Welcome to The Corner Box, where your hosts, David Hedgecock and John Barber, lean into their decades of comic book industry experience, writing, drawing, editing, and publishing. They'll talk to fellow professionals, deep dive into influential, and overlooked works, and analyze the state of the art, and business of comics, and pop culture. Thanks for joining us on The Corner Box.

[00:28] John Barber: Hello, and welcome back to The Corner Box. I'm your host, John Barber, but I'm only one host. With me, as always, is my good friend

[00:37] David Hedgecock: David Hedgecock.

[00:39] John: And we’re here to talk comics.

[00:40] David: John, there's a lot going on in the comic book space, and I'm anxious to talk about all of it, but before we get to that, I have to share with you an amazing thing that happened to me this week. This is not comic related. So, if you want to skip forward a little bit, you can, but it's David Hedgecock-life-related.

[00:55] John: How do I do that?

[00:58] David: You can't do it. You have to listen, but our listeners can skip ahead, if they want.

[01:03] John: All right.

[01:04] David: You son of a gun. All right. This week, John, I got very sick. I was not feeling great. Had a fever, all that. Couldn't sleep.

[01:13] John: I thought the joke about one of us dying was going to be in bad taste, but it turned out to be fine.

[01:20] David: I didn't die, but I was not feeling good, and as the week wore on, I had a bad fever, and my gut was hurting, my abdomen, around my waist, and I was like, “what's that? That's not normal. That's not flu or Covid,” and then I started thinking, “Oh, my God. My appendix is going to burst, or it's about to burst, or it has burst, and I'm going to die.” I called the doctor, and he's like, “yeah, you're not going to die, but you definitely need to get in here tomorrow morning and come see me.” I said, “okay.” So, I woke up on Thursday morning, I’m getting ready to go to the doctor. I was like, “I'm feeling a little better.” I didn't feel like I had the fever anymore. The fever had gone away. I was feeling a little better, but I was still going to the doctor to get checked out, but I was very glad that I was feeling better. So, I get to the doctor, and he's like, “okay, what's going on?” Starts palpating my stomach, and all that stuff, and he's like, “okay, well, good news is, it's not your appendix. It's on the wrong side. You’ve got some stuff stuck in your colon, and it got a little infected, and you had a fever from it, but you don't have a fever now. So, whatever it was, it's working its way through, and your body's taking care of it. You're going to be fine. You just need to let your body work through it, and drink a lot of water, and you're going to be fine.” So, great. “If you want, you can take this GasX medicine, or something when you eat to help alleviate any discomfort, but, in the meantime, I'll write you a little excuse, if you need one,” and I'm like, “an excuse for passing gas?” And he's all, “well, yeah. Is that what you need?” I'm like, “1000%. I need that in my life.” He said, “okay, yeah, I'll write that.”

So, John, I now have a written, signed doctor's excuse to pass wind at any moment, when I need it. I have it, John. I have a piece of paper from a doctor that tells everyone that I need to tell that, if I pass gas, it’s for medical reasons, and I'm going to laminate that, and keep it in my wallet for the rest of my life, John, because, I mean, 10-year-old me is dancing the dance of happiness like he's never danced before.

[03:32] John: I feel like Eric Cartman on that one episode of South Park, where he feels remorse, or something, and he doesn't know what it is. That's just funnier than funny. I don't know what to do with that.

[03:42] David: I do. Laminate it.

[03:45] John: I've also never been happier that someone wasn't going to San Diego ComiCon.

[03:52] David: Yeah. If you think I'm not using this doctor's note, you're crazy. I have been freed in a way that no man has ever been freed. John, I feel like I am one-of-one on this planet right now. I feel like I won the lottery.

[04:05] John: Did you put it on LinkedIn yet?

[04:10] David: Yeah, I'm definitely going to add that to all my-- That's how my week's been going, John. It started out not great, but it ended up pretty good, and here we are.

[04:23] John: That’s quite a turnaround.

[04:27] David: So, anyway—Comics. San Diego ComiCon is coming.

[04:30] John: Speaking of a bunch of hot air.

[04:32] David: There you go.

[04:24] John: Or has passed by the time you're listening to this, or is currently happening, maybe?

[04:39] David: I think it will have passed. I think it will have passed by the time this comes out. It'll be the week after. It will all be in the aftermath of ComiCon when this hits. Are you going, John?

[04:51] John: Oh, totally. I’ve got to say, you not going is the craziest thing I've ever heard, but good for you. That sounds exciting. Pug-W had a booth, or a section of a booth, connected to Cryptozoic. So, I'll be there. I’ve got a signing. Doing a panel.

[05:05] David: What are you signing, John?

[05:07] John: Signa #1.

[05:11] David: Just the first one?

[05:12] John: First one, yes.

[05:13] David: Oh, okay.

[05:15] John: You can you see art from Issue #3, if you go to the panel.

[05:20] David: Wow, that's exciting. Sorry. If I was there, I'd be bringing my copies. I'd probably just buy a new copy, because I'd forget to bring my copy, and then I'd buy one from you and have you sign it right there.

[05:30] John: That's perfect. You'd be able to do that. I mean, I hope. I mean, at this point, we don’t know for sure, but yeah, I'm excited.

[05:40] David: Are you doing panels?

[05:41] John: Am I doing any, or going to any?

[05:43] David: Are you hosting?

[05:46] John: I'm not. We have a puG-W panel. I'm going to be on there with Livio Ramondelli and his brother, Yuri, Ian Chalgren, who designed the Conan book, Blaise, our Director of Design—or we call it Design Director. Sorry.

[06:02] David: I feel like Director of Design could be a job title, also.

[06:06] John: I just found out Marion is not going to be on that panel. Marion Copeland, our mutual friend—she was going to be on there. I'm like, “oh, that's great. She’ll have a lot to say. We're not going to need to talk.” She said she wasn't going to be able to make it. I'm like, “man, now we need to get other people on there.”

[06:20] David: She's going to be at ComiCon though?

