Kevin Smith admits he was caught up in Warner Bros.'s recent cuts to HBO Max and has spoken about his own unrealized plans to bring Nicolas Cage in to play Bizarro Superman in a DC television series. Smith, who rose to fame in the 1990s off the back of his independent film Clerks is well known for his love of the comic-book world, and in addition to penning his own issues for both Marvel and DC comics, he also directed episodes for the CW's The Flash and Supergirl. Smith was also responsible for writing an early version of the script for Superman Lives, Tim Burton's infamous Superman reboot film, which was also set to star Cage before it was canceled in 1998.
Over the past week, Warner Bros. Discovery has dominated headlines with their decision to shelve the HBO Max film Batgirl along with several other projects in various stages of development. In addition to Batgirl's shelving, the cuts also affected the planned sequel to the 2020's Scoob, which was also near to completion, and it was reported that HBO Max would be moving away from developing new original scripted content altogether. These changes would culminate in the announcement that HBO Max would be combined with the Discovery+ streaming service in Summer 2023.
It would seem that Smith himself was one of the many creatives affected by Warner Bros. latest moves and has spoken about his own plans, which were placed on the chopping block as a result of the Warner Bros. Discovery merger. On the latest episode of Hollywood Babble-On, Smith revealed that he was approached to write and direct an episode of a planned DC-centric anthology show, DC's Strange Adventures, which would focus on some of the lesser-known characters in the DC universe. Smith's chosen episode would have featured Superman photojournalist Jimmy Olsen and villain Bizarro in a story charting the latter's origins. Moreover, Smith suggested that he wanted Nicolas Cage to play Bizarro in the episode. Check out some of Smith's comments below:
We didn’t lock it in, he wasn’t signed to a contract, but the person we were pursuing to play our Bizarro was Nicolas Cage...
This was always a million to one shot, I couldn't believe they even asked me to do it.. and it was heading toward production, it wasn't like wish fulfilment, this was something they were going to do… This was killed definitely by the new regime.
This latest news would be another bitter blow to DC fans still left reeling from Warner Bros.'s latest cost-cutting measures. Not only would the prospect of an anthology show like DC's Strange Adventures allow the studio to explore DC's expansive pantheon of characters, but to potentially bring Nicolas Cage back to play Bizarro would have been an exciting homage to his history with Superman's character. What other DC characters and stories the series would have potentially explored is not yet known.
Despite the massive shake-ups undertaken in the wake of the Warner Bros. Discovery merger, the studio's new CEO David Zaslav has assured fans that the DC franchise is a key priority moving forward and that they have a 10-year plan for their comic-book properties. Exactly what this will look like remains to be seen, but hopefully, it will result in the franchise enjoying much more consistent success at the box office moving forward. As for Smith's canceled Bizarro Superman project, there's no doubt the infamously verbose filmmaker will have plenty more insights to share in the future.
Update: Representatives of Nicolas Cage reached out to Screen Rant stating unequivocally that Mr. Cage never had any involvement with any “canceled” Superman project.
Source: Hollywood Babble-On
