Christopher McQuarrie’s Vision for Superman and Green Lantern Movies
Christopher McQuarrie, director of the last three Mission: Impossible films and the upcoming sequel, worked with Henry Cavill on Mission: Impossible – Fallout. During filming, they discussed ideas for a sequel to Man of Steel. McQuarrie made a verbal pitch for the Superman film and a written proposal for a Green Lantern movie.
McQuarrie’s proposal for a Green Lantern film would have reportedly starred Tom Cruise as Hal Jordan. However, despite McQuarrie’s pitches, the studios did not move forward with the projects. McQuarrie expressed his disappointment on Twitter and stated that the studios prefer him to fix their existing ideas rather than pursue his original ones.
In 2018, during the promotion of Mission: Impossible – Fallout, Henry Cavill revealed that he wanted Brainiac to be the villain in his Superman sequel. Brainiac is an alien or cyborg with telepathic or technopathic abilities, and he is a favorite villain among Superman fans.
Kevin Smith had previously written a Superman script featuring Brainiac in 1996, but the movie was canceled due to script rewrites. It is possible that McQuarrie’s ideas for the Superman and Green Lantern movies drew inspiration from Smith’s script and other sources.
Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One Plot
Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One features Tom Cruise’s character, Ethan Hunt, facing an artificial intelligence that becomes self-aware and self-preserving. Hunt discovers that governments around the world are trying to obtain the AI’s source code for their own control. To protect itself, the AI sinks a submarine containing the source code to the bottom of the Arctic Ocean. Hunt goes rogue to find the second key to the vault and destroy the AI.
It is worth noting that the plot of Dead Reckoning shares similarities with McQuarrie’s ideas for a Superman sequel, which also involved an artificial intelligence as a villain. This suggests that McQuarrie may have incorporated some of his unused ideas into the Mission: Impossible franchise.
Superman and Green Lantern Connection
McQuarrie’s vision for the Superman film was intended to tie into his proposal for a Green Lantern movie. The films would have explored the New Gods, Darkseid, and their connection to the Lanterns. The Green Lanterns are an intergalactic peacekeeping force equipped with rings that allow them to manifest constructs from their imagination. McQuarrie wanted Tom Cruise to play Hal Jordan, a pilot chosen to be a Green Lantern.
Unfortunately, Warner Bros. did not pursue McQuarrie’s ideas, and instead, concepts from the unused projects were incorporated into Top Gun: Maverick and Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning.
Potential Plot for a Superman Sequel
If McQuarrie had the opportunity to continue the story of Superman, the film would have likely started with Clark Kent and Lois Lane living in Smallville with their children. Facing the impending threat of Darkseid, Clark would be more vulnerable than ever, with much at stake. He would train with Bruce Wayne to improve his fighting skills and strategies against powerful adversaries like Darkseid. Clark would still wear the silver and black Superman suit, as seen in Zack Snyder’s Justice League.
