Blogs > Cliopatria > "... and i know what's happening"

Jan 10, 2006

"... and i know what's happening"


by Cliopatria


This is really Tim Burke territory, but he's busy teaching Africa and the slave trade, so we here at POTUS pick up the slack:
Even though you've been raised as a human being, you are not one of them. They can be a great people... they wish to be. They only lack the light to show the way. For this reason above all -- their capacity for good -- I have sent them you, my only son.

Thus speaks a heavenly father to his only begotten son. Superman's getting really messianic on its long-awaited return, isn't it?

(You can hear Jor-El's Y-hw-h -like speech if you watch the trailer.)


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Oscar Chamberlain - 1/14/2006

"I should leave the Tim Burke portfolio to Tim Burke."

Not at all. It is quite interesting that this theme has been pulled into the foreground. The Superman of 1978 is pretty human, ignoring Dad's advice to turn back time and save Lois. It makes me wonder where they may take this, which, thinking about it, is exactly what a good trailer should do.


PS The voice in the trailer sounded a bit more like someone imitating Marlon Brando than Brando himself. However, arguably, that was what Brando was doing the first time around. He was supposed to be this "august presence," and, rather like Alec Guiness in first Star WArs movie, his name alone made people take the movie a bit more seriously.

Eric Rauchway - 1/14/2006

Although, upon reflection, I see the obvious point here is that I should leave the Tim Burke portfolio to Tim Burke.

Eric Rauchway - 1/14/2006

No, I got that (I recognized Marlon Brando's voice). But this time, it's the foregrounded speech in the trailer, the hook that's supposed to pull you into the theater. I don't remember how they did it in 1978, but it did strike me this time around.

Timothy James Burke - 1/14/2006

As Oscar says, this was a part of the 1978 film. It's also something that the Superman comic before John Byrne "rebooted" it some years back was increasingly drifting towards. It's come up again in recent years in the comic book, especially after Superman died and was resurrected (the hilarious thing about that was that DC actually posited a new religion rising up around Superman and then threw that plot element away after 15 or 20 issues, since it obviously led into uncomfortable territory).

Oscar Chamberlain - 1/12/2006

Actually, those lines--along with the music--were in the Christopher Reeve's movie. The cinematography was different; I'm pretty sure that I saw a reference to the 2001 space child in Superman's face right at the end which certainly adds an emphasis to the Messianic vision.

But most of all what strikes me is the sense that this is not a new version of Superman but a remake of the 1978 movie.