Man of Steel is coming to theaters this June…there’s nothing anyone can do to stop it. A lot of people are excited. Some of us are leery. I have ranted previously about my dismay at the ditching of the John Williams score. But unless you were reading my blogs back on MySpace back in 2007, you don’t know of the sequel idea I had for Superman Returns. I didn’t fully flesh it out then, so I plan to do so now.

One of the biggest problems people had with 2006’s Superman Returns was the fact that [spoiler…for a 7 year old movie] Superman has a kid with Lois. Yipes! What a weird thing to do to the character(s). How do you deal with the kid in a sequel? Some would suggest to sweep him under the rug. Not Tim Babb. I would have made him center stage.

Hear me out. Remember Superman’s kid in the first movie? He’s totally fragile. He’s weak, he has asthma, and he’s scrawny as all get out. Then, later in the movie he is exposed to kryptonite. Lex Luthor shoves it right in his Anakin Skywalker school of acting face. What happens? A few scenes later, he’s able to hurl a gigantic piano at the bad guys. …so basically, the kid is the opposite of Superman…or dare I say, “Bizarro?”

So my sequel would involve a new villain, maybe Braniac or The Eradicator. Both of these are villains with Kyrptonian orgins (at least in some versions). They decide to take over Earth and remake it as New Krypton. Somehow the villain is able to piece together the secret of Superman’s son. While Superman is busy thwarting the initial attempt to remake Earth into Krypton, the villain kidnaps Lil’ Superman. He is able to brainwash the kid by providing Kryptonite to him which speeds up his growth rate, slows his mind, makes him more powerful…and ultimately disfigures him. Then the villain sends “Bizarro” out to do battle with Superman. While the battle rages on, Braniac/Eradicator begins to take over the Earth again. Superman realizes this and ditches the fight with Bizarro to try and stop him. But Bizarro follows him and it soon becomes clear that Superman won’t be able to defeat them both, so he concentrates on defeating Bizzaro. Just as Superman buries Bizzaro in a mountain of rubble, Braniac/Eradicator reveals Bizarro’s identity to Superman. Superman then digs furiously through the rubble to save Bizzaro. Just as he reaches him and begins to try and revive him, Braniac/Eradicator attacks. In his weakened state, Superman is clearly losing the battle…until Bizarro regains consciousness and begins to fight Braniac/Eradicator. In the end Bizarro, sacrifices his life saving Superman and planet Earth.

That seems like a good sequel to me. It has drama. Superman fighting super powered beings, and even Superman in mortal danger. Most of all, at the end, the kid is gone!

…or maybe Bizarro survives but flies off to find new adventures so it’s not such a downer ending. We can hammer out the finer points of the narrative later. The important part is that it will have the #%$@ING JOHN WILLIAMS SCORE!!!

…screw you, Zack Snyder.