Say the words “ Tim Burton ’s Superman hold out ” on the cyberspace and you feel the hate . Nicolas Cage as Superman ? Those frightening costumes ? It would ’ve been the big motion-picture show of all time . Well , The Death of Superman Lives : What Happened ? just might prove that the total net is faulty .
channelise by Jon Schnepp , The Death of Superman Lives : What befall ? is an in - depth , fascinating infotainment about the development , destruction and , at last , the mythos surrounding one of the great never - produced superhero pic of all fourth dimension . But not only does it tell that story , it changes the entire story around it by featuring never - before - see video , images and interviews that gloriously set up the criminal record straight .
A bit of backstory : In the nineties , Warner Bros. desire to reboot Superman . They employ Nicolas Cage to play him , Tim Burton to channelize him , and had multiple scripts written by Kevin Smith , Dan Gilroy and others . The film was to be called Superman Lives and it would have concentrate on the famous Death of Superman laughable story which was a international sensation . After twelvemonth of development , the moving picture was eventually cancel and all but forget . Until , of course , the internet began digging it back up .
Some years later , photos from the photographic film ’s preproduction commence to surface . One demonstrate an wacky Cage in an dead terrible looking edition of the suit ( seen above ) . Others showed a green , translucent , light - up neon adaptation of the suit ( seen below ) . Based on these prototype alone , almost every single individual who read or heard about this motion-picture show thanked their favorable stars the movie was cancel .
It ’s a classic case of instant cyberspace reaction . So many people run to form concrete , unflappable opinions free-base on the tiniest shred of info . A unmarried citation . One image . A logline . A small chip of data can quickly become the basis for an entire belief system surround a project . And for Superman Lives , that opinion was the movie was destined to be a man of shit .
This is where The Death of Superman Lives : What Happened ? comes in . It sets all of this up but then does something so few of us actually do : Research . To be fair , in the fount of Superman Lives , research was impossible because everything was lock away . But Schnepp pick up a nifty many things about the film ; for object lesson , every single prototype that has made it into the public was wildly out of context . The awkward Cage photo ? A random shot at a very , very , very early costume examination . Those atomic number 10 suit ? To be used in one single sequence , that would ’ve last seconds .
It turns out we had this movie all wrong .
The documentary unearth the factual video footage of that inauspicious costume examination , decease so far as to nail the instant the picture was take in . Eventually — and this is a moment of a pillager , but fuck it — it picture the terminal Superman costume Cage would have used in the movie . And venture what ? It rivaled both Brandon Routh ’s in Superman Returns ( which is the picture that was made based on this one ) and Henry Cavill ’s in Man of Steel . This is faithful to it .
These revelations are simply the biggest victory of the picture , but there ’s more . Schnepp spend a good chunk of his movie talking to the film ’s producer , author , concept artists , production designer and even director Tim Burton himself about what Superman liveliness would have been . We see the evolution of the costume , the script , the story , the villains . We see conception for all form of dissimilar reading of Doomsday , Brainiac and more . We listen to them all explain why this movie was going to be different and , frankly , probably way forrader of its time .
Ultimately , the looker is left with a broad , multi - faceted savvy of Superman Lives . You simultaneously understand why Warner Bros. pulled the plug weeks before take , but still feel angry about it . Schnepp wins you over . scores of that is due to the playfulness editing and humor throughout , and the rest is just because of the ultra impressive admittance and research that went into the movie .
Superman spirit would have present an emotional , complex and conflicted Heron … and then it would have killed him . These are ideas that probably even Marvel would have trouble with 20 class later . It was going to be a bragging movie , a weird picture show , and an expensive flick — and no , there ’s no guarantee it would ’ve worked . Maybe it would have been that piece of shit everyone on the internet assumes it would have been . Then again , maybe it would have been The Dark Knight 10 years before Christopher Nolan .
There are definitely some flaws to The Death of Superman last : What Happened ? The copious amount of research does hurt the movie ’s momentum on occasion . Some of the animations and diversion that are used do n’t land . But those are minor hiccups , when you count at the large characterisation . This film superintend to hold , educate , and not - so - subtly give a vast middle fingerbreadth to reactionary net finish . After watching this movie , no longer will you have those vicious thoughts towards Superman Lives . rather , you ’ll in all likelihood be upset it ’ll never happened . How many cinema can in reality ease that kind of modification ?
The Death of Superman live : What Happened ? will be available as a digital download and on Blu - re on July 9 . Find out how to watch it atthe prescribed web site here . And here ’s the first 10 minutes of the movie .
[ H / T / Film ]
SupermanTim Burton
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