Matthew Vaughn's Unmade Superman Trilogy Would've Tried To Make Richard Donner Proud
As a filmmaker, Matthew Vaughn seems incapable of taking the material he's working with seriously. It's a quality that's allowed him to carve out a niche as a specialist in deliberately irreverent genre fare like "Stardust" and "Kick-Ass" but made him a bit of a poor match for "X-Men: First Class" (a film that, like most other "X-Men" films, aspires to be fairly earnest). It can also make his "Kingsman" films pretty polarizing since they allow him to double-dip on his juvenile humor to the point of self-indulgence. In fact, the one time Vaughn tried to play things seriously with that franchise, the result was the tonally bizarre prequel "The King's Man."
This is all to say that Vaughn's abandoned "Superman" trilogy always seemed like an odd proposition. As he's talked about on many occasions over the years, Vaughn and his "Kick-Ass" and "Kingsman" cohort, writer Mark Millar, approached Warner Bros. in 2008 in the hopes of convincing the studio to sign off on their vision for a hopeful and uplifting trio of films about the Man of Steel. WB would ultimately pass on the project in favor of Christopher Nolan and Zack Snyder's own Superman film, "Man of Steel," launching Snyder's DC Extended Universe in the process.
DC's movie and TV universe is now on the verge of undergoing a massive reboot spearheaded by newly-appointed DC Studios heads James Gunn and Peter Safran. Appearing on the "Happy Sad Confused" podcast (via Variety), Vaughn confirmed he's "been talking" with Gunn and Safran about a potential collaboration, but indicated that nothing's come of it yet. This also led to him taking a trip down memory lane and recounting how his and Millar's "Superman" trilogy would've been their attempt to channel Richard Donner's own classic cinematic take on the superhero.
Up, up and away (from Vaughn)!
Forget Stephen Norrington's "Blade" or Tim Burton's "Batman" films. Without Richard Donner's 1978 "Superman," we wouldn't have had any of the superhero films that have flooded theaters since the dawn of the 21st century. It's an unabashedly sincere take on the Superman mythos that doesn't attempt to reinvent the Man of Steel so much as demonstrate what makes him an aspirational figure in the first place. However, for as much as Vaughn wanted to emulate Donner with his unmade "Superman" trilogy, it would have also seen him deviate pretty dramatically from the superhero's traditional origin story. He touched on this again on the podcast, explaining:
"I think Donner nailed it. 'Wonder Woman' worked very well because it was basically a Donner/Superman film but reimagined as Wonder Woman. I would've done a modern version of Donner. Our big idea was that Krypton doesn't blow up. It does eventually. The dad was right, but he got his timing wrong. When Superman is grown up, suddenly there's a mass exodus and all hell breaks loose. That was our main idea."
Abandoning the idea of an infant Superman being sent to Earth shortly before his home planet is destroyed would've certainly been a big swing on Vaughn's part. Again, though, it's not so much the story that gives one pause as it is the question of whether Vaughn could have even come close to matching Donner's heartfelt approach with his trilogy. His upcoming spy flick "Argylle," which coincidentally enough features "Man of Steel" star Henry Cavill, certainly looks as flippant as anything else he's done, so it's not as though Vaughn even seems interested in turning over a new leaf. Maybe it's for the better that this is one dream that flew up, up and away from him.