Superman is my favorite DC superhero, although in recent years he’s been overshadowed by the Batman. Done right, Superman can be inspirational and action packed. Recently, a fan-produced animated short by Disney animator Robb Pratt has been running around the internet, so eventually I had to catch it. At only about a minute (not including credits and the animator going a bit into the background of the short) it’s pretty good, but ordinarily wouldn’t be more than a “filler video” for the Spotlight.
However, this had me looking to see if any other fan-produced non-parody cartoons had been produced. Sadly, very few and only two others interested me enough to post. So here they all are for your pleasure.
First let’s see Pratt’s version, including the actor he got to voice Superman’s limited lines.
Interestingly, the Superman serials that inspired him actually used animation to show off many of Superman’s powers (especially flight) mixed with the live-action. Pretty lame by today’s standards, and when you realize that The Adventures of Captain Marvel was made before the Superman serials that still pretty lame.
I’m hoping there’s a sequel coming, so we can learn how he stops all those other robots.
Next was done by a film student and mixes live backgrounds and actors with what appears to be art lifted from the infamous “Death of Superman” story arc. He’s how the Superman vs. Doomsday fight would have gone at the University of South Florida.
The only flaw (considering what it is, of course) is when he stretched the panels to fill the screen. Was that really necessary? Still, for an illustrated feature (if I call it a “motion comic”, BW Fave and virtual mentor, Jerzy Drozd, will have my head. 🙂 ) it’s a decent production.
Lastly, a computer animated tale of Superman being taken over, and Batman having to decide whether or not to kill him.
The animator says he’s adapting a story from the book Mythology, made by famed artist Alex Ross and written by Chip Kidd. It’s well known that Batman does have a piece of Kryptonite just in case, but depending on the writer and media/universe the story takes place in sometimes Superman gave him the piece just in case, as in this story, and sometimes Batman is just that untrusting of anyone that he obtained it himself.
I wish I could have found more (I did come across a couple parodies, but I wanted honest Superman stories), so if you know of any, feel free to let us all know in the comments. I know of a few live-action fan-films that I just may look into for future Showcase entries. Personally, I think animated is better than live-action when it comes to Superman. Why? I’ll save that for next week’s Saturday Night Showcase.
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