July
17 Watchmen's Snyder Reveals Secrets; Legendary's Tull Talks Superman

superman's antagonist needs to be dirtier. filthy. has been 'take over the world, mua-ha-ha' bad, but squeaky clean at same time

the joker and anton chigurh (no country for old men) have set the bar for bad guys. lex luthor just doesn't cut it anymore

without a good (filthy disgusting sick freak) bad guy nobody cares

I read you at superherohype where webmasters stop by sometimes and it has been known for a long time that the writing is about done and the sequel anouncement is only waiting until after TDK opens huge. In a few days MOS will be anounced and you will look completely stupid.

Jamie Williams at screenrant.com has been emailing everybody for months that his sources say MOS is speeding ahead and it has writers nearly done. His sources say Orci and Kurtzman.
Jamie and screenrant get a lot of respect because he breaks all the big scoops. Like he called that lady from Craigslist the other day and found out that MOS is most likely to be announced next week or at least real soon and the movie was already casting. Jamie beat everybody else to the news. Even though that was only confirmed yesterday his sources had been saying for a long time that MOS would be greenlit after TDK or at least Comic Con so Jamie beat everybody for miles and miles on that scoop.

And he says Brandon Routh will be a huge movie star after MOS because he is very well respected in Hollywood. Jamie says Routh was offered to be the star of another huge franchise but Routh turned it down to focus on indie pictures. Jamie says that after MOS is a hit Routh will do big comedy movies and leave action movies behind and he will be a big comedy star like Ben Stiller. Jamie says Routh might do a movie with Kal Penn because they are friends and people in Hollywood like Routh and say he is going to be a big star. Jamie says Hollywood is like a small town and so everybody knows about and talks about Routh's good reputation. Jamie makes all the big scooper posts on screenrant.com and if you want to know what is going on you should go read him there or pm him. He also posts in bunches of other forums but that is where he posts his scoops.

Orci and Kurtzman huh? They've yet to write one memorable line of dialogue.

1. Consider the source. Tull is the guy who's paying for half the movie. He said they were taking it slow to get it right. It does sound like Man of Steel will come a lot sooner than Justice League.
2. Here's October 2007 story about Superman Return writers not coming back. http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117974449.html?categoryid=13&cs=1
3. Here's the Brandon Routh reference. http://www.hollywood.com/content/feature_detail.aspx?id=5243868&p=4. Sounds like a bit of wishful thinking. No writers have been announced. Orci and Kurtzman have been working on Star Trek for J.J. Abrams.
4. Here's my January 2008 story about impact of writers strike on slowing things down. http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117978919.html?categoryid=2526&cs=1

That was some of most singularly gobbledygook shit I've ever read.

I'll take Horshack over Rorschach any day.

anyone who still thinks that there will be another Superman film with Bryan Singer at the helm is a delusional fanboy. It should be fairly obvious that isnt happening by now and WB is looking to move in another direction. It's been two years since that first turkey of a film was in theaters and there is nothing not even solid rumor saying otherwise. Despite what some internet hack on screenrant is saying, you've got an editor for Variety for cripes sake AND the guy who's writing half the check on all the WB movies saying nothing is going on. It's unbelievable who you people will believe as long as they're telling you what you want to hear.

I consider it a follow-up to Superman Returns, yes.

Thank you for answering. Is it likely Brandon Routh will reprise the role? I enjoyed his work in the first one and I would like to see his continuation of the character.

What the ...? I came back to see if my second question was answered. I didn't expect to see THAT! Anne doesn't deserve that.

Just to be clear, my post was not hinting at anything. I know "insider" claims are running rampant at Superherohype and all the other Superman forums, but my post wasn't one of them. This was not cryptic so-called "insider" info, just my humble opinion. This time of strife and anxiety has the whole Superman fandom on a hair trigger and there are far too many "insider" trolls amusing themselves by stirring the forum fans up.

