Superman is the first superhero and one of the most popular fictional characters of the 20th century. He’s one of the first multimedia superheroes, starting out in comics and then moving to cartoons, movies, TV, newspaper strips, books, video games, and every other one you can think of. Superman films in the 21st century weren’t exactly beloved; Superman Returns tried to recapture the vibe of Superman: The Motion Picture and Superman II but was honestly kind of boring. Then, we had the Snyderverse films Man of Steel, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, and Justice League; they had their fans but the majority didn’t enjoy them at all. The Man of Tomorrow was down and out on the big screen, but that changed last year.
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Writer/director James Gunn and producer Peter Saffran kicked off the movie segment of their cinematic universe with Superman and it was a hit. David Corenswet’s Clark Kent was perfect and fans are honestly pretty excited to see where he shows up next (Supergirl was good and he was great in it!). The DCU has a lot of stories to choose from for inspiration, with Supes starring in some of the coolest ever. However, not every story starring the Metropolis Marvel should be adapted. These five Superman stories should never be adapted; fans may love them as comics, but they would never work in the DCU.
5) “Death of Superman”
“Death of Superman” is a legendary story. 34 years ago, the death of the Man of Steel was big news, as the monster Doomsday attacked Metropolis. This is one of the most popular Superman stories of all time. It has been adapted in cartoons numerous times. Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice and Justice League remixed the idea and presented it in Snyder’s style. Once upon a time, everyone wanted to see this story on the big screen. In 2026, fans aren’t as rabid for it. We’ve seen it too many times; every kid who watched cartoons has seen it. There’s an idea that it would be a fun to see a movie where the focus of the story would be the battle against Doomsday, but honestly, it wouldn’t really be a good story. We all love “Death of Superman”, but it’s not really much of a story. The movie would just be scene after scene of Supes getting beat on as Doomsday gets closer and closer. It would get repetitive after the first hour. If spectacle’s your thing, than you might want this, but the rest of us would rather not to have to see it again.
4) Superman and the Authority
Superman and the Authority, by Grant Morrison, Mikel Janin, Travel Foreman, and Fico Ossio, is an awesome comic and I’ve loved it since I first read it, even if the weird 5G stuff makes its canon status questionable. Superman is losing his powers and he recruits a new version of the Authority to help him in his never-ending battle. However, his two most dangerous enemies decide that now’s the best time to attack him. I love Grant Morrison and there are certainly Morrison JLA stories that the DCU could adapt or maybe their Animal Man or something like that. However, this one is a little too much. To begin with, its villains are all characters that only comic fans would be able to recognize, and then you have the Authority itself, which incorporates numerous conflicting pieces of DC continuity. This is a comic story in the most Morrison way possible; it is written for their fans, to say good-bye to their full-time DC career (their novel Luda is brilliant). It just wouldn’t really work in the movies without being almost completely changed.
3) “Warworld Saga”
“Warworld Saga” is one of the best Superman stories, but that doesn’t mean that it should ever be a movie. This story ran over the course of nearly two years, as Superman, his powers still on the fritz, and the Authority attack Warworld to end the threat of Mongul. However, it goes even worse than expected, as they battle Mongul at his most brutal. They are defeated and enslaved, with Superman deciding to start a revolution in the planet’s gladiator pits, as the rest of his team enact a plan that they had the entire time. This is an amazing story, but when it comes right down to it, it’s much too long to ever be successfully adapted. There is three or four movies of story in this one, and no one is going to wait a decade to see the whole thing. Maybe you could do a series, but you’d need to establish so much that it just wouldn’t work. Great story, maybe parts of it can be salvaged, but it shouldn’t be adapted as is.
2) “Superman Red/Superman Blue”
So, there are two different “Superman Red/Superman Blue” and I would honestly be okay with the first one, an “imaginary” Silver Age story that saw Superman split himself into two, with each starting their own lives. It’s corny, but it would be fun. However, the second one from the late ’90s should never, ever leave the pages of the comics. The ’90s were a weird time to be a Superman fan. One the one hand, the “Death and Return of Superman” saga was actually pretty awesome, but on the other hand, DC thought that the best way to make the character popular was to do big, character-redefining stories and this led to him getting the electric blue powers. He became an energy being with electromagnetic powers that could transform into a non-powered human form and eventually, he split into two. It was a ridiculous idea and no one ever needs to see it in a movie. It’s from a very weird time in the history of the character and it doesn’t really need to be on the big – or small – screen ever.
1) Action Comics (Vol. 2) #0-18
Grant Morrison is back on the list with one of their finest – but underappreciated – stories. Morrison was chosen to reboot the Man of Steel for the New 52, given control of Action Comics and allowed to tell the first Superman story of a new era. It consists of three interrelated story arcs, as the new protector of Metropolis faces an enemy that truly boggles the imagination. It’s one of my favorite Superman stories ever, with Morrison setting up the story in a very non-linear fashion that you won’t realize until all of the tricks are revealed. However, this plays against it when it comes to being a movie. General audiences aren’t going to like Morrison’s recursive storytelling and there’s no recognizable villain to speak of – there are villains, but none of them have names anyone recognizes (well, there’s one that has been around for decades, but he’s actually an ally in this story). Finally, it’s really long and it needs every single issue to tell its story. It’s an amazing Super-story that you one hundred percent should read, but the DCU should stay far away from it.
What Superman story do you think shouldn’t be adapted? Leave a comment in the comment section below and join the conversation on the ComicBook Forums!
