Superman Stands For Truth And Justice. No Wonder MAGA Hates Him.

MAGA struggles to understand a hero who’s your friend.

James Gunn’s new Superman movie opens this weekend, and the director has apparently stirred some controversy with his public statements that Superman is some kind of hero. (Spoiler warning, I guess.)

“Superman is the story of America,” Gunn said in an interview with the Times of London. “An immigrant that came from other places and populated the country, but for me it is mostly a story that says basic human kindness is a value and is something we have lost.”

This inspired a predictable MAGA freak out. “We don’t go to movies to be lectured at,” Kellyanne Conway whined on Fox News. It’s strange but not surprisingly that the “alternative facts” lady considers what was once overtly patriotic messaging a tedious lecture.

The Fox News chyron screamed, “Super Woke: Iconic Hero Movie To Embrace Pro-Immigrant Themes.” Unfortunately, this wasn’t over-the-top parody. These people are seriously stupid or at least cynical enough to profit off their viewers’ stupidity. So, yes, it’s true. Superman is an immigrant. He’s been an immigrant since his first appearance in 1938. He’s also an illegal immigrant, a refugee from a doomed planet whose desperate parents sent him here to have a better life (one where he doesn’t die with them in a fiery global holocaust). Yet, the usual gang of xenophobes at Fox News seems upset that Gunn’s Superman movie is even acknowledging that he’s an immigrant at all.

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Yes, Superman Is An Illegal Immigrant

Right-wing commentator Clay Travis posted on social media, “I’m going to skip seeing Superman now. Director is an absolute moron to say this publicly the week before release. America is desperate for apolitical entertainment and Hollywood is unable to deliver it.”

Gunn said nothing that wasn’t true about every other version of Superman in film and television. Superman is an immigrant from another planet who better represents “truth and justice” than the native-born Lex Luthor who only cares about his own personal enrichment. Fox News regular Dean Cain played the same Superman in the 1990s that Fox News now seems to think is “woke.”

Travis claims he wants “apolitical” entertainment, which he would probably define as Superman mindlessly beating up Muslim-coded brown people. He might enjoy some of the more unfortunate World War II Superman cartoons with titles like “Japoteurs.” However, in 1946, Superman literally fought white supremacists in The Adventures of Superman radio serial storyline “Clan of the Fiery Cross.” A “group of hate mongers” attacks Jimmy Olsen’s friend Tommy Lee because he’s Chinese. They later kidnap Jimmy and Daily Planet editor Perry White and demand that they stop standing up for “those yellow foreigners!”

“They’re not foreigners!” Jimmy says. “They’re darn good Americans. A whole lot better than you are.” When Perry points out that the Lees are “American citizens, entitled to the same privileges as any of us,” the 1940s Stephen Miller stand in shouts, They’re not Americans! They’re foreigners! Their skin isn’t white!

“You’re talking rot and you know it,” Perry says. “The nation was founded by foreigners and built by foreigners. Everyone here either came from another country or is descended from folks who did. Don’t you ever read your history, you stupid bigot?”

The actual Klu Klux Klan tried to boycott show sponsor Kellogg’s, but the company didn’t fold. I can guarantee that nothing so pointedly political will appear in Gunn’s Superman. He’s just a kind man who uses his powers for good. That’s what MAGA considers “woke.”

Sonny Bunch from the Bulwark suggested that Superman is the “good” kind of immigrant, one who assimilates completely and seamlessly into the dominant culture. He dropped “Kal-El” for Clark Kent and is 100 percent American. He even recorded a Christmas album.

“The thing about Superman is that it is an immigration story but also it’s an assimilation story,” Bunch posted on social media. “Kal-El comes to America, is given the very American name Clark Kent, learns how to be good through salt of the Earth Kansans, and brings order/hope to the decadent metropolis/world.”

Metropolis is rarely depicted as “decadent,” but usually the “city of tomorrow” even before Superman arrives. It’s Batman who brings “order” to a corrupt city. Superman saves cats from trees.

“Immigration without assimilation gets you, well, [General Zod],” Bunch added.

However, Zod is a colonizer in the European tradition. He’s the Kryptonian Columbus, a conquering imperialist who shares ivory trader Kurtz’s “exterminate the brutes” philosophy. His followers don’t want to lay low and work menial jobs for less than minimum wage, occasionally frustrating Americans when they only speak Kryptonian. They want to make the entire world a new Krypton — like what Americans did to, well, America.

Right-wingers like Stephen Miller and Charlie Kirk consider any form of immigration that diversifies the culture an “invasion.” This makes them more like Lex Luthor, who believes Superman is a threat regardless of how much he assimilates.

Jewish identity has been a theme for the character from the start. Superman was of course created by two Jewish men in 1938 while Nazis persecuted Jews in Europe. Hitler was named Time Magazine’s Man of the Year but Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster offered a better figure to emulate. Siegel was the son of immigrants who fled antisemitic persecution, and Canadian-born Shuster’s parents were immigrants, as well. David Corenswet is the first Jewish actor to play the part.

Superman was never an example of idealized Anglo-assimilation. Krypton was more than just an explanation for his powers. By the 1950s, Superman’s Kryptonian heritage had become a vital element of the mythos. He still worshipped Krypton’s god, Rao, and observed his Kryptonian faith’s traditions. Although “Clark Kent” was the name his adoptive parents gave him, Superman’s closest friends and literal family (his cousin Supergirl) called him “Kal.” He frequently visited what remained of his homeland in the bottle city of Kandor that he kept at his Fortress of Solitude. (Michael Weiss has a great thread about this on Bluesky.)

When John Byrne revamped Superman in 1986, he abandoned the character’s Kryptonian heritage and replaced it with a superficial Reagan-era American heartland background that was far less realistic. Byrne’s Superman was truly “America first.” Krypton was “anathema” to him, and he dismissed the memories of its culture and history that his biological parents provided him as mere “curiosities.” Fortunately, later versions of the character ignore Byrne’s depiction. The symbol he wears on his chest isn’t just a stylized “S” but his family’s crest. In Mark Waid’s Birthright — far superior to Byrne’s Man Of Steel — the “S” shield is a Kryptonian standard that “became a promise. A sign of people fighting to make a better world. A symbol of hope.” Thus, Superman, as Earth’s champion, still proudly showcases his heritage.

MAGA can appreciate Batman on a primal level because he’s a rich guy beating up poor people. The stories are obviously more complicated than this (if the films sometimes aren’t), but Superman’s very nature is a rejection of everything MAGA represents — truth and justice versus propaganda and inequity.

During a press tour for his final (and sadly worst) Superman film, Christopher Reeve offered my favorite description of what the character means.

“A friend. That’s what people really need the most. They don’t need a strong arm, one man vigilante force. They need a friend.

We’re living in an age where basically people are afraid of contact with each other, where they live in big cities and don’t even know their neighbors, they’re afraid to go out in the street, something might happen to them. Technology is against you, life is overwhelming, even the bank doesn’t know who you are, and … we run around scared a lot, particularly those of us who live in cities.

America was founded on the virtues of a helping hand, of going five miles to lend your neighbor a donkey or whatever he needed, and I think it’s that kind of virtue that’s at the bottom, that’s the heart of Superman — the genuine love of people and that you always know, he’s your friend.”

This was 1987, and Reeve’s words were especially prescient. Even when his Superman appeared in films that weren’t worthy of him, he was still our friend. He was still driven to service for those less fortunate. MAGA doesn’t understand genuine friendship, only aggression and dominance. It’s why MAGA doesn’t truly understand Superman.