The summer movie season is heating up, and all eyes are on James Gunn’s Superman. Anticipation for this big screen reboot continues to grow, with Warner Bros. releasing a brand new trailer that gives us a bit more insight into the movie’s plot and the relationship between David Corenswet’s Superman and Rachel Brosnahan’s Lois Lane.
But really, it’s all about the villains. The new trailer not only showcases Nicholas Hoult’s Lex Luthor, but also characters like María Gabriela de Faría’s Engineer, Gunn’s creation the Hammer of Boravia, and the mysterious Ultraman.
It all begs the question - who is really the villain of Gunn’s Superman? Is Lex taking a backseat to some of the DCU’s other baddies? Let’s explore the many villains featured in Superman and how these characters all fit together.
Who Is the Hammer of Boravia?
One of the newcomers in the latest trailer is a hulking, armored character called the Hammer of Boravia. Don’t worry if that name doesn’t set off any DC continuity alarm bells. In this case, Gunn isn’t adapting an existing character from the comics, but rather inventing an entirely new villain for David Corenswet’s Superman to battle. It’s an interesting choice, given how vast DC’s character library is and the fact that the large majority have yet to be touched by the DCU.
This character was actually first teased in some of DC’s promotional material for the film. A faux-Daily Planet newspaper features the headline “‘Hammer of Boravia’ Creates Havoc Downtown.” We seem to be seeing that conflict play out in the trailer, as the Hammer trades blows with Superman and unleashes a devastating laser attack.
It definitely appears that the Hammer of Boravia is relying on technology to even the playing field with Superman. This seems to be a soldier wearing a weaponized battlesuit. The suit reminds us of nothing if not the Zaku from the various Gundam series. Interestingly, Gunn has also referred to the various giant monsters in the film as kaiju. This suggests that the director and his design team have taken a lot of inspiration from Japanese media for their Superman villains, even as Superman himself seems to draw more from the classic Silver Age comics and the graphic novel All-Star Superman. This movie is shaping up to be a unique fusion of Eastern and Western elements.
Based on what Warners has revealed about the Hammer of Boravia so far, we know that this character represents the fictional nation of Boravia, which at the time of the film has recently invaded the neighboring country of Jarhanpur. Superman has just intervened to put a stop to that war, drawing the Hammer’s wrath upon Metropolis. We can see scenes of that invasion playing out in the trailer, and we also get a sense of the serious political fallout Superman creates by interfering in said war. Even the US Secretary of Defense is breathing down his neck.
This makes it clear that Gunn’s Superman will explore the challenges Kal-El faces trying to be not just a force for good inside Metropolis, but on the world stage. He’s doing his best to protect all innocents and creating an international incident in the process. In that sense, the new film seems to share a little in common with Zack Snyder’s Batman v Superman, which also dealt with the unintended consequences of Superman operating outside the boundaries of the US. Let’s just hope this doesn’t also result in Jimmy Olsen being shot in the head in the film’s first act.
María Gabriela de Faría’s Engineer
After barely appearing in the first teaser trailer, María Gabriela de Faría’s character The Engineer plays a much bigger role in this trailer. We get a closer glimpse of her nanotech-based powers, and it’s clear right away that she’s no friend of Superman’s.
It’s a bit of a role reversal for The Engineer compared to her comic book counterpart. In the comics, she’s a member of a superhero team called The Authority. The Authority are never painted as outright villains, but they are depicted as a much more proactive and militant alternative to the Justice League. They’re far less concerned with things like collateral damage or national sovereignty. In that sense, it’s easy to see why Gunn would want to include The Engineer, aka Angela Spica, in his film. The new Superman movie is all about the conflict between Superman’s brand of old-fashioned heroism and a new generation of more cynical heroes. We see that conflict embodied even in Superman’s costume, as the angular S logo is borrowed from the graphic novel Kingdom Come, which also dealt with such themes.
