FIRST LOOK: 'MAN OF STEEL'

HENRY CAVILL HAS SOME BIG RED BOOTS TO FILL

Zach Snyder (300, Watchmen) and Christopher Nolan (Batman: The Dark Knight, Inception) are collaborating on Warner Bros and Legendary Pictures most recent installment of DC comic’s epic Superman saga.

Well, almost.

The film’s crew was recently shaken by Nolan’s decision to work on the initial script with screenwriter David Goyer and then hand all creative control to Snyder, to enable him to focus on his own upcoming comic book blockbuster The Dark Knight Rises.

Man of Steel will star British born Henry Cavill as the lead, (Cavill was a front-runner for recent remake flop Superman returns, for which newcomer Brandon Routhe was cast) while Amy Adams will take the role of firey reporter and romantic interest ‘Lois Lane’. Adams knocked some pretty heavy-weight actresses off the top spot for this one, she was cast over Natalie Portman, Anne Hathaway, Kristen Stewart, Rachel McAdams, Olivia Wilde, Mila Kunis and Jessica Biel, to name a few.

Russell Crowe has been officially named as the protagonist’s birth father and Kryptonian ‘Jor-El’ and Kevin Costner and Diane Lane will resurrect the characters ‘Jonathan’ and ‘Martha Kent’, Clarks adoptive (and human) parents. Connie Nielson is currently rumoured to play ‘Lara’.

Surprisingly, long-time arch nemesis ‘Lex Luthor’ will not feature as main villain of the piece, instead Michael Shannon will make a star turn as heel ‘General Zod’.

Prestigious directors that didn’t make the cut included Black Swan’s Darren Aronofksy, Let Me In’s Matt Reeves and Source Code’s Duncan Jones. Ben Affleck reportedly turned down the job due to inexperience with VFX.

Warner Bros has announced the film will be a “clean reboot’ of the famous franchise. Hoping to start fresh and put a new spin on an old story.

In the last week, Bleeding Cool via the website Collider leaked a plot synopsis for the film which was met by outrage from the industry. The summary details the thread of a young reporter who roams the world covering news stories. He is compelled to use his secret powers to prevent a crisis in West Africa, causing him to return to his hometown and learn more about his origins, in order to ‘be the hero he was born to be’. For fans of the series, this won’t seem to stretch too far from what they were expecting. In fact, it should strike a chord with comic book readers who will no doubt see the similarity to a Mark Waid comic ‘Birthright’ which follows Kal-El from infancy to manhood, sees him witness a conflict in Western Africa between two fictional ethnic clans and which also sees him head back to Smallville to go on a voyage of personal discovery. With a rumoured budget of a modest 175 million dollars and a pressure to bring us something new, Man of Steel will have to really work to pull something out of the bag.