Bryan Singer on what he would have changed about Superman Returns

Last Updated on August 5, 2021

I made no secret that I am a fan of SUPERMAN RETURNS. Both as an homage to the Richard Donner film and the classic version of Superman, SUPERMAN RETURNS is not the modern take of the Man of Steel that everyone was hoping for. Bryan Singer has always stood quietly behind the movie he made, but he recently made comments explaining what he would have done differently.

Empire interviewed Bryan Singer who said this about the fan backlash against SUPERMAN RETURNS.

“Half of that I understand and half of it I never will,” Singer told them. “It was a movie made for a certain kind of audience. Perhaps more of a female audience. It wasn’t what it needed to be, I guess. I think I could lop the first quarter off and start the movie a bit more aggressively and maybe find a way to start the movie with the jet disaster sequence or something. I could have grabbed the audience a little more quickly. I don’y know what would have helped. Probably nothing. If I could go again, I would do an origin. I would reboot it.”

I am not sure if I would reboot Superman again, especially as a follow-up to SUPERMAN RETURNS, but Singer also shared that plans were in motion after the 2006 release of the movie to make a sequel he planned to call MAN OF STEEL. Singer envisioned Darkseid as the villain in the sequel, a major upgrade from the real estate mogul version of Lex Luthor. I would have loved to see that movie. Why didn’t it happen? Singer went on to make VALKYRIE and the project lost steam at the studio.

Singer’s film is not nearly as bad as most make it out to be and is still a fun watch after the mega-destruction of MAN OF STEEL. I still will wonder what would have happened to the Brandon Routh version of Supes if they had made the original MAN OF STEEL.