If a manual were made on how not to make a superhero movie, on its cover you could read in capital letters Superman Lives. With colorful letters and on a yellow shield. On the back cover, perhaps, a huge spider. A double warning to dissuade anyone who tries to follow those same steps. The authors? Jon Peters alongside Tim Burton, Nicolas Cage… And, as you will see, Kevin Smith would be delighted to write the prologue. He would rub his hands together.
At the end of the 90s, already in the wake of the successful Batman film franchise started by Tim Burton, Warner Bros. set out to make a new film based on the man of steel. It was the perfect moment: the event The Death of Superman in comics it had generated a worldwide phenomenon. The challenge itself was to renew the icon for the big screen. And that’s exactly where Kevin Smith and Jon Peters come into the equation.
The time Hollywood defeated Superman
Kevin Smith, at home, talking about his participation in the film for the documentary The Death of Superman Lives: What Happened?
Kevin Smith hardly needs any introduction: the director of Clerks o Mallrats He is also a screenwriter, producer and, from time to time, plays Silent Bob in his own films. A guy born in New Jersey who knows how to defend himself with ease in the Hollywood jungle and its fauna.
Of course, Kevin Smith is above all a comic book enthusiast. Something that was noticeable in his early work and that at that time was not so common among executives and filmmakers from the big studios. He even got Stan Lee to make a cameo in his movies before Marvel Studios existed! Elements that, precisely, will bind you for life to the worst Superman movie that never was.
By chance, Smith not only learned of Warner’s intentions to bring Superman back to the big screen, in addition to a film in which Bitelchus would go to Hawaii, but They suggested redoing the script. However, Warner Studios did not have all the rights to the character as it was a franchise and not its own project. So it had to have the approval of Jon Peters and, by extension, adjust to three very specific conditions of his:
- Superman would not have his suitbecause Peters thought the suit was ridiculous
- Superman couldn’t flyand what defines his image to the world was his height and the fact of being able to fly
- And in act three Superman must fight a giant spider in the third act of the film. Because “spiders are the most bloodthirsty killers among insects.”
Not without a lot of work and sacrifice, an emerging Smith in his career managed to do pirouettes to adjust to the conditions while discovering how Peters was not very clear about who Superman was. What’s more, he found out during the script reading of his birth name. However, as a producer Peters had the last word facing the film, and Smith wanted to work on that film. No matter how absurd his proposals were.
In fact, Peters’ ideas did not end there: That Superman movie was going to have the villain Brainiac fighting polar bears in the arctic (for no reason or reason) or an R2D2-esque robot whose voice sounded like a gay African-American. The latter to be able to get toys and merchandising, by the way. And although Smith adapted his script to all those changes, the one who removed him from the project was Tim Burton.
The death and resurrection of Nicolas Cage’s Superman
One of the final costumes from Cage’s canceled Superman
Both Burton and Cage signed on to make the new film Superman with Smith’s script, but once on board, Burton brought in his team of writers and began working on his own script. For his part, the New Jersey filmmaker received a good salary for his work, an abundance of merchandising and an anecdote that is a pleasure to see him tell.
For their part, Nicolas Cage and Burton delved deeply into the project and the former tried on several suits. Giving him a very different look to the image of Superman from the comics, and – luckily – to the one Jon Peters wanted to make. And despite this, that film did not go much further.
In 2002, the DVD of An Evening with Kevin Smith (an evening with Kevin Smith), which included his lectures at different universities in the United States answering questions from students. It was a matter of time before one of them, comic fans, asked him about that Superman movie in which he participated and was never made. The result is more than an answer: a sensational 20 minute monologue in which all your participation in the project counts.
The cancellation of Superman Lives (originally called Superman Reborn) was not the end of Man of Steel on the big screen, although at that time it was not known if a new film would be made. A few years later, Bryan Singer would leave Marvel’s mutants behind in the third installment of X-Men to direct Superman Returns and brandished photos of Nicolas Cage in the suit to have more creative power over the project than the executives. In a way, he was right.
The other reality is that Superman Returns It lacked the depth of the classic saga (with Christopher Reeve’s unforgettable Superman) and the strength that Zack Snyder would capture years later when he took the reins of DC on the big screen.
Cage’s debut as the Man of Steel on the big screen
Are we left without Nicolas Cage’s Superman? The truth is that in 2018 he performed it without putting on his underwear outside. Or if. We don’t know that because basically what he did was lend his voice to the Man of Steel in Teen Titans Go! The movie. A choice that, far from being coincidental, would put the finishing touch to the story.
And so fie until the movie Flash, which went through its own storm, reopened the box of thunder. But that’s another story.
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