James Gunn says he’s not making a “young Superman movie” despite hiring a younger Superman

Back in December, when new DC Studios co-boss James Gunn announced that he was developing a new Superman movie without Henry Cavill in the lead role, he said it was because the movie would be “focusing on an earlier part of Superman’s life”—leading to everyone making the natural assumption that this would be some kind of origin story. Then, David Corenswet was announced as the lead of the film, now called Superman: Legacy, which fit with what Gunn had said initially: Cavill is 40, which is obviously too old to be in a movie, while Corenswet is only 30, which is one of the youngest ages you can be.

But hold up, says Gunn. Just because his movie is about an earlier part of Superman’s life, and because he moved on from the previous actor for being too old, and because he hired an actor who is a decade younger doesn’t mean he’s making a movie about a “young Superman.” Wherever would someone get an idea that absurd? Gunn offered this clarification(?) on Threads, the hot new social media platform made by a bad billionaire (not the anti-nuke drama of the same name), in response to a question someone had about Blue Beetle and how it fits into this universe with a younger Superman.

Gunn explained(?) that he “was never making a ‘young Superman’ movie, just a Superman movie,” which doesn’t answer the fan’s original question and also introduces further questions. But it wouldn’t be Superman: Legacy if we didn’t have questions, since this is also the project where Gunn followed up the news that he was hiring Corenswet and Rachel Brosnahan as Clark and Lois Lane by casting people to play Guy Gardner (maybe the third most important Green Lantern?), Hawkgirl, Mister Terrific, and (later) Metamorpho. Those would all be bizarre characters to include in a “young Superman movie,” but since this apparently isn’t that… it’s still pretty weird, actually.