In a few weeks, Robert Pattinson will introduce a new Bruce Wayne to the DC Extended Universe. Based on its trailers, Matt Reeves’ The Batman looks like a quintessential dark and brooding take on the Caped Crusader with neo-noir visuals, plenty of brutal action, and a deep dive into the Bat’s disturbed psychology. The new Bat-reboot is set on the DCEU’s “Earth-Two,” a parallel universe opposite the timeline that includes Affleck’s Batman, Henry Cavill’s Superman, and Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman.
This multiversal pretext for a new big-screen Bruce Wayne opens the door for a whole new version of the DCEU with its own version of Superman separate from Cavill’s established take. There have been rumors of a non-Cavill-related Superman movie for years, linked to such revered blockbuster talent as Michael B. Jordan and J.J. Abrams. Any potential Earth-Two Superman reboot should avoid the mistakes made by the last Superman reboot to ride the coattails of a Batman franchise: Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel.
With Man of Steel, Snyder emulated the gritty, realistic style of Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy. But that tone didn’t work for Superman. The success of Batman Begins inspired gritty reboots for just about every major superhero, but a dark, edgy reinvention didn’t suit all of them. Fant4stic and The Amazing Spider-Man movies stumbled because Spidey and the Fantastic Four aren’t grisly antiheroes; they’re goofy, wholesome role models. Some heroes work much better in a lighter context – and Superman is a perfect example.
The Gritty Dark Knight Makeover Wasn’t A Good Look For Superman
From the gruesome violence glimpsed in the trailers, The Batman is shaping up to be an even darker and edgier vision of the Bat’s mythos than The Dark Knight trilogy. Even if The Batman surpasses Endgame and Avatar to become the highest-grossing movie ever made, any possible Superman reboot that follows it shouldn’t try to copy its tone like Snyder did with Nolan’s Bat-reimagining. Instead, it should aim for the complete opposite tone: bright, optimistic, and with a hero who doesn’t brood.
In the context of the larger DC Comics universe, Superman is supposed to be an inversion of Batman. While they’re both quintessential symbols of hope, Superman represents the opposite of what Batman represents. Supes embodies unbridled optimism in the face of adversity whereas the Bat embodies a more skeptical form of hope that expects disappointment and questions whether humanity can even be redeemed.
With Batman movies, the darker the tone, the better. He’s the perfect antihero for a gritty neo-noir exploring modern urban decay and the ethics of vigilantism. But Superman is the polar opposite of that. Making a Superman movie in the style of a Batman movie is the wrong approach. Cynicism should be nowhere near a Superman story. In the comics, Superman’s biggest internal conflict has nothing to do with whether or not people are worth saving – that doesn’t even enter into it. He’s just torn up by the fact that he can’t be in multiple places at once, so he’s physically incapable of rescuing everybody who needs to be rescued.
Superman Movies Should Be Fun, Breezy Sci-Fi Adventures
Dark, gritty reimaginings of classic mythologies might be all the rage right now, but Superman doesn’t suit that tone. Even dark subversions of the Superman trope are becoming tired and overdone (The Boys, Invincible, Brightburn – the list goes on). Superman movies should be fun, uplifting, lighthearted sci-fi adventures. Richard Donner got it right in 1978 with the genre-defining masterpiece that Kevin Feige still returns to before making every MCU movie.
With The Batman, Reeves is going back to Batman’s heyday, evoking Frank Miller’s dark, brooding, inexperienced early-career take on Batman from the seminal Year One storyline. Reeves is exploring a sort of “Year Two” narrative, skipping the origin story but exploring the Bat’s early days as a masked crime fighter defending Gotham from sadistic villains. Traditionally, Batman movies have jumped from the murder of Bruce Wayne’s parents to Batman fighting crime at the top of his game. Nolan stopped in the middle to show Bruce training with the League of Shadows, but Reeves is diving into fertile story territory with a young, naive Dark Knight.
While audiences will have to wait until The Batman hits theaters to declare whether it’s a great Batman movie or not, one thing is abundantly clear from the trailers: Reeves has a deep love and appreciation of the character and his surrounding source material. Whether it’s Jordan, Abrams, or somebody who has yet to come into the offices of Warner Bros. with the perfect pitch, Superman needs a filmmaker like that, with a Jerry Seinfeld-level passion for the last son of Krypton to take Clark Kent back to his roots and deliver a faithful take on the big screen.