<\/p>\n
Now that James Gunn’s “Superman” proved to be a bona fide hit<\/a>, the doors are wide open for Gunn to expand on that movie in the larger DC Universe. One of the best aspects of “Superman” was seeing the movie portray a large world that is already used to seeing superheroes taking on extradimensional imps and kaijus attacking the city just like a regular Tuesday afternoon. It allows Gunn and whoever comes next to imagine a DC Universe where you don’t have to stop and explain everything, where you don’t need funny quips every 15 minutes to joke about how weird it is that we’re seeing a comic book movie.<\/p>\n So far, Gunn and Peter Safran have done an excellent job making the DC Universe a unique and distinct superhero universe compared to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, making it a place that embraces weird concepts and characters like the entire cast of “Creature Commandos” or teases for Mister Mxyzptlk in “Peacemaker” season 2<\/a>. With the “Superman” sequel seemingly confirming Brainiac as the villain, it seems Gunn is finally letting DC movies embrace weirder, explicitly comic book-y characters that are more than just punching bags.<\/p>\n Unfortunately, there are still characters we probably will never see in movies. Such is the case of Superman’s most powerful villain, who is also one of the strangest and most complicated character origin stories in modern times: Superboy-Prime.<\/p>\n Superboy-Prime was introduced in DC Comics Presents in 1985 during the last stretches of the massive crossover event “Crisis on Infinite Earths.” It is there that we are introduced to Earth-Prime, the “real world” of the DC multiverse, where Superman is a fictional hero appearing in comic books and DC Comics is just a comic book company. There we meet a 15-year-old superhero fanboy who has been teased throughout his life for sharing a name with his favorite hero \u2014 Clark Kent. Except this Clark discovers that he, too, comes from Krypton and has superpowers. He goes on to become one of the strongest characters in mainstream comics, and one of the most meta, too. Superboy-Prime is capable of literally punching holes in reality and the time stream, and he tends to break the fourth wall like Deadpool \u2014 just with a much worst attitude.<\/p>\n Read more: The 15 Most Underrated Batman Villains Ranked<\/a><\/p>\nA commentary on fandom<\/h2>\n