Ex-Superman Dean Cain Says James Gunn Made a ‘Mistake’ Calling Superman an ‘Immigrant’ and ‘It’s Going to Hurt’ the Box Office: ‘How Woke Is Hollywood Going to Make This Character?’

Another chance to post this...

From a 1949 book cover distributed to schools by DC.

Superman was always woke you dummy.

The very notion of superman is woke. With his powers, he could rule earth. Instead he helps kids and little old ladies with nothing to gain for himself. The guy is empathy incarnate.
- Superman: Red Son
- Fine, I guess I'll go read All-Star Superman again.
I know we never measured up to these ideals, but at least we had them. Painful to see.
I don't know what social media Gunn uses, but someone should get him to recreate this poster with David.
- That's a great idea!
Superman started off as Anti-Facist. But it’s worth noting it was co-opted during WW2 and the Cold War and became more of a propaganda vehicle than anything.

Dean Cain is an idiot. So there's that.

Sadly, yes. Like the hercules guy
He's also not white so what does he gain from making a stink about this? Japanese superman was the most woke thing to exist until 2018, he's got no room to talk. His show was also basically about superman's girlfriend, an extremely woke interpretation of superman. We can do this all day lmao
- basically about superman's girlfriend,
  And casting Teri Hatcher in that role, someone who's very expressive and versatile, was a huge success.
- Not white? What color is he, pink?

Superman as an immigrant's story is one of the oldest and most obvious analyses of the character. It's barely even subtext; it's just text. Imagine how he'll react when he finds out Superman was originally a New Deal socialist who went around smashing up corrupt capitalists' businesses for safety violations.

The quintessential symbol of heroism, of 'The American Way', Superman, was created during the rise of fascism and nazism by two Midwestern Jewish boys, one of whom had immigrated from Canada and whose parents were immigrants from Russia and The Netherlands. In the story introducing their character to the world, he saves a wrongly convicted woman from execution, stops a wife beater from killing his wife, and stops a slimy lobbyist and corrupt senator from roping the US into a war with Europe. i.e. it acknowledges that the justice system gets it wrong, that women can be abused and endangered by their husbands, and that congress has a huge corruption and bribery problem. Sounds pretty fucking woke to me. And a few years later had him literally punch Hitler. The idea that they didnt have anything to say with the character about prejudice, about immigrants adopting their new home and being adopted in turn, about politics, is fucking laughable... "too woke". No, Dean, you're too ignorant to think that he ever wasn't "woke".
- Oh, that's the tip if the iceberg. There's one comic where he smashes up the city's slums because he finds out the government will replace them with nicer, rent-subsidized apartments. There's another where he traps a mine owner and all of his rich friends in a cave-in because of unsafe working conditions. Then there was the time he decided to take on traffic safety by smashing cars until the mayor promised to start enforcing traffic violations. Old-school Superman was one of those violent, radical-leftists the conservatives are so scared of.

He's litterally an alien.

An Illegal alien at that. He can't even claim Birthright Citizenship, if we still followed the Constitution I mean.
- He can’t even claim Birthright Citizenship
  Canonically, I believe he was still technically gestating in the pod before he arrived. So he's more of an Anchor Baby.

Wait can someone explain since when is superman not an immigrant? Bro literally fell from the sky or some shit from an alien planet. How the fuck is he not an immigrant? Oh right hes white.

Not that it is incorrect to call him an immigrant, but I do think "castaway" and "refugee" fit his situation a little better. Still a xenophobic thing to say he's not an immigrant. Every single document regarding Clark Kent's existence is falsified, so he is, by definition, an illegal alien.
- They actually changed this in the mid-90s (and since changed it back). From 96-09, he was a legal US citizen because his "rocket" was somehow just incubating the embryonic Kal-El and thus he was ACTUALLY born on American soil from the Birthing Matrix.
Jesus is whitey white aswell
- 6'3" Dutch-Irishman with crystal blue eyes and perfectly manicured cuticles.
You're also forgetting he is generally considered a good guy and wears Red (valor and bravery) and blue(vigilance, peserverence, and justice) on the American flag. He doesn't wear white as that represents purity and innocence.

