5 Superman Villains We’d Rather See Than Luthor And Zod

2. Batman

Wipe your coffee from your keyboard, and hear me out on this one. Batman is not a supervillain by any stretch of the imagination. In most portrayals, he and Superman are both members of the Justice League of America, implacable allies in the face of evil. They’ve fought Ra’s al Ghul, Nekron, Darkseid and countless other threats together. That said, different interpretations are the bread-and-butter of the superhero world, and have spawned some of the greatest and most imaginative examples of the genre.

Most importantly, however, Superman and Batman as enemies of one another has quite a lot of precedent. The most classic example would be Frank Miller‘s The Dark Knight Returns, which saw Superman directed by the US government to take down the vigilante, culminating in the iconic battle scene against an aged Batman. Miller‘s The Dark Knight Strikes Again elaborated on this theme, with Superman and Captain Marvel having little choice but to target the Dark Knight again, with their loved ones held hostage. Miller‘s works tend to depict Batman as the gritty hero and Superman as the government’s thrall, but I don’t doubt that a talented writer for the screen could create a different convincing narrative true to the characters, with Superman more of a hero than in Miller‘s depictions. A “Superman vs. Batman” tale would not inevitably become a copy of those two iconic graphic novels, either: many other works have pitted the two heroes against each other, not least of which were Brian Azzarello‘s Lex Luthor: Man of Steel, Mark Millar‘s Superman: Red Son, and, most recently, Injustice: Gods Among Us. Many writers have portrayed the heroes at loggerheads, and in my opinion, it’s a dynamic that really, really works. It muddies the definition of what a superhero is, and it challenges the audience to decide which character is the real hero.

It’s not what anybody would expect upon hearing of an upcoming Superman film, but that can be a good thing; it still offers plenty of opportunities for incredible action, cinematography, intrigue, all the things people really turn up to see in a Superhero film. It’s never been done before, but it would offer an incredible pay-off if done right. The two characters have a lot to agree on, but they also have a great deal to fight about, and neither are known to be big on compromise. A film to explore the relationship between the two would have a huge amount of potential.