope from altruism, to what Warren Ellis termed "benign fascism", to outright fascism.

Wayne deals with that in Nolan's films, but I imagine it's an even greater concern for a guy like Clark who has the ability to, in the space of hours, dismantle entire governments and subject humanity to his rule. That doesn't have to play as dark as it sounds, but it would be interesting to see Superman debate involving himself with our affairs with that threat on the table. It's like this great quote from Brian Azzarello on Superman, where he goes into how he doubted the portrayal of Batman being this totally in control guy, and stated that Superman has to be the most in control superhero, in that he has to be mindful of every little step he takes b/c they could have cataclysmic consequences. Now, if one can do all that, but not break the action that we want in a Superman film, I'll have no problem at all with it. The two things don't have to be mutually exclusive. You can handle it in the context of a superhero battle and not have him go to Darfur or some really on the nose shit like that.

I think it should start with Superman established but still fairly new to being Superman and then have him get his ass kicked by a Supervillain for the first time. Have him experience what it is like for a bad guy to actually put up a fight for once. That way you could have some big action set pieces and still have the "maybe i'm not cut out for this" theatrics.

Not sure that would work in the context of a film unless Superman already lives in a world heavily populated by superbeings, and if there are somehow others better equipped for the job than him. If there's someone out there that can own Superman to the point that he considers quitting, I think that would be a huge problem for the free world and Superman would look like an asshole for tucking his tail between his legs. It's not like he's Batman, a well-trained, well-equipped, but ultimately human vigilante, he's a friggin' demigod.

Link to Azzarello on Superman, please?

I like your take, it suits really good with Nolan take on Batman. The only problem is that here we don't have a live father figure who could transmit this and turning this doubt into a inner monologue might be atrocious.

I'm having trouble finding it, but it was a couple of years ago for either Superman: For Tomorrow or Lex Luthor: Man of Steel and published by Newsarama or Comic Book Resources, but I'm not getting it anywhere. =(

I appreciate Joseph Campbell's writings as scholarly work, but I would be totally cool with rounding up every copy of Hero With A Thousand Faces and burying them in the desert, if it would stop people coping this story structure in every frigging movie.

My thoughts exaclty. His origin has been told so many times it's painfull. There is no new material to mine from it.

I want me some giant fricken robots.

De-powering Supes to some degree can fix many of the potential problems with another movie.

Alex Augustine, De-Powering Superman is...Not the answer. Giving him sufficient...Supervillains to fight is. Giant LexCorp Robots are also a good way to go.

I've been telling friends for a while now that if I were writing a new SUPERMAN movie, I'd start with the camera slowly winding through Metropolis. Skyscrapers. Traffic jams. People walking every which direction. The Daily Planet. A normal day.

Then CRASH! Some giant alien monstrosity flies backwards out of a tall glass building and slams into the ground below. Emerging from the hole left behind is Superman (cue John Williams), flying upright, toes pointed to the ground. The alien stands up and glares. Superman swoops down fist first to deliver another blow.

Then you spend the next 10 minutes giving people the kind of Superman-vs.-alien smackdown that we've never seen on the big screen. It doesn't even have to tie into whatever the movie's going to be about. Just use the ol' INDIANA JONES trick -- Superman is here, he's awesome and this is the grand finale of his most recent battle to protect us.

It's obvious from reading this thread that I'm not the only one who thinks this is clearly the way to go. Why isn't it obvious to Warner Bros.?