Look Superman might have soared through the box office but it’s my own hell. Not because I hate capes or prefer the villains in comic book movies, or truth or justice or whatever, but because every time a new Superman movie drops, I spiral into a cinematic fever dream where I try to remember exactly how many of these damn things have been made. Spoiler: too many, not enough, and somehow never quite the one we all secretly wanted, maybe not you but me, okay?
I can still smell the burnt popcorn and root beer float. The year is 2015 and Jon Schnepp just released a documentary that he had crowdfunded through social media. I was donated in the beginning to the project and you’re about to find out why. The title was The Death of “Superman Lives”: What Happened? And it told the story of how our National Treasure Nicolas Cage himself was set to play Superman once upon a time.
In some alternate timeline, Nicolas Cage donned the iconic red-and-blue and gave us a version of Superman that would’ve made the Snyderverse look like a PBS special. This wasn’t just a rumor, which I thought for so long that it was, or a Reddit fever dream. It was real. There were costume tests. There were scripts. There was Kevin Smith, yes Silent Bob Kevin Smith, locked and loaded as the screenwriter. He was set to craft a version of the Man of Steel with all the Gen X angst and weirdness the late ’90s could handle. He was brilliant and early in his career. He stalled on providing a script and would tell them he would fax it over and would fax blank pages at 5 o’clock on a Friday so he could use the weekend to write the actual script and buy him some time since technology was still powered by vibes, dial-up, and sheer delusion.
The studio brought in Tim Burton to direct. That’s right. Batman 1989 Tim Burton. YOUNG TIM BURTON. And what followed was less a production and more of a fever dream stitched together with studio notes, chaos, and one man’s unrelenting obsession with giant metal spiders.
Enter Jon Peters: the producer behind this beautiful mess. Peters didn’t just want a Superman movie. He wanted a Superman movie where Kal-El doesn’t fly, doesn’t wear the cape, and fights a massive, robotic spider in the third act. Kevin Smith has a whole bit on it. It’s AWFUL. That spider didn’t make it into Superman Lives (because the movie got yeeted into the void), but like any good villain, it came back. Jon Peters finally got his giant metal spider, in the 1999 Wild Wild West movie starring Will Smith.
Yes. That spider.
The documentary dives into all of it: concept art, Nic Cage’s wild hair, Burton’s vision, Peters’ chaos, and the studio’s cold feet. It’s the kind of behind-the-scenes madness that makes you wish the film had actually been made, just so we could collectively look back and go, “What the hell was that?” After seeing the costume tests you cannot convince me that Nic would not have crushed that role.
I remember being devastated for WEEKS after watching the documentary knowing that we were robbed of what could’ve been one of Cage’s best films and yes I’m counting that out of the current 123 movies he’s done. And if you must know this is my top 5.
- Con Air
- Gone In 60 Seconds
- Trapped In Paradise
- National Treasure
- Raising Arizona
These are my rankings, they will not change, I will throw hands. I will not tolerate any slander or badgering. Cameron Poe, Memphis Reigns, Bill Firpo, Benjamin Gates, and H.I. Mcdunnough are my boys for life.
If you know anything about Nic you know he’s a huge comic book fan, like he’s a diehard, name-his-son-Kal-El level fan. This wasn’t just another paycheck or a weird detour on his acting resume. No, Superman Lives was personal. This was the role. His white whale. The role that would’ve let him blend his chaotic energy with cape-wearing destiny. And by all accounts—interviews, behind-the-scenes footage, leaked costume tests—it was the one film that truly haunted him. The one that got so close, then vanished in a puff of studio smoke and a pile of rewrites. For Cage, Superman Lives wasn’t just a missed movie—it was his cinematic heartbreak.
Somewhere out there, Nic Cage is still ready to take flight. And somewhere deep inside me, I know I still believe in the Superman we never got.
Long live the Death of Superman Lives.
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