I want to set something straight. I'm Steve from SaveSuperman.com and I have NEVER said WB was making a decision based on Singer's lifestyle choices. I don't agree with his lifestyle, but claiming I said WB cares about it is a flat out lie. And I find attacking Anne Thompson under the guise of being associated with me or our website to be appalling and underhanded.

As for everything else, JLA is not set with Tom Welling. I've repeatedly said he was contacted for the role, but negotiations broke down. Don't expect the rumored cast to be part of it anymore, but don't expect Welling to be in it either.

Yes, I posted about something going on with WB/DC before the meetings went public. And yes, I protect all my sources. Wouldn't you? I'm the only one who said nothing would be announced at or before SDCC for either JLA or Superman while other "insiders" at SHH and SHP were claiming Singer's sequel would be announced as soon as Dark Knight started making money. Who was right?

Superman is a franchise in deep trouble with nothing good on the horizon at the moment. A sequel is 90% in the grave at this point as 5 groups are vying for the opportunity at a reboot including us. If WB makes a decision before Christmas we'll be lucky. I wouldn't hold my breath on it though.

If you want to know what's going on without being fed crap by people who have merchandise contracts with WB (Hi Mr. Younis) then pay us a visit at SaveSuperman.com

I'll just be happy if the person that does a Superman movie makes Superman the Super MAN that he has always been and should always be. Singer did a great job of ruining that image. Superman needs to be SUPER again, not a marketing icon.

I think I enjoyed seeing SR more after seeing TDK,.. It's has a different sensibility which is a good juc-suppose (spelling?) of Batman... I think if Lex Luthor had a better threat the movie would have been excellent,.. Like Lois said in the movie: "Land? I don't get it..." & they can make B Routh look a bit more manlier,.. The curl was a bit disturbing to watch at times!.. But I am a BIG SR fan..

I remain fascinated by the polarized state of the Superman fanbase. Is there the remotest possibility that Singer (who delivered on the X-Men franchise) might listen and learn and indeed pull off a Wrath of Khan on his second Superman go-round? Why is it all or nothing here?

I don't think the fanbase is nearly as polarized as it seems. Unfortunately, through the internet, a vocal minority can spend a lot of time making themselves sound louder than they are - and fanboys are the worst lot. I hope the studios see through that. And I think they do. Because if the Internet was a factor, "Snakes on a Plane" would have been a monster hit. And if they listened to the internet, "Justice League: Mortal" would already be dead and buried. Oh, and Heath Ledger never would have been cast as the Joker. Nobody thought that was a good idea. One guy above claimed he has a financial stake in a reboot, so of course he is going to trash the movie. And after his post, a few more come on trashing the movie (some with multiple posts). On the Internet, a few can seem like a lot.
(As an aside to Anne Thompson, if you are reading this: As a fellow movie fan, can you imagine what it would have been like if "Gone With the Wind" would have been made during the internet age? No way Vivien Leigh, a Brit!, would have gotten the role.)
I enjoyed Superman Returns. I think it deserves a sequel. But I don't feel the desire to post my opinion over and over. Warner Bros. has been in business for 90 years, and I hope its executives have more trust in themselves than to listen to a few fanboys with too much time on their hands.

Wow. People are really fired up.
Anyway, from a purely business sense, a sequel makes more sense.
If they make a sequel and it's a hit, they have a franchise on their hands.
If they do a reboot and it's a hit, they have a franchise on their hands.
Sounds good either way.
But...
If they make a sequel and it's a flop, they can then say, "Well, this didn't work, let's do a reboot."
If they do a reboot and it's a flop, then they have a lot of trouble on their hands. Where do they go from there? Another reboot? That would be many years away.

And one question that has never really been answered is why Superman Returns was considered a disappointment financially, while Batman Begins was considered a success.

