Mr. Mxyzptlk- quite a few of them, and all were supes tricking Mr. Mxyzptlk into saying his name backwards. Similar with Bizarro. Anything with Ambush Bug. All humorous and not much punching.
It works perfectly fine when its Supergirl.
I’ll have to disagree on this one. In Civil War the villains goal was to destroy the Avengers. He won, the Avengers are no more (until Thunderbolts came along), and this lead directly to their other loss in Infinity War.
Or his morals. Remember, they don’t call him the Big Blue Boy Scout for nothing - his sense of right and wrong and his code of ethics are his real superpower, and also his key weakness.
This reminds me of a comment made by my boss at the time when Tim Burton’s “Batman” came out. “Michael Keaton? He can’t be the Batman. He’s just a little guy!”
Yeah, there’s a ton of stories where Superman solves the central conflict through his intelligence, or talking it out, or otherwise finding a non-punching solution. It’s not remotely uncommon for him, and its this sort of “criticism” of the character that leads me back to my first post in this thread.
FWIW the new Superman movie is doing very well in reviews (box office too):
Superman currently has an 85% critic score and a sky-high 95% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes. That 95% is above second place, Zack Snyder’s Justice League cut, which has a 92% and an army of Snyder superfans who were certainly going to score it high. Whether you want to consider Justice League a “Superman movie” is up for debate. That’s sort of like considering four Avengers movies “Thor movies” or “Iron Man movies,” and I’m not sure it counts, though it may be the case the audience score dips below that in the future.
I do think Metacritic does a good job. It has a 69 on that now, meaning “generally favorable”.
Not through the roof positive, like a Lord of the Rings or something, but positive generally.
Chris Stuckman said this is the funniest Superman movie.
Now, hold on. Funnier than Richard Pryor skiing down the side of a building?
Christopher Reeve specifically called out that moment in Superman 3 as a moment when he realized Richard Lester was making something so much sillier and stupid than Donner.
Richard Lester is who you call when you want silly. Sure, the Musketeer movies and Royal Flash were adventures, but they were silly adventures. The one serious adventure on Lester’s resume (Juggernaut) was horrible. Whoever hired him was aiming for 1966 Batman level silliness.
Ok that is my favorite Superman movie now. Having Krypto is just straight up cheating though.
What’s wrong with Krypto?
Just got back and I loved this. Krypto is the best! He got quite the positive reception from my audience.
Can’t wait to see this, not sure when I’ll have the opportunity. Hopefully soon.
Huge fan of the character going back to when I was a little kid. Grew up on Christopher Reeve and repeats of the George Reeves TV show on Nick at Night. I was a regular collector of comic books when I was in my late teens and twenties, mostly from about 1996 to 2006. The various Superman comics were a regular purchase of mine. This was not his best time period in the comics quite frankly, but the strengths of the character always shine through for me.
Two thoughts…
First, regarding the “Superman=Superwoke” BS that’s floating around in the ether out there. Basic kindness and human decency has become controversial even in our pop culture. I look at MAGA and I totally understand why they hate the character as he’s traditionally portrayed. He’s everything that they are not.
Second, I want to support those pointing out that the immigration angle is foundational to the character and has been since the very beginning in 1938. Siegel and Shuster were the offspring of Jewish immigrants to North America. I’m very certain that what was going on in Europe at the time was on their minds when they created this character. Yes he’s fought the Klan, he also fought slumlords and corrupt businessmen before Lex Luthor. The initial beginnings of the character in the late 30s were very socially progressive. Even if some of that has been softened over the years, it’s difficult to get rid of it entirely as it informs so much of the characters background.
Superman is an alien from a dying planet who lands in the Midwest and is raised by a middle-aged Midwestern farm family. He adopts their values, which includes things like fairness, kindness, and being generous to your neighbors. He quite literally makes America stronger. To me personally that is the core of the character. The “American Way” portion of his classic motto is meant to include the immigrant experience/story.
Nothing is wrong with him, he steals the movie.
There’s a Green Lantern series currently in the midst of production. So we know Hal Jordan, John Stewart and Sinestro.
The next movie is Supergirl, so we know who’s playing her is as well as Lobo.
And there’s a Clayface movie coming up. So far, we only know who’s been cast as Clayface.
What’s with the cape in the third pic? It looks like a red bridal train.
They were doing Superman teaches about intolerance comics way back, 1949 to be precise.
Several after that-
But if Lobo is in it, I wont pay for it. I hate that character.
Saw it today – it’s really fantastic. Every character was spot on, AFAICT, though I’m not deep enough in the comics to know much about some of the side characters (Hawkgirl, Mr. Terrific (who was absolutely terrific), Metamorpho). Best DC movie since The Dark Knight IMO (at least of the ones I’ve seen).
We’re seeing it tomorrow.