Lot of Gunns work on Brightburn, featuring a dark twist on a Superman-like mythos.
James Gunn (director of the Guardians of the Galaxy films) produces a script by brothers Brian and Mark Gunn. Young actor Jackson A. Dunn stars as the central character, a young alien boy who is starting to figure out he wasn’t actually adopted by his parents (Elizabeth Banks and David Denman). Like Superman, he has superpowers, including heat vision and super strength—but unlike Superman, he apparently doesn’t intend to put those powers to good use, because he starts ruthlessly killing people, including immediate family.
While the movie does have a superhero-gone-bad, sci-fi element, it’s mostly just a ruthless horror film with nasty gore. I really don’t have a problem with this, and I found Brightburn somewhat entertaining, but it’s nothing all that original. I do give the filmmakers props for going to the dark side and staying there.
Brightburn is available via online sources including iTunes and Amazon.com.