He's litteraly immigrant. It's objective fact. What he's talking about? He think calling Wonder Woman a woman is "making her woke"?

He think calling Wonder Woman a woman is "making her woke"?
That sounds exactly like something this twerp would say
"Woke" literally means "anything the right doesn't like". It's used in the same way the Nazis used Degenerate. Remember that.
Not just that. Pretty sure he fits the definition of “illegal immigrant” pretty well. Doubt that either the baby of the Kent family filled out any immigration or asylum forms

How is it a mistake? Kal El is literally from another planet! The term "immigrant" or "alien" could not possibly apply more.

also El in the name refers to GOD too it as christian as it can get

Superman isn't just an immigrant. He's a refugee when his home was destroyed by civil war. He came to the USA and made it better because he's an immigrant.

In most versions, Krypton isn't destroyed by a civil war, but an ecological disaster. But your point still stands.
In what continuity is Krypton destroyed by a civil war?
- Man of Steel

That's literally his backstory. He's a refugee from another planet that's like the whole point.

Imagine being this goddamn stupid.

Well, Ackchyually...
The "Superman isn't an immigrant" is a bad faith argument... but I think it's technically correct.
Being an immigrant implies intent of moving from one country to another, which Superman didn't have. Especially since he came to earth as a baby and has no ties to krypton. I wouldn't call someone who was born in another country and was adopted as a baby into another country and immigrant.
Superman does explore themes of immigration from its conception. Though it's worth noting that if viewed from this perspective, it's a very old fashion American model of immigration, that might be viewed negatively today - he adopts his American upbringing in every meaningful way, especially his values, while his own culture is abandoned (nearly?) completely.
Supergirl, on the other hand, is an immigrant.
- Superman is an immigrant created by two sons of immigrants.
  His parents sent him to Earth to have a better life (any life at all really). Something similar happens in reality where parents in Central and South America send their children, alone, to the US.
  Also happens with babies adopted from other countries. You may not consider them immigrants, but the government sure as hell does. There's quite a bit of immigration paperwork that needs to get filed in order for one of those adoptions to go through.
- You just wrote an essay to argue semantics. Why? Maybe "refugee" would be more accurate, but the two are synonymous in the current political discussion. You're creating a conflict here for no reason other than your own enjoyment from arguing. If that's what you want to do, go to twitter.
- Really because art doesn't exist in a vacuum. Art is influenced by the culture in which it is created.
  Are you seriously trying to argue that a man with unprecedented godlike powers from another world isn't an allegory.

If the only thing Cain has to whine about in 2025 is denying Superman's leftist origins written by depression era immigrants, he's really got nothing to complain about or is trying to distract from some bullshit or sell something

He tries to stay relevant by being a right wing influencer. He is the definition of has been.
- hes like sorbo, brain damage from stroke, and only cast in christian movies.

Worst Superman has harsh words for creator of better Superman. After playing the part for a decade, Dean Cain still doesn't understand the character.

I mean, he may be right that it'll hurt the box office to polarize the public, but Superman is as much an illegal alien as you can get.

Come to think of it, what is the story regarding his birth certificate, citizenship etc? Did Ma and Pa Kent claim a home birth and get him documented?

