Animation Guild | We are 839 Digital Magazine
Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1399900
F E AT U R E HERO WORSHIP In the years since Superman's small-screen debut in 1941, animated superheroes have been walking the line between tradition and innovation. Superheroes get it done. This much, we know. Caped, masked, alter ego-ed, or otherwise, these men and women of action arrive on the scene, fully formed and with one purpose: to defeat the bad guy, vanquish evil, right wrongs, and save the day. They never hesitate, deviate, or do anything contrary to their purpose. Superheroes never act in a manner that is anything other than, well, heroic… except when they do. Filmmaker Bruce Timm recalls the uproar from traditionalist Superman fans over the superhero-to-be killing the villain at the end of Zack Snyder's 2013 live-action film Man of Steel. Admittedly, Clark Kent was in a no-win situation. Lives were being threatened, so he had to make a quick decision. "Break the villain's neck. What else is he going to do?" says Timm. "But boy, when I talked to my friends who worked at DC Comics, they were freaking out. They were like, 'Superman would never do that.'" Timm, who is a creator, producer, director, writer, and character designer for countless animated superhero shows including the groundbreaking Batman: The Animated Series in the early 1990s, had envisioned—years before Snyder's controversial film finale—a similar resolution to a battle between Superman and the monster Doomsday in the direct-to-video animated movie Superman: Doomsday in 2007. "It seemed like justifiable homicide to me," says Timm, "[but DC was] like, 'Nope, you cannot do that. He would never do that. He would find some other way.'" By Evan Henerson 36 KEYFRAME