Superman (2025) Review: Look Up
Look Up. The perfect tagline. David Corenswet. The perfect Superman. James Gunn has launched his new cinematic universe for the DCU, and it starts with a resounding bang. Superman is not the typical origin story for the big blue Boy Scout. Instead, we are following Superman 3 years into his career of fighting for the people of Metropolis. We follow him as he battles Kaijus, meta-humans, and his greatest adversary, Lex Luthor.
To start, the absolute best thing about this movie is its cast. From Corenswet down to the minor side characters, this movie knocked the cast out of the park, finding actors who knew how to embody the characters they were portraying. David Corenswet is going to go down as one of the best Superman portrayals next to Christopher Reeve, with how well he blends the sincerity and earnestness of both Clark Kent and Superman. Rachel Brosnahan is excellent as Lois Lane, as she commands the screen in each of her scenes. Her and Corenswet’s chemistry was off the charts, and I personally believe it should set the standard for how iconic couples are cast in the future.
Nicholas Hoult is one of my favorite actors, and he truly embodied the hate and envy Lex Luthor has for Superman. He is diabolical and legitimately evil, and also commands the screen in a way that Lex should. The Justice Gang members Nathan Fillion (Guy Gardner- Green Lantern), Edi Gathegi (Mr. Terrific), and Isabela Merced (Hawkgirl) crushed it in their small roles. Gathegi, in particular, elevated the story and created some of the most fun moments in the theater. The best I can say is that in their small roles, I was hoping to see more, and now I’m looking forward to the next time I can see them.
James Gunn has truly cemented himself in a tier above when it comes to comic book directors. It was a bold, creative decision to start a new universe not with an origin story and to introduce us to a universe already lived in. To some, I can see how that would be an issue as characters exist without introduction, and if you’re not familiar with them coming into the movie, you probably aren’t coming out of this movie knowing more about them. But for me, someone who enjoys these movies and grew up with comics and the animated shows and movies, this felt like a comic story ripped right from the pages and put onto the big screen.
I was never the biggest fan of Zack Snyder’s overly gritty and cynical take on Superman. I didn’t like how alien he felt to his fellow humans, and I didn’t like the constant religious metaphors. The difference between these two iterations is so different, they feel like two separate characters. This Superman is one full of hope, full of love, and full of compassion. He stops in the middle of fights with giant monsters to save squirrels and dogs, and believes in the safe preservation of monsters instead of trying to kill them. In one of the best scenes of the movie, he and Lois talk about their different outlooks on the world, and Lois says that he believes everyone and everything is beautiful. He says that’s the real punk rock. He truly inspires hope for the world around him, and even when the world turns its back on him, he never loses that hope or humanity. Having Krypto be such a major part of the story added a layer of relatability to him as well. I mean, who amongst us wouldn’t fly against a black hole to save their dog?
In terms of boldness, Superman does take massive swings, with not all of them connecting. There is a lot of information that is thrown at the audience in the first chunk of the film, with Gunn trusting the audience to retain it all. Superman has been active for years, his conflict with Lex Luthor has ripened to a point where Lex has studied his moves enough to come up with counters, and metahumans have existed in this world for decades at this point. Visually, I appreciated the attempts the movie made to differentiate itself from the grounded movies the studio had been releasing earlier. While some shots weren’t pleasing and some sequences caught me off guard stylistically, I will never fault the creative team behind a movie for being unapologetically behind their vision.
Their vision led to some breathtaking scenes of Superman action. His and the Justice Gang’s fight with the kaiju, his fight with Ultraman and the Engineer at the baseball field, and his final fight with Ultraman and Lex’s raptors are up there as some of the best choreographed scenes for a comic book movie in a while, in my honest opinion. I am not lying when I said there is a moment towards the end that brought tears to my eyes with how incredible the action was, with how the music was swelling.
In terms of being unapologetic, this movie is also incredibly political, to the point where it would feel wrong not to address in this climate. One of the driving forces of the story is how Superman intervenes in a conflict in the Middle East between the fictional military power Boravia and the smaller, weaker Jarhanpur. It is a clear allegory for the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestine, and it is incredibly bold and refreshing to see Gunn take a stance on the topic. He hasn’t shied away from heavy topics like American Interventionism and proxy wars in The Suicide Squad, but this is making a firm stance on the topic.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Superman is everything I was hoping it would be. Yes, I had high hopes, and while it is imperfect, I came out of the theater with so much hope. The cast is excellent from the top down, the story is as entertaining as it is rich with lore, and it truly feels like what a comic book movie should be. I completely understand, though, that some choices the movie makes won’t work for everyone, and that’s ok. Movies should be subjective, and there shouldn’t be a right or wrong opinion to have. I happened to love Superman, and I hope you come out feeling a similar way.