Superman '78 Digital-First Series Announced

[Quinlan58]

Yes, but for obvious reasons.
I get that you need to show childhood more to give a fuller perspective
about the Clark-Lois family life.

But stories with infants, babies who are only a couple of years old, present
problems. The temptation is to just grow them up a little or else to
skip ahead several years for a new entry point. Superman and Lois is a prime
example of skipping most of childhood to focus on teenage sons.

Oh, sure, but there's a difference between "time skip until they can be more than props" and "let's age children that were already working as characters through convoluted shenanigans", like Jon, Chris and apparently Jason in this pitch. I guess Superman missing out on his children's childhood is just something that speaks to creators for some reason.

[superduperman]

The Cage Superman would be interesting.

I would also love to see Superman Returns II.


But then I'm in the minority who actually liked Superman Returns.

Given how...problematic...the people associated with Returns are, I doubt Warners has any interest in touching that property. The closest thing we may get is Routh's Superman from COIE showing up on S&L. Which wouldn't break my heart any.

[Myskin]

Whenever I see stuff like this Superman '78 series I seriously start to question what the comic book industry has become and - to a degree - what the fandom has become, too.
So, Superman '78, right? I guess that at least some of the people who took part in the first movie gave their blessing to this series.

But it didn't happen, unless I am missing something. Richard Donner is dead. All of the main actors from the original Superman movies have died, some of them in a tragic way. Well, except for Gene Hackman, but I doubt that Gene Hackman would give a damn about this book. He probably doesn't care about the Superman movies he was actually in, either.

So I guess that this is the Superman III which never was. But it isn't written by the original Superman screenwriter (Batman '89 - at least - is written by Sam Hamm). And it isn't even close to the original Superman III pitch. You can find it online, if you want. It had Supergirl, Brainiac and Mxyzptlk in it. And - believe it or not - it is actually worse than the Superman III we actually got. Yes, the one with Richard Pryor.

Maybe it is written with a sensibility which tries to be as close as possible to the 1970s? Well, no. Because the story is actually a thinly veiled version of the animated movie Superman Unbound (2013). Which was an adaptation of Johns' Brainiac saga (2008). Which contained several elements from the first Brainiac episode in Superman TAS (1996).

And besides that, the writing is quite bland. Not awful, just bland. Which I'd expect from Venditti actually.
So it's basically a fanfiction which revisits the main points of a 2008 storyline pretending that it is a threequel to a 1978 movie, with no reference at all to the real Superman III treatment or the original pitch to that movie. And all the characters look like dead actors. And it's a "tribute".

I don't know. I mean, am I the only one who is a bit disturbed by the entire operation? (In all probability, yes, I am). What kind of convoluted logic can lead the powers that be to create a project like this one? (Well, I know the answer to this one. It's about money).

And - quite frankly - I really, really don't understand the fascination this type of work may evoke for the readers. Nostalgia? But it's not the original Superman III. If they had really made a Superman III movie in the 1970s with Brainiac in it, it wouldn't have been even remotely similar to this one. The only pre-existing work I can think of which resemble Superman '78 is Roger Rabbit: The Resurrection of Doom, a comic book sequel to the movie Who Framed Roger Rabbit. But it was written in the 1980s, in full Roger Rabbit mania, all the original Roger Rabbit creators and actors were still alive and I guess that it may have met a potential audience. Superman '78 is so weird (not in terms of writing, I am referring to the project) that it goes beyond my understanding.

[Vordan]

Lmao Myskin you’re waaaaaaaay overthinking it. If this happened it’s because the estates of everyone involved signed off on it, and this kind of comic is no different from Smallville S11, or the DCEU comic tie-ins, or the CW shows’ comic tie-ins. Why is it happening? Because people like this version of Superman and DC is hoping that people will buy it and read it. It’s not harming anyone or whatever you’re implying.

[Frontier]

Yeah, I don't see it as any different from the Wonder Woman '77 or Batman '66 comic.

I mean, the Batman '89 comic has the actual script writer writing it but I think it's still probably not an exact envisioned follow up to those films and just something for the fans.

[Gaius]

Personally I'm still waiting for Green Lantern '11 and Jonah Hex '10.

[superduperman]

Steel '97 or GTFO!

[Myskin]

It’s not harming anyone or whatever you’re implying.

I am not implying it is harmful. I just think that it is really, really weird, and DC is open to make money by capitalizing literally everything. Even the fandom's most bizarre, übernerd fetish lmao. I mean, it's not a homage to a specific period in the history of comics, like the Golden Age, with characters drawn in a certain style and pulpish dialogues. And it's not the unmade Superman III which Donner had in mind. The only fact that it classifies it as Superman '78 is that the characters resemble the actors. I mean, they look like real people (people, not estates) who unfortunately are not among us anymore (by the way, I don't care about Superman: The Movie that much). I don't find Batman '66 equally creepy because when the Batman '66 revival happened Adam West was still alive and he actually took part in it, by voicing Batman in a couple of animated movies. This is just utterly bizarre.

[HsssH]

Edit: nevermind.

[Frontier]

Can't it just simply be a comic based around a popular continuity using the versions of characters from that continuity?

[Myskin]

Can't it just simply be a comic based around a popular continuity using the versions of characters from that continuity?

