Crisis Averted: A Look at Nicolas Cage's Superman?
Filed under: RumorMonger, Comic/Superhero/Geek, Images
I was always intrigued by the notion of Nicolas Cage as Superman. It seemed insane, but possibly brilliant, especially in a time before the craptastic fare that Cage has busied himself with recently. But man, if the above image is legit, we dodged the biggest bullet ever. Tim Burton JP revealed the above stunner, which is supposed to be one of Cage's costume tests for the production. It looks one teeny tiny degree away from rubber nipples. So much for my visions of Cage in stretchy cotton!
As IGN outlined, the Warner Bros. production of Superman Lives was gearing up back in the late '90s, with Cage playing Supes, and Tim Burton directing from a screenplay by Kevin Smith (that was rewritten by Wesley Strick). But the budget was expanding out of control, and after concept art and costumes were designed, the project was scrapped (Hallelujah!) and ultimately reworked into the less-than-stellar Superman Returns many years later.
I love the Burton, but he really would've rivaled Joel Schumacher for ridiculous superhero costumes if this made it to the big screen. Could this possibly be real? Could you have stomached Superman donning a cape and faux-muscled body suit?
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
9-22-2009 @ 9:25AM
MarkH said...
Wow, that's...awful. Worse than the suit is Cage's scraggy, please-use-shampoo hair. Though since it's just a test, one could at least hope he'd hurried over from the Con Air shoot and hadn't had time to go to makeup. Or to wake up, for that matter.
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9-22-2009 @ 9:49AM
Eric said...
Wow that is so bad.
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9-22-2009 @ 10:08AM
Wayne said...
That's so bad that I have a hard time believing it's real. The logo is crooked for crissakes!
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9-22-2009 @ 10:08AM
Wexler said...
it's making my eyes hurt, but I can't look away!
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9-22-2009 @ 10:29AM
ML said...
Is it just me or does that look like a head grafted onto a toy body?
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9-22-2009 @ 10:31AM
frank said...
honestly folks...you believe this photoshop trickery??? Its a horrible joke. Its clearly a superman action figue with Cage's head photoshopped on. Nptoce the head is out of proportion to the body! The body is platic...which is why it looks plastic. Its not supposed to be a Joel Shumakery rubber nipple suit...it looks plastric because it IS plastic...its a toy people!!!! Look at the base of his neck, thats where the "real" person stops and the "toy person" starts...there is a line...where the toy head swivels.
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9-22-2009 @ 11:00AM
Dork said...
Ummm...isn't that an action figure with Cage's head shopped on with a faded filters to make it blend?
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9-22-2009 @ 11:36AM
Chet said...
The real question is...
Will it blend?
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9-22-2009 @ 12:39PM
Papa said...
The "S"-design here doesn't even look like the "S"-designs at the website.
Maybe it's Cage's homemade outfit...
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9-22-2009 @ 1:14PM
Batzarro said...
Doesn't look like no costume test to me. I thought it was a mannequin when I first saw it. I don'r rhink Cage has ever had that line in his neck.
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9-22-2009 @ 1:41PM
Marc said...
Wow this looks like he'd be better suited to play Bizarro.
I remember hearing this news years ago and the above shot (as fake as it probably is) is still a step up from where I though it would be. I imagined Nic playing superman using his costume from Con Air, but with a tattered/stained cape, wearing gold chains, a toothpick in his teeth all the while pushing a shopping cart full of booze like he did in Leaving Las Vegas...hey there's always a worse case scenario right?:P
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9-22-2009 @ 6:42PM
Walley said...
Kevin Smith talks about this version on his "An Evening with Kevin Smith" DVD. Superman was to fight a giant robot spider and polar bears and have a gay robot side-kick. So based on what Smith has said the movie would of been as bad as these test make it out to be.
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9-23-2009 @ 9:54AM
poeboy said...
That's a Superman action figure with the "Kingdom Come" costume design. Not even good Photoshop, folks.
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9-23-2009 @ 10:33PM
Frohike in STL said...
Could you just delete this "story" already?
I've seen 10 year olds do better work on a computer than this crap.
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9-27-2009 @ 5:10AM
Dugle said...
Come on cinematical, this is just silly
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9-27-2009 @ 12:49PM
I'm Troy McClure said...
A costume test is not "put the actor in the costume and have him do a screen test"; it's "let's do some digital or rendered mockups of what the actor could/should look like in various possible costumes"
Yes this is bad photoshop. It was supposed to be. A costume test is the directors "sketch" of what the actors should look like in costume and if this piece of crap image is a part of that process we did in fact dodge a serious bullet.
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9-28-2009 @ 10:25PM
WTF said...
No, this is exactly what I pictured when I heard Cage was going to play Superman. He sucks, in everything!!!
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9-29-2009 @ 12:20AM
edc said...
its not photoshopped, its a proposed silicone chest piece in the suit. believe it or not, but most toys come with jointed elbows, not to mention this is not any superman toy.
this was a very quick one piece mockup designed to see what Nic would be wearing.
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