[06:21] John: Yeah. It was a specific timing issue.

[06:24] David: Oh, okay. Got it. Doing some signings, doing some panels, and doing the ComiCon thing.

[06:29] John: Yeah, hopefully get to walk around.

[06:30] David: Like a real professional.

[06:32] John: Well, yeah, I want to check some stuff out, too. I'm hoping to make it to the Groo panel, which seems relevant to the show, the way we often talk about that comic. Sergio Aragones won't be there, but I think the rest of the team will be there.

[06:41] David: Oh, he's not even going to make it down to San Diego, huh? Man, that's not a good sign.

[06:47] John: Evanier, on his blog, said they were going to try to call him during it, or something. I think it's more of a location thing than anything. Look, I don't have any reason to suspect it's anything other than that.

[06:59] David: Oh, okay. I hope that's true.

[07:02] John: […] Who knows?

[07:05] David: Yeah, maybe Sergio's taking a year off, like me. He probably heard that I wasn't going to be there. So, he was like, “I'm just going to take a little break, too.”

[07:12] John: Maybe he just heard about your Pass Pass.

[07:16] David: Past my new license, my license to wind?

[07:19] John: Yeah. License to wind. Yeah, that's good. I like that.

[07:22] David: Our listeners aren't seeing the way your wheels are spinning in your head right now, John, but I can tell that you're going to add this to one of your comic books. I can tell, you're in your head, like, “this is comedy gold, and I am going to put this in every comic that I write moving forward.”

[07:36] John: I can't help thinking about the--what was it? The 4th Transformers movie? It was the one after the Shia LaBeouf character. They had Mark Wahlberg in it.

[07:46] David: Oh, that one.

[07:47] John: Yeah. This girl, but her boyfriend had a pass that let him sleep with her, even though she was under 18, and that was a big thing that kept showing up. So, that's what I imagine you have. That's where I'm equating all this in my head.

[08:01] David: What I have is way more precious and valuable than what that guy. You talked to any man on the planet--they want this license. I can make millions off this license.

[08:10] John: Potentially, you're putting your life in jeopardy just by saying you have that.

[08:15] David: To be clear, it does have my name on it. So, you have to have the same name as me. So, maybe it's not as easily transferable as that.

[08:22] John: You’re probably all right, but I'm looking forward to ComiCon. We'll do a wrap-up, I guess, afterwards. I'll tell you everything.

[08:27] David: Yeah, I'm anxious to hear how it goes. I'm a little sad that I'm missing it, but not super sad. I'm doing other stuff that is very fun. I'll be in South Carolina. We'll be hanging out in South Carolina, and not thinking about comic books, probably. So, our listeners should check in and tell us how ComiCon went.

[08:47] John: Yeah, write your ComiCon experience on a piece of paper and throw it away. That'll be fine. That's a joke from the novelization of the Howard the Duck movie, by the way.

[08:55] David: John, that's too deep a cut, man. You can't go that deep.

[08:57] John: It is.

[08:58] David: You can't go that deep. I have no idea what you're talking about right now. Neither does anybody else.

[09:03] John: No, it's fine

[09:04] David: The novelization of the failed Howard the Duck movie?

[09:08] John: Well, I mean, I guess, failed is an opinion thing, but yeah.

[09:10] David: Did you really the Howard the Duck movie?

[09:12] John: I mean, how old was I when that came out? I was excited because there weren't a lot of comic book movies. I think my mom worked at a bookstore. I mean, I know my mom worked at a bookstore, but I think she worked at one right then. So, it was relatively easy to get, whatever, the $3 paperbacks, half-off, or something. So, I remember reading it on a summer camping trip, and then when I saw the movie, I remember the novelization was actually much funnier, but again, I've not revisited either of those since the year they came out.

[09:44] David: 1986. The first thing that pops up, when you type in “Howard the Duck movie” is “why is Howard the Duck rated R?”

[09:52] John: It wasn't, was it?

[09:54] David: I don’t remember, John.

[09:55] John: It has duck breasts in it.

[09:58] David: Jesus.

[10:00] John: And I don't mean that in the sense of a dinner. I mean that in the sense of mammalian duck breasts.

[10:07] David: Where are we going?

[10:08] John: I don't know.

[10:09] David: We need to pull the […]. Speaking of comic book movies, John, I have now watched the new Superman film. John, it is very good.

[10:20] John: It's divisive, I guess.

[10:23] David: The vitriol amongst the Twitterati is insane. I don't understand what's going on. I don't live inside a bubble, or anything. I understand that there's Snyderbro’s, people that love the Snyderverse version of the Snyder movies. I always thought they were just okay, for me. I didn't love any of them. I felt they were always too dark, and they didn't feel very comic booky, I guess. I liked some of them okay, but I didn't really totally love any of them. Did he do Wonder Woman? I did enjoy Wonder Woman. That was not him directing? I liked the Aquaman one. I did like the Snyder cut of the Justice League. I think we talked about this.

[11:06] John: I think there's no movie ever, where I have a wider disparity in my opinion of it, between the theatrical version of Superman vs Batman and the extended cut of Superman vs Batman. I hate the theatrical cut, and I really like the extended cut. I actually really enjoyed it. It shocked me that I enjoyed it, as much as I did. I hated that movie, and I'm like, “would I want to see more of it?” It's like, “oh, no. All the stuff that I was missing from the movie, like plot coherence and character development, was actually there. They just cut it out.” I don't have the hatred against it that a lot of people do. This is the two guys that made the Dawn of the Dead remake--writer of that movie, James Gunn, and director of that movie, Zack Snyder. That's funny.

[11:52] David: I forgot about that. I just don't understand why you can't like both things. That's the thing that's confusing. It's confusing to me. Genuinely confusing. Like, “hey, I like those other movies okay, but that doesn't mean that I can only like that version.” I don't know. I'm very confused by all of it. I don’t understand why you have to hate the new thing. For me, it's just, there's the Curt Swan version of Superman, and then there's the Dan Jurgens version of Superman, and there's the Grant Morrison/Frank Quitely version of Superman, and I enjoy all of them. They're definitely different versions of the same character, but why can't I just enjoy all of them and just be happy that they get around? Again, I don't want to really jump into the debate too much, because I genuinely don't understand it, but it's very confusing.