But he's white, how can he be an "immigrant"
Probably, when did the original Superman even come? 40's? Records were pretty lazy back then, especially in rural America.
I don't even know if being "illegal" was a thing, we might have still had an open immigration policy.
In Smallville, I think mama and papa Kent had help from papa Luthor in the paperwork department so officially they adopted an orphan. I don't remember what, if anything, happened to the original orphan whose info they used.
Depends on what comics. From what i read in some comic series he was actually birthed on earth and was able to run for president. While in other comic series he came as a baby and was adopted ( which, if unknown origins, means us citizenship iirc ).
Edit: not sure why im getting downvoted. I said what is true, that in most comics he's a baby that came from krypton, and due to us laws was basically adopted as a us citizen. Doesnt make him less of an immigrant...
- That is only the story in a couple of comics of the 90's.
  Since its conception in the 30's, Superman has always been an illegal immigrant from Krypton.
- I don't think they adopted him as in a legal process, I think they just pretended that he was their biological son. You can't just go to the court and be like "We found a baby, can we keep it?". They could have surrendered the infant to law enforcement and then petitioned to adopt it, but afaik this never happened the Comics, Movies or TV Shows (including the one Dean Cain was on). So while it's true that he was a US citizen, it was because the Kent's lied about his origin.
  From what i read in some comic series he was actually birthed on earth and was able to run for president.
  If you are referring to Kalel/ Calvin Ellis from Earth 23, he wasn't born on Earth either. He was born on Krypton like the other Supermen.
  The point that GaMEChld and James Gunn are making is that even if Kal-El was made a legal citizen he is still very much an immigrant (and technically an illegal Alien) and none of that matters one single bit. Being born on U.S. Soil to American parents doesn't make you a good citizen and being born somewhere else doesn't make you a bad one.

Everything i don't like is woke (or communism).

You gotta add /s

This is peak absurdity. You have a being from another planet, the being is sent from another planet because his planet was about to explode. In a last ditch attempt he was sent to earth by his parents. It surely sounds like a person who could be identified as an immigrant, illegal alien or asylum seeker.

Did Covid make dumb people even dumber? Ignorance certainly is bliss..

Funny thing is I've been calling Superman an illegal immigrant for decades. All of the sudden it's not a joke anymore. It's a friggin comic book hero for crying out loud.
These people want to be evil but hate being told that they're evil, so anything with an anti-evil message must be "woke".
Did COVID make dumb people even dumber?
No, they were always that dumb. They probably just projected themselves onto Superman because he's a strong white man and clearly strong white people cannot be illegal immigrants because that breaks their pathetic little power trip fantasy.
- This is specifically comments by Dean Cain, a man who once played Superman, but didn't seem to actually pay attention to any of the scripts, because he became a right wing grifter.
I dont know how legit was the research methodology, but I did read a paper somewhere that even asymptomatic covid decreased peoples QI for a measurable ammount.
Maybe actually. They figured out what caused the loss of smell: brain damage

Dean Cain is a fat jackass with MAGA brain rot.hes also the worst of the superman actors

Cain voted for Bill Clinton twice, and voted for Al Gore in the 2000 United States presidential election, the latter of which he later said he regretted.[21] He supported John McCain in the 2008 election, and supported Rick Perry in the 2012 election.[30] In 2016 and 2020, he endorsed and voted for Donald Trump.[31][32] He also endorsed him for the 2024 election.[33]

In 2018, Cain was elected to the board of directors of the National Rifle Association of America.[34][35]

-Wikipedia

check dean caine's pipes for lead contamination
- Maybe he has that mold that JK Rowling has.
It's like you can track his slow backslide into the racist Republican pipeline.

Well, Superman wasn't born in the U.S.A to parents in the U.S.A..

He travelled as an unaccompanied minor to the USA. I hate to say it but it seems pretty obvious to me he's not from 'round here with the whole flying and laser eyes thing too.

Superman wasn't born in the U.S.A
DC furiously sweeping the "birthing pod" thing under the rug
(New 52 erased this I believe)
That last part is literally a plot point in Superman Smashes the Klan. Through most of the book, he avoids flying and heat vision for fear it will other him too much.

DUDE! In the 1940s they called Superman an immigrant... HE IS A FUCKING ALIEN!

Also he was an ILLEGAL alien! His escape pod landed outside some childless couple's farm house in the mid-west, and bless their hearts the first thing they did was adopt him.

