The Flash Brings One Of The Craziest Hollywood Stories Of All Time To Life
This post contains major spoilers for "The Flash."
The Flash can run very, very fast. Indeed, it seems that Barry Allen (Ezra Miller) can run so fast, he can pass into an alternate dimension where time has no meaning. This dimension is colloquially called the Speed Force. While inside, Barry is protected by a supernatural bubble, and while in it, he can look out on a whirling carousel of images. Each image represents a particular moment from the past. The Flash is then able to step out of the bubble and into one of those moments, effectively traveling through time.
During the finale of "The Flash," both Barry and his time travel duplicate have both found out how to access the Speed Force, and the two will have conversations from inside. They had just fled a battle back on Earth, a battle that had become increasingly dire. One of the Barrys — Barry #2 — feels he can alter the past, and repeatedly enters the Speed Force, trying to change the course of the battle. Each time he tries, however, he fails. As Barry #2 repeatedly travels back in time, Barry #1 sees from within the Speed Force that reality itself is untangling. Heavenly spheres appear above his head, and on each one, he can see an alternate universe where familiar superheroes are played by different actors.
Easter egg hunters should keep their eyes peeled during this sequence, as the alternate-universe Supermen and Batmen come fast and furious. Your favorite Batman or Superman movies and TV shows might be lurking in there.
The most surprising of these cameos, however, comes from a movie that was never made — a Superman, played by a long-haired, CGI-generated Nicolas Cage.
Some laugh. Others require an explanation.
Superman Lives
Those who were paying attention to production rumors in 1998 will likely be able to tell you all about Tim Burton's "Superman Lives." Burton, having had a major success with "Batman" in 1989, was tapped by Warner Bros. to do something similar with Superman. Burton cast Nicolas Cage in the role and even went so far as to find a Superman costume for him (you can see said costume in the photo above). Clark Kent was going to have long black hair, and the rumor was that Burton would highlight Superman's isolation from humanity. He is, after all, the only member of his species on Earth and often retires to a Fortress of Solitude to be by himself. In those regards, Superman is very much like Batman, and Burton seemed like a good match.
Many, many, many screenwriters took a pass at "Superman Lives," and most of them were shot down.
In 1996, Kevin Smith was a rising star. He had directed the massive indie hit "Clerks" and some were even fond of his better-funded follow-up "Mallrats." He was also about to release his acclaimed queer romance "Chasing Amy." In all of those movies, the characters openly discuss their love for comics and pop culture, leaving Smith a vital new voice in the way pop movies were discussed ... in movies. "Superman Lives" executive producer Jon Peters noticed Smith's voice and felt the self-professed comic book nerd would be ideal to write a Superman movie.
Smith was, of course, stoked to have been asked. Years later, however, Smith went on numerous speaking tours, and often related how strange his experience was on "Superman Lives." It seems Peters laid out some really, really unusual screenwriting mandates for Superman.
For one, Superman couldn't fly.
What?
I want a spider
Kevin Smith, being an expert raconteur, became very colorful about his meetings with Jon Peters, a story he also related in Jon Schnepp's 2015 documentary film, "The Death of 'Superman Lives': What Happened?" It seems that Peters wasn't much of a Superman fan, and had very peculiar ideas as to what his 1990s Superman film might require. Peters, it should be noted, was a notoriously outsized character who dated or was married to several notable celebrities in his life, including Lesley Ann Warren, Barbra Streisand, and Pamela Anderson. Peters was also depicted as a coked-out window smasher, played by Bradley Cooper, in Paul Thomas Anderson's film "Licorice Pizza."
Peters' ideas for Superman, according to Smith, were pointedly anti-Superman. Peters didn't want any scenes of Superman flying, for instance, feeling that the visual was corny. Smith got around this mandate by describing Superman's flight as so fast that he would only appear as a blur. The villain of "Superman Lives" was to be the DC Comics supervillain Brainiac, and Peters insisted that Brainiac fight a polar bear outside the Fortress of Solitude. Knowing that a Superman film would be a marketing bonanza, Peters also demanded that Smith include a "space dog" in the script, hoping to convert it into a plush toy. Peters also admired the actor Dwight Ewell for his performance as a queer comic artist in Smith's "Chasing Amy." Peters wanted Ewell to play the voice of L-Ron, the robot assistant to Brainiac, which he described as "a gay R2-D2 with attitude."
Most notably, Peters wanted a scene where Superman is in a gladiatorial arena when a giant pair of doors fly open, and a giant spider comes charging in. Superman vs. a giant spider.
Smith tried to do what he could and actually provided everything Peters asked for.
You got your spider
In Kevin Smith's script, Superman fought a monster called Doomsday, and Earth's sun was blocked out, rendering him powerless. Superman was brought back into combat by a robot called the Eradicator and was outfitted with a powerful robot suit built from pieces of the same. And, yes, Smith wrote in the giant spider scene. All of this was written before Tim Burton was brought on as director. Burton did not use Smith's script, preferring to commission something new. Tony Gilroy took a pass at the script under Burton. It was also at this point that Nicolas Cage was brought on to play the Man of Steel. Smith said that he wanted Ben Affleck to play Superman.
Smith's has been very open about his script and working with Peters, and completely understood why he was fired from the project. In David Hughes' 2008 book "The Greatest Sci-Fi Movies Never Made," Smith saw that Warner Bros. could either choose between the man who made "Clerks" or the man who made them a billion dollars with "Batman." Smith is not bitter.
The giant spider never made its way into "Superman Lives" because, well, the film fell through. Smith was astonished to see, however, that the 1999 film "Wild Wild West," another Jon Peters-produced film, featured a giant spider. Peters, it seems, got his wish.
With "The Flash," however, Peters' legacy lives on. During the multiverse scene during the film's climax, a Superman animated to look like Nicolas Cage — wearing the Tim Burton-approved costume — can be seen briefly fighting a giant spider.
Although "Superman Lives" was never made, it has nonetheless become a palpable part of Superman's cinematic lore. Now, thanks to "The Flash," it exists in the real world. The giant spider lives.