[12:40] John: Here's something I do think about that, sometimes, though, is--what are we, in our 30s, or so, roughly speaking?

[12:46] David: Yeah, sure.

[12:48] John: No, but we're older, we've been through stuff, where things that were the way they were changed, in terms of characters and entertainment, and stuff. I definitely look at some things that I enjoy that, if I was going into it thinking that that is what it is going to be from now on, and it was going a way I liked, and then they made it into something I don't like, I could see having a negative reaction to it. I always think about Ralph Macchio at Marvel, talking about when Jack Kirby came onto the Black Panther comic, and Don McGregor had been writing these really sociopolitical stories about Africa--I mean, I don't know really serious is the right way to describe it, but fairly serious for the time--and Kirby comes on, and they're fighting King Solomon's frogs, and he was just like, “this is terrible. I loved where this comic was going before, and now it's just goofy,” but for me, when I read those, I was reading them 20 years later, or whatever. The Kirby stuff was just fun Kirby stuff. I loved it, and I feel like now, you can look at that and be like, “well, the direction that character went was other ways. It was all fine. You can enjoy all that stuff.” Sometimes, the directional changes, time heals those, and maybe everybody will heal. Anyway. Let's talk about the movie itself.

[14:06] David: I want to give you one more anecdote. Yeah, I agree. That all makes sense to me, and just to put it in a little more context, because that reminds me of something, I was having a conversation with my niece last night, and she was saying she had just been to Disneyland recently--we've been going to Disneyland a lot lately--and we were talking about, “what's your favorite ride?” and she said, “Pirates of the Caribbean,” and she's only experienced the Pirates of the Caribbean that's there now, and I said, oh, that used to be my favorite ride, but they've changed it so much that it's not anymore,” and she didn't even realize that it really changed. She was like, “oh, when they added Jack Sparrow, or something like that?” I was like, “well, yeah, but they changed it before that even. When I was a kid, that whole ride had one coherent narrative that made lots of sense, and it had funny little joke bits all throughout it, and serious pieces, and at the end of the day, the bad guys get their comeuppance, and it's a really fun little ride. The story around the ride was really fun and entertaining, in addition to it just being a fun actual ride--the physical aspect of it,” and she was like, “oh,” and I started telling her bits and pieces of what had changed, and she's like, “oh. Sounds like the new version is way better.” I'm like, “yeah, well there you go.”

It's not that I don't like the new version. It's just that I like that other version better, but I guess the big thing, for me, was that I need to be open-minded enough to accept that the new thing--maybe it is better. Maybe the only reason it's better, to me, is because I experienced it differently for the first time, at an age where things were much more important. So, it made me really give pause to my own personal interpretations of what that ride was about, and you're right. That only comes, though, at the age I'm at, and you're at. That's happened to us a couple of times now--more than a couple of times, at this point, especially when it comes to superhero being retro, actively changed, and stuff. That stuff happens on, it seems, a monthly basis these days. That's all I had about that, John. I don't know how we got into that, but that piece is confusing me, and the reason it’s confusing me is because I like some of the Snyder stuff, and boy, this new movie, I just adored. I loved it. I had such a good time with it.

[16:33] John: Yeah. That's awesome. I got my thoughts out before. So, I want to hear yours, but we've got to get into some spoiler territory here, probably.

[16:41] David: Yeah, I think we're okay. It’s been a couple of weeks now. So, definitely, spoilers, everybody. I think we're going to definitely talk about a few bits and pieces in here that, if you haven't watched it, you should definitely watch it, if you don't want to have it spoiled. So, fast forward a little bit. This is the second time we've told people to fast forward.

[16:58] John: It counts as a view. So, that's okay.

[17:00] David: Okay, is that how it works? I don't know. When do we get paid? That's the part that I want to know. We haven't had anybody listen long enough to actually get paid for anything, John. I don't know how that pay thing works, but I feel like we're missing something there. Maybe it's because people aren’t listening all the way through.

[17:16] John: There you go. Yeah, I’m sure that's it. Yes.

[17:23] David: So, here's a bunch of stuff that I loved about Superman. One, the movie starts with him being defeated, which immediately gives him a level of vulnerability that makes him more relatable. “Okay, fantastic. This is a guy who's been kicked and beaten down, and he's getting back up, and he's going to try to keep going, even though he's been kicked and beaten down.” Totally relatable, very human, regular, normal guy level stuff, and of course, it's all in this bigger picture, or this bigger stage, but it's still a very relatable thing. I really liked that. The other thing that I liked about it is that, a lot of the movie, Superman is not fighting anybody. He's trying to save everybody. Most of his time is spent trying to save people, or squirrels. He's trying to save everybody--even the people that he's being forced to fight, and he doesn't want to fight. He wants to save people. That's really his primary motivation. I think that really comes through, throughout the story. This guy is very invested. He cares deeply about the people around him, whether he knows them or not, and I really liked that. That felt like the core of the Superman. My favorite versions of the Superman are that version. So, I loved that, especially that piece where he saved everyone in this square.

There's a giant Kaiju monster in the middle of New York, in the middle of the town square, and he has cleared the area of everyone, and he's trying to find a way to stop this giant monster without doing serious harm to it, A, and also, without harming anything that the Kaiju's around, because the Kaiju’s so giant, if it falls one way or another, it’s going to destroy buildings and blocks, and all he's concerned about is containing this problem, in a way that it doesn't hurt anybody, including the problem itself, which is the Kaiju, to the point of, he stops what he's doing to save a squirrel. Every life is important, and I loved that. I was like, “that was such a great piece,” and then I guess the cherry on top, or the button-up of that particular thought was, I think he's talking to Lois, and he says, “I’ve got to go get the dog.” They’re like, “you're going to get locked up.” He's like, “well, I think the dog’s there. I’ve got to go save the dog. He's not very good dog, but think that I’ve got to go take care of him.”

