James Gunn Teases Which Version of Brainiac We’ll See in the DCU

After months of speculation, it’s finally been confirmed that Brainiac will make his long-awaited live-action film debut in Man of Tomorrow. This weekend, director and DC Studios co-head James Gunn confirmed that Lars Eidinger will portray the iconic villain, a casting choice that already has fans intrigued well before we see his performance in action. Now that we know these details, the conversation can turn to other aspects, such as how the DC Universe’s version of Brainiac will compare to the source material. The character has been around since the late 1950s, so there’s decades of lore to pull from — and it sounds like Gunn is leaving no stone left unturned.

On Threads, a fan asked Gunn if there was a specific version of Brainiac that he was influenced by when developing Man of Tomorrow. “I love aspects of many versions of the characters, from the 1950s [Otto] Binder stuff to the surprisingly scary [Marv] Wolfman stuff to the animated versions and up through the truly creepy and wonderful, current Absolute Brainiac,” he wrote in his response.

Man of Tomorrow‘s Brainiac Should Be a Well-Rounded, Intimidating Villain

Based on Gunn’s comments, it sounds like the big-screen Brainiac will be an amalgamation of various sources instead of a direct adaptation of just one or two iterations. This is an exciting proposition since the character has greatly evolved over the course of his appearances throughout the decades. There’s so much rich material out there to draw from that it would be limiting to not use it all as inspiration. The trick will be finding the right balance between all of these sources so that the DCU’s Brainiac is a compelling character in his own right, but Gunn has proven time and time again he is a master at capturing comic book sensibilities and depicting those qualities on screen.

Ever since it was revealed that Man of Tomorrow would see Superman and Lex Luthor team up, fans knew that only a significant, dangerous threat could force those two to work together. If Gunn is planning on sprinkling bits of all these different versions of Brainiac into the DCU’s iteration, then Brainiac will more than fit that bill. From the beginning, the villain has always been a supremely intelligent being interested in acquiring knowledge from across the universe (collecting cities from various planets), but later depictions have been even more terrifying. Absolute Brainiac is so terrifying that some comic readers see him akin to a horror movie villain, and the Wolfman reinvention from the 1980s transformed Brainiac into a cold, monstrous threat. So not only will Brainiac be a savvy, brilliant foe matching intellectual wits with our protagonists, he’ll also be a very scary presence.

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In the Absolute Universe, which only debuted late last year, Brainiac teams up with Ra’s al Ghul and poses as corporate AI. It’s unlikely famed Batman villain Ra’s appears in Man of Tomorrow, but perhaps elements of this story could be incorporated into Gunn’s film, serving as a bit of commentary on the dangers of AI (which has become an increasingly prevalent component of our everyday life, including in the realm of business). There could be other sources of inspiration that Gunn hasn’t listed, such as the “House of Brainiac” storyline that sees Superman and Lex take on Brainiac and the Brainiac Queen.

The old saying is that a story is only as good as its villain, and that should hold true in Man of Tomorrow. Brainiac has long been one of Superman’s most notorious enemies, and fans have waited a long time to see him take center stage in a live-action movie. Gunn has a great understanding of the character and his vast potential, so he’s planning on using Man of Tomorrow to showcase a variety of elements and demonstrate why Brainiac has been one of the leading members of Superman’s rogues’ gallery for decades. It won’t be easy following up Nicholas Hoult’s memorable Lex Luthor as the main villain in a DCU film, but Eidinger’s Brainiac should prove to be a worthy opponent.

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