The new Superman movie is all about the conflict between Superman’s brand of old-fashioned heroism and a new generation of more cynical heroes.But again, it’s up for debate as to whether Angela qualifies as a hero at all in the DCU. The trailer makes it plain that Angela is working for Luthor, and she seems all too eager to take on Superman in the field of battle. We see her battling the Man of Steel in the middle of a baseball stadium, and we also see her tearing into Superman’s loyal robot servants in the Fortress of Solitude. Even Krypto isn’t safe from her wrath, though he gets in a good hit of his own.
We assume that The Engineer, like Luthor himself, believes herself to be on the right side and believes Superman is a threat to humanity. Will she have her mind changed by the end? Possibly. We know that Gunn was at one point planning an Authority movie to spin out of Superman, though that project appears to have been put on the back burner. Still, we imagine Superman is the start of a larger storyline for de Faría’s character.
Is Ultraman in James Gunn’s Superman?
The Engineer seems to be looking for Lex Luthor in the movie, but we also see her fighting alongside a mysterious, masked character who’s been the source of plenty of speculation in recent months. Is this character the DCU version of Ultraman?
That’s definitely the prevailing theory, both because of the large U emblem on his chest and the fact that he clearly has the strength and durability to trade blows with Superman himself. But if this is Ultraman, the movie is definitely taking a loose approach to the source material.
Traditionally, Ultraman is a version of Superman from an alternate DC Universe. He hails from Earth-3, a world where the traditional dynamic between DC’s heroes and villains is reversed. In this world, Ultraman is the leader of an anti-Justice League known as the Crime Syndicate of America, a group that also includes Superwoman, Owlman, Power Ring, and Johnny Quick. Earth-3’s Lex Luthor is that world’s greatest hero. Outlandish as it may seem, we have to wonder if there’s an element to Earth-3 Lex in Hoult’s version. He obviously sees himself as Earth’s greatest hero, in any case.
With everything else going on in Gunn’s Superman, we highly doubt the film is going to be delving into the DC multiverse. It’s more likely that Ultraman is being reworked to become something more akin to Nuclear Man from 1987’s Superman IV: The Quest for Peace, or some versions of Bizarro from the comics. He could be a character who’s been genetically engineered to mimic Superman’s powers. The fact that we can’t see his face or any part of his body may mean he was horribly disfigured in the process… and is the perfect set-up for a dramatic reveal with Corenswet behind the mask.
Physically, it’s looking like Ultraman, not Lex, is the endgame villain of Gunn’s Superman. The Man of Steel will have to contend with a villain who has all of his strength and probably none of his morality. And if previous trailers are any indication, Kal-El is going to get seriously banged up in the process.
Superman vs. Kaiju
The new trailer showcases the massive scale of this superhero movie. At one point, we even see buildings toppling over like dominoes. As much as Superman is devoted to saving innocent lives, Metropolis may wind up with a body count to rival the climax of Man of Steel if he isn’t careful.
The problem is that Kal-El isn’t just fighting humanoid villains like the Hammer of Boravia and the Engineer in this movie. He’s also got a giant monster problem. We see him battling a kaiju that would be right at home in Legendary’s Monsterverse series or the Pacific Rim movies.
Another scene hearkens back to the original costume reveal photo Gunn released in 2024. That image showed Superman suiting up while a mysterious and very massive monster terrorized Metropolis in the background. That scene will apparently play out in the movie itself, though based on these trailers, we know that Lois Lane is also present. We’ll get to the unusual relationship between Lois and Clark in a bit.
The big question here is why Superman is fighting so many kaiju in the movie. Is there a reason these beasts are rampaging through Metropolis? Is this just an average Tuesday for the DCU, or is something (or someone) summoning them? Hoult’s Lex Luthor seems like exactly the sort of guy who would manufacture a kaiju crisis to make Superman look bad.
On that note, let's finally turn our attention to Lex Luthor himself.
Lex Luthor: Supporting Villain?
The trailer makes it clear that Superman will have no shortage of enemies to punch in his latest big-screen outing. But it doesn’t appear that Hoult’s Lex Luthor will be among them. There’s no need for Lex to don his iconic green and purple armor and take on Superman directly when he has so many other pawns who can do the dirty work for him.
