Welcome to another installment of “Monday at the Movies.” This week, a two-parter, and long-time readers of the blog will know that I always think this sort of thing shouldn’t happen. For the record, this ought to be one movie, but if it’s going to be two, it’s probably best not to space them out too far; an hour’s intermission did the trick for me.
The Death of Superman (2018) – Famously killed off because the writers wanted to delay his wedding to Lois Lane, Superman perished in the comics in 1992, and
The Death of Superman has persisted with surprising vigor for a story that goosed sales and was ultimately reversed within a year. DC’s animated stable trotted out this story in 2007 with mixed success, but this time the animators give scripting duties to noted comics scribe Peter J. Tomasi, who does a much better job adapting the comics slugfest into a narrative with real heart as Superman (Jerry O’Connell) wrestles with divulging his identity to Lois Lane (Rebecca Romijn), even as the beast called Doomsday begins to tear its way toward Metropolis for their fateful showdown. The film’s highlight is obviously the brawl promised by its title, and the action choreography is quite successful. The first half of the film is a little talky, though it hits all the right character beats and sows interesting seeds for the sequel. In a sense,
The Death of Superman succeeds where
The Killing Joke failed by devising an opening act that feeds into the emotional heart of the story rather than wasting time and defaming its characters. Here the emotional center is relocated onto Lois and Clark’s relationship, which gets added weight as the inevitable, eponymous death approaches. It’s hard to imagine this film working as well for someone who isn’t already a big fan of Superman, but Tomasi does a very good job at capturing the spirit and the scope of those early 1990s Superman comics, with a deep bench of supporting characters (remember Bibbo?) and a very of-its-moment approach to the Lois and Clark dynamic. But it’s sweet (with an adorable reference to the “You’ve got me? Who’s got you?” from
Superman) and touching, even if it feels a bit overlong at times.
Reign of the Supermen (2019) – As the second half of the story,
Reign of the Supermen is a lot more frenetic, with a good deal more plotting and easily half a dozen characters to explore. Where
Death kept the focus tight, feeling protracted when it wouldn’t expand,
Reign feels overfull, with barely any downtime. I knew the film was off to breakneck speed when its earliest scenes swiftly bring together the four Supermen in a clash of wills and fists, something the comics eased into over the course of about six months of storytelling. Surprisingly, though,
Reign adheres to the comics story with remarkable allegiance; granted, major changes are made (Mongul doesn’t appear, but you can probably guess which hulking alien dictator replaces him), but screenwriters Tim Sheridan and Jim Krieg follow the broad strokes with the devotion of someone who’s read the book a hundred times. They also draw in a wide net from comics continuity at large, bringing in the 2003 retcon that Superboy has a helping of Lex Luthor’s DNA holding his clone body together. In Superman’s absence, the voice cast steps up their game; Rainn Wilson acquits himself better here as Lex Luthor than he did in
Death, where he sounded too much like Dwight Schrute. Among the four Supermen, Cameron Monaghan is the standout as the brash Superboy, but Cress Williams is a fine Steel, and Patrick Fabian channels all his
Better Call Saul superiority as the Cyborg Superman.
Reign also does well to draw on the internal continuity of these DC animated films, linking its storyline as far back as
Justice League: War and setting up a few future developments in a tantalizing post-credits sequence (
Death had four, but
Reign makes its singular stinger count). As much as DC’s live-action films have buckled under the weight of studio interference, it’s refreshing to see a Justice League film that isn’t pulled in a dozen different directions; indeed, you’ll be surprised how large the League looms in
Reign, but it’s all in service of a pretty strong Superman story.
That does it for this week’s edition of “Monday at the Movies.” See you next week!
The Death of Superman (2018) – Famously killed off because the writers wanted to delay his wedding to Lois Lane, Superman perished in the comics in 1992, and The Death of Superman has persisted with surprising vigor for a story that goosed sales and was ultimately reversed within a year. DC’s animated stable trotted out this story in 2007 with mixed success, but this time the animators give scripting duties to noted comics scribe Peter J. Tomasi, who does a much better job adapting the comics slugfest into a narrative with real heart as Superman (Jerry O’Connell) wrestles with divulging his identity to Lois Lane (Rebecca Romijn), even as the beast called Doomsday begins to tear its way toward Metropolis for their fateful showdown. The film’s highlight is obviously the brawl promised by its title, and the action choreography is quite successful. The first half of the film is a little talky, though it hits all the right character beats and sows interesting seeds for the sequel. In a sense, The Death of Superman succeeds where The Killing Joke failed by devising an opening act that feeds into the emotional heart of the story rather than wasting time and defaming its characters. Here the emotional center is relocated onto Lois and Clark’s relationship, which gets added weight as the inevitable, eponymous death approaches. It’s hard to imagine this film working as well for someone who isn’t already a big fan of Superman, but Tomasi does a very good job at capturing the spirit and the scope of those early 1990s Superman comics, with a deep bench of supporting characters (remember Bibbo?) and a very of-its-moment approach to the Lois and Clark dynamic. But it’s sweet (with an adorable reference to the “You’ve got me? Who’s got you?” from Superman) and touching, even if it feels a bit overlong at times.
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