He was brought to (or rather, fired at) Earth as a baby. Arguably he should be first in line to be a DACA recipient.
He also spends his spare time literally fighting a billionaire, so there's that...
- Fired at earth because his planet was literally going to be destroyed. His parents sent him there because it was his best chance at surviving.

Acrtion Comics #1 ...Lets see:

Superman persuades the Governor to stay the execution of an innocent death-row inmate (p. 3-4)
Beats up an abusive husband (p. 6-7)
Dumps some rich sex-pests out of their car (p. 9-10)
Intervenes in a corrupt lobbyist bribing a DC Senator (p. 11-end)

"When did Superman become so WOOOooooOOOke????"

thank you, at least we have a definitive answer now: literally in the first comic book that he appeared in.

Dean Cain can lick a sweaty nutsack. An embarrassment in the history of Superman casting.

Him and Kevin Sorbo can lick boots together while they swap stories about how they used to play strong guys on TV but now spend their time being weak-willed sheep IRL.

Die in a fire, Dean.

What else would superman be? Are you gonna change the lore so Krypton is a small town in Kansas?

And that Lex Co. is strip mining it for a rare earth mineral, now the CEO is going to run as president because of those pesky environmentalists… wait !

What's he going to do next, go after white people who are simply proud of their heritage?

That was such a good book i loved the pocket size of the books associated well.
More context. Drunk history did a thing on it.
https://youtu.be/-3VyPR0S0LM

An illegal alien immigrant at that!

Dean Cain and Kevin Sorbo - two people who would get their asses kicked by the characters they played.

I mean, literally all people would get their asses kicked if they got into a fight with either super man or hercules
- Lucy Lawless could probably take down Hercules.
- I would just pray to hera that zeus wouldnt shut up about how hercules is his favorite son and how he cheats on her constantly. I would feed superman non stop blackpill content until he just leaves the planet.

Dean Cain was in one of the 'God's not Dead" movies. That tells you all you need to know about him.

It's almost like these people have no clue about the source material at all. Reminds me of religious folks 😂

Well, you can fuck off Dean Cain.

Superman is an assimilated Jewish diaspora immigrant.

"Name?"

"Kal-El"

"Clark Kent, got it."

He's also a powerful tool for the maintenance of the status quo

Dean Cain was absolute shit as 'Murica's favorite mascot — regardless of the unavoidable fact that the character came from another world in every single iteration across all mediums ...so far. 😶

Fuck you and your fetid career, you dumbass, Dean. 🖕🏼🤣

Which iteration was he? I'm in the wilderness and don't have any bars
- Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman
  Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman is an American superhero television series based on the DC Comics character Superman created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. It stars Dean Cain as Clark Kent / Superman and Teri Hatcher as Lois Lane. The series aired on ABC from September 12, 1993, to June 14, 1997.[1]
  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lois_%26_Clark:_The_New_Adventures_of_Superman
- Luckeee 🤩

Every once in a while I'm reminded of what an absolute dipshit one of my fondly remembered actors from childhood is

Yep they all seem to go batshit insane sooner or later. Really sad.
- I saw a YouTube short the other day of Bruce Campbell talking about how there's this stereotype in acting where the good-guy actors are all pieces of shit, and the bad-guy actors are all the nicest people you've ever met.
- Cognitive decline leading them to adopt ideologies that don't require them to think too hard
- Sadly, it's profitable.
Yeah, I kind of enjoyed Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman back then.
it's one thing seeing these idiots, but even more disappointing to see so-called liberals supporting genocide.

The argument that "I like immigrants, but don't let them change our culture" has been around for a long time. They'd say that about Italians, and now I can find a pizza place all over town. Seems like they can change it for the better to me.

Tomato's aren't native to Italy
- Correct. There was a back and forth movement of culture. Tomatoes were sent out, then they put them in pizza, then their immigrants came over with the pizzas. The world is a melting pot of cultures.
  Edit: maybe "sent out" is too nice of a term though. The process is messy and complex. Ugly at times
- And you really got the hang of them. I want to come back to Italy for the food and people. Mostly the food though.
- Wait... Are you saying tomatoes are an immigrant too?!