[20:02] John: “He’s alone, and he's probably scared.” I remember. 

[20:05] David: Yeah. “He's alone, and he's probably scared. I need to go be there with him.” No care for his own safety, or what's going to happen to him. Just that he's got to go help his dog, because he knows the dog’s potentially in peril--not even in peril, but rather, afraid, and I was just like, “man, what a great little moment there, to really put a capstone on who this character is, and the way that he thinks.” So, there's a lot of little moments like that, but those were two of the big ones, for me, and they both were around animals, but I think he was making a point there, that James Gunn, the director, was making a point there, with those two particular pieces. So, I loved that. I thought the special effects were fantastic. I thought the ensemble cast was a really great mix.

 There's a moment where I think it's Superman, he's standing next to Mr. Terrific, or somebody’s standing next to Mr. terrific, and I think they're looking at the portal or something--anyway, it's a back shot of Mr. Terrific, and that is so perfectly the comic book. The fair play is running down both sides of both sleeves, and that black jacket with the white sleeves—it is a hot outfit. That outfit looks so cool. That’s a great comic book superhero costume, and they nailed it. They made it look as cool as it could possibly look, and I was like, “man, they didn't shy away from any of that.” The fair play is right there, down the sleeve, and it's such a part of that character. The fair play idea, historically speaking, going all the way back, fair play is a big deal, and they didn't take it away. They left it in there, and it could have looked weird and corny, and out of place, and it totally didn't. It totally finished the look, the way it's supposed to. I loved that. So, they treated the ensemble cast really well. It felt like a comic book that I was watching on the screen, which I loved, and while the characters weren't specific versions of comic book characters, but they were all true to the core, in my opinion, of those individual characters. Guy Gardner's the snarky jerk who's got a heart of gold, and then there's that Mr. Terrific’s super brain, who's always thinking two steps ahead, and cocky, and definitely a leader.

[22:34] John: This is obviously a reference to a different comic book line, but at the end, when he's going over to Lex Luthor’s computer, and the Marc Maron-looking guy is like, “I can help,” he goes, “I don't need your help. I'm goddamn Mr. Terrific.” That was just such a good line.

[22:53] David: I loved that, too. Yeah, it was really good, man. The only part that took me out for just half a second, and I still liked it, I still thought it was good, was when Krypto comes in and beats the hell out of Lex Luther. It was a funny moment, but it was so reminiscent of when the Incredible Hulk does that to Loki.

[23:12] John: Oh, you're right.

[23:14] David: I recalled that, and it threw me out a little bit, because it was basically the same joke, but I still liked it. I still thought it was funny, and it was different enough that I think it was okay, but it pulled me out a little bit, but outside of that, and a couple other little minor niggling little things, most of them I can't even remember, I was just having a great time. I got teared up a couple of times. I was super into it.

[23:40] John: A couple of things I've been thinking about with it--the only thing that really bothered me about the movie is that the end gets into that “we can do a clean version of 9/11, by having everybody leave Metropolis.” I mean, that's a story point in the movie, and it is on screen in the movie, but it's still so preposterous that you could evacuate a city and smash a bunch of buildings, and nobody's going to get hurt, and then also at the end, when it matters that they reveal anything, I'm like, “what world does this take place in?” When the media reveals that Lex Luthor’s behind it. Does anybody care?

[24:18] David: Sadly, that was the point where I was like “this isn't real.” Maybe in 1980, this stuff worked, but it doesn't work like that now.

[24:27] John: The thing that I really liked about it, the more I thought about that, that seems they don't have cell phones or Google. That seems like such a modern thing that you'd have trouble wrapping your head around, or I have trouble wrapping my head around. I remember this line that Alan Moore had, and I can't remember where Alan Moore had said this--if it was in the introduction to Dark Knight Returns, that he wrote, which was a brilliant piece of writing, that introduction--it was in one of the original Dark Knight paperbacks.

[24:54] David: I don't know that I've read that.

[24:56] John: I don’t know if it holds up that much now, but at the time, just that idea of him analyzing what Frank Miller was doing, especially knowing where that two diverge immediately after that, but the two of them, that year, were where comics grew up, but it was either there, or maybe just some interview, or something, but he's talking about “when you're a kid, you see Superman, and Superman's morality gives you a morality that you can live with. As you get older, you start to learn there's more nuances to things, and you do have to think about things a little bit more, but the basic morality of what Superman is--you help people, you're truthful, you use your powers for good, all that stuff--that gives you a baseline to start operating off of,” and I feel like societally, across the board, we've gone so far away from that, that having a Superman movie that comes, like a course-correction, and is like, “no, here's a guy that's trying to do good.”

It brings up some of the arguments in the movie, and it leaves them unsolved, because this is a comic book movie, and there's more to come, and there's a lot of stuff that is dangling at the end. I assume we’re going to see the fallout of, what's the Justice Gang going into that other country--? We're going to see the fallout of that in Peacemaker. That's got to be what the story is, because all those characters are in Peacemaker, but just having that, why does he want to stop the war? Because he doesn't want people to get hurt, and that seems like the baseline that you should operate off of, and then make decisions with that underlying it, and you still need to go to war, sure, of course, but you shouldn't lose sight of the fact that there are people in there.

[26:23] David: And I don't think Superman actually thinks that. I don't think Superman thinks there is any time to go to war.

[26:29] John: No, I agree.

[26:30] David: In the movie, he is genuinely confused by Lois's concern at his actions. He genuinely is like, “I don't know what you're talking about. People were going to die, and I stopped it. No one died. No one got hurt.” End of story for Superman. That's the end of it. There is no questioning that that's what you do. Maybe that comes back to haunt him, but I was like, “wow, there you go. There's a superhero. That's what you want.”

