Should Supeman get the classic suit back?

[Osiris-Rex]

I said an Elvis pompadour. A pompadour was a popular trending hair style in the '50s. That's part of what I was saying about what it would have been like if they were conforming Superman to the fads and fashion trends back then, and they didn't go down that road. They are not just taking away Superman's trunks, there is a lot more to it than that.

Superman did have a mullet for a while

[Steven Ely]

Having Superman conform to the '90s Billy Ray Cyrus mullet hair fad was laughably ridiculous. Speaking of '50s style, and the '78 style movie, here is something I found very interesting from director Richard Donner's interview in Fantastic Films: The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction in the Cinema (June 1979):

Fantastic Films: "Did you ever consider doing Superman as a period piece instead of making in contemporary?"

Donner: "That was suggested to me, but I just felt it would be totally wrong. Although we're not really dealing with contemporary issues. I didn't want to have anything that politically or sociologically significant in the film. But Superman is today."

#$#stmp188gh.jpg

I think a retro '30s/'40s/'50s Art Deco style would have really improved the '78 Superman movie instead of making Metropolis set in obviously New York City of the '70s, and in making it retro - then they could have used a classic Art Deco phone booth for Clark to change into Superman with authenticity to Golden Age Superman, and they would have sidestepped the '70s phone booth fiasco, etc. Christopher Reeve's Clark did wear a retro style fedora hat, which didn't blend into the '70s New Yorkers settings surrounding him at all.

superman-movie-screencapstgu.jpg

As Dave Kehr's 1978 review in the Chicago Reader noted, "The apocalyptic moment comes when Clark Kent dashes out of an office building, looks around for an inconspicuous place to effect his transformation into Superman, and directs a contemptuous glance toward one of those newfangled half-shell telephone booths. The shot is irresistibly funny, but in the space of that one short laugh, the movie comes crashing down. By making a joke out of the convention, Donner turns what he'd previously treated as archetype into mere cliche, to be treated as mockingly as possible. Our carefully and tenuously suspended disbelief falls straight through the popcorn-strewn floor."

stmp291hhj.jpg

And as Terry Gross' 1978 review also noted, "The first time Superman has to change his clothes, he is on the street. The camera gives us a shot of a sign for a phone booth. The audience responds, Superman is going into a phone booth, hooray, Lois Lane will be saved. But the camera pulls back to reveal a modern phone enclosure that has two small sides and no door. The audience is supposed to laugh. This is, after all, camp. The audience does not laugh."
http://superman1978.com/STM_Articles/stmp293.html

[jimmy]

Art Deco I can dig that and bring back the phone booths and revolving doors!

[Osiris-Rex]

As Dave Kehr's 1978 review in the Chicago Reader noted, "The apocalyptic moment comes when Clark Kent dashes out of an office building, looks around for an inconspicuous place to effect his transformation into Superman, and directs a contemptuous glance toward one of those newfangled half-shell telephone booths. The shot is irresistibly funny, but in the space of that one short laugh, the movie comes crashing down. By making a joke out of the convention, Donner turns what he'd previously treated as archetype into mere cliche, to be treated as mockingly as possible. Our carefully and tenuously suspended disbelief falls straight through the popcorn-strewn floor."

And as Terry Gross' 1978 review also noted, "The first time Superman has to change his clothes, he is on the street. The camera gives us a shot of a sign for a phone booth. The audience responds, Superman is going into a phone booth, hooray, Lois Lane will be saved. But the camera pulls back to reveal a modern phone enclosure that has a two small sides and no door. The audience is supposed to laugh. This is, after all, camp. The audience does not laugh."
http://superman1978.com/STM_Articles/stmp293.html

That scene actually did get a chuckle out of me because I got the joke. But it probably did sail over the heads of the younger kids in the audience, hence the lack of response.

[The Darknight Detective]

That scene actually did get a chuckle out of me because I got the joke. But it probably did sail over the heads of the younger kids in the audience, hence the lack of response.

