In 2023, Henry Cavill donned the red cape of Superman for Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel and brought forth an unconventional take on the character. Standing for hope, truth, and justice, the widely beloved DC Comics character saw a serious, pensive, and at times, dark reboot in the movie instead of his usual positive demeanor in the ink pages of the comics. While the director has time and time again justified his vision and also held a swooning fan-base for the same, the actor once laid bare his preferences.

The lead actor’s choice of Superman comics once again highlighted that Snyder’s decision did not totally depart away from the loyal pages and that at times, Superman did, in fact, go ‘unconventional’.

Henry Cavill once revealed his favorite Superman comic that saw references in Man of Steel

Created by Jerry Siegel, Superman debuted on the pages of DC Comics in 1938, 75 years before Henry Cavill starred in its 21st-century live-action adaptation with Man of Steel. While Zack Snyder may have based his adaptation on John Byrne’s 1986 comic of the same name, the actor had a different choice for the character. In an Instagram post in June 2018, Cavill revealed that Superman: For Tomorrow remained his “hands down” favorite adaptation and that “This, for me, is Superman.”

Written by Brian Azzarello, illustrated by Jim Lee, and published in Superman #204–215, For Tomorrow featured a 12-part comic book story arc. The pages featured a storyline set a year after a million people from Earth, including Lois Lane, disappeared, with even Superman vanishing away to Metropia, an alternate world in the Phantom Zone. After his return, laden with guilt, he confides and befriends a priest who acts as his confessor, a scene also loosely depicted in Man of Steel.

This unconventional energy in Cavill’s performance and favorite Superman would have continued had Snyder stayed back in the then DCEU.

Zack Snyder had massive plans for the DCEU with Justice League 2

Before Joss Whedon came aboard to put together a half-finished storyline relic left by Zack Snyder for 2017’s Justice League, the latter had major plans for his DC universe. Planned as a trilogy, the Justice League series would have featured Henry Cavill take on the Injustice adaptation of the character, going all-out evil under Darkseid’s control owing to the Anti-Life equation.

A few glimpses of the incoming magnitude hinted at Zack Snyder’s Justice League, the version, known as the Knightmare sequence, would have seen Superman go berserk after the death of Lois Lane, laying waste and devastation to the face of the Earth unlike anything before. However, all may not be lost because for Snyder, there may still be hope for continuing this storyline even outside of DC.

What are your thoughts on the favorite Superman book of Henry Cavill? Let us know in the comments below.