After a failed attempt to get Superman back to the big screen in the early 90’s, the film seemed back on track after Warner Bros. hired Kevin Smith to take a stab at what appeared to be a fairly lousy script. If you have never heard Smith recount this story and his interactions with the film’s producer, Jon Peters, click here for the brilliant and thorough rundown of events.
Warner Bros. brought in Director Tim Burton to helm the movie—why not, he had mined gold with Batman in 1989—and things started really moving. Wesley Strick (Arachnophobia and Cape Fear) was hired by the director to rewrite Smith’s script; Strick kept Lex Luthor and Braniac as the villains, but they eventually join into a single entity called Lexiac.Nicholas Cage was hired to portray Superman and the rest of the cast began contract negotiations (I believe only Chris Rock had been confirmed for the role of Jimmy Olsen).
Under a mandate to keep Superman out of his classic primary duds, Art Designers James Carson and Sylvain Despretz were tasked with bringing a more current (I guess) look to Superman. The pictures of the outfit have finally hit the web, and we can see that this film was looking to be the super hero film equivalent of The Day the Clown Cried, Jerry Lewis’s never-before-seen disasterpiece.
The script was completed, the sets were designed (and some built), and the “costumes” were ready when Warners decided to pull the plug, reportedly due to budget concerns (and not due to what would have been the rape of comicdom’s most legendary character).
A while back, Burton’s Braniac design (below) was finally released. Oh boy. Zak Snyder’s Superman film has nowhere to go from here but up, up and away.
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