Superman Reboot Sparks Calls for Henry Cavill Comeback and Multiple Supermen

Superman will soar again at Warner Bros., but it won’t be Henry Cavill suiting up as the Man of Steel: an announced reboot will take flight from producer J.J. Abrams and acclaimed author and comic book writer Ta-Nehisi Coates. After completing a Superman trilogy in Snyder’s Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and the upcoming Zack Snyder’s Justice League — where a brief round of additional photography marked Cavill’s first time back in the role since 2017 — Cavill’s Superman future remains in limbo as the studio is set to introduce Supergirl (Sasha Calle) in The Flash and moving forward on its untitled Coates-Abrams Superman.

On Friday, The Hollywood Reporter’s Borys Kit reported Warners is revisiting the “Black Superman project” pitched to them by Black Panther star Michael B. Jordan in 2019, the same year Jordan’s production company Outlier Society inked a first-look deal with the studio. Justin Kroll of Deadline reported Jordan is not currently involved with the Coates-Abrams Superman, which TheWrap‘s Umberto Gonzalez seemingly confirmed would center on Calvin Ellis — a.k.a. Kalel, the Superman of Earth-23 — and not a recast or rebooted Clark Kent.

In a statement, Coates said he is looking forward to “meaningfully adding to the legacy of America’s most iconic mythic hero,” while Abrams said the Bad Robot-produced reboot will tell a “new, powerful and moving Superman story yet to be told.”

The news drew mixed reactions from DC Comics readers, but fans of the Cavill Superman — whose DCEU future remains unknown outside of a potential future crossover with Dwayne Johnson’s Black Adam — are displeased the studio is moving on from the so-called SnyderVerse and seemingly leaving Cavill, and his red cape, out to dry.

Some say there’s room for multiple Supermen in the DC Films universe in the same way that the Joaquin Phoenix and Jared Leto Jokers can exist in separate realities. The concept of the Multiverse, which will be fully explored in The Flash, has also made it possible for the studio to have several Batmen across universes: the Michael Keaton Dark Knight will return alongside Ben Affleck’s Batfleck in Flash, and Robert Pattinson will portray a younger Bruce Wayne in the rebooted The Batman, set in its own continuity outside of the shared DCEU.

“I don’t think anyone else has ever attempted this,” Walter Hamada, president of DC Films, recently told The New York Times about simultaneously bringing to screen multiple versions of the same superhero with different actors. “But audiences are sophisticated enough to understand it. If we make good movies, they will go with it.”

Because the Multiverse makes it possible for Cavill’s Superman to exist and operate opposite the Calvin Ellis Superman, frustrated fans want to know: why has a Man of Steel 2 failed to get off the ground with Cavill back as Superman? As the Coates-Abrams reboot looks to be the first solo Superman movie in nearly a decade, Cavill fans are again making the push for the star to return as Superman after rallying around the #HenryCavillSuperman social media effort just weeks ago:

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