James Gunn Reveals Why Superman Isn’t An Origin Story
James Gunn, David Corenswet, and Rachel Brosnahan talk about introducing the iconic character to a new generation.
How do you make a Superman movie in this day and age? When Superman first appeared in the pages of Action Comics, he was the first of his kind. That’s far from the case today, with James Gunn’s Superman premiering 47 years after Richard Donner’s beloved classic first brought the Man of Steel to the big screen, 12 years after Zack Snyder attempted to build a DC cinematic universe, and five years after audiences had grown tired of anything that had to do with superheroes. Unlike in 1938, when Superman was able to make an impression by simply lifting a car and leaping tall buildings in a single bound, 2025’s Superman — which has the formidable task of launching Gunn’s new DCU — has a lot more to prove.
So with so much riding on Superman, it would be smart for writer-director James Gunn to play it safe, right? Not quite.
Warning! Minor spoilers for Superman follow.
Superman is basically a live-action comic book. It drops you in medias res into Superman’s story, three years after he made his debut (and three minutes after he lost his first fight). Already, Lex Luthor’s scheme to bring about Superman’s downfall is in motion. Already, Superman is facing a crossroads in his superhero career. And already, the world is teeming with superheroes. It’s a storytelling structure straight out of the comics — something that Gunn wanted Superman to reflect.
“When I entered the world of Superman, I entered this world [with] not only Superman, I had all his meta human friends and monsters.”
“When I was a kid, I fell in love with comics,” Gunn tells Inverse. “I learned to read on comic books. When I entered the world of Superman, I entered this world [with] not only Superman, I had all his meta human friends and monsters and giant monsters and flying dogs and robots and sorcery and science so advanced it almost seems like sorcery. I loved all of that stuff. I loved the world of DC, this connected universe of all these different characters that would interact with each other and know each other and rely on each other.”
Superman saves a child in a scene from Superman.
Conveniently, this approach also reflects the world that Gunn’s Superman enters: one in which Superman is no longer the first, and only, superhero — he’s not even the first hero to debut in Gunn’s nascent DC Universe (that honor might belong to John Cena’s Peacemaker, who makes a brief cameo in Superman). The film quickly brushes past Superman’s traditional origin story — his coming to Earth as a baby, being raised by the Kents in Kansas, and moving to Metropolis as a bushy-tailed reporter — because Gunn didn’t believe in retreading the well-worn narrative. “I don’t need to see baby Kal coming from Krypton in a little baby rocket,” he recently told The Sunday Times. Instead, the film assumes you know who Superman is, and runs with it.
And to be fair, he’s a character steeped in decades of history and iconography. Everyone knows what Superman is: the red cape, the iconic insignia, and all the trimmings that come with being the strongest, and most good-hearted, superhero on the planet. But for David Corenswet, who takes on the mantle of the Man of Steel after beloved actors like Christopher Reeve, Brandon Routh, and Henry Cavill, there was no pressure to embody what had been done before.
“I think it would've been impossible to fall back on the great things that have already been established by the great actors and writers and artists who have contributed so much to these characters,” Corenswet tells Inverse. “Because James' script was so original and explored such different and new corners of the characters. So, you really couldn't say the lines that were written without treading new ground and discovering new things about the characters.”
Mister Terrific (Edi Gathegi) is part of the Justice Gang, and is already used to a world full of superheroes.
Rachel Brosnahan, who plays the Lois Lane to Corenswet’s Superman/Clark Kent, agrees. “I went in obviously knowing these iconic characters, but I had really only seen the Christopher Reeve, Margot Kidder films and some of Smallville. So, there wasn't a lot to fall back on,” she tells Inverse. “And it felt nice to go in a little bit blind and get to spend some time learning about this character more intimately through the comics and also through James' fantastic script.”
“[Superman] can feel, in people's imaginations, kind of limited, like he's not allowed to behave in certain ways.”
Gunn’s script features a younger, bleeding-heart Superman. He expresses concern for the well-being of the monster terrorizing Metropolis, arguing to the Justice Gang that it needs to be studied, not slaughtered. He says things like “buddy” and “gosh.” And he brings hell or high water if his dog is in trouble. It feels like a huge departure from the more placid, calm performance that Reeve made so iconic, and especially from the stone-cold stoicism that Cavill brought to the character. But Corenswet thinks that perception of Superman is “kind of limited.”
“When we did find the scenes where things were quieter or Superman was more stoic or unfazed by what was going on around him, we ended up finding this great, huge range of experiences for the character,” Corenswet says. “I think [Superman] can feel, in people's imaginations, kind of limited, like he's not allowed to behave in certain ways. It was cool to get to explore all the different possibilities with him.”
Neither Corenswet and Brosnahan felt the pressure of stepping into such iconic roles.
But Gunn made sure not to deviate from what we know and love about Superman too much. “I love the character,” Gunn says. “I was really careful with what I changed or didn't change about Superman.”
So, despite changing Superman’s origin story, and despite debuting Superman in a world where metahumans have already existed for centuries, Gunn is hopeful that audiences will accept this new Superman, ripped straight from the comic books.
“Trying to create that experience that I had as a child for an audience through a different medium was part of the challenge and the excitement for me,” Gunn says.
