WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for Brightburn, in theaters now.
From its first trailer, Brightburn was obviously positioned as a Superman parody, but more so, a dark -- well, darker -- take on Zack Snyder's Man of Steel. That turned out to be more than a mere marketing tactic.
Produced by James Gunn, the film tells the origin of Brandon Breyer (Jackson A. Dunn) who, like Superman, rockets to Earth as an infant, where he's found and adopted by a kindly couple in a small town in Kansas. The twist, however, is that while Kal-El grows up to become the protector of mankind, Brandon turns evil, and embraces his destiny to become a world conqueror. What's unfortunate, though, is that Brightburn doesn't really have anything to say about the iconic superhero or his mythology. It's simply Man of Steel, unshackled, with all of the triteness and bleakness you would associate with that.
Make no mistake, Brandon is a dark Superboy. He doesn't have the ice breath, super-hearing or super-sight, but for all intents and purposes, he's a young Clark Kent who breaks bad. But rather than take the concept into original territory, the filmmakers follow a path similar to DC's Red Son, with Brandon deciding he's superior, and destined to "take the world."
If that's the approach they were determined to take, ripping off Snyder's film isn't the way to go. Director David Yarovesky copies the cinematography so much you'd swear you were watching Man of Steel: the barn, the Breyers' house, the mailbox all pay homage to the Kents.
The shaky cam also mimics Snyder's style, and the score by Timothy Williams echoes Hans Zimmer's. But it all comes across as an Elseworlds tale, and nothing more. It's not thought-provoking or fresh; it's murder porn with superpowers.
Snyder's Superman didn't go into murder-mode fully, but we did witness his powers during the Metropolis-destroying battle against the invading Kryptonians, and when he snapped Zod's neck. That divided audiences, and established a dark tone that Warner Bros.' so-called DC Extended Universe has only recently succeeded in shrugging off. Many fans recoiled at the levels of violence and destruction, while far fewer appeared to align with the explanation that Man of Steel's title character was still learning about his powers and what it means to be a hero. However, Snyder's film was spectacle over substance, relying on the well-worn trope of superhumans employing extreme measures in pursuit of admirable goals.
Brightburn similarly is more style than substance, because it leaves nothing to the imagination. We already know what would happen if a Superman were to go berserk, so we don't need to see Clark Kent as a superpowered child killer. Therefore, this film is little more than a by-the-numbers take on a cosmic tyrant.
In an era in which superheroes routinely rule the box office, and some aspire to be something more than mindless fun, Brightburn feels like little more than a grim relic of the birth of the DCEU, which was six years and a lifetime ago. Had the creators of Brightburn chosen not to copy Man of Steel and instead adopt a fresh approach on warped children with superpowers, like Josh Trank's 2012 film Chronicle, it might have resonated more. Sadly, however, Brightburn is merely cheap thrills and a stark reminder that we haven't seen a truly inspirational depiction of Superman on the big screen in decades.
Directed by David Yarovesky, Brightburn is produced by James Gunn and written by Brian Gunn and Mark Gunn. The film stars Elizabeth Banks, David Denman, Jackson A. Dunn, Matt Jones, Meredith Hagner, Steve Agee, Becky Wahlstrom and Stephen Blackehart.