In just a few short years, we’ll be hitting the 30th anniversary of the “Death of Superman” storyline, which saw the Man of Steel meeting his demise in battle against Doomsday. Of course, as is often the case in superhero comics, the death didn’t stick, and when Superman did return to the land of the living, he rocked a black suit for a short period of time. Henry Cavill’s Superman was also expected to don a black suit after being resurrected in Justice League, but alas, that suit was nowhere to be seen in the movie’s theatrical cut.
However, if you’ve been wondering what Henry Cavill’s Superman would look like boasting not just his comic book counterpart’s black suit, but an iconic ‘90s mullet too, you’re in luck. Check out what one fan’s mock-up of how that would look.
This fan art comes from Instagram user jscomicart, who took a still of Henry Cavill from 2013’s Man of Steel and gave him a makeover inspired by the black-suited Superman who writer/artist Dan Jurgens designed almost three decades ago. While I doubt the mullet would fly as well now as it did in the 1990s, that black suit with the silver symbol looks pretty cool, and I would have been down to see Cavill wear this.
Of course, anyone who has followed along with the Justice League news cycle knows that a black suit was designed for the movie that saw Superman being brought back to life and teaming up with Batman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman, Cyborg and Flash to quell Steppenwolf’s invasion. However, it was basically a black and silver redesign of Superman DCEU suit (including still having a cape), and it could briefly be seen in one of the deleted scenes on Justice League’s home media release.
As for why this black suit wasn’t included in Justice League’s theatrical cut, costume designer Michael Wilkinson, said back in 2018 that as the tone of the movie developed, the filmmakers felt that it was “more appropriate” to have Superman wear his classic red and blue suit upon officially returning to action. We would later learn that this was among the changes made to Justice League following Zack Snyder’s departure and Joss Whedon taking over helming duties. In fact, Snyder planned on having Superman go on a journey across subsequent movies to earn back the blue suit.
With Justice League having come out over two and a half years ago, that means we’ve missed our chance to see Henry Cavill’s Superman wear a black suit, right? Not necessarily! With the Snyder Cut, officially titled Zack Snyder’s Justice League, heading to HBO Max, it’s a good bet that this’ll be among the many aspects of the movie being added back in. Assuming that is indeed the case, it’ll finally be nice to finally have official footage of Cavill’s version of the character flying around in these kind of duds.
Zack Snyder’s Justice League is expected to drop on HBO Max in early to mid-2021, so stay tuned for continuing coverage. In the meantime, learn what other DC movies are on the way with our handy guide.