[27:01] John: I hope that Superman maintains like that, throughout the whole run of this existence of the DCU, but I hope other characters have different reactions to it. I hope there is a little bit more. I hope that it shows that […] that are more clearly for adults, that it gets into some other stuff. That's fine, but the Superman, I love that it's not, and even Superman is such a kid. He's such a grown-up kid in that movie, and the movie is all built around that, in a way that I love. You talk about the moments with animals. There's so many with that, in this movie. Krypto is such a big part of the movie.

[27:34] David: A shockingly large part.

[27:36] John: So, he set it up that a pet is front and center in this movie. So, you're thinking about pets in there. Friend of the show, Mason, was telling me, originally, there was a scene when they go into the Fortress of Solitude, where Ultraman punches Krypto, and nothing more happens. That's all. Then he gets wrapped up in the metal thing, and everything. That was the worst testing scene that James Gunn had ever seen in his life, with test audiences. We're just going to take that out, but yeah, Superman saves a bunch of animals. He saves the squirrel, but when they're evacuating Metropolis, all the pets are going, too. They make a point of showing people taking their pets into their vehicles, and they're leaving. Old lady’s got her turtles, and that's such a kid thing to think about, of “oh, they're leaving, they're evacuating the city. Are all the animals okay?” And that's a kid thing, but also, that is what I think. When I see that, I'm like, “are the animals going to be okay?” I've got a dog who's not a good dog.

Going back and making Superman, both emotionally and physically, but also still that big kid, he's doing the thing you dream of being, when you're a kid, of doing good, of the good that you can do--it recalls the best of Christopher Reeve in the role, without it being a pastiche of it--and Brandon Routh is fine--but the way the Bryan Singer movie was. It was just a pastiche of that. That didn't feel honest, in the way that this feels honest in approaching that stuff. So, yeah, I thought that was great. Well, I meant to bring up last time, but it's much better to bring it up here--did you notice, or was this my imagination, a chunk of that fight in Metropolis, at the end, when it's Superman fighting Ultraman, I very strongly believe that they very intentionally have a big chunk of it taking place in an analog of the lobby of the San Diego Convention Center, and then they punch them outside into the neighboring baseball stadium, and I think that that was intentionally set to look like San Diego ComiCon. Do you know what I'm talking about?

[29:35] David: Yeah, I know the scene you're talking about. I totally know, but--

[29:38] John: They’re in a white lobby with a big open window out to the city.

[29:42] David: Yeah, I wasn't paying that close attention to the architecture.

[29:46] John: If they weren't actually going for that feel, I bet that that was just operating subconsciously, because that reminded me a whole lot of San Diego Convention Center. There isn't an equivalent of that in New York. […], and then you get punched into Yankee Stadium. They're not near each other.

[30:02] David: Oh, that's interesting. Yeah, maybe. I don't know. I didn't notice that part. I didn't catch that.

[30:07] John: Love it, either way. Whatever.

[30:13] David: So, I want to talk a little bit about parents, because I feel like those were the biggest swings that the movie took, in terms of changing the core of the Superman, and the comic book versions of Superman, and all the characters. So, the Ma and Pa Kent that we see in this movie is radically different from the last couple of iterations that we've seen. What did you think?

[30:38] John: Ma and Pa Kent got real cool after Smallville. They aged way down and they got much cooler.

[30:45] David: Yeah, Smallville definitely was the point.

[30:49] John: They were TV show people, and I mean that in a good way. That was fun for Smallville. I thought that was really cool.

[30:58] David: I love that version of them.

[30:59] John: It’s not like your parents in high school are as old as you thought they were when you were a kid, or whatever. They do have lives. They do stuff. This definitely seemed like it was going back, even exaggerating the John Byrne 1980s version of the characters, where Pa was chunkier and Ma was there, but crucially, they weren't dead, which they had been up till John Byrne started writing and drawing Superman, but they definitely had that Midwestern, salt of the earth, utterly un-hip, can't use cell phones, stuff like that. I don't even think they had cell phones when Smallville came out, in any meaningful way, but the mom in Smallville could use a cellphone. If you handed it to her now, she’d use it. I liked it. It made a good balance against his bad parents, which I thought was a fun twist, that Jor-El and Lara were not good, and it also, somehow makes the whole, shooting a baby off into space when your planets exploding, make a whole lot more sense, if you're evil.

[32:03] David: Yeah, who does that?

[32:04] John: Yeah. There's never a point where that's the right thing to do.

[32:07] David: If you think it's the only way to save your kid, you’d do it.

[32:10] John: You don't have built a baby-sized rocket. You build a rocket that can hold three people. That's the thing. You don't have “dog- and baby-sized. The end.”

[32:23] David: He's working with the materials he had, in hand. He didn't have enough stuff, man.

[32:27] John: Maybe, but I thought they were good. I don't know. What do you think of Ma and Pa?

[32:31] David: I loved this version of Ma and Pa Kent. I loved, as you said, the salt of the earth, the heavy Southern Midwest accent. Lay it on thick, man. I thought that was great. The thing that was cool was that they felt like regular people, and again, it grounded Superman. It made Superman normal, in a way that is impossible to make a superpower being, who can fly, and is invulnerable, and can move at the speed of light--it's not relatable, at all, but his parents are just regular folks. They're just good old boys and girls, and they come from that Bible belt. At least that's how they sound, and how it looks, from that Midwestern America. So, I loved that. It instantly grounds Superman and gives Superman a back story that's instantly--I don't know--it tells so much about what his upbringing was like, without them having to say a word.

You see those two people talking and interacting with each other, and with their son, Superman, and you're like, “Oh, yeah. I know exactly what his childhood looked like. I know how that guy was brought up,” and I can see, just looking at those two and hearing what they're talking about, and how they're speaking, and where they're coming from, how he gets to where he is, where he's got such a deep, abiding love of the world that he's living in, and how he can feel like he's one of us, because man, there's not a better version of us, in the United States, than his parents, as it's laid out. So, I thought it was really smart, to ground those characters that way, and really just dig into the heart of America feel, and it speaks to the truth, justice, and the American way. Man, maybe we're not saying American way, but Superman is all about the American way, if you look at his parents. So, I thought that was a really good way to instill that in him, without ever having to say anything, just by making his parents who they were, in the piece.