I was 13 when the movie came out and I doubt too many kids, unless they were preschoolers, didn't understand the joke. Superman running into a phone booth was well known back then (even Chips Ahoy had Cookie Man doing it in their commercials). However, based on his speed, it was always stupid he would need a phone booth in the first place.

[Jim Kelly]

I saw SUPERMAN fourteen times in the theatre when it first came out. I can tell you exactly when the large audiences of all ages laughed and they did indeed laugh every time at the phone booth joke, also the "Say Jim" joke and the "You've got me, who's got you." I mean, it was sometimes frustrating because the audiences laughed and cheered over some lines I wanted to hear, which was one good reason to go see the movie so many times.

[Ascended]

I said an Elvis pompadour. A pompadour was a popular trending hair style in the '50s.

Indeed it is. I stand corrected!

I feel like I used to know that at one point.......obviously forgot about it somewhere in life.

They are not just taking away Superman's trunks, there is a lot more to it than that.

Eh, to each their own. I dont see it as a huge thing. From a design perspective the color balance is easily maintained in other ways, and while the trunks are part of a costume that has been burned into the DNA of the human race, Clark's still totally recognizable without them.

[Kuwagaton]

I don't get the "say jim" thing from the pimp...

the funniest thing I can think about that is them coaching the poor guy to sound funky.

Superman did have a mullet for a while

I think mullets are hilarious and welcome them, but that wasn't it. Bolland wasn't a Superman artist back then, so people link that picture to show a mullet but the Superman comics showed long hair on the sides with most angles. I think if the Boring era drew Superman to look like a conservative version of Elvis, the "mullet" was actually just a non styled version of the WHAM! George Michael.

[stephens2177]

Wrong thread

Who wears it better?

[Kuwagaton]

To be honest, I have never read Kingdom Come and if that's what Ross did, I find the idea of older Superman to be depicted as an inflated Christopher Reeve to be an interesting mix of odd and perfect looking.

[JAK]

I don't get the "say jim" thing from the pimp...

the funniest thing I can think about that is them coaching the poor guy to sound funky.



I think mullets are hilarious and welcome them, but that wasn't it. Bolland wasn't a Superman artist back then, so people link that picture to show a mullet but the Superman comics showed long hair on the sides with most angles. I think if the Boring era drew Superman to look like a conservative version of Elvis, the "mullet" was actually just a non styled version of the WHAM! George Michael.

Exactly. His hair looked more like Kevin Sorbo in Hercules.

So it's not Super-mullet, it's Super-Sorbo, lol

[Jim Kelly]

It's never outright said that the guy is a pimp, but let's say he is. And he's dressed like the '70s stereotype of a pimp--which was ultra flamboyant. So when he says "Say, Jim," that's an expression of admiration, because Supes has the style a pimp could admire--as in "Say, man, I'm digging the threads, baby. You is hip to the ship and fly to the sky." But with much less wordplay because it was a quick scene.

I grant you this is racial profiling but it was pretty typical for the times and got a lot of laughs. Dy-no-mite!!!

[jimmy]

Precisely the dude on the street was just giving his thumbs up 'seal of approval' to the classic threads that the "MAN OF STEEL" was wearing! -

To which, Superman - who is always polite says: "Excuse me!"

[Osiris-Rex]

So it looks like Superman is getting the red trunks back.



https://twitter.com/DCComics/status/...olor-covers%2F

[Ascended]

You know, everyone is looking at the first cover and thinking it's when Clark joined the League, early in his career. But I don't think it is. Orin has the beard and longer hair he's been rocking lately, and Cyborg's design isn't the clunky, huge mech suit that Jim Lee put him in. Diana's also in her post-movie costume. I think this cover is meant to present the League as they stand today. Perhaps not the current roster, since Hal is here instead of Baz and Cruz, but I think we're looking at the original members (of this timeline) as they currently are, not as they were when they first got together.