Curse hanging over Superman franchise as new film soars at box office
Forget Lex Luthor. Red Son. Or even Kryptonite.
If urban myth is to be believed, the curse hanging over the Superman franchise poses more of a threat to those who play the Man of Steel than any plot line James Gunn could conjure up for the latest spin on the hero.
The Guardians Of The Galaxy director has been charged with breathing new life into the DC Comics hero, casting David Corenswet as the Kryptonian, Rachel Brosnahan as his Lois Lane and Nicholas Hoult in the role of Lex Luthor.
The new Superman film stars David Corenswet (right) as the Man of Steel, Rachel Brosnahan as his Lois Lane, and Nicholas Hoult (left) as Lex Luthor. Picture: MayaGunn's reboot comes after a series of box office disappointments with Henry Cavill's stint in the suit.
Although Cavill's name is now in the mix to play James Bond, he expressed his disappointment about Gunn's recasting on Instagram in 2022, saying the news wasn't the easiest.
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'But the changing of the guard is something that happens. I respect that,' he wrote.
Talk of a curse began way before Cavill was sent packing. Or even Zack Snyder's troubled Justice League film in 2017, and Bryan Singer's snooze-worthy Superman Returns a decade before that.
It all started with TV Superman George Reeves' mysterious death in 1959. Found shot dead – ruled suicide but speculated to be murder – Reeves' disillusionment with superhero fame and subsequent alcoholism was detailed in the 2006 film Hollywoodland starring Ben Affleck.
Corenswet in a scene from the new Superman film, which raked in a whopping $US210 million worldwide on its opening weekend. Picture: Warner Bros Pictures via AP
Henry Cavill was the last to play Superman on screen. Picture: Warner Bros
Affleck, who had played Daredevil before shooting Hollywoodland, told female.com.au he understood Reeves' frustrations with the superhero genre.
'I knew how ridiculous you feel in a red suit,' Affleck laughed. 'You feel – even if these movies work – very, very silly.'
Likewise, Affleck understood the downsides of fame.
'The modern form of typecasting, you don't get typecast as a certain character you get typecast as yourself, and with George they couldn't see past the Superman character,' Affleck explained.
'Nowadays the danger is that people don't see past what they read in the tabloids, and that can be as damaging if not more so than the other type of typecasting. I certainly can tell you from experience it's bad. It's bad psychologically, bad for your career.'
Superman director James Gunn with Corenswet, Brosnahan and attend at CinemaCon 2025 in April in Las Vegas. Picture: Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images for CinemaCon
Of course, Reeves wasn't the only actor whose career never really took flight after playing Superman. Dean Cain (who starred alongside Teri Hatcher in '90s TV series Lois & Clark), Brandon Routh (Superman Returns) and Tom Welling (who played a teenage Clark Kent in long-running TV show Smallville) also struggled after hanging up their capes.
Perhaps the saddest example of the so-called curse came from the 1978 classic Superman, when its star Christopher Reeve was left paralysed from the neck down in 1995 after a horseriding accident. He died in 2004, aged 52.
George Reeves, who played Superman in the 1950s TV series with Noel Neill as Lois Lane, died under mysterious circumstances in 1959.
Adding to that tragedy, Reeve's co-star Margot Kidder (who played the feisty Lois Lane) took her own life in 2018 after a long struggle with bipolar disorder, and Gene Hackman (Lex Luthor) was found dead in his home alongside his wife and dog in February this year.
Lee John Quigley, who played Kal-El (aka baby Superman) in the same film, died when he was just 14.
Before her death, Kidder shrugged off talk of a curse, telling The Telegraph in 2002: 'The idea cracks me up. What about the luck of Superman?
'When my car crashed this August, if I hadn't hit a telegraph pole after rolling three times, I would have dropped down a 50- to 60-foot ravine. Why don't people focus on that?'
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So, should the stars of James Gunn's reboot be quaking in their super suits?
Josh Hartnett certainly thinks so. But not necessarily because of any curse.
The Black Hawk Down star told The Guardian last year that he turned down the role of Superman twice because he didn't want to be swallowed up by the fame that came with playing a superhero.
'And you saw what happened to some people back then. They got obliterated by it. I didn't want that for myself,' he said.
Likewise, in the documentary I Am Paul Walker, The Fast And The Furious actor's longtime pal and stunt double Oakley Lehman revealed Walker was in line to play Superman before he died.
According to Walker's manager Matt Luber, he took one look at himself in the suit and thought: 'I've got an S on, I got a cape, boots, tights … this is not me. I'm getting the f*** out of here.'
Brandon Routh played the superhero in the 2006 offering Superman Returns.
Tom Welling shared in the TV series Smallville, which followed Clark Kent's high school adventures.
Certainly, anyone who takes on the mantle of Superman has big boots to fill. And Corenswet will have his work cut out for him living up to some of his predecessor's work. As will Superman's writer and director Gunn, who fans expect to save their hero from the super scrapheap.
Gunn seems confident he's found the right blend of cheesy nostalgia and tongue-in-cheek humour to make Superman soar once more.
Speaking on the DC Studios Official Podcast, Gunn said his latest foray into the superhero genre wouldn't rely as heavily on catchy tunes and wisecracking characters as Guardians Of The Galaxy or Suicide Squad.
Dean Cain and Teri Hatcher starred on the series Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman.
Christopher Reeve and Margot Kidder in 1978 film.
'Anything I do is going to be different, but it isn't about that, it's not relying on that, it's not relying on the songs, it's about this pure good, beautiful guy, who is trying to get by in a world that isn't those things and just happens to have superpowers, right?' he said.
Celebrate the film's cinematic release on July 10 with a trip down Superman memory lane on Tubi.
Adventures Of Superman: The Lost Episode: Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's Reeves in a lost episode of the classic series that never made it to TV.
Airplane vs Volcano: Ex-Superman Dean Cain is among the everyday heroes trying to stay alive when the plane they're on flies into a ring of erupting volcanoes.
The Great Escape II: The Untold Story: In his bid to be taken seriously as an actor post-Superman, Reeve plays a former prisoner of war who leads a manhunt to bring his captors to justice.
Now streaming on Tubi
Originally published as Curse hanging over Superman franchise as new film soars at box office
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