So, I like that they're a little older, because, of course, they're older. Superman’s 30 years old in this movie. Of course, they're not going to be 20-somethings. They're not going to be in their 40s, even. Come on. They're in their early 60s, probably, and they look like it. It's great. They sound like the people that they should sound like, if that's where he’s from--Kansas? And I thought the little speech that the dad gave--again, that was a one-minute monologue, and it just really sets up who Superman is, and where he comes from, in that one little bit, “hey, I'm proud of you,” and then on the flip side of it, his now-evil parents. So, that was the big change, I think. That was a much bigger change. Ma and Pa Kent being more folksy, that's not that drastic of a swing, but making his birth parents evil—that felt like a pretty big swing. Even though it was a big swing, it's pretty safe. That's a pretty safe change to make. If you want to make your mark and make a change, I think that's a good spot to look, because his birth parents don't play any meaningful part in the overall story. It's his back story, where he comes from, and that's not that important to the character, the fact that he comes from another planet. I don't know.

[36:02] John: It's one of those things that comes and goes, in terms of importance. I think that's one of the things about Superman enduring after the superhero boom ended post-World War 2, is that he was also a science fiction character, like Hawkman, or somebody, wasn't. Then they remade Hawkman. He is a science fiction character, but Superman was. He was able to go on adventures, and you were able to see all those stories of “well, what if Krypton hadn't done this? So, what about that time that Jor-El had to become Superman before Superman did?” There is a lot of stuff there. I’ve seen some writing about this, that back at Marvel, Bill Jemas used to say this thing of “what is your metaphor?” and it isn't the best way necessarily to write a story, but it is the thing that you sometimes need to check, that when you're telling these stories, where things are metaphorical about larger issues, what are your storytelling choices saying about the larger thing? And there is that danger that this is saying that “no, immigrants actually are here to destroy and take over America,” but I think the larger thing that it was saying is that “you're not what you were born. You're what you become.” I think Pa says something like that. I think that's more meaningful than being able to figure out a way to take offense to the way that that's constructed, or make a reading that the movie clearly isn't attempting to make, and I don't think it goes over the top on it. I don't know.

We've seen Krypton a bunch of times. It immediately clears up a bunch of stuff. We've seen Batman's parents get danced at like that, a little bit, here and there. It's usually revealed that “Thomas Wayne actually was a good guy.” I think in one of the telltale video games, he's just not. I think they just use that Long Halloween, or whatever story, Hush story, and find out that he was a big guy working for criminals, and stuff. So, it touches here and there on Batman, but I don't know. I thought that that was nice. I liked it. His real parents are the ones that raised him, and I think that that's nice.

[38:03] David: Yeah, I think it's to-be-continued on that part of the story, too. It's a nice little foil in this movie, but I can see that little piece of information having larger ramifications down the road, at some point, which creates some really interesting fun conflict that we probably haven't seen around Superman before. So, if they do end up going in that direction, at one point or another, which seems like they might, just because of the way Supergirl’s presented--

[38:35] John: Yeah, exactly. Not the only person from Krypton. So, what does that mean?

[38:38] David: Not only not the only person from Krypton, but the other person from Krypton, that we're aware of, seems to be a bit of a douchebag. She’s an ass when she shows up. I heard that the reaction for Supergirl, when she showed up on screen, was a pretty big reaction. People were really happy for it, and she seemed cool and funny, but she did seem like an asshole, to me. She was half-drunk and wasn't very appreciative of the fact that Superman’s been taking care of her dog, and I don't know. I was like, “you're a jerk.” So, the only other Kryptonian we've ever come across, at this point, is a jerk. It's an interesting spin. I'm interested in where it goes, and I don't feel like, “yes, that's not comic book canon.” It didn't feel like it was breaking the rules, in any way that would push me out.

[39:29] John: It seemed like a clever twist that you'd find out in a comic book, and that's one of those things. It bothered me, for a second, that Superman basically lets Ultraman fall into a black hole and die, and then I thought about it for 2 seconds, and I'm like, “wait a minute. If Superman fell into that black hole, he'd be fine. So, Ultraman's obviously fine. That's probably a story that gets dealt with later, as well.” That's probably […] trying to figure out how the Phantom Zone works, because it is astounding, in this entire movie, and this is where I do think my complaint about the bloodless destruction of the city--I don't mind it that much--One person dies in this movie. There's one death. I will bet dollars to donuts that that guy, the evil president of the country that was invading--I bet he is alive, and I bet he is in Peacemaker.

[40:16] David: Oh, you think so? I mean, they show him land.

[40:21] John: No, they don't. They cut to the Alka-Seltzer.

[40:22] David: Are you sure? I thought they show him splatter.

[40:26] John: I don't know. Maybe.

[40:27] David: Oh, maybe I'm remembering it—[…].

[40:33] John: No more than two people die, including the robots in the beginning, and that was a part where I'm like, “that's sad. The robots died,” but no, they're okay. They're fine. They're better than fine, at the end. They're great. You have a couple of seconds of being worried about Krypto, and then it's, “oh, no, obviously, that's what the movie--No, he's fine. Krypto's fine.”

[40:53] David: I did feel like the killing of the shop owner, or the restaurant owner, or whatever, in front of Superman and Metamorpho, by Lex Luthor, that was one of the bits that I had a small complaint about, now that we're talking about it. Lex Luthor feels like he would be more calculating than that. He flippantly says, “I thought I would have more—"

[41:13] John: Yeah, I don't think he thought that was going to happen.

[41:15] David: I didn't think so either. That doesn't feel Lex Luthor. That's my concern. The level of Machiavellian plots that he has been laying out, to entrap Superman and try to take him down, are through the roof. This guy's been thinking this through, and to flippantly kill that guy, in front of Metamorpho, in particular, seems like a slip, in a way that maybe Lex Luthor wouldn't have done. He's a little more calculating than that. He would have set that scenario up better, to get the result that he wanted. Again, it's not a big complaint. I don't know. That one threw me out a little bit, and that death was brutal, man.

