Controversial Luthor opinions!

[DochaDocha]

I still am unsure how Lex Luthor hasn't become a compelling villain for a live-action Superman movie in 40 years. It kind of stings to see the last two Joker portrayals come home with Academy Awards, whereas nobody has really made Luthor come alive when there are so many fictional and real-world examples of power-hungry villains who have direct and in-direct parallels to Luthor.

As much as I hate it when DC and WB rely so much on Superman as villain, I wonder if all this time there was one acceptable way to do it, but they keep overlooking telling this story in bigger media with Luthor as the protagonist.

[Vakanai]

It kind of stings to see the last two Joker portrayals come home with Academy Awards,

That's not true. Yes, two Joker portrayals have won, but it wasn't the last two. As much as we all want to forget the one with the "Damaged" forehead tattoo...

[DochaDocha]

That's not true. Yes, two Joker portrayals have won, but it wasn't the last two. As much as we all want to forget the one with the "Damaged" forehead tattoo...

Well, you can't blame me for forgetting the guy in the middle, can you?

[Vakanai]

Well, you can't blame me for forgetting the guy in the middle, can you?

Hey, I'd forget too if I could. I think Leto could have made for a decent Joker if they had gone with a different take than what they chose to go with - but we will never know, because the direction they wanted was a horrible one.

As for Lex, while he'll never be the version I picture in my head, Jon Cryer's done him justice and then some. And of course we've had a few stellar versions in animation (the DCAU, All Star Superman, the DCAMU, Man of Tomorrow).

[Osiris-Rex]

I think the problem is we never really got the "real" Lex Luthor in a movie. Gene Hackman was really just more of a crooked land developer and Keven Spacey was just sort of his clone.
And I don't know what the hell Jesse Eisenberg was supposed to be playing.
The only ones that seemed to capture what Lex Luthor was were John Shea of Lois & Clark and John Cryer of Supergirl. (Sorry Michael Rosenbaum. You played a fantastic character, but that
wasn't really Lex Luthor)

[Agent Z]

I think the problem is we never really got the "real" Lex Luthor in a movie. Gene Hackman was really just more of a crooked land developer and Keven Spacey was just sort of his clone.
And I don't know what the hell Jesse Eisenberg was supposed to be playing.
The only ones that seemed to capture what Lex Luthor was were John Shea of Lois & Clark and John Cryer of Supergirl. (Sorry Michael Rosenbaum. You played a fantastic character, but that
wasn't really Lex Luthor)

A bald super genius who opposed Superman and ran a company? How was that not Superman?

[manwhohaseverything]

A bald super genius who opposed Superman and ran a company? How was that not Superman?

People have a preconcieved notions about Superman and Lex.What he means is he has yet to get a character similar to his idea of Lex Luthor which is normally either dcau or postcrisis.

[Ra-El]

Personally, the next 3 or 5 Superman live action adaptations should forget Luthor exists. Animated adaptations too.

[witchboy]

I think the problem is we never really got the "real" Lex Luthor in a movie. Gene Hackman was really just more of a crooked land developer and Keven Spacey was just sort of his clone.
And I don't know what the hell Jesse Eisenberg was supposed to be playing.
The only ones that seemed to capture what Lex Luthor was were John Shea of Lois & Clark and John Cryer of Supergirl. (Sorry Michael Rosenbaum. You played a fantastic character, but that
wasn't really Lex Luthor)

I thought Rosenbaum was an excellent Lex- my favorite.
He had years to build the character, and took him through many different kinds of Lex, from the troubled boy who was his friend all the way to the evil genius corporate villain at the end.

[Lukmendes]

There is a common Luthor trope, which has been used by basically ALL the writers in the past decades, Morrison included.
For some reason, there ALWAYS must be a scene in which Luthor gets fooled by someone (generally Superman, but it happens with other characters too) and throws a temper tantrum by doing something stupid (he destroys a piece of furniture, yells or something like that).
I HATE this concept. I really can't understand why it became so common. In all-Star it works better because of the specific atmosphere created by Morrison, but in general, for some reason, many writers depict Luthor as a frustrated, spoiled brat rather than an evil mastermind. I like that in the Young Justice TV series Luthor is a smooth talker who always seems to be in control of everything. My ideal Luthor would be more similar to Hannibal Lecter than a Trump-like man-child suffering from a bad case of hemorroids.

He essentially threw a tantrun in YJ's season 3 episode 19, when he tried to make Outsiders look bad because he wanted revenge when they destroyed one of his factories that made him lose a lot of money, Godfrey even calls him out on it.

