I mean, they made an entire TV series for a decade.
There are two popular fighting games whose entire point is "Superman is bad".
And uhhh... Superman American Alien.
This is how that was sold.
And yet:
American Alien Is The Best Superman Story In Ages
Note, I really don't like Landis as a persona, but American Alien is a legitimately great Superman story.
So what's the difference? Part of it is longform storytelling—as I said before there's things we allow for in serialized fiction that you won't in a movie. A TV show or comic mini-series can spread the journey out, whereas a film needs to satisfy in each picture. Harry Potter is eight films, but the first few films are completely satisfying on their own. The second is down to pure execution. As I've said, Man of Steel was flawed in a few ways, but people generally enjoyed it. the Letterboxed is 2.9 out of 5 stars, the IMDB is 7.1 out of 10. But BvS as the second part of that character's story was the misstep.
You can do a lot with Superman. Yes, he's the same noble good archetype you see in characters like Captain America, but there are things you can do with that. You can go more human, like American Alien. Authoritarian like Red Son and Injustice. Mythical like All-Star Superman:
And the truth is, Cavill could probably do it. but if you're going to direct Superman, you need to want to direct Superman first and foremost, and I think that's a tough nut to crack. Batman is a crime drama, that's easy. Superman is... a myth. Gotta stretch a bit.
There are two popular fighting games whose entire point is "Superman is bad".
And uhhh... Superman American Alien.
This is how that was sold.
This is the story of Clark Kent, a Kansas farm boy who happens to be from another planet. It's the story of a scared young kid with impossible powers, of a teenage delinquent with a lot to learn, of a reporter with a nose for the truth who's keeping the biggest secret the world has ever known.
This is not the Superman you know. Not yet.
And yet:
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER!
IGN's People's Choice winner for 2016 Best Limited Comic Book or Mini-Series
American Alien Is The Best Superman Story In Ages
Under the RadarDespite the fact that hundreds of great stories exist about Superman, one of the worst fallacies about him is that he's a boring character who's hard to write because of how all-powerful and altruistic he is. All you need to do is look at the way that Man of Steel and Batman v Superman turned out—hormonally moody in the most annoyingly adolescent way—to see that Zack Snyder and the powers that be at Warner Bros believe that idea.
Free from continuity, Superman: American Alien flies highAmerican Alien excels as a Superman story because it acknowledges the qualities that made the character interesting to a 1940s audience are not necessarily the same qualities we need to see in Superman in 2016. But it also proves that The Man of Steel is more malleable than we presumed, and that a search for the Kryptonian's soul could lead to his most human story to date.
In an interview running in the back of all DC's titles this week, Landis mentions that DC reached out to him around the time he released his opinion piece "Regarding Clark," in which he details the qualities he values about Superman and the ways he's disappointed by the treatment of the character in Zack Snyder's Man Of Steel.
American Alien #1 is one of the best Superman comics in a year when the character has already experienced some major changes for the better. But unlike the current story unfolding in the main Superman titles, this issue isn't memorable because it takes the character in a bold new direction. It's memorable because it gets at the heart of what has made the character one of the world's popular heroes.
Note, I really don't like Landis as a persona, but American Alien is a legitimately great Superman story.
So what's the difference? Part of it is longform storytelling—as I said before there's things we allow for in serialized fiction that you won't in a movie. A TV show or comic mini-series can spread the journey out, whereas a film needs to satisfy in each picture. Harry Potter is eight films, but the first few films are completely satisfying on their own. The second is down to pure execution. As I've said, Man of Steel was flawed in a few ways, but people generally enjoyed it. the Letterboxed is 2.9 out of 5 stars, the IMDB is 7.1 out of 10. But BvS as the second part of that character's story was the misstep.
You can do a lot with Superman. Yes, he's the same noble good archetype you see in characters like Captain America, but there are things you can do with that. You can go more human, like American Alien. Authoritarian like Red Son and Injustice. Mythical like All-Star Superman:
Square jawed stoic hero like George Reeves, a lithe goofball like Chris Reeves, or pretty much anything. You just gotta execute.
And the truth is, Cavill could probably do it. but if you're going to direct Superman, you need to want to direct Superman first and foremost, and I think that's a tough nut to crack. Batman is a crime drama, that's easy. Superman is... a myth. Gotta stretch a bit.
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