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My Adventures with Superman Is One of the Best-Written TV Shows Going

My Adventures with Superman is easily one of the best-written TV shows going right now, animated or live-action. James Gunn, please take note.

My Adventures with Superman is a delightful retelling of the Superman story that's the best-written TV series out there right now. Never mind that it's a cartoon for kids and a superhero story, its writing is so sharp, clear, and deceptively simple that it should be a lesson to every writer who wants to tell stories.

"My Adventures with Superman" Makes Everything Feel New 

Every story should feel like you're hearing it for the first time. My Adventures with Superman succeeds in making the story of Superman feel new and fresh. Yes, if you're a long-term fan of the comics, you can see all the easter eggs referencing Superman and DC Comics lore and how concepts and characters have been reconfigured and redesigned for a new version of the story that starts from scratch. It's a Superman story for kids and people who have never seen Superman before. In fact, you're probably better off as a viewer who comes to Superman completely fresh.

It Makes You Care About Superman AND Everyone Else, Too

This sounds obvious, but so many writers have complained for decades that Superman was too boring because he was uncomplicated and invulnerable. My Adventures with Superman finds a way of making you care about him by making him an awkward, earnest himbo goofball who's constantly at odds with the world and his friends because he has to hide his secret. It makes Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen equally funny as his foils with their own issues as the three bounce off each other. Clark needs to hide. Lois wants to uncover Superman's secrets. Jimmy wants to find the truth about aliens and the paranormal. It all puts the three of them in conflict with each other.

It has Great Plotting

Plotting a story is hard. Just ask any writer. It's Hollywood values plots so much and often struggles to find a balance between plot and character (when the real answer is that character drives plot). Each half-hour episode is a lesson in how to reintroduce the characters, then set up the situation they're in and escalate the stakes and complications that are uncomplicated but not without complexity. It lays out the plot points without overly long speeches or expositionary dialogue and zips through the story with seeming ease. This leads to the next point.

It Makes Complicated Ideas and Characters Easy to Follow

There's a lot to unpack in the story of My Adventures with Superman: it has to set up and hint at the mystery behind Clark's origins, then have a procedural "bad guy/alien Science of the week" plot and how Clark, Lois, and Jimmy react to it, and how it puts them at odds with each other and the situation, and how it also brings them together at the same time.

It's Fun!

It can't be said often enough. My Adventures with Superman is fun! It's enjoyable! The characters are funny and lovable! The show has an unparalleled amount of wit and sheer joy that no other DC comic, movie, or TV show of the last fifteen years had. It doesn't have the grimdark edgelord nastiness of the comics or the Snyderverse or an angst-ridden, grim Superman. It sets out to tell the optimistic story of a kind, selfless young man who wants to help people and just live his best life with his friends, his family, and a job he's passionate about. It makes Superman matter to every kid in the way the character was always meant to be when he was first created in the 1930s.

If James Gunn wants to bring in a new DC Universe of movies and TV shows that are appealing to everyone, the tone and lovability of My Adventures with Superman would be a very good model to base it on.

My Adventures with Superman is streaming on MAX.

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