[42:03] John: Yeah, it was mean. For a character that had 15 seconds of screen time, it was really meaningful. Again, silly, in that they did a lot of damage to a city, and then that newspaper headline is about the one guy that died the day before, but that's cool, but I loved it. I liked that. That wasn't a complaint.

[42:22] David: It really did feel like a comic book.

[42:27] John: I had one other thing. This is sort of related to you talking about Silver Surfer, and characters that you have a version of that you like, and that you think about a lot. This is going to sound snarkier than I mean it. Does anyone like Hawkman and Hawkgirl the way they are now? I don't mean her in the movie. I liked her in the movie. I thought she was cool in the movie. I enjoyed her. She was like Aubrey Plaza in Parks and Rec, when she's not as Hawkgirl, and when she is Hawkgirl, she's how you might imagine that character being if she was a superhero, screeching like a hawk, and stuff. I enjoyed the performance. I enjoyed everything about the character in here, but what I mean is, you like Norrin Radd as Silver Surfer, because you like the character of Norrin Radd, and you like the back story of Norrin Radd, and him giving up his humanity to save his planet, and blah, blah, blah, all the stuff about Norrin Radd and Silver Surfer that makes sense. Are there fans of the current DC Universe Hawkman? That is the most incomprehensible character, to me, anywhere, even more so than Savage Dragon or Spawn, or something.

[43:37] David: I think the last time anybody liked Hawkman--well, the last time I liked Hawkman--Well, I've liked Hawkman twice in my life. One was Hawkworld, because that was badass. Loved it, and then then next time I liked Hawkman was the JSA run that Geoff Johns and who was the original writer for the JSA stuff?

[43:57] John: Oh, Goyer.

[44:00] David: Yeah, I think it was, and they cleaned up the all the different iterations and different back stories of Hawkman, and made it all make sense, and that version then made sense, but since then, I think it's gotten muddy.

[44:16] John: That was Geoff Johns at the height of Geoff Johns, Geoff Johns-ing stuff. Mr. Terrific. He's about to do that with Green Lantern. I really liked what he did with Green Lantern and the spectrums of emotions, and all the stuff that he untangled to make Hal Jordan a good character again, and I thought that was really good. I didn't really read all of the JSA run. So, maybe I'm missing out on that key piece that would make me like the version of the character, but I like the old Silver Age Gardner Fox/Joe Kubert stuff, the Golden Age Joe Kubert/Gardner Fox stuff. The original Hawkman is the guy who gets whatever mystical thing, and he fights crime, and he's a cop from another planet. That's cool. Hawkworld took that and cyberpunked it up, and gave him the only cool Hawkman costume. That Hawkworld costume is so rad.

[45:10] David: Yeah, that's rad.

[45:11] John: Same thing with Hawkgirl in both of those, but all you come across now is just this nonsense about reincarnation, and them going through all these times, and I've seen in a bunch of TV shows and movies, and comics. It always seems like it's starting from square one, with me, and I was reading the New History of the DC Universe, and it gets to the section on Hawkman and I’m like, “all right, see what this is, too. Let’s see how Mark Wade clears it up,” and it's like, “whatever. Okay, he's reincarnated on Thanagar, and on earth. Whatever.” I guess there are people that came in on the Geoff Johns’ run, and that was clearly a good version of the story we're talking about. I just don’t like everything that came after it.

[45:51] David: I don't know. I don't have a lot of interest in the character, but noticeably, John, in the Superman movie, Hawkgirl is the least developed character of all of them, by far. We do not yet know really anything about Hawkgirl other than, when she fights, she screams a lot. That's all we really know about her, which, man, I don't know if I like that scream. It's annoying, but at the same time, can you imagine somebody just flying at you, with a giant mace, and just screaming these hawk screams? That's very scary, John. That would scare the crap out of me.

[46:27] John: The other problem with Hawkgirl, the hawks, is they fly and fight with medieval weapons, and here they're on a team of three, one of whom is Mr. Terrific, who floats around and has these orbs that can do anything, and I think on the promotional material, the actor mentions he's the third smartest person in the universe. He's a super genius. The other guy has a ring that can do anything, and then you're Hawkgirl, and you've got wings and a mace, but that scream makes it seem like she's totally on par with them. It's one of those things, like Batman having one of those moves, where it’s like “of course, Batman would be up there with Shazam and Superman, and Wonder Woman. The screen makes it work in that movie.

[47:12] David: Yeah. The Green Lantern ring is the best they've used the ring. They've finally figured out how to use that ring. I was really happy with that. When he's destroying the tanks with the middle finger, that one caught me off guard. I was laughing pretty hard on that. That was pretty funny.

[47:30] John: My last big thing I want to say, other than how much I love Guy Gardner, is I love that he is a jerk. He saves that kid, and then he's like, “sorry, kid. You got an upgrade,” and then you look at that kid, and you're like, “that kid is now the world's biggest Guy Gardner fan.” Guy Gardner wasn’t saying it shittily to the kid. He's just like, “I'm your guy.” It's like, “yeah, you are. That's awesome.” One of the things the movie does a lot of is do the exact same things that happened in the Snyder versions, but twist them around, or turn them. Lex Luthor has this plan that is reminiscent of the plan in Batman vs Superman, of turning people against Superman, and having Superman engaged in a foreign war to turn people against him, but it comes out totally different. It plays out real different, and one of them is the big thing in Man of Steel, where there's the--I don't know--the giant beam thing in Metropolis, or on the opposite side of the world. So, Superman has to abandon Metropolis and go fight that thing, and the movie sets up this duality of that, of Superman has to be in two places. He has to stop the war, but he has to get to Metropolis to stop the rift that's going to tear the city apart, but then Superman uses his greatest superpower to save the other country, which is his ability to inspire others to do the best that's within them, and that's awesome. That's how he wins, in the end--by doing the actual real power that Superman really does have.

