James Gunn’s ‘Superman’ Isn’t a Comic Book Movie. It’s a Punk Rock Victory Lap

There’s a small, somewhat throwaway line spoken halfway into Superman by Rachel Brosnahan’s whip-smart Lois Lane to David Corenswet’s titular Kryptonian that is the key to what’s really going on in DC’s highly anticipated blockbuster. I’d go so far as to say this moment underlines the real meaning of the entire movie. 

This Superman — James Gunn’s Superman — is the first feature film released by the newly rebranded DC Studios, which Gunn runs alongside producing partner Peter Safran. Corenswet leads the charge, donning the iconic cape and briefs in a refreshingly joyful way, alongside the witty, brilliant Brosnahan. 

Spoiler alert: There’s no way around it; there will be some Superman spoilers below. I’ll do my best to keep them to a minimum. But if you want to avoid this type of information, please turn back now.

Read more: Peacemaker Review: The Perfect Suicide Squad Chaser Is on HBO Max Now

Instead of retreading narrative subject matter audiences have become bored with (no baby Kal-El in a spaceship crashing to Earth here), Gunn’s take on the character’s story drops the audience into an already built world.

Superman and Lois are already dating. The corporate-minded Justice Gang — Green Lantern (Nathan Fillion), Hawkgirl (Isabela Merced) and Mister Terrific (Edi Gathegi) — play second-fiddle crime fighters to the Man of Steel. It’s an accepted reality that monsters may ravage the streets at any time, and a scrappy dog with superpowers can help save the day. 

In this hyper-colorful reality, there’s a growing civil unrest between two neighboring countries, social media trolls (err, monkeys) working tirelessly to cancel Superman and a megalomaniacal billionaire driven by jealousy who’s hell-bent on being the most powerful person on the planet. 

These are the big items on Superman’s plate, and they build the stakes and keep the pace moving at a steady clip. It all works.

But there’s another narrative line being explored in this movie that may not be as obvious. This brings me back to that throwaway moment between Lois and Superman I referenced above. It turns out, Brosnahan’s Lois Lane has a punk rock backstory. Her skeptical personality, which finds her questioning everything, is the polar opposite of Superman’s unrelenting drive to do good and trust humanity.

I kept thinking there had to be more going on here with this punk rock detail. That’s when my wheels began spinning. I started thinking about Gunn’s journey as a filmmaker from his early cult movie days with Troma to his subversive genre work with films like Slither, Super and Brightburn, the 2019 movie that inverted Superman’s origin story into a satisfying horror flick. 

Let’s not at all forget his short-lived YouTube series, PG Porn.

That’s when it clicked. If there’s any filmmaker shaping the entertainment industry today that I would view as punk rock, it would be Gunn. 

In the movie, Superman is the target of a social media cancellation campaign that immediately tarnishes his public image. If that feels extra personal, it should. After making it big with Marvel with the Guardians of the Galaxy movies, a collection of old, bad-taste social media posts was resurrected online, which led to his firing (and eventual rehiring) by Disney. 

I believe Superman is Gunn’s reckoning with his anti-establishment past and his current success as a corporate shill, for lack of a better term, for Warner Bros.

Gunn’s journey reminds me, in a way, of Matthew Lillard’s Stevo in 1999’s cult flick SLC Punk. In that movie, Stevo goes from being a loud-and-proud mohawk-sporting punk rocker striving to buck the system in the conservative realm of 1980s Salt Lake City to a buttoned-up young man pursuing a more conventional life. 

By the end of that story, Stevo ends up explaining why: “I didn’t sell out. I bought in.”

I feel like that’s where Gunn is now. He’s reached the creative zenith, a stellar accomplishment that he may not have believed would ever happen. 

His reckoning with his past and present can be heard in these characters, from Mister Terrific’s high self-regard and dry delivery to Jimmy Olsen’s (Skyler Gisondo) confident nerdy bravado and Lex Luthor’s (Nicholas Hoult) pride, greed, lust, anger and wrath (so sinful, that man). 

When Superman professes his love for Lois, was this really Gunn giving his younger, more erratic self, some long-overdue grace? And when Lois finally said it back, was that Gunn’s inner punk returning the favor? To me, the answer is a resounding yes.

James Gunn is punk rock. 

Seriously, I really mean it.  

And, yes, his Superman is punk rock. 

This movie is extremely fun, uplifting and filled with joy, which are things I am not used to saying about comic book movies nowadays. His reverence for the Man of Steel, in all of his various comic book iterations, is weaved into this film. You can feel his deep love for Richard Donner’s original movie, which starred Christopher Reeve in his career-defining role, and its insanely enjoyable sequel. 

This Superman is wholesome and optimistic and pays homage to the past without repeating it. Gunn truly shocked me with this one and delivered an aspirational superhero movie unlike anything I’ve seen on the big screen in years. He disrupted the MCU-dominated establishment (again), bucked the bleak, antihero expectations that have dragged the genre down for too long and wiped the slate clean. 

Honestly, if that isn’t punk rock, I don’t know what is.