El Iron Man was born in June 1938 by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster in the comics. However, Superman was not brought to the big screen until the year 1978 by producer Alexander Salkind and director Richard Donner to commemorate the character's 40th anniversary. Superman hasn't starred in too many movies, something that can be quite shocking considering its impact on mass culture. In fact, there are more Man of Steel projects canceled than completed. This has been due to a multitude of factors such as economic problems, loss of rights or discrepancies between the scriptwriters. Next we will review the steps through which the superhero has gone through in his time in the cinema, as well as all his movies.
Original stage: the Salkind era (1978 – 1987)
The first stage of the Superman movies is the considered series of salkind films, which lasted almost a decade: from 1978 to 1987. During all these years, Christopher Reeve He was commissioned to play the superhero.
Superman (1978)
The first film of the Kryptonian superhero was also the most expensive film in history at the time. It told the story that we all know about the beginnings of Kal-El on his collapsing home planet and subsequent shipment to Earth, where he is found by a Smallville farm couple and raised as their own son. After adolescence, Clark would leave town to move to Metropolis, where he would end up confronting Lex Luthor.
it was a movie very well valued by critics both for its technical aspect and for the double interpretation of Christopher Reeve and the directed by Richard Donner. Also John Williams he was commissioned to create a soundtrack that hasn't aged since those days.
Superman II (1980)
The second Superman movie would come a couple of years later, but not without its problems. The Salkinds (Alexander and Ilya) did not agree with the director's vision, and they decided to fire him when he had almost three quarters of the film done. Instead they put Richard Lester, who redid a good part of the film and barely kept a third of Richard Donner's work, who was not even credited in the film.
Superman II tells the story of several Kryptonians who are accidentally freed by Superman himself, who end up seeking revenge when they discover that he is the son of Jor-El. Despite all the changes that his script underwent, the movie was a success, since it retained part of the charm of the first part and was well valued in general terms.
Superman III (1983)
The third installment was commissioned again to Richard Lester, but he lost Mario Puzo as a screenwriter, one of the most important assets that the Salkinds had at that time. would tell the story of Ross Webster, a megalomaniac who decides to take revenge on Superman when the superhero destroys a crop he owned that was dangerous for the environment. Ross orders a computer expert to design a synthetic kryptonite to face Superman, who would end up dividing him between Clark Kent and a dark superman.
On this occasion, the film was criticized a lot, both for its direction and for its little originality.
Superman IV: In Search of Peace (1987)
It was Christopher Reeve himself, who pulled the strings so that this film ended up being produced, getting the support of Cannon FIlms, Golan-Globus and Warner itself.
The story was proposed by Reeve, and it was about nuclear disarmament. The movie opens with the superhero attending the United Nations General Assembly and announcing that he will eliminate all nuclear weapons on the planet. However, Lex Luthor disagrees with Superman's plans. the villain would end cloning the superhero and creating a version of the protagonist powered by nuclear power. The film was even weaker than the previous one, and would close Reeve's stage as a superhero.
The Dark Stage: Superman's Canceled Projects
After the four films, we would not see Superman on the big screen again until 2006. Through it there were all kinds of canceled projects. Superman V it would end up being canceled due to the bankruptcy of Cannon Films, the production company that was behind the previous installment.
En 1993Warners regained the film rights to Superman and handed the project over to Jon Peters, who had produced Tim Burton's two Batman movies in 1989 and 1992. Peters would end up hiring screenwriter Jonathan Lemkin, who completely ignored Warner's guidelines and did the script of Superman Reborn, which told the story of how Superman died and Lois gave birth to a new Superman. The story did not please Warner, as expected. Subsequently, the project would be canceled after hiring a new screenwriter who did not end up convincing the studio either.
The following flop by jon peters it was called Superman lives. The script was entrusted to Kevin Smith, forcing him to comply with a series of absurd premises that the creator ignored. The film should have been released in 1998, directed by Tim Burton and starring Nicolas Cage. The film started shooting, but was stopped to rewrite the story. The rest were chained. Wesley Strick was hired, who scuttled many of Smith's ideas. Subsequently, the director himself began to show discontent with Peters, and seeing the Warner's financial situation At that time, the most sensible thing to do was to cancel the project. All this history is collected in the documentary The Death of Superman Lives: What Happened?Directed by Jon Schnepp.