Ex-Superman Dean Cain can fuck off

I mean technically Superman is a refugee

And an immigrant

Ignoranus n. Someone who is both ignorant and an asshole.

Dean Cain is just Kevin Sorbo 2.0

Actually I believe they are both alphas*, so I think he'd be Sorbo 0.2
*(Derogatory)

Remember when they had to define woke for some court case? The definition was something like acknowledging that there are inequalities in society. Superman's whole schtick is that he's morally good and has a ton of power but doesn't resort to authoritarianism. That seems pretty "woke" to me, too.

Remember when Dean Cain and Kristy Swanson starred in an "exposé" about Obamagate?

Just remember; when someone says “don’t make it political,” that’s a statement with a political agenda.

Call them out on that bullshit.

Everyone this movie matters to already understands Superman enough not to be bothered by the comments of some has-been actor who clearly never understood the character he portrayed.

ICE shows up at Henry Cavill's house this weekend

That’ll be quite the talking point in South Kensington next week!

Worst Superman says what?

Check out Model Minority by Cory Doctorow.
It's about an unnamed superhero (who wears a red cape, and a spandex suit with a big S on it, and is engaged to a journalist named Lois, and his best friend/rival is named Bruce (who has a bat-themed alter ego)... anyway) who realizes that the cops are just beating people up and hiding it, so he makes a stand, but isn't quite sure about how to do so.

Cory Doctorow is a writer who I want to love, i like the plot descriptions of his work and he seems like a really smart and with it person, but his writing style just doesn't spark joy. It feels like work. IDK how to describe it, I just can't get in the flow with his writing.

They didn't go woke Dean, you aged to be a shitty person.

Did dean cain fall off a fucking horse and get brain damage?

he became a looney right wing christian at some point, like cavaziel, sorbo. yup he had a stroke, and some other TBIs too.

Superman punches Nazis. This isn't new.

Hope I live long enough to see these kinds of things with Trump instead.
- In about a decade Superman will be freed from his corporate shackles.

We're still getting Dean Cain's opinion on things? Whoever wrote this article could have avoided all the torture by ignoring that Christofascist xenophobe like the rest of us.

Im gonna go to the theater just to watch this to piss of the conservatives lol

nazis crying that their ubermensch is also a mensch

He couldn't be possibly have been created by Immigrants /s

Looks up Joe Shuster birth place... Toronto, Ontario, Canada with his mother being from Ukraine

Looks up Jerry Siegel parents were from Lithuania

Hell looking up their parents if superman couldn't be an Immigrant he would be a Soviet.

Also Dean Cain has always been a has been loser for a long time now.

Ah yes, Superman. The all American hero... Created by a Canadian.

What an ignorant bitch.

I'm going to guess that James Gunn isn't going to take career advice from...checks notes...Dean fucking Cain.

Sorry, I forgot you existed Dean Cain.

Dollar Store Jerry O'Connell is still around? Figured he'd have drank himself to death about 10 years after Lois and Clark ended.

Welp. All I have to say about that is: fuck Dean Cain.

Yeah he made a mistake, superman isn't a immigrant, he's a refugee

I don't think everyone has to have read the original source material to enjoy something made from that material.

But if you're going to complain about it being faithful to the source material? Naw, that's in no way legit.

Plus... Like, definitionally, Superman was not born on US soil or to American parents. He doesn't have birthright citizenship
He's a literal alien with a fake identity, at the very least he's an immigrant, in every canon
- Technically, wouldn't he be an illegal immigrant?
- Not every canon.
  There is an origin story in the 90's where he isn't an immigrant from Krypton. And a couple of original drafts have him gain powers through super soldier serums. But all other canon make him an illegal immigrant. The whole 90 years of it.

I kinda wish they had gone for an actor of middle eastern descent, or perhaps even immigrant status, to portray Supes. For no reason other than to piss off the bigots.

