Some links

The Curse of Superman has been something people have talked about for a while. I think Benbella books The Man from Krypton had a chapter about it (titled "A Word of Warning for Brandon Routh). Anyway, this piece for Business Day online by Phil Altbeker is about the curse, and seems to be the most comprehensive statement of it that I've seen.

I didn't write about the curse at all in my book. It's not really about superman in the way that certain jokes or the Superman Celebration is about the character. It's about the actors. Additionally, I've never heard it mentioned outside of the media, so it's really not folklore (as far as I can tell). I suppose if somebody wanted to explore it, the best place to start would be to talk to the actors themselves, see what they've been told.

Then there's this curiosity over at the AV Club: a defense of Superman returns by David Sims. I disagree with everything the article asserts about how the story was handled, but in the end what I really take issue with is this line:

The Christ/angel imagery is inescapable (at one point, Supes falls from the sky, his arms outstretched as if he’s on a cross), but what else could you possibly be looking for in a Superman film?

Maybe Sims doesn't think that people could be looking for a Superman story in a Superman film.

From a while ago, a review of Man of Steel that seems worth reading by Timothy O'Neil.

Another review of the same movie that seems worth reading, by Justice Carmon. Takes the opposite perspective.

That's about it.

George Reeves

George Reeves died, and the details of his death were immediately fashioned into legend. The newspaper headline read "Superman Kills Self," conflating the man with one of his roles. It was, of course, the role that defined his career, but he didn't necessarily want it to define his life. Nonetheless, to this day The Adventures of Superman has a devoted following, and the death of its star is still cause for speculation.



Part of the reason people still talk about it is the so-called "Superman Curse." Supposedly, if you're involved in the production of Superman television or movies, you're doomed. The Unexplained Mysteries (dot com) has a page devoted to the curse. The Superman Homepage offers a page of "common superman misconceptions" related to Superman, which includes sections on Reeves' death and on the curse. Lou Anders writes an article about it in The Man from Krypton: A Closer Look at Superman. The article is titled "A Word of Warning for Brandon Routh," and was written prior to Superman Returns. It's a curiously nonsensical article, which focuses far more on Keanu Reeves than one would think an essay on Superman should focus on a person who has never played Superman (his role in The Matrix notwithstanding). It does, however, have this little bit:



"...it can't be glossed over that it was this injury (to Christopher Reeve) which began the idle speculation that something supernatural existed called the Superman curse. Perhaps man isn't meant to reach too high, the thinking goes, and daring to take on the role of such a super man tempts the gods too much."



I'm tempted not to note here that Hugo Danner, protagonist of Gladiator and often-cited inspiration for Superman, died while tempting the "gods" by cursing them. He's struck by lightning.



Anyway, Greg Hatcher writes about George Reeves' death on Comic Book Resources.

Here's a page about George Reeves' ghost haunting the house where he died, which I don't think I'd encountered before.

The Straight Dope tackles the subject here.

There's a lot more to this. A book was written about it: Hollywood Kryptonite: The Lady, the Bulldog, and the Death of Superman. This book seems to have been the primary inspiration for Hollywoodland, a film that creates a fictional detective to investigate the case. The book pretty much goes for a murder verdict, the film concludes suicide. The book also goes over a lot of the rumors about Reeves.

There's so much more to this. The rumors persist. In her recent Memoirs of an Occasional Superheroine, Valerie D'Orazio writes about her contemplation of suicide: "Oh, how was I going to do it? Window. Sixth floor. I think George Reeves died like that, no? Took LSD, thought he was really Superman? or was that an urban legend?"

I could link to websites all day, but this seems to cover the important facets.

superstition

One of the types of folklore in which Superman is featured is superstition, or folk belief. There are evidently some people out there who believe there is a Superman Curse. Evidently, just pretending to be Superman for a paycheck will lead to the end of your career or life. The evidence are the untimely demises of Christopher Reeve and George Reeves. Also cited are the less-than-thrilling post-Superman careers of Dean Caine, Kirk Alyn, and others. There's an article about it in Glenn Yeffeth's The Man from Krypton (in the Smart Pop book series). It takes the form of a letter to Brandon Routh on the eve of his debut in Superman Returns.



George Reeve contributes the most to this belief, it seems. Snopes has a page devoted to the rumors surrounding his death. There is evidently a book about it, which I have not yet read, and a recent movie called Hollywoodland, which I have not seen. I really need to catch up on my movie watching.



This picture is a custom figure, built by someone called Sillof, who does this sort of thing a lot. Custom figures are more common than I realized. The Superman guy from the Confessions of a Superhero documentary does this sort of thing as well. Here, Sillof imagines a Victorian Superman, based, he explains, on the idea behind Gotham by Gaslight, which imagined Batman solving the Jack the Ripper murders, if I recall correctly.