Superman is ready to soar again, bigger, bolder & more vibrant than ever before. Director James Gunn’s take on the iconic superhero isn’t just a reboot; it’s the launchpad for an all-new DC Universe, blending heartfelt legacy with bold new world-building. We joined Gunn for a virtual catch-up, where he answered journalist questions and dropped plenty of super-sized details on what to expect from the film.
David Corenswet dons the cape as a younger, more relatable Clark Kent, navigating the early days of his Metropolis career, balancing his Kryptonian heritage with his Kansas upbringing, and striving to become the world’s symbol of hope. Rachel Brosnahan steps in as the sharp, fearless Lois Lane, and Nicholas Hoult brings a fresh menace to Lex Luthor, promising a showdown worthy of the Man of Steel.
Gunn started the chat saying his film was from one fan to another, “This project is so much more than just another movie to me, it’s a story about humanity about what it means to be a hero in a world that doesn’t always make it easy to be one”.
There were much lower stakes for the director when he launched ‘Guardians Of The Galaxy’ back in 2014. “Nobody knew who they were” laughs Gunn, “There were 12 people in the world that were upset because Yondu didn’t have a fin in the first movie. That was the extent of the outrage over something that wasn’t the way they envisioned it. Superman is one of the most popular characters in the world, and everyone has their idea of what he should be like, what his costume should look like, what his morals should be, what his power set is. It was finding something that was as true and as authentic as I could possibly make it, because at the end of the day, if I can make something that’s authentic, then I think it works”.
James Gunn loves an animal sidekick, and just when you thought Superman would fly solo, along comes Krypto the Superdog to steal the spotlight. Krypto was inspired by Gunn’s own dog Ozu, who he adopted shortly after he started writing Superman. Gunn says that raising Ozu “was problematic to say the least. He immediately came in & destroyed our home, our shoes, our furniture – he even ate my laptop. It took a long time before he would even let us touch him. I remember thinking, “Gosh, how difficult would life be if Ozu had superpowers?” – and thus Krypto came into the script & changed the shape of the story as Ozu was changing my life. What better time to debut the not-so-good-good-boy Krypto”.
Casting the perfect Lois and Clark was no easy feat. Gunn revealed he shortlisted three actors for each role, but it wasn’t until he paired everyone together for a chemistry test that he made his final decision to cast Corenswet and Brosnahan. “David and Rachel were incredible individually, but when we brought them together, there was an electricity in the room that was palpable” shared Gunn, “Part of it is the steaminess, the sexiness of it, but part of it’s just the way they bounce off of each other, in the way that old 40’s movie stars do… Like, Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert in ‘It Happened One Night’. So it’s this really miraculous energy between the two of them. I felt like we were casting actors, but also casting the energy between these two actors”.
Forget any notions of Lois Lane as a damsel in distress—this Lois is a journalistic powerhouse who can take down villains with her pen as effectively as Superman does with his fists. “I think you’re going to be freaked out by how much journalism takes a part of this movie and how important it is to the story” Gunn told us, “I think that Lois Lane is someone who is going to be admired by boys and girls around the world for her pursuit of the truth and her strength in that”.
Superman’s suit is also getting a glow-up. Gunn is blending elements from different comic eras, making the suit more colourful, practical, and approachable. The director told us that he settled on using the S chest symbol from 1996 comic series ‘Kingdom Come’ early on & had it on the cover of his first script. “I also wanted the costumes to be real, something that people could actually wear” shared the director, “as someone in the film business, having been around a lot of costume suits and seeing just so many fake muscles in suits and airbrush muscles on suits, I didn’t want to go that route. So we did something a little bit different.