Breaking Non News: Superman Franchise Still On Hold
Fri, November 27, 2009 
Is there anything that riles up nerds of the Internet more than Superman? I can’t think of anything. Maybe the inane hatred of Brett Ratner or the Twilight franchise. That’s another debate for another time. I know.
Anne Thompson of Thompson On Hollywood has the latest developments on the Superman film franchise. And it’s everything we’ve already heard and assumed using good old fashioned “connecting the dots” logic. Nothing is going on at the moment. Of course, DC head Diane Nelson already said this to MTV months ago.
Warner Brothers has hit the “Pause” button on the Last Son of Krypton until reaching a settlement with the Siegel/Shuster estates? Again, we already knew that. Some would like you to think both families can literally take everything from the past 70-odd years of the Superman mythology and just sell it to the highest bidder. I even read a speculation piece on the possibility of Disney nabbing Kal-El and his pals. Uh, yeah. That has a realistic shot of ever happening. (Hint: sarcasm).
Plain and simple, there’s no way there won’t be a settlement. Time Warner has iron-clad ownership on many key Superman elements like the classic \S/ symbol, some of his powers including flight (remember he leaped tall buildings initially), characters like Lex Luthor, famous phrases like “Truth, Justice & the American Way” and so on. They even own the International rights to the character as a whole. The Siegel/Shuster estates will retain the rights to Action Comics #1 (the first appearance of Supes/Clark Kent, Lois Lane, his origin story, etc.) by 2013. There's too much money to be made for the parties to dick around forever.
Also no screenwriters are onboard at the moment. Although pitches are still being heard. From the way the article sounds, they’ve still yet to settle on doing a sequel, requel or full-on reboot. But again at this point, who is anyone kidding? It’ll be the latter. It also shoots down the rumors of the Wachowskis (even though we know for a fact they’ve met with the Brothers Warner on-and-off since early 2007 for the gig) or James McTeigue (despite his recent confirmation to the contrary to Collider).
Remember, boys and girls, James Bond and Star Trek were both in the gutter for years. Look at them now. I've said this before and I'll say it again. Superman will grace our silver screens again. It's merely a question of when and under whose directorial eye.
Reader Comments (1)
Its in the best interest of the family to settle as well, I'm sure they're just trying to figure out how they can get the most money while WB is trying to say the character is worthless. Some people are delusional if they think someone else is going to buy the superman rights without the most important piece, the symbol, which I'm sure WB makes the most money on in terms of merchandise. If I had to take a guess, once this thing gets settled we'll hear about a movie. Which reminds me, there was another thing scheduled in october if I'm not mistaken, and the judge was supposed to step down earlier this month, interesting how we haven't heard anything.