It's definitely one of DC's many attempts to capitalize on the popularity on Superman 1978. But IMHO there is a difference between paying homage to a specific period of Superman history and this project.
A comic book like this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superm..._of_the_Worlds is what people call a pastiche. It is made in the style of a pre-existing work (in this case, Golden Age Superman and Wellsian sci-fi). But it is entirely about the style (aesthetics, dialogues, etc.). This is what I consider a version of a character from a specific continuity.
IMHO Superman '78 is on a different level because there isn't anything particularly remarkable in terms of style - it's just the classic, generic Superman setup, Clark Kent as a shy, mild-mannered reporter, Superman punching Brainiac etc. It's not even made with a specific 1970s sensibility, since the story is basically inspired by relatively recent works (and the original Superman III, as Donner - I think it was him - envisioned it, was completely different). It's more or less entirely about the characters looking like the actors. It reminds me of a page in Alan Moore's The Tempest (the final volume in the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen saga) in which superheroes are depicted as decrepit icons which corporations refuse to let die because they want to continue exploiting them. I don't think that stuff like Superman '78 is what Alan Moore had in mind when he wrote that page, but it's definitely the first thing which comes to my mind.
I don't want to convince anyone that I am right, it's just my opinion. I guess that it is quite normal in the world of pop culture to deal with this stuff in terms of estates and likeness instead of real people who had a real (and unfortunately sometimes tragic) life. I just can't help finding it weird.

[Bored at 3:00AM]

It's definitely one of DC's many attempts to capitalize on the popularity on Superman 1978. But IMHO there is a difference between paying homage to a specific period of Superman history and this project.
A comic book like this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superm..._of_the_Worlds is what people call a pastiche. It is made in the style of a pre-existing work (in this case, Golden Age Superman and Wellsian sci-fi). But it is entirely about the style (aesthetics, dialogues, etc.). This is what I consider a version of a character from a specific continuity.
IMHO Superman '78 is on a different level because there isn't anything particularly remarkable in terms of style - it's just the classic, generic Superman setup, Clark Kent as a shy, mild-mannered reporter, Superman punching Brainiac etc. It's not even made with a specific 1970s sensibility, since the story is basically inspired by relatively recent works (and the original Superman III, as Donner - I think it was him - envisioned it, was completely different). It's more or less entirely about the characters looking like the actors. It reminds me of a page in Alan Moore's The Tempest (the final volume in the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen saga) in which superheroes are depicted as decrepit icons which corporations refuse to let die because they want to continue exploiting them. I don't think that stuff like Superman '78 is what Alan Moore had in mind when he wrote that page, but it's definitely the first thing which comes to my mind.
I don't want to convince anyone that I am right, it's just my opinion. I guess that it is quite normal in the world of pop culture to deal with this stuff in terms of estates and likeness instead of real people who had a real (and unfortunately sometimes tragic) life. I just can't help finding it weird.

Myskin, I'm sure you're a lovely guy, but you strike me as the kind of person who hangs out at the HMV at the local mall in order to lecture 13 year old girls about why the boy band they love is awful, actually.

Of course this series is about pandering to nostalgia. It's not pretending to be anything else, nor do any of the people buying it think it's more than that either. Sometimes, people just want a cheeseburger.

This series is exactly that. No more, no less.

[Frontier]

It's definitely one of DC's many attempts to capitalize on the popularity on Superman 1978. But IMHO there is a difference between paying homage to a specific period of Superman history and this project.
A comic book like this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superm..._of_the_Worlds is what people call a pastiche. It is made in the style of a pre-existing work (in this case, Golden Age Superman and Wellsian sci-fi). But it is entirely about the style (aesthetics, dialogues, etc.). This is what I consider a version of a character from a specific continuity.
IMHO Superman '78 is on a different level because there isn't anything particularly remarkable in terms of style - it's just the classic, generic Superman setup, Clark Kent as a shy, mild-mannered reporter, Superman punching Brainiac etc. It's not even made with a specific 1970s sensibility, since the story is basically inspired by relatively recent works (and the original Superman III, as Donner - I think it was him - envisioned it, was completely different). It's more or less entirely about the characters looking like the actors. It reminds me of a page in Alan Moore's The Tempest (the final volume in the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen saga) in which superheroes are depicted as decrepit icons which corporations refuse to let die because they want to continue exploiting them. I don't think that stuff like Superman '78 is what Alan Moore had in mind when he wrote that page, but it's definitely the first thing which comes to my mind.
I don't want to convince anyone that I am right, it's just my opinion. I guess that it is quite normal in the world of pop culture to deal with this stuff in terms of estates and likeness instead of real people who had a real (and unfortunately sometimes tragic) life. I just can't help finding it weird.

I think it's just simply a comic set in the Donner-verse and featuring Superman fighting Brainiac and other iconic Rogues. I don't think it needs to be more complicated than that.

[RobinGA]

Considering the pleasure many people took in the first Superman movie, it would
be strange for DC to not do this. I mean the template, as many people have
already pointed out, has already been set.

[manwhohaseverything]

It's definitely one of DC's many attempts to capitalize on the popularity on Superman 1978. But IMHO there is a difference between paying homage to a specific period of Superman history and this project.
A comic book like this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superm..._of_the_Worlds is what people call a pastiche. It is made in the style of a pre-existing work (in this case, Golden Age Superman and Wellsian sci-fi). But it is entirely about the style (aesthetics, dialogues, etc.). This is what I consider a version of a character from a specific continuity.

Now this feels like something i might like or love.I never heard of the book before though...hmmm!