Dean Cain is a "has been". He hasn't been on anything important in decades.

I don't think Dean Cain has ever actually been relevant.
Very kind of you to imply the guy has ever "been".
Perry White: He's not even a has-been, he's a never-was.

Trump's wife is an immigrant. Trump's parents were immigrants. Many people who are immigrants don't like immigrants because immigrant is code for "someone I don't like for x reason".

I've never cared about anything superman related because it is just the most boring premise of a character to me. what's the best way not get lumped in with idiots like this?

If the premise of a superman story is "strong guy fight strong guy," then yeah, not very interesting. What I'd prefer to see is a story that explores what having superheroes around does to humanity. What happens when a kid copies Superman and jumps off a building, and doesn't get caught? What happens when police expect a superhero to do their job for them? At what point does Superman decide to step away because he thinks he's causing more harm than good?
- What I'd prefer to see is a story that explores what having superheroes around does to humanity.
  The Boys, basically.
- Misfits is a personal favourite show that explores some of those themes.
Go see the movie just to spite Dean Cain.

Well, the migratory status isn't really been the issue with migrants, legal or not. Ethnicity in other hand...

He & Sorbo need to have themselves a bro down, together. My money is on Cain being first nut out.

They did, they're called God's Not Dead 1-58

Anyone who just read the headline needs to actually go read the article. It's not very long. Not that the headline is misleading, he absolutely said those things, but the whole thing is just the most deranged rant. Cain somehow got from being mad about changing the slogan to "truth, justice, and a better tomorrow" to immigrants want to make America into Somalia in two moves.

The US of course having nothing to do with Somalias messed up 20th and 21th century history...

Yeah well I’m calling Dean Cain a little bitch.

Boomer has boomer opinion, next at 11.

whoever that is made a mistake of opening his mug.

He's the Ripley's believe it or not guy, and had a superman series that didn't do well for like 3 or 4 seasons. He's super right wing and super douchey sorta like the dude that ruined Andromeda Kevin sorbo.
- Like Sorbo, Cain is a fraud who only turned into an ultra-right God-botherer because it was a convenient way to hand-wave away a tanking career and find a new one being a (washed up) celebrity mouthpiece for a messianic death cult.
  No, Hollywood didn't stop calling because you're a walking meme about corny 90s television. Its because they're all woke homosexual Satanists and who hate real American conservative Christians who tuck-in their t shirts and have missionary-only sex with their wife.

I'm super disappointed. I had sympathy for the guy, the superman of my childhood. Anyway

- It sounds like you’re thinking of Tom Welling of Smallville. This is the Superman from Lois and Clark in the ‘90s. Costumed in episode one.
  Edit: clearly doesn’t mean he’s not a loser, though. But I enjoyed the show.

So this is how he tries to start relevant now? He should get a hobby.

A good movie is going to do well. This is just called marketing! Like the fight between elon and trump it’s all an illusion to grab your attention.

I’m sorry who is Dean Cain? Next.

Kal-El is an anchor baby!!! lol

Red Son is the only correct version of Superman.

Everything else is bourgeois revisionism.

Wait 'til they find out that Joe Shuster was an immigrant too.

I thought he was dead.

Hol the F up, the guy from Believe it or Not was superman?

Why tho?

The guy from Superman was on Ripley's. He was one of the popular actors in that era. The show was pretty good and he had a decent turn as the Boy in Blue.

Superman is an All-American immigrant

... is that Dean Cain?

Who? The only things I recall about that show were real, and were spectacular.

Umm, wasn't he actually an immigrant? LOL

What a garbage take, this isn't Nazi Germany(yet) and we don't need everything to be government propaganda.

"Truth, Justice and A Better Tomorrow"

I can get behind that

Then Mr. Ex-Superman blatantly ignores the canon origins of the character he played.

I've not seen any Superman movie - did the version Dean Cain was in contain the origin story?

DISAPPOINTED!!