Based on what we see of Hoult’s Lex in the trailer, he’s pretty traditional in his motivations. He sees himself as humanity’s savior, the only guy smart enough to lead mankind into a new era. He doesn’t like that the public has grown so enamored with Superman. He can’t abide the thought of humanity looking to an outside force to save itself when it should be looking to Lex himself. Superman is living rent-free in this guy’s head, and he can’t stand it. This Lex is so anti-Superman that he even refers to Kal-El as “it.”
Lex is clearly going to great lengths to discredit the Man of Steel in this movie. It appears he may even be working with ARGUS, suggesting we’ll see an alliance between Lex and Frank Grillo’s Rick Flagg, Sr. At one point, we see Superman sharing a superhuman prison cell with Anthony Carrigan’s Metamorpho and being beaten by prison guards. Apparently, Kal-El’s political crisis grows dire enough that he’s actually thrown in jail.
All of this suggests that Hoult is playing more of a supporting role in the film than fans might be expecting. Lex is still ostensibly the main villain of the movie. He’s Superman’s greatest arch-nemesis, and that’s never going to change, no matter how many times the DCU gets rebooted. But he seems to be working very indirectly in this film, relying on allies like The Engineer and Ultraman to do the actual fighting while he quietly works to tarnish the Man of Steel’s reputation.
Ultimately, Lex will probably still emerge as the final villain of Gunn’s Superman, but more in a thematic and emotional sense, whereas Ultraman is the prime physical threat. The movie will almost surely culminate in Kal-El proving Lex wrong and reminding the world that kindness, decency, and hope still have a place in our cynical 21st-century world. But don’t expect the two to settle their differences with fisticuffs. And don’t be surprised if Lex doesn’t wind up in prison by the end, but rather sticks around to play a recurring role in the DCU. His defeat will be an intellectual one, not necessarily a physical one.
Lois Lane and Clark Kent’s Relationship
While the villains definitely hog most of the spotlight in this new trailer, it is worth taking a step back to examine the dynamic between Brosnahan’s Lois Lane and Corenswet’s Clark Kent. The opening scene reveals that Lois already knows Clark’s secret. It makes sense. If she’s truly the intrepid, brilliant reporter she’s made out to be, Lois really needs to be smart enough to see through Clark’s flimsy human disguise.
That opening scene is somewhat reminiscent of the one in 1978’s Superman where Margot Kidder’s Lois interviews Christopher Reeve’s Superman for the first time. But in this case, Gunn is downplaying the romantic tension in favor of allowing Lois to really grill Clark on the political fallout of Superman’s actions. Again, she’s a reporter first and a love interest second.
On that note, it’s enough to wonder just what the state of Lois and Clark’s relationship is in this movie. In the comics, Clark only revealed his secret to Lois after they had already fallen in love. But here, she’s already figured it out. The tone of that interview scene suggests that the two are close friends, but not necessarily lovers yet. Though as we see from their dramatic kiss later in the trailer, that will apparently change over the course of the film.
Gunn spoke about the Lois/Clark dynamic when IGN visited the set of the film in 2024, saying “It's a complicated relationship and we really get into it and there's long scenes that are about their relationship and the way they relate and what it would be like for a person, who's this incredibly intelligent, strong-headed, stubborn, skeptical journalist, to have a relationship with someone who can lift a skyscraper.”
One thing is clear - despite the fact that Superman will be contending with villains both human and monster in the movie, Gunn is intent on preventing Lois from falling into the same damsel-in-distress trap that she so often has in past Superman adaptations. This is a character who, intellectually, can hold her own against Superman every bit as easily as Lex Luthor.
Who do you think is the real endgame villain of Gunn’s Superman? Which epic superhero battle are you most excited to see? Let us know what you think in the comments.
For more on the future of the DCU, see every DC movie and series in development.
Jesse is a mild-mannered staff writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on BlueSky.
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