However still three more films would be canceled. The first project of Batman vs. Superman was commissioned to JJ Abrams, and would be canceled in 2002. . Later, the same artist wrote Superman: Flyby, what? it was canceled because Abrams felt they were underbudgeted. And finally, it would also end on deaf ears. Superman Destruction in the early 2000's
Superman Returns (2006)
Almost three decades later, Bryan Singer decided to cancel two productions to direct Superman Returns from the hand of Warner Bros. Apparently, the director had been a big fan of Richard Donner's work, and to some extent, Superman Returns was completely ignorant of everything that happened in the two films after Donner's run, so it could be considered a direct sequel to Superman II.
On this occasion, the Man of Steel would be played by Brandon routh, quite unknown until then, but with a profile slightly reminiscent of Reeve. He was also given the role of Lex Luthor to Kevin Spacey. The film narrated Superman's return to Earth after five years searching for survivors from his home planet, which had caused Lex Luthor to camp at his ease.
This stage could have been much longer, as the film was quite successful, grossing almost 400 million dollars and having very good reviews. The sequel was scheduled for the summer of 2009, but Warner ended up considering that the numbers had not been as spectacular as they imagined. The sequel never got written, but according to Singer, it would have been called The Man of Steel, that is to say, just as the reboot later.
DC Extended Universe
others passed seven years more and Warner Bros finally decided to give Superman a new chance, doing a complete reboot of the franchise, and laying the foundations of what we now consider the DC Extended Universe.
Man of Steel (2013)
It is the current stage of Superman. He was born with Man of Steel (2013), where it was presented to Henry Cavill as the protagonist and started the zack snyder era, which in turn was influenced by Christopher Nolan, who had just succeeded with his trilogy of The dark knight.
This film combines part of the two original films starring Christopher Reeve, which narrates the early life of clark kent, his evolution and his subsequent confrontation with the other survivor of Krypton, the General Zod, who wants to destroy humanity.
Snyder's vision was quite interesting, showing a very introverted Superman with very dark overtones. The collection was a <strong>success</strong>, making more than 668 million dollars at the box office.
batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016)
Titled in Spain as Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, this movie happens a year later than Man of Steel. On this occasion, Batman (now played by Ben Affleck) would see with his own eyes how the fight between Superman and Zod in Metropolis would destroy the entire Wayne Enterprises building due to the negligence of the Kryptonian himself, where Jack O'Dwyer ends up dying, Bruce Wayne's henchman.
After these events, the Dark Knight ends up totally opposing the Kryptonian's way of delivering justice —as if his had previously gone through a court order— and decides to confront him. Meanwhile, Lex Luthor will create a monster from Zod's DNA, which he names Doomsday.
Justice League (2017)
The Justice League movie planning began right after the filming of Man of Steel in 2012, and followed the events of its predecessor. Without Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman—along with other DC superheroes—do not see themselves capable of facing Steppenwolf, a new threat to the world, so they come to the conclusion that the only way to deal with it is to resurrect Superman.
The script was in charge of David S. Goyer and it was established that there would be two films in total, but not consecutive. Both would be directed by Snyder. However, everything would go wrong after the premiere of Batman vs. Superman, which had very bad reviews. Warnet decided to take weight off of Snyder so as not to burn him out. This was added to the fact that the director and his wife were going through a bad time, so they both stepped aside and Joss Whedon was hired for post-production of the movie. Whedon would end up making multiple changes, and even re-shooting scenes and adding touches of humor.
What's more, the review was quite negative. DC fans would start a campaign for Snyder to launch his own montage of the film under the slogan #ReleasetheSnyderCut. And, for the first time in history, complaining on Twitter did something. On March 18, 2021, it was published on HBO (HBO Max in the US) Zack Snyder's Justice League (2021), a 'director's cut' adapted for television that was highly valued by critics, despite being an unnecessarily long montage.
Superman's future plans
Much has been said about the future of this character in the DC Cinematic Universe. In recent years there have been strong rumors that Henry Cavill He could leave the superhero costume, although the truth is that these rumors are part of the actor's daily life, since the same was speculated for his role as Geralt de Rivia.
With the latest movements Warner and DiscoveryIt is not very clear how they are going to organize the future of the superhero, since the company is making quite a few unusual movements, such as the cancellation of Batgirl, a film that had cost 90 million dollars and was practically finished.
Apparently, there shouldn't be much time left until Man of Steel 2 is announced. David Zaslav, the CEO of the group, has already shown his intentions to push Superman back, so it wouldn't be strange if he reached out to Zack Snyder for a new installment that should arrive at the end of 2023 or 2024.