Superman Returns box office
$200,069,408 (USA)
$391,081,192 (Worldwide)
$191,000,000 (Non-USA)

Batman Begins box office
$205,343,774 (USA)
$371,853,783 (Worldwide)
$166,510,009 (Non-USA)

I understand Superman Returns had the higher budget, by a substantial amount, but a good chunk of that budget is attributed to previous failed incarnations, including a $20 million pay-or-pay deal to Nicholas Cage.
Both were well-reviewed movies and both got off to great starts at the box office. However, Superman Returns had a much tougher task. In its first week, SR faced off against the hit movie The Devil Wears Prada and the following week it went against a scorching-hot Pirates of the Carribean sequel (with its $135 million opening weekend). What did Batman Begins face? In its first week it was Hilary Duff's bomb A Perfect Man. And in its second week it saw Bewitched and Herbie Fully Loaded.
If you don't think competition affects a movie's box office, see what happened to the previous week's number one movie, the Hellboy sequel, when it faced The Dark Knight.
And as far as the buget being set at $175 million, Singer can do this. X-men came in at $75 million and X2 at $110 million.

Those Superman Returns figures don't quite reflect the films actual performance in theaters and the bad word of mouth it received over all.

The Dark Knight, of course, five days

Pirates of the Carribean took eight days to break the 200 mil mark domestically.

Spider Man 2, eight days.. Spider Man and Spider Man 3, nine days.

Iron Man, 16 days

Indiana Jones and Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, ten days.

The list goes on ..

Superman Returns on the other hand, falls into the category of top ten films that are the all time SLOWEST to break that 200 mil domestic mark.

117 days.

Studios pay closer attention to these things these days. Film production has sky rocketed.

I'm not a "fan boy", I haven't picked up a comic book in ages, much less even drive by a comic book store. I don't go to "comicons".

I'm an average movie goer and part of that imaginary "divided fan base" that some like to pretend doesn't exist.

The fan base IS divided and saying "it ain't so" doesn't mean it isn't.

You know, I went back and read Anne's thoughts on the first movie and I bet that's how a lot of people feel. If the sequel gets good reviews, people will go.
If they do this reboot, I'm not interested. I didn't see the new Hulk movie and I won't see the next Punisher movie.
As an aside, I liked Brandon Routh as Superman. Whatever they do, I hope they keep him. Kate Bosworth, I could go either way on.
Oh, and the Watchman movie looks good. :)

What we have is a generational divide fueling the sequel vs. reboot war. Generations X, Y, and Z (AKA Millennials) became Superman fans after the 1980's. During this time DC comics rebooted both Batman, under Frank Miller and Superman, under John Byrne. Miller's Batman went on to influence all subsequent incarnations of Batman media like the animated series, the animated movies, other Batman comic series, etc, and finally into Nolan's Batman reboot.

Byrne's Superman similarly went onto influence the tv series 'Lois and Clark' of the '90s, the animated series, the direct-to-dvd movies, 'Smallville', and the new animated series 'Legion of Superheroes'. Each of the series expanded the Superman fanbase in different ways. 'Lois and Clark' brought females in; the cartoon series brought kids in; 'Smallville' brought teens and young adults in; and so on. But this happy circumstance of drastically expanding the fanbase has a dark side. The new fans are fans of the new Superman. But the old Boomer generation and older fans hate the new Superman.

Miller's Batman managed the happy feat of gaining new fans for the character while still satisfying most of the old fans. Byrne's Superman gained a ton of new fans while angering the old fans. The reasons for this are too numerous and detailed to go into here. That would take pages and pages of explanation. Just one example is that in the old version Superman is the real person and Clark Kent is the act, thus Donner's and Singer's Kent is the slapstick bumbler act. In the new version, which younger generations are familiar with and like, Clark Kent is the real person and Superman is his job or act. Younger generations are more apt to despise seeing bumbler Clark on screen instead of confident guy Clark.

The WWII generation had Lex Luthor as a mad scientist. The Boomers and part of GenX had Luthor as a somewhat goofy petty criminal. The Gen-Y, Gen-Z, and younger GenXers know Lex Luthor as a respected, but evil, political and business tycoon (he was even the U.S. President for a time). Each generation likes its version of Superman, his enemies, and his world the best. Younger generations embraced the new (post-Miller) Batman as their own. Nolan’s films embraced the new Batman, and so, in a perfect circle, younger generations embraced Nolan’s films. Younger generations embraced the new Superman as their own. Singer’s film embraced and turned back to clock to the Boomer version of Superman and his world. Post-Boomer generations abjured the film, “It’s not my Superman”.

