New DCU Superman Costume Takes Inspiration from Key Elements of Kal-El’s Past

Finally, we get our first look at David Corenswet as the Man of Steel, in a cute costume image posted to social media by Superman director and DCU lord James Gunn. In our first look at this Superman costume, we see that it has many influences from Kal-El’s 86-year history. These influences come from comic book costumes, as well as other Superman media over the years. Let’s break it all down.

The “New 52” Superman costume

The biggest influence on this new combination is Jim Lee’s 2011 update for DC’s “New 52” initiative. Lee gave Superman his most radical overhaul in decades for this reboot. He gave Superman a raised collar for the first time and added tons of piping and extra detail to the suit itself. The red boots suddenly featured new crests on the side and, most famously, a red belt replaced the red trunks. The costume has always been controversial and the classic costume returned a few years later. This new cinematic costume retains the extra details, like the stand-up collar. Luckily, red trunks have also made a comeback.

The muted tones of recent live-action Superman costumes

In the comics, and in most media outside of comics, Clark’s colors were bright red, blue, and yellow. But in live-action, that changed in 2006. The Return of Superman. Brandon Routh’s costume replaced the bright red with an almost maroon color but kept the classic blue. Since then, Superman’s costume has become more and more desaturated on screen. Both Steel man costume as well as that of Tyler Hoechlin Superman and Lois have extremely dull tones. With this latest costume, it looks like pop red, but the blue remains toned down. It’s worth noting that the image posted by James Gunn shows Superman mostly in dim lighting. In places where the light hits his suit (at knee level), the blue looks quite bright. So we’ll have to wait and see what this new Superman costume will look like when his DCU movie arrives.

The classic Superman Spit Curl

This isn’t technically part of Superman’s “costume,” but it’s a classic part of his overall look. Since almost the very beginning of his comic book career, Superman has had a stylized curl in his jet black hair. It’s almost like a little “S” on his forehead (the mark, friends!). The original Superman from the ’40s, Kirk Alyn, had it, but TV’s George Reeves didn’t. Christopher Reeve kept it for his incarnation of the Last Son of Krypton, just like the live-action Super Boy 80s TV series. However, most of the live-action Superman cast has since abandoned it. Dean Cain on Lois and Clark in the 90s, he had slicked back hair, just like Henry Cavill. Brandon Routh, whose Christopher Reeve iteration Superman was, kept the spit curl going. We’re happy that David Corenswet is staying traditional and bringing back the pin buckle for modern times.

THE kingdom come Shield “S”

Even if we had seen it before, we would be remiss not to mention the “S” shield. Artist Alex Ross designed this new badge for the series kingdom come. This 1996 miniseries from writer Mark Waid was about an older Superman who returns to the scene years after retiring. In this comic, the yellow has been replaced by black. This version of the emblem has already been seen in live-action. Brandon Routh used it in 2019’s Arrowverse Crisis on Infinite Earths crossover event. At first it was a direct homage to Kingdom Comhe looks. By the end of this crossover, it was a traditionally colored version of Superman. In fact, one of the very first things James Gunn teased when he took the job as Superman was an illustration from Kingdom Come.

Of course, we won’t really know what this DCU costume looks like until we see Superman in action. We know that this Superman costume is definitely full of influences from many previous versions of his iconic outfit. It remains to be seen whether this one will become as legendary as most of the others. Superman released July 11, 2025.