A new trailer for Man of Steel, the latest Superman reboot, was released Tuesday. Currently set for release June 14, 2013, the film is distributed by Warner Brothers, seeking to boost the DC franchise to recover revenue lost from the wrap-up of the Harry Potter series. Man of Steel is produced by Dark Knight series producer Christopher Nolan, with a screenplay by Nolan’s partner on that project David S. Goyer. The movie stars The Tudors actor Henry Cavill as Superman.
I have guarded expectations for this film. I loved Smallville and would applaud a successful Superman movie franchise. Unfortunately, I feel this film is going in with several strikes against it, and it has several hurdles to jump to overcome my skepticism. The last Superman film did a grave injustice to the franchise, with only the fantastic airplane rescue scene to redeem it, making me question whether the powers that be at Warner Brothers are enough in touch with the character to handle an adaptation. While Nolan and Goyer did well on Batman Begins, their last two Batman films were inconsistent, and Goyer is equally capable of turning out wretched material like Blade: Trinity, which had dialogue so bad I literally could not sit through to the end of the film (and I’ve watched Manos: The Hands of Fate multiple times, so it takes a lot to drive me from a theater). Finally, I see no need for yet another retelling of Superman’s origin, which the classic radio and TV shows managed to sum up in about 30 seconds at the beginning of every episode, whereas Hollywood seems to need a full-length retelling of superhero characters’ origins every few years. Enough is enough, we know he’s from Krypton, get on with the story so we can see a Justice League movie. Marvel will probably be on Avengers 4 before we ever see the JLA on screen at this rate. Warner would be better off adapting some story arcs from Justice League Unlimited or Smallville to the screen than redoing Superman’s origin again.
So much for my reservations. But I will see the film and hope for the best.