Just caught the two-part season premiere of the new animated Superman series, which debuted on Adult Swim last night and is available for streaming on their site and on HBO Max.
When I heard a Superman series was coming to Adult Swim, I assumed it was going to be some sort of adult-oriented parody like the rest of their fare - but instead it’s a family-friendly, TV-PG-rated action comedy that feels like a throwback to the golden age of '90s superhero cartoons. (I’m honestly not even sure why it’s on Adult Swim in the first place - it feels like it should be part of Cartoon Network’s daytime programming instead of the late night block.) After the last 10-15 years of grimdark live action Superman, this is very much a breath of fresh air and a reminder of what Superman should be - an exemplar of everything that is good and noble about humanity, a champion of Truth, Justice, and the American Way, who despite being a god among mortals refuses to lose sight of his simple small-town upbringing.
Stylistically, it reminds me a lot of the She-Ra reboot - the animation style is very similar, as is the awkward comedic banter between our protagonists. The shy romantic tension between Clark and Lois (who are both in their early 20s in this version, with Clark having yet to adopt his costume and alias) is a pretty big driving force in their interactions, with Jimmy Olson (who is so much like She-Ra’s Bow that I would’ve sworn they had the same voice actor) acting as the third wheel and instigator. Jor-El, who appears in hologram form much like in the Christopher Reeve movies, is something of a beefed-up and less hammy version of Marlon Brando’s Jor-El, and speaks in untranslated Kryptonian which, if you listen carefully, is vaguely Latin in its sentence structure and lexicon (he refers to clark as “filo” and introduces himself by saying “Nomo me Jor-El”, for example.)
The action scenes are what you’d expect from a show intended for a younger audience - lasers but no guns, violence but no blood and gore, death is mentioned and presented as a possibility but (so far) hasn’t actually been depicted. We have two dueling antagonists so far - Livewire, a fairly new-ish character from the comics, and Chris Parnell, of all people, as Deathstroke .
Anyone else watching? I for one am eager to see where this story is going.
I watched the first two eps and then watched it again with my teen. They called out loud that Superman was going to get a magical anime girl transformation and then started laughing out loud when he got one.
I liked the eps, they were fun and a little different than previous iterations, which I enjoyed. I am surprised to hear that it’s on Adult Swin though we watched it on Max.
I watched the first episode and it just didn’t grab me enough to keep watching which is a shame because I love the character of Superman. I can’t even say why exactly. I did like the lighter tone and lack of cynicism (at least in the first episode, maybe that changes) so maybe I will give it another shot.
I’m impressed at Jack Quaid’s voice acting, having previously only known him as Boimler on Star Trek: Lower Decks.
In the seventh episode of My Adventures with Superman, they bring in the multiverse. It seems kind of like an acknowledgement that this version of the characters are different, being in the style of a TV anime. But then, they change the extradimensional Mr. Mxyzptlk into something wild & TV-anime styled in the same episode.
I noticed while watching that episode that the Loises referred to our Lois’ homeworld as Earth-12. I don’t know if this is still canon considering how many times DC has rebooted their multiverse, but as of New 52 Earth-12 was the Batman Beyond timeline.
No telling whether that’s just an Easter egg for nerds, or if we’ll actually see Terry McGinnis pop up in season 2.
About the character, I find it pretty funny that a name obviously designed to be unpronounceable for the comics transitioned to video where people have to give it some pronunciation.
Myx has some fourth wall awareness. I can see the one in this cartoon being the same one from the comics, he just knows he’s in an anime and dressed accordingly.
That episode was full of little Easter eggs. We got a view of the Timm-verse Lois, and “Lois Prime” was drawn to resemble the Lois from the Fleischer cartoons. We also saw Dr. Fate’s helmet, Starman/Stargirl’s cosmic staff, a Legion of Super-Heroes flight ring, and probably some other stuff that I missed.
I’m a fan of Quaid from The Boys as well. I like him as an actor and think he works as Clark Kent, since he has that earnestness and humility you would expect for a guy who grew up in a small Kansas town raised by parents who tried hard to instill good values in him.
The little Shin Godzilla Easter egg/homage with Parasite in this week’s episode was pretty amazing.
They’ve all but spelled it out that the General is Sam Lane, Lois’ father, so there’s definitely gonna be a LOT of drama in the inevitable season finale confrontation.
True, although it’s interesting that the General, unlike Waller, seems to have some scruples. He’s trying to avoid civilian casualties, and recognizes that Clark is most likely innocent of whatever happened in the past. So he’s not completely irredeemable.
When I learned about Rutherford’s race it was while googling about why that actor wasn’t on the new season of Tacoma FD (where he had been for 3 seasons).
Yeah, I noticed her ‘fancy’ outfit for the gala a few episodes back pointed in that direction so I figured there had to be some Korean influence. Having it be a pantsuit was certainly non-traditional but appropriate all things considered.
I assumed she was meant to be Asian, but I couldn’t narrow it down further than that. Jimmy and Perry have both been race-flipped, so it seemed natural that she would be as well. Upon this revelation, I noticed that the General definitely appears to have some Asian features as well. If it’s true that the General is Sam Lane, then I assume that the phone call he was taking during the flashback to Zero Day was him hearing about her birth.
I’m also reading rumors that Dr. Ivo’s young assistant with the shaggy hair and glasses is meant to be Lex Luthor. If true, I imagine his story arc will probably be a big part of season 2.
(Re first spoilered speculation) yeah, I went back and looked at that character based on that new knowledge, and thought “maybe?”. The details are so subtle I just assumed “white” for both of them.
Another interesting tidbit I’ve discovered - in the flashback to Clark’s childhood where the Jor-El hologram is speaking to him in untranslated Kryptonian, the voice actor is actually speaking Esperanto, which is pretty clever and probably the first time since Red Dwarf that I’ve seen that particular language used in a TV show.
