In another reality, Nicolas Cage would have gotten to play Superman in the late ‘90s, but in our reality, the Tim Burton-directed Superman Lives ended up being shelved shortly before production was set to begin. However, last year audiences got a taste of what could have been when a de-aged Cage appeared as the Man of Steel in The Flash, just one of the movie’s many big cameos. In recent months though, Cage has directed criticism at how his Superman cameo was shot, but now he’s clarified his feelings on the matter, noting that it boiled down to him feeling “perplexed.”
This came about during an interview with Deadline when Cage said that he “wasn’t angry” about Superman Lives being scrapped over 25 years ago, but rather “confused” because it would be helped by Burton, who’d already shown off his superhero movie chops with Batman and Batman Returns, which both featured Michael Keaton wearing the cape and cowl. Then on the subject of The Flash, the actor stated:
And then subsequently what happened with The Flash… I wasn’t upset, I was just perplexed. I was just like, ‘It wasn’t what I shot,’ and I was worried about it. Like, ‘Did you just tell me that I was witnessing the destruction of the universe so you could take pictures of me and then animate me?’ Whether it was through CGI or AI, that wasn’t the conversation we had. So I was confused.
For those who missed out on Nicolas Cage’s earlier Flash-related comments, he shared that when he came in to shoot his cameo, all he was “supposed to do was literally just be standing in an alternate dimension, if you will, and witnessing the destruction of the universe,” and without saying any lines. He had no idea his Superman would be fighting a giant spider, referencing the action set piece that was going to be included in Superman Lives. So when he sat down to watch The Flash, he was surprised to see his character doing that.
Although Nicolas Cage later said that he wished there’d simply been full transparency regarding what his Superman appearance entailed, he went on to say in this new interview that he did like getting to see his version of Superman finally brought to life, although his de-aged self didn’t look convincing enough to him. As he put it:
But I was still happy to look at it. I still wanted to see Colleen Atwood’s suit, which I maintain is a beautiful suit, and 50% of that [character] was my design. I wanted Superman to have the long, kind of black Samurai hair and a vulnerable feeling — almost no blinking, a stillness in his eyes. And so it was 50/50. It was Tim and myself, we had designed something, and it never came to light, so when I saw it moving, I was very happy that Andy Muschietti wanted me to do it. I did get some satisfaction from seeing the character, but to me it didn’t look [right]. But then, Superman is an alien. Kal-El is from another planet. So in that way, the CGI kind of looked right, because it’s alien. It doesn’t look real. It doesn’t look like it has a heartbeat. So I can look at it that way and think that it worked.
The Flash actually marked Cage’s second brief Superman outing, as he previously voiced the character in 2018’s Teen Titans Go! to the Movies. Although Superman Lives never got made, a documentary called The Death of "Superman Lives": What Happened? was released in 2015 that explored the doomed production, though Cage was not among the subjects interviewed. As for what the future holds in store for Superman on the big screen, David Corenswet has been selected to play the character in Superman: Legacy, which will be the first movie in the new DC Universe franchise.
Those wishing to revisit The Flash can do so by streaming it with a Max subscription. Nicolas Cage’s latest movie, Dream Scenario, can be purchased or rented on digital platforms, and his offerings on the 2024 movies schedule include Longlegs, Arcadian and The Surfer.
