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Hello and welcome back to the bonker news Without the Nonsense, five days a week.

Well, maybe a little bit of nonsense, because what is life without dreams, beauty, flights

of imagination, and heroic fantasy role models who reflect our idea of our best selves back to us?

On July the 11th, Superman returns to cinemas in what is technically the third

reboot of the beloved character, who was created in 1933 by young writer Jerry Siegel and

artist Joe Schuster while there were high school students in Cleveland. In sharp contrast to the dismal

downbeat Superman we saw last time, director James Gunn says his version of the character will embody hope, kindness and

compassion, a super optimistic, super decent, super good guy, who arrives in cinemas, although it wasn't

planned this way, are perhaps the most debased moments in modern American history. This Superman

may even be super woke. So why does the character as Superman, with his multiple identities, Clark Kent,

the nerdy reporter, Calell, the lonely last survivor of an alien race, and of course the man of steel,

keep resonating so powerfully over the decades? Why do people love him? How has he changed?

And how will he land at a time when, as we've discussed often on this podcast, the actual

real-life president

is so corrupt and cynical, he might as well be a super villain himself. He is, after all,

a real estate developer who has his faults. Here to Neil Before Pod is Ian Gordon, author

of Superman, The Persistence of an American icon and a cultural historian. He joins me Zray from

Singapore.

Hello, Ian.

Welcome to our Fortress of Solitude.

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