[48:56] David: That's awesome. That's a good catch. What a good movie. I really enjoyed that. I was trying to think of the last few superhero movies. I’ve enjoyed plenty of movies, but the last few superhero movies I've seen, that I really enjoyed. I think it's right up there of the movies of the last few years. Deadpool vs Wolverine, for me, last year, was just a super fun romp. That movie was exactly what I wanted it to be, and delivered in every way that I expected it to. I loved it. I super enjoyed that movie. I thought it was super fun. Ryan Reynolds is the perfect Deadpool for me. He is Deadpool for me, and I was thinking, before that, the last one that I really enjoyed was Guardians of Galaxy 3, which is another James Gunn movie, just because I thought he ended that three-movie arc--that's the best landing of any three-movie arc I've ever seen, outside of maybe Back to the Future.

The ending to Guardians of Galaxy 3, the way he ended that, was so pitch perfect, and it set up so much for moving forward, while perfectly putting a button on so many plots and ideas, and thoughts that were happening around those three movies. I loved it. So, yeah, I guess I like James Gunn, because I was also thinking, that TV show, the Peacemaker, with John Cena--I've never been a John Cena guy, but I'm telling you, man, I love John Cena now, as an actor. Him as Peacemaker, I love him. I love him in that show, and I love that TV show. So, yeah. I'm going to be a Gunnverse guy, John, and maybe that's a thing. I'm going to be one of those.

[50:28] John: A Gunnman.

[50:29] David: There you go.

[50:30] John: I loved seeing John Cena show up in Superman. He’s in there for a second.

[50:34] David: Oh, yeah. Being interviewed. Yeah, that was good. The last thing that I really liked, the one other thing that was really great was Lex Luthor. Man, what’s that actor’s name? That guy was amazing. He was a great villain. He crushed that Lex Luthor, man. That was a really good Lex Luthor.

[50:56] John: Yeah. Nicholas Hoult.

[50:57] David: Nicholas Hoult. I thought he did a great job. I don't have too many Lex Luthor's that I don't like. I think everybody does a pretty good job with the Lex Luthor character.

[51:08] John: You were just saying beforehand, there's nothing in the world Kevin Spacey could do that would make you think less of him, because he's so good.

[51:17] David: Now, now. Let’s not get into that.

[51:20] John: Jesse Eisenberg was terrible.

[51:21] David: Oh, come on. I didn't think it was terrible. No, I wouldn't say that. I mean, I don't think I loved him, but I wouldn't go so far as to say I hated him. Anyway, I thought this guy did a great job. I really liked him as Lex Luthor. He looked like a believable Lex Luthor. I think they got a lot of cool things with that character, and the thing that was cool about this iteration of Lex Luthor is, at some point, he says, “yeah, I set up all this stuff to take control of half of a country and own it, and add billions and billions of dollars to my already billions of dollars, but I did all of that because I hate you, and it was just furthering my ability to take you down,” and I was just like, “yes. I want my villains to just have a hatred in their heart, man.” I thought that was fantastic. I really liked that. I thought “that's how I want my villains. Just real simple.” “I don't have to have a reason. I just hate you, and I want you to go,” and I think his reasons for his hatred are so great. The motivations for him to hate Superman are so great. There's so many different reasons for him to hate him, and he uses them all, man. It's great. So, I thought that was pretty good. I like the Lex Luthor character. I liked his motivations. I thought the guy that was acting as Lex Luthor was a very believable version of the villain.

[52:50] John: Probably my second favorite. My other favorite Lex Luthor, Michael Rosenbaum from Smallville, he did a voice of one of Luthor’s soldier guys, one of the guys that's yelling.

[52:59] David: Oh, really?

[53:00] John: Yeah.

[53:01] David: Oh, that's funny. Nice little Easter egg.

[53:04] John: Rachel Brosnahan is also great in this movie as Lois Lane. That's a great Lois Lane, and a terrific take on her. It seems like it's got all the spark from Lewis and Clark, and all that stuff--Margot Kidder, minus the part where she's just trying to figure out who Superman is, and somebody--I mean, she gets Mr. Terrific and goes out and rescues Superman and Krypto from the place.

[53:30] David: Yeah, she's got real agency, for sure.

[53:32] John: Yeah, she's got stuff to do, and Rachel Brosnan's terrific, in general, but also in the role.

[53:37] David: Who was the blonde character?

[53:39] John: Jimmy Olsen?

[53:40] David: The one that worked on the staff. Was it Lana Lang?

[53:43] John: Oh, Cat Grant.

[53:44] David: Cat Grant, yeah.

[53:45] John: I don't know […], but yeah, that's her character.

[53:49] David: That's not usually my type, but she's my type, John. There's some baddies in that movie, man. Lois Lane is definitely one of them, too. Well, John, there you go. There’s Superman movie, done. I'm anxious to, through the grapevine, hear about all the little Easter eggs that I didn't catch in this movie, but I thoroughly enjoyed it, regardless of that fact.

[54:13] John: Yeah, I thought Michael Ian Black was playing the Creeper. What's his name? Jack Ryder. I thought he was Jack Ryder, but apparently he's not. That's not what the guy’s name is. I think Michael Ian Black playing the Creeper in something would be really fun.

[54:27] David: For sure.

[54:28] John: Anyway, there you go.

[54:29] David: John, I think we do a good business here. What do you think? Should we wrap this one up?

[54:31] John: Cool. That was the Superman talk. What are we called? The Corner Box, with us, John Barber and David Hedgecock, and we'll be back next week. As always, stay safe, and look up.

[54:45] David: Thanks, everybody.

[54:46] John: Bye.

[54:46] David: Bye.

Thanks for joining us, and please subscribe, rate, and tell your friends about us. You can find updates, and links at www.thecornerbox.club, and we’ll be back next week with more from David, and John, here at The Corner Box.