Superman: Doomsday

Superman: Doomsday is the first straight-to-DVD movie released as part of Warner Brothers Animation’s new DC Universe line – a series of animated films that adapt particular comic book stories. Superman: Doomsday is an adaptation of the sprawling “Death of Superman” storyline from the 1990s, the same storyline that almost became the plot to Superman Returns movie. However, there is something hollow about this first animated film. For me, and I can only speak personally, the 1990s “Death of Superman” storyline worked so well because it was so embedded within the rich tapestry of the ongoing Superman continuity. It drew upon the large supporting cast to add a sense of pathos that it shared with Jerry Siegel’s original 1961 “Death of Superman” imaginary story. This movie doesn’t have that room to do that and makes do with an abridged retelling of the original plotline.

The original “Death of Superman” storyline was made up of four story arcs. The first was the “Doomsday” fight which whistles past at a frenetic pace as its only really a plot device to get to the second block, the “Funeral For A Friend” arc, which is the richest part of the storytelling. That is deals with the funeral, the grieving of his friends, and machinations that happen once Superman is gone. That arc ends with Pa Kent having a near death experience and a vision of his son’s soul returning to Earth. The next arc, “Reign of the Supermen”, suddenly changes pace with the appearance of four pretenders that each claim to embody some element of Superman’s legacy. It was that arc which produced Superboy and Steel, arguably the two biggest breakout characters of the 1990s at DC. The final arc, the “Return of Superman”, is a massive blockbuster storyline that sees the returned, but still powerless Superman, unite his successors against a villain who posed as one of them.

In the movie, the first act is also the build up and fight between Superman and Doomsday. This is probably the closest act to the original story. The abridgement really hurts the story in the second act, where characterisation mattered the most, as we see Superman’s friends trying to cope with his death. Without an established group of running characters the creators have to use symbolic character beats to show how their versions of the characters cope. Not all of those beats work for me – Martha Kent was too hard, Jimmy too shallow, and Perry’s implied alcohol dependence just didn’t ring true.

After the truncated “Funeral For a Friend” part, the plot heavily diverges from source material, but many of its elements are reused from somewhere in the original story. In place of the “Reign of the Supermen” we now only have a single imposter rather than four and the entire Coast City/Mongul conclusion from “the Return of Superman” is dropped. The replacement carries plot elements cherry picked from of Superboy, the Eradicator, and the Cyborg and is essentially an adult Superman-clone. It starts out under Lex Luthor’s control, but his imperfect programming slowly causes it to pervert Superman’s mission and the original Man of Steel has to return from the dead to stop its misguided slaughter. Lex Luthor’s increased presence in the story turns him into an agitator whose opportunistic interference jumps the plot forward, first by releasing Doomsday and then by creating the clone.

The voice actors mostly give solid performances although it really took me a while to get use to Anne Heche and Adam Baldwin and as Lois Lane and Superman. Both of the leads feel like older versions than the ones in the original story – Heche’s Lois almost sounds elderly at times. This also isn’t helped by the Superman model which makes him look grizzled, a bit like Superman from the first season of Justice League (those cheek bones and chin make his face look puffy). I can understand why Timm and co. wanted to do this as a standalone story, but I just can’t help feel that it would have worked so much better if they’d stuck with their own established continuity and with their more established versions of these characters. And for all the protestations of trying to make this a standalone story it is still very close in the style to the Animate DCU – different model sheets, but same animation style (contrast with how different the current The Batman cartoon is).

This is the fourth direct adaptation of the “Death of Superman” storyline. The lacklustre arcade game can be excused, but the other two – a novelisation and a radio play – stuck quite closely to the original material. That is not unsurprising considering that the novelization was written by Roger Stern. The radio play was produced in the UK by the BBC and features a full cast recreation of the comics — in fact its so close you can almost read along. The radio play remains for me the greatest of the adaptations and eclipses even this DVD movie — to this day I still imagine Lois Lane sounding like Lorelei King and Superman like Stuart Milligan.

Ultimately, I wonder if Superman: Doomsday was something that Warner Brothers Animation had to get out of their system. After almost twenty years of Animated DCU under network Standards and Practices guidance this was the project that allowed them to get as blatantly violent as they wanted, to show civilians getting murdered by the villain, and to show the hero bleed. On one level this feels a bit like the Superman: Brainiac Attacks movie from last year — just a hell of a lot better. Not a perfect film, but an enjoyable and inventive retelling of the storyline nevertheless.

Other people say:

• “What the movie does better than the likes of Ultimate Avengers is focus on a more adult audience. Superman / Doomsday is PG-13 and carries a serious tone throughout. It’s a dark if ultimately uplifting story, and doesn’t opt for childish camp.” (Van Jensen, Arkansas Democrat Express).
• “Superman: Doomsday consists essentially of two bunker-busting fight scenes separated by a pretty good Lois Lane story.” (Tom Bondurant, Newsarama)
• “On the MAJOR PLUS side, one of the Special Features is “Requiem and Rebirth: Superman Lives!” documentary, a terrific look back at the phenomenon that was the real ‘Death’ storyline, and that alone made this disc worth the price of admission.” (M. E. Zimmerman, Amazon.com reviewer)
• “Some kid is going to watch this because his parent doesn’t know better, and that kid isn’t going to be corrupted, he’s going to realize that there’s a reasonable, adult, rational way to explore violence in a way that simultaneously condemns its bad aspects and shows what can be cool about it.” (Neal Bailey, Superman Homapage