Considering how in seasons 1 and 2 he was only taking the pragmatic path, then season 3 has him making that mistake, it was honestly weird, specially considering he got fucker over more personally in season 1 and didn't react much to it, but losing a factory pisses him off enough to forget that "Revenge is a sucker's game"? Yeah...

[Frontier]

Define pure selfishness?if you mean scientific ethics and morality when you say disregard of other people.Sure,but then clark has broken time barriers,created a physical plain in phantom zone...etx done some of the destructive things disregarding consequences.heck!if you go by chaos theorey and butterfly effect superman's existence throws a monkey rench into the system and causes things to go out of wack.

Well,what happens when clark does'nt feel good by doing good?there is difference between doing the right thing and doing good.Sometimes,you don't feel good.They say he likes writing.i have'nt seen that expanded at all.His muscles are hot air.As researcher,collector and assembler of technology,artifacts,even preserver of endangered species .i guess,clark does good work.Even then that's more silverage and bronze age kal el superman ,not postcrisis clark kent superman.Even then kal does not share a damn thing.He is just like lex.His knoweledge,tech..etc are shoved in fortress amd that's that.As said,Clark and lex are'nt really different

I think you're rally skewing things to try and make Clark and Lex seem more similar to each other when their motivations couldn't be more different, as well as their actual impact on people.

I mean...if Clark doesn't feel good by doing good, then he's not really Superman, is he?

He essentially threw a tantrun in YJ's season 3 episode 19, when he tried to make Outsiders look bad because he wanted revenge when they destroyed one of his factories that made him lose a lot of money, Godfrey even calls him out on it.

Considering how in seasons 1 and 2 he was only taking the pragmatic path, then season 3 has him making that mistake, it was honestly weird, specially considering he got fucker over more personally in season 1 and didn't react much to it, but losing a factory pisses him off enough to forget that "Revenge is a sucker's game"? Yeah...

I always liked to think Superman was the exception to the "Revenge is a sucker's game" mantra, but admittedly we don't get much of any Superman/Luthor time in YJ...

[Lukmendes]

I always liked to think Superman was the exception to the "Revenge is a sucker's game" mantra, but admittedly we don't get much of any Superman/Luthor time in YJ...

We only have allusions to their relationship, and if anything, it seems that Lex is the one who ticks off Supes (Season 3's episode 19 has Ms Martian talking about getting a print about Lex's screw up, saying Supes would wanna frame it), and not the other way around... Like really, outside of season 3's ending where Conner tells everyone that he's a clone, which Supes was there, did YJ ever even put both of them at the same place, at the same time? 'Cause they definitely never talked with each other.

Seriously, YJ's way of writing stuff not about the team being "We're not showing those same things from the comics 'cause you should know, except our interpretation differs from the comics very often, so lol" is, really, really lazy, I mean for ****'s sake, Ted died off-screen and he was never even around season 1 where we should at least have seen him, and Barbara is crippled now in season 3, so apparently Killing Joke happened off-screen too? Urgh... So damn lazy.

Either way, even if Supes is an exception to "Revenge is a sucker's game" ****, which I doubt since the way Lex reacts in season 3's episode 19 once Godfrey tells him off makes it sound like Lex doesn't screw up much, he's definitely not the only one now, so yeah.

[llozymandias]

I remember once or twice where people would post something on these boards requesting stories where Superman is the only fantastic element in his world. Then they go on about how they want Lex to be in those stories. Sorry, Lex would have no point, or place if Superman is the only fantastic element.

[Agent Z]

I remember once or twice where people would post something on these boards requesting stories where Superman is the only fantastic element in his world. Then they go on about how they want Lex to be in those stories. Sorry, Lex would have no point, or place if Superman is the only fantastic element.

How? It isn't like Luthor's character is dependent on anything other than Superman.

[Agent Z]

He essentially threw a tantrun in YJ's season 3 episode 19, when he tried to make Outsiders look bad because he wanted revenge when they destroyed one of his factories that made him lose a lot of money, Godfrey even calls him out on it.

Considering how in seasons 1 and 2 he was only taking the pragmatic path, then season 3 has him making that mistake, it was honestly weird, specially considering he got fucker over more personally in season 1 and didn't react much to it, but losing a factory pisses him off enough to forget that "Revenge is a sucker's game"? Yeah...

Luthor's a hypocrite. He likes to think he's above human weaknesses and pettiness when he isn't. YJ got that part down in season 3 and this kind of thing is consistent with Greg Weisman's work when it comes to villains.