James Gunn Confirms One of the Most Shocking Twists in New ‘Superman’ Movie is Real
The new Superman movie from James Gunn has been out for just a week, and it’s already a huge hit. People everywhere are going to see it, and most fans are happy with the bright, hopeful version of Superman that the film shows.
But there’s one part of the movie that surprised a lot of people, and it has to do with Superman’s father, Jor-El.
Usually, in Superman stories, Clark gets a message from his Kryptonian parents telling him to help Earth and be its protector. That’s how it always goes. But in this new movie, things are different. This time, the message from Jor-El and Lara wasn’t about saving Earth. It told Superman to conquer it. Yes, his parents told him to take over the planet.
This big twist comes out during the film when Lex Luthor, played by Nicholas Hoult, finds the hidden message. The message had been corrupted, so Superman never heard the full version before. Lex uses this secret to turn people against Superman, and it becomes a big part of the movie’s main story.
Even though the movie clearly shows that the message was real, fans didn’t stop questioning it. Many people thought Lex might have faked it or changed it somehow.
James Gunn, who directed the movie and runs DC Studios, has now cleared everything up. Speaking on Joshua Horowitz’s Happy Sad Confused podcast, Gunn said fans should trust what they saw in the film. When asked about the theory that Lex faked the message, Gunn laughed and said, “How can someone not think it’s real?”
He explained that in the movie, there are three different times where characters confirm the message is true. Gunn said, “In the test screenings people said, ‘With AI, no one trusts anything.’ So, okay, in the movie Mister Terrific says, ‘I know those computer forensics guys, there is no way.’ That’s Mister Terrific, he’s as smart as Lex Luthor. Then I have Mori, the Secretary of Defense, say, ‘Think whatever you think about Luthor, but it’s real.’ And then the clincher is that Ghurkos and Lex are walking together and Ghurkos say, ‘Ahh you doctored the message. This is great.’ And Lex says, ‘It’s not doctored. It’s real, and who thought it would be his own parents to bring him down?’”
So, according to James Gunn, the message is definitely real. Lex didn’t fake it. Jor-El and Lara actually told Clark to take over Earth.
Fans are shocked by this twist because it changes Superman’s usual backstory. But Gunn says that’s the point. He wanted this Superman to have his own unique story in the new DC Universe. And even though this is a new idea for a Superman movie, Gunn pointed out that it’s not the first time Jor-El has been shown in a negative light in other versions of Superman’s story. It’s unusual, but not totally new.
When asked if the message might come back in future movies, Gunn said probably not. He said Superman’s personal journey with the message is finished in this film. Gunn explained, “Honestly, I think he deals with it in this story pretty much. This story, at the heart of it, is a story about a guy who is doing things for reasons he thinks outside of himself, but comes to realize through the love of his parental figure, his mother and father, that he is not doing things because of someone outside himself. He is doing things because that’s what he believes.”
So fans shouldn’t expect the video message to return in Superman 2. If anything from Superman’s past comes up again, it’ll probably be the emotional scene between Clark and Pa Kent on the porch in the first movie. In that moment, Pa Kent tells Clark what being Superman really means, it’s not about Krypton, and it’s not about following what his birth parents said. It’s about who he is inside. That’s the real heart of this new Superman story.
James Gunn’s Superman is now playing in theaters everywhere, and the message from Jor-El? It’s real.
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