Well said, Lori. I think that is why a lot of people feel a sequel to the first movie, but with more action, is the way to go. Too many movies today are mindless "thrill rides." Superman Returns was different. It was thoughtful and visually poetic. The answer is somewhere in the middle. Personally, I have faith that Bryan Singer is the director to do this. I know some don't have that faith, but I also know that I don't have much faith in a lot of other directors to do this. We saw what Superman movies almost became under Tim Burton, McG, Brett Ratner, et al. We don't want that. I do think that having Superman: Man of Steel go the route of X-Men 2 or Star Trek The Wrath of Khan, as Anne noted, is the way to go.

Doubledown44, the point is, there is no compromise between the old Boomer Superman and Modern Superman. Singer understood that and made the choice to return to the Boomer era Superman. The characterizations are so disparate, such as "Who is the real person?" and petty criminal Luthor vs. U.S. President Luthor, that trying to paste bits and pieces of each together results in a Frankenstein monster abhorrent to both Boomers and younger generations. In the next film, Horn et al may decide to try again with Boomer era Superman, (with results IMO likely worse than last time) or they may decide to try a Modern Superman reboot, (with results unknown). But it will be a definitive decision. No hemming or hawing or futile fudging. They'll go into it with eyes wide open to the consequences of their decision.

They lost the teen and youth audience last time and will continue to do so in any sequel or even any reboot that utilizes the Boomer era characterizations. Aging fanboys like to slag the younger generations, saying "Those dumb kids. Give them more action and they'll be all excited to support a sequel to old Superman." No, they'll only be excited if they're supporting *their* Superman. Old Superman doing action is still old Superman. The characterization that you grew up with leaves an indelible mark on you.

To Boomers, old Superman is the "real" Superman. To Generations X, Y, and Z, modern Superman is what they grew up with. Modern Superman is the "real" Superman to them. Saying, "Hey kids, show up to see Fake Superman because he has some neat action scenes this time!" does not compute to those weened on a different character.

It's like kids saying, "Hey Boomers, show up to see the next Mutt Williams movie, because it'll have all that old-timey stuff you love. It'll be practically the same thing as a Indiana Jones movie - only starring Mutt Williams instead!" It's an insulting and stupid argument.

But a reboot that utilizes the Modern Superman could alienate Boomers and remove that audience. Either way the bottom line will take a hit. Warners will pick the audience it cares about more and all decisions will flow from that.

The irony is that McG's, Abrams' or even Burton's Superman would have probably made more money and Warners likely wants to slap all the whining fanboys who convinced them to go with the moribundly nostalgic take on Superman instead of the too aggressively modern one. Hindsight is 20/20.

As a 23-year-old, I hate to be generalized into one category. I quite enjoyed Superman Returns. And I don't know anyone among my friends who would be caught dead watching Smallville. We don't really consider it a "superman" show, but more like a teen angst show. He never even becomes Superman on that show. If the sequel is good people will see it, and if it isn't, they won't.

If you are referring to me, I was not a teen when I saw it. I was 21. I did go with a group of my friends. We drove two hours to see it in an Imax theater. There was a group of five of us and we all really enjoyed it. I recently revisted it on blu-ray and I found I liked it just as much.
BTW, I love Variety. A lot of these other sites that are reporting on the Superman sequel seem to just be making guesses based on what Anne reports.

Superman Returns was the 3rd best Superman film right after Superman: the Movie and Superman 2: the Dick Donner cut, meaning it was AMAZING! not a flop or crap or anything close to "bad". Anyone who says other wise is an idiot. Not all great movies make it big at the box office, why? Because people are idiots!

Get: Singer, Routh, Williams/Ottoman & the rest of the SR cast.

Make: the Man of Steel