You might be warned, there are positively spoilers for Superman forward!
James Gunn’s Superman, which opened this weekend as a part of the 2025 film schedule, is dominating the field workplace, however within the film, Superman (David Corenswet) himself doesn’t precisely dominate his enemies. Actually, beginning with the opening scene, Superman is normally getting his butt kicked all through the movie. Whereas I feel Superman is nice and a really strong begin to the newly rebooted DC Universe, I did get a bit of annoyed as I watched, questioning simply who was essentially the most highly effective superhero on this film.
The primary picture we see of Superman, because it was with the trailer, is the Kryptonian mendacity bruised and bloody within the snow someplace close to, however not in, his Fortress of Solitude. Earth’s yellow solar heals him shortly, however because the title card says, that is the primary time the Man of Metal has misplaced a battle.
It’s an ideal starting, and I used to be instantly drawn in, however someplace in direction of the center of the movie, I began to get actually aggravated at how usually Superman bought his butt kicked by the villains. First by “The Hammer of Boravia” (who we later discover out is definitely Ultraman, performed additionally by Corenswet), then later by Lex Luthor’s newly fashioned “Authority” led by Ultraman and The Engineer, performed by María Gabriela de Faría (Superman has an ideal feminine solid).
He additionally has a tough go of it in Lex Luthor’s jail when he’s debilitated by Metamorpho’s means to show into kryptonite. Luthor (Nicholas Hoult) will get the higher of Superman whereas he’s within the cell, not by laying arms on him bodily, however by roughing him up emotionally, whereas Metamorpho (Anthony Carrigan) does the bodily bit. All in all, it’s a fairly tough film for Superman.
In the meantime, The Inexperienced Lantern is Seemingly Untouchable
Whereas Superman is taking his lumps all through the superhero film, The Inexperienced Lantern, performed splendidly by Nathan Fillion, walks by means of disasters and battles with nary a scratch. He’s unflappable and seemingly untouchable by any of the various enemies he faces all through the film. He’s even cocky about it.
This all leads me to surprise simply who the actual superhero is right here? Superman is, for lack of a greater time period, human, all through, whereas Lantern is unstoppable. He at all times is aware of what to do, and he saves Superman on a couple of event, to not point out saving the folks of Jarhanpur together with the opposite members of the “Justice Gang.” Hawkgirl (Isabela Merced) and Mr. Terrific (Edi Gathegi) each have their moments saving Superman, too. Even Kryto the canine saves Supe at one level.
That is all to say that whereas I did actually benefit from the film, and I feel author and director James Gunn nailed the tone of an ideal Superman story, it actually began to hassle me that Superman was by no means actually “tremendous” till the very finish of the movie. Gunn’s relaunch of the DCU is off to an ideal begin, and I can’t wait to see Milly Alcock in Supergirl on the 2026 film schedule. Her cameo was aces!