'Superman' - It's perfect...ly fine.

Josh
Jul 17, 2025
4 min read

Updated: Aug 23, 2025

James Gunn (2025)

Superman gets super kicked in the balls.

Without trying to downplay James Gunn, Superman was like looking at a painting from a very talented, competent, energetic university graduate artist. They truly understand the subject matter and the world it inhabits with the appropriate use of colour, sound, composition, references and moments that make the viewer feel like they didn't waste over $20 to go see it. Unlike the most recent attempts at the character, which I had watched recently, that takes a simple, almost 100-year-old blank power fantasy character and turns him into the cinematic equivalent of those cringe-edge-lord “Sorry Liberals” gun packing grim reaper images.

And that 100-year-old build-up of a power fantasy is one of the core reasons I find Superman to be a pretty boring character. He has an interesting history of being a Jewish creation (Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster), to promoting the American way during World War 2, to fighting Apes with his meaning evolving for various people over his years. Being a metaphor for immigration, literally being an alien but providing a service to his country or in this case, the world. Or taking the religious approach and not the Zach Snyder, “Let’s have a glass pane of Jesus as a double profile with Superman”, but more inline with his Judaic origins. But once you strip away the metaphor and thematic approach to the character, he’s boring as fuck. So, how do you make him interesting? Well, you gotta challenge his perspectives and happy-go-lucky Kansas upbringing. Does James Gunn's adaptation of the Man of Steel make him interesting? Yeah, kinda.

*Superman (2025) courtesy of Warner Bros.*

Taking place only a few years into the world’s introduction to Superman (David Corenswet), a younger super-hero is met with challenges of his origins, public perception, views on political rights and wrongs and of course, over-the-top villainous billionaires. There are some modern-day political notes with a war between neighbouring countries that Superman intervenes in, which is seen as a pro-Palestinian view (based). That sparks a discussion in one of the better scenes between Clark and Lois (Rachel Brosnahan), as they talk about the ethics of who is saved and what the political implications could be perceived. As well, with the theme of him being an alien, there's a plot by Lex (Nicholas Hoult) to turn the world against him by showing how he wants to destroy their way of life. Using an encrypted message from his crystal hologram parents. However, his father isn't Marlon Brando, drunk and reading the script in front of him.

If anything, the movie does get a tick for feeling like a random Superman comic. For better or worse, but for me worse, a lot is going on for the simple story of Lex wanting to frame and take down Superman. It has the James Gunn staple of eagerly engaging in the weirder and niche characters found within the 100s of years worth of comics designed to sell fake x-ray glasses. Each character from some version of the Green Lantern with a bad haircut played by Nathan Fillion, Hawkgirl played by Isabela Merced and the surprise hit Mr. Terrific played by Edi Gathegi. No idea what his powers were, but I think he was smart or something. Then we’ve got the villains, which range from Lex, this blade-wielding nanotech chick (María Gabriela de Faría), Ultraman and some big ass monster. Then there’s all the Daily Planet characters, Lois Lane, Jimmy Olsen (Skyler Gisondo), his clingy double agent one-way love interest (Sara Sampaio), and Ma (Neva Howell) and Pa (Pruitt Taylor Vince) Kent, Superman’s dog Krypto and the Superman assistant robots (Alan Tudyk, Grace Chan, Michael Rooker, Rom Klementieff). I did forget who was who at points, or forget people’s names.

Also, a side note, the basics I know of Superman are that Pa Kent dies when Clark is young as a way to teach him that he cannot save everyone. No matter how super he is. But in this version, he’s still alive, so I’m going to assume that in some version of the Infinite Earth comic series, he is alive.

Another James Gunnism that appears in all his superhero movies is fun action. And the action is fun. It’s well done, and Superman's actions within the action both complement his character and make him feel like a comic book character. He checks on people involved in traumatic events to make sure everyone is okay, or gets knocked underground and tunnels back to the surface. Yet something very specific took me out of the movie, and that was one simple action scene set to a catchy tune, all done as a oner with Lois Lane as the central pivot. Which sounds cool, but it’s something we’ve seen in almost all of James Gunn’s superhero movies. And my first thought was, “Oh, we’re doing this again.” This was the only scene that was really poppy; the rest of the action had a score that’s reminiscent of John Williams' iconic triumphant melody. Although it is a positive thing that, towards the end of a Superman film, I wasn’t reminded of Ground Zero at 9/11.

I don’t think anyone would be disappointed watching this movie. It’s exactly what you expect from a Superman movie. And unlike Man of Steel (2013), you won’t be leaving feeling like a shellshocked WW2 soldier. It’ll be interesting to see the final box office results to gauge the public's interest in another round of cinematic universes. Positive reactions have been flowing in; it could be a revival for DC, sadly, I don’t care. Unless we’re talking Batman, I won’t be keeping track of these films going forward. Sorry, Gunn, it’s not you, it’s superheroes.