About the film
The film Superman came out in 2025 and was directed by James Gunn. This movie focuses on the life of Clark Kent (Superman), as he balances his life as the Kryptonian superhero and as the human reporter. He faces conflicts especially involving the billionaire, Lex Luthor, who seeks to get Superman out of the picture for good. This is a film about hope, identity, and humanity.
My experience
I have always been a fan of comic books, so I was excited to see this movie in theaters. What I didn’t expect was for it to bring me to tears. Superman’s view of his parents and himself collapsed after his parent’s true intentions of why they sent him to earth was brought to light. His parents true intentions of sending him to earth was for the purpose of taking it over to continue the Kryptonian bloodline, which causes a chain reaction of unfortunate events for Superman. The truth cut deep and seeing Superman struggle with his identity was hard to see, especially since David Corenswet did such a great job with portraying those emotions. The part that made me cry is when he came to the realization that, despite his differences, he was just as human as anybody. Even if he is a Kryptonian, he feels within his heart that he is still human. In Superman’s speech he speaks about his experiences and that’s the part that makes him human, not his DNA or lineage, and I found that incredibly beautiful. This can also be applied to current day events, like how some people view immigrants as less than or treat them cruelly. But no matter where they’ve come from, whether it be outer space or another country, they are just as human as anyone and deserve to be treated as such.
I also found Lex Luthor’s actions throughout the movie extremely frustrating, like how he was the main cause of Superman’s identify crisis all because of his jealously. Lex Luthor, to put it simply, was an awful person and his motives only made me extremely angry which is another reason why I believe this movie was so emotionally impactful. The reason why I felt such frustration was because Lex Luthor loves humanity, yet he doesn’t care for people. He loves humanity because he can be the smartest, the richest, and one of world’s most powerful men. But, superheroes mess all of that up from him because he lacks what they have, real superpower. Lex particularly has distain for Superman because he’s an alien, so now it’s not even a human that is surpassing him. That fact drives Lex Luthor crazy and he deploys several plans to take Superman down because he can’t stand that someone he views as sub-human can receive more adoration and love from humanity than himself. Lex hated him so much he created man-made superheroes, despite his hate for superheroes, all to take Superman down. This can also be parallel to real life scenarios were people who are viewed as different and are still successful find themselves facing adversity and hate. Overall, this movie touched upon sensitive topics that caused controversy and yet, that shows simply how impactful this one story about a superhero can be.
Classifying my experience
An experience I definitely had during this movie was the feeling optimism. While I did experience other emotions I found this to be my most strongest one and the one I felt movie was trying to invoke the most. For example, just as I began to think things were looking bleak during this movie there would be a twist that made me feel hopeful again. For example, when Metamorpho who was keeping Superman trapped switched sides to help Superman free Metamorpho’s son. As well as that scene, the feeling of optimism could also be applied to the scene were Superman confronts Lex Luthor. There was this breakthrough were Superman realizes who he was and finally freed from the confusion he had been experiencing with his identify throughout the movie. This gave me hope, I felt a little bit happier walking out of that theater because this movie made me feel as if things could truly be all right in the end. They also used upbeat and inspiring instrumental music to provoke this feeling of optimism too, especially during Superman’s final confrontation with Lex Luthor. Despite how much Superman and some others in the cast struggled, they came out on top even though they faced adversity. It also felt extremely on brand for a Superman movie, because Superman is a symbol of hope.
Determining the narrative technologies prompting my experience
I’d say the most present technology used throughout this movie and the one that had a lot to do with my experience was poetic justice. That feeling of hope I received when things seemed to be at it’s worst for Superman and then suddenly something good would happen, that was poetic justice. When good things happen to good characters and when bad things happened to bad character. Like, at the end of the movie when all Lex Luthor’s wrong doings had been exposed and he was arrested. I’ve seen some complaints about the use of this technology especially in this movie, calling the film cliche but I found the use of this to be perfect. It was why I had such a great experience watching this despite all the frustration a felt throughout the film. Perhaps people found it cliche was because pervious Superman movies had been focusing on darker twist of the hero, so having a Superman movie that leaned more into comedy felt jarring compared to the other films in this franchise. Another technology used was the plot twist, like when it was revealed of Superman’s parents true intentions for sending him to earth that I had mentioned previously. Superman only saw half of the message his parents sent away with him but it was destroyed in the crash. When Lex Luthor finds said video and restores it, it’s revealed that Superman was sent to earth to take over and restore the Kryptonian race. All that time Superman simply believed his parents wanted him to do good and we as the audience believe that too until it was revealed otherwise. This adds a major twist in the movie because this shifts the public view of Superman, especially after his parents basically insulted the human race and insinuated that earth would be easy to take over. There could also be a second added twist to this when Superman Confirms that the video is real to the Justice Gang but expresses that he’s never seen the second half up until now. As a comic reader there are slightly different variants of Superman’s story so I still found it to be a twist. These technologies both added so much to the movie and made it feel like a classic superhero movie but, with complex ideas. Especially when it came to Superman’s immigration and trying to find his place in society as both his personas.
Extra
While I do feel I added a lot of videos throughout this paper, I think they all add something and don’t particularly feel like links to unimportant scenes. They highlight Superman’s inner struggle and touch upon those ideas of immigration and how he is judged, by not only others but also by himself, for being an alien. While they also help to further show what scenes particularly made me get that feeling of optimism in this story, like the final confrontation. I also feel that if anyone who is viewing it and hasn’t seen the movie can better understand the topics i’m touching upon and my explanations by watching these scene and seeing the acting.
Sources
Experiences – WonderCat. https://wonder-cat.org/experiences/ Accessed 6 Feb. 2026.
Technologies – WonderCat. https://wonder-cat.org/technologies/ Accessed 6 Feb. 2026.
Gunn, James. Superman. Warner Bros. Pictures, 2025
Featured image
Gunn, James. Superman. Warner Bros. Pictures, 2025
