Singer May Be Done With Superman
Itís happening again. Bryan Singer may have just handed Brett Ratner, or his cinematic equivalent another superhero franchise to ruin. Variety is reporting that Superman Returns writers Michael Dougherty and Dan Harris have opted not to return to write the filmís sequel.
That in itself isnít a major blow for the project, after all Singer could be going on without them. Whatís worrying is that Variety article seems to be hinting that the WB may be looking to start completely over with Superman (though Warners denies it), and pretend the other movie never existed, as theyíre doing with Hulk. If thatís really whatís happening, then forget about Bryan Singer being involved.
The baffling thing here is that despite all the panic surrounding its box office totals, Superman Returns was a hit. It made just as much money as Batman Begins, which has now spawned another film helmed by Chris Nolan and backed entirely by the studio. Superman Returns cost more to make, but a large portion of that cost had nothing to do with the actual movie and was carried over by previous, failed efforts to make the movie happen. Superman Returns is not Hulk, and starting over with it seems not just ridiculous, but sot of insulting to the huge audiences who showed up to see it.
You have to wonder if this has something to do with Singerís slowness to get started on making the sequel. Warner Brothers was all for it, then Singer took a bunch of other projects instead of getting his ass in gear to make the blue boy fly again. Right now heís working on Tom Cruiseís Nazi movie Valkyrie for United Artsits when Warners would almost certainly like to have him doing pre-production for Supes with them. Assuming Singer was actually serious about wanting to do it. Lately it hasnít seemed like it.
He did the same thing on X-Men 3, delaying on doing anything with it while he loaded up other projects to do first. Eventually Fox got sick of waiting for him, they never got a deal done, and the studio grabbed the first jerk they could find to direct it. The result was the awful Brett Ratner soiling of the once great X-Men franchise. Ratner has always wanted to get his hands on Superman, somewhere out there heís smiling.
For now though, thereís nothing definitive. Hopefully this is all wrong-headed rumor and conjecture. We need more Superman, but more importantly we need more of Bryan Singerís brilliant Superman. If heís not involved and if itís not a sequel to Returns, then forget it. Nobody is interested, youíre only pissing on the character. Apparently thereís a worse word in the cinematic language than ìremakeî or ìprequelî. Itís ìrebootî and itís kryptonite for Superman. For now though, no reason to panic. The official word is that this is still a sequel and as far as anyone knows Singer will be back. Get to work Bryan!
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