The New ‘Superman’ Trailer Has Me Worried All Over Again

The DC cinematic universe is about to get a fresh new start. James Gunn’s Superman releases this summer, and with it the beginning of an entirely new DCU era, one that promises to be a lot less dark and gritty than the Snyderverse and hopefully a lot more coherent (and higher quality) than DC’s offerings since then.

I think I speak for all DC fans when I say that I really hope this is good. I genuinely want DC to rise from the ashes so that we can start getting decent comic book movies again. There was a time when Marvel was really crushing DC, but for the last few years it’s been pretty bleak on all sides, with only a smattering of decent comic book movies punctuating a the parade of mediocrity.

A lot rides on Superman, which is fitting enough, and I personally hope that my fears are totally unfounded. But after watching the second trailer for the film, I can’t help but feel that something is just . . . off. Here’s the trailer before we go further:

One thing I keep hoping is that every new trailer will release me from my concerns. When the first, mostly story-free, trailer released I was worried about two things: First, there are just so many characters in this film. Too many. And second, the color-grading and CGI make it look overly-polished and kind of cheap all at the same time.

When the second teaser trailer released, I thought that Superman just looked very weird when he was flying. That might sound like nit-picking, but I think it’s important that your superhero looks good when flying, especially when it’s Superman.

This is the third trailer, and the first story trailer, so we get a lot more dialogue and see some of the characters interact, and a lot of that feels great. I like the casting all around. I think David Corenswet does a terrific job in his interview with Lois Lane, as his voice changes from the nervous, kind of fluttery voice of Clark Kent into a deeper, more confident superhero voice. Lois Lane is played by Rachel Brosnahan and she seems perfect here. I’m a huge fan of Nicholas Hoult and while he’s a little young for how I picture Lex Luthor, I’m confident that he’s got the acting chops to pull it off.

But my other concerns remain largely intact. Setting aside the CGI/color-grading/special effects which may simply be hard to judge from a trailer, there are so many characters in this movie that I’m a little bit worried how this will impact both runtime (please stop making superhero films longer than two hours) and the story itself. This isn’t another Superman origin story (James Gunn has rightfully pointed out that we’ve had enough of these) and it’s not an ensemble picture. “At the middle of everything is Clark, Lois, and Lex,” Gunn remarked during an Instagram Live session. “It’s about these three characters.” But if that’s true, why is there such a sprawling cast of side villains and superheroes?

IGN posted a list of all the characters we’ve seen or had confirmed for the film so far, and it’s rather massive:

• Superman
• Lois Lane
• Lex Luthor
• Mister Terrific
• Guy Gardner
• Hawkgirl
• Metamorpho
• The Engineer
• The Hammer of Boravia
• Ultraman
• Rick Flag Sr.
• Supergirl
• Maxwell Lord
• Kryptonian robots, including Kelex
• Krypto
• Jonathan Kent
• Martha Kent
• Perry White
• Jimmy Olsen
• Steve Lombard
• Cat Grant
• Ron Troupe
• Eve Teschmacher
• Otis

There could easily be more we haven’t learned about, plus monsters and aliens and who knows what else. This doesn’t mean the film will be bad, by any means, and certainly Gunn has proven he can do movies with lots of characters. But it’s worth looking at Gunn’s past films to see how well that’s turned out. Sure, Guardians of the Galaxy was phenomenal, but his crack at The Suicide Squad – while certainly better than the first film – was pretty messy and it dragged on for way too long. There were plenty of funny bits. That’s one of Gunn’s strong suits. But of course we don’t really need a funny Superman movie.

On the one hand, I’m glad that the trailer doesn’t give too much away about the story. On the other, I worry that the story is going to be a jumbled mess with such a big cast and so much going on. Tonally, it feels good. It feels bright and hopeful. Whatever struggles Superman faces, he’s still a symbol of optimism. Yes, we see people turn on him, throw stuff at him and so forth, but we also see a civilian help him to his feet. This is clearly a return to unabashedly heroic superhero cinema, and I’m happy about that. I just want this nagging, pessimistic voice in my head to go away. Maybe it will on July 11th when I go see the movie and can finally make up my own mind.