In a single Tweet James Gunn has lit the touch-paper for the Superman Legacy UK release date (full details below). It’s still early days in terms of the production, but we’ll take you through everything we know about the film, including when it’s coming out, the age rating latest, story, cast and runtime estimate.
Superman Legacy is set to be the starting point for the new DC Universe (DCU), which will replace the Extended Universe (DCEU) now that Gunn and Peter Safran have taken the helm for DC Studios. It looks set to begin it all over again, wiping most of the slate clean.
AdvertisementIt’ll be interesting to see what this means for the future of big screen names like Batman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman and The Flash, but in general it’s all up in the air at the moment. At the moment, none of these are on the DCU slate, so it might be a long time after the Superman Legacy release date before we see any of these again.
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Superman Legacy UK release date
It’s years away, but the Superman Legacy UK release date has already been confirmed for July 21st, 2025. It was announced by James Gunn in a Tweet recently and while you might imagine that we could see delays with such a long lead in time, the rest of the Tweet means that it could well be as solid as Superman’s solid bits.
In it he reveals that the date coincides with his late father’s birthday, so it seems unlikely that he’ll want to change it. The only thing to take into account is that he didn’t choose the date on purpose. He’d forgotten and his brother Matt Gunn reminded him, so this could keep things to the date.
It’ll be the same date in North America too, so there shouldn’t be any story details to avoid online. No other films are due out on the same weekend as things stand, but with a couple of years to go before the release and the summer blockbuster period up for grabs there’s bound to be some competition for Superman Legacy.
Age rating
As things stand the Superman Legacy age rating hasn’t been confirmed for either the UK or North America, but there’s a lot to go on still. With over two years to go until the release date we won’t get the official announcement for a while, but we can look at the previous Superman films for things to consider.
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For example, Man of Steel was given an age rating of 12 in the UK with notes for moderate violence. It was a similar story for Superman Returns in 2006 and if you throw in the 12 certificate that both DCEU Wonder Woman films picked up, plus Aquaman, Batman Vs. Superman Dawn of Justice, Justice League and Shazam! and you’ve got a pretty clear trend.
That being said, prior to Superman Returns, all of the Christopher Reeve films were give a PG age rating, so it’s at least possible that Legacy could do something similar. However, the fact that these all came out in the 70s is enough to say that things change, so probably not that likely.
Story
We’re not getting another origin film, but the Superman Legacy story will feature a younger version of Clarke Kent than previously seen on the big screen. Whether or not this means something more like Tom Holland as Spider-Man is yet to be seen, but with the success of the MCU character it’s a maybe.
The plot will see a younger Clarke juggling his duel identities as the legendary superhero, while also trying to put in a shift at the Daily Planet as an investigative journalist. It’s not meant to be an origin story, as such, so it will probably be akin to the 1978 Superman, but with a younger timeline.
Cast
As things stand, there’s literally nothing to go on for the Superman Legacy cast and it will probably be a while before we get anything confirmed. For now, we’re just going to put together our own suggested casting, just in case James and team are looking for any hints.
Firstly, we’ve got a way younger version of Superman to cast, so we’re expecting this to be a totally new face from open casting. Our top pick for Louis Lane is Jenna Ortega from Wednesday, but for us it’s all about the baddy. If it’s Lex Luthur then a return to the older Gene Hackman style would be good to see.
Options include Sean Penn, Jeff Bridges, George Clooney, Gary Oldman, Forest Whitaker, Adam Driver, Viggo Mortensen, Christian Bale, Michael Fassbender, and Bryan Cranston. A lot of these would also work well if they threw in a new villain like Brainiac and you can add Benedict Cumberbatch, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Steve Carell and Brad Pitt into the mix too.
Runtime
As with the age rating, the Superman Legacy runtime will only be confirmed when we’re close to the release date in 2025. However, Man of Steel was 2 hours and 23 minutes long, Batman Vs. Superman Dawn of Justice was 2 hours and 32 minutes and Superman Returns was 2 hours and 34 minutes long.
That should give you a good ballpark for the runtime for James Gunn’s first DCU movie.
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