“Who is Superman’s greatest foe?” Ask anyone, and nine out of ten will say Lex Luthor. And that’s accurate; the billionaire genius has long been the Man of Steel’s most notable nemesis. But just as consistently, the alien android Brainiac has been his second most popular villain for decades. And yet, he’s never appeared in a live-action film, even after seven Superman films. Imagine if, by the time of The Dark Knight Rises, all we’d seen on screen fighting Batman was Joker and Riddler. See why it’s so absurd? But why is Brainiac so important to the Superman mythos, and thus long overdue for cinematic treatment? For that, we’ve got to get into the character’s history, which goes back to DC Comics’ Silver Age.
The Silver Age Brainiac, Superman’s Alien Enemy
Superman had been around for 20 years when Brainiac first appeared on the scene, showing up in Action Comics #242 in 1958. Writer Otto Binder and artist Al Plastino created him. This was at the dawn of DC Comics’ Silver Age, an era that was a renaissance for the publisher. DC started leaning more into high-concept sci-fi, and no character leaned harder into it than Superman. Under editor Julius Schwartz, this era saw an expansion of his supporting cast, introducing Supergirl, the Legion of Super-Heroes, and Krypto the Superdog. New iconic villains with more kid-friendly appeal appeared, like Bizarro and the Phantom Zone criminals. Each of them was a true physical threat to Superman.
Originally, Brainiac was a green-skinned alien from the planet Colu (sometimes called Byrak), who wanted to accumulate all knowledge in the universe. He miniaturized the Kryptonian city of Kandor before its destruction and attempted to do the same to Metropolis. Superman stopped him, but the alien villain nevertheless caught on with young readers. After a few more appearances over the next few years, DC revealed that Brainiac was actually an android. He was a creation of the Computer Tyrants of the planet Colu, sent out as an agent to conquer other worlds. He was given a genius-level Coluan child to raise named Vril Dox, who was given the title “Brainiac 2.” Vril’s descendant, Querl Dox, would become the Legion of Super-Heroes’ Brainiac 5 a millennia later.
Saturday Morning Cartoons Make Brainiac a TV Star
Brainiac would plague Superman several times over the next few years. But his popularity would be cemented thanks to Saturday morning cartoons. He appeared in the 1960s Adventures of Superman series, later reappearing in several iterations of Super Friends. In 1983, Brainiac would get a modern, more menacing makeover. Instead of a green dude in short shorts and white go-go boots, he downloaded his computer consciousness into a new body. This new metal form looked like an almost insectoid skeleton. Upgraded Brainiac flew around the galaxy in a giant skull ship, and fans immediately took to the menacing new design, especially as it featured prominently in the Super Powers action figure line of the ‘80s. This Brainiac was actually scary, and posed a physical threat to Superman. But he was not to last, as DC’s reality-altering Crisis on Infinite Earths event erased the old Brainiac from continuity.
The Evolution of Modern Brainiac in the Pages of Superman
The post-Crisis Brainiac was, at first, not very exciting. He was a short, middle-aged human man named Milton Fine, a carnival mentalist going by “The Amazing Brainiac.” However, his mental powers were actually real. When the alien Vril Dox was executed on the planet Colu for inciting rebellion, his consciousness connected with Fine’s, merging with his. Over the next decade, Fine would clone himself a superior body (a green one, an homage to the original), and eventually, a powerful robotic form.
In the ‘90s, this new Brainiac became one of Superman’s most lethal enemies, one Kal-El often needed the Justice League’s help to defeat. In 2008, writer Geoff Johns revealed that all the previous Brainiacs were merely drones, or splinter aspects of the real Brainiac’s programming. The true Brainiac was an ancient being, who took design inspiration (thanks to artist Gary Frank) from the Borg Queen in Star Trek: First Contact, and the art of Alien concept designer, H.R. Giger.
Superman: The Animated Series‘ Brainiac Is the Best Version
As previously mentioned, Brainiac would gain household name status thanks to the Super Friends cartoons of the ‘70s. However, his superior animated incarnation was in the 1996-2000 Superman: The Animated Series. That version broke with almost 40 years of lore, making Brainiac an A.I. from Krypton, not Colu. In fact, he was created by Superman’s father Jor-El as the computer system designed to run all of Krypton’s day-to-day functions. Gaining sentience, he allows Krypton to die, uploading himself off the planet. He builds himself a new body, when he eventually encounters Jor-El’s adult son, now Superman. This version, voiced by the great Corey Burton, had vast intellect and power, collecting knowledge from world after world, and then destroying the planet. And as he was a creation of Jor-El, he was (in a sense) Superman’s evil brother. It all worked like gangbusters. So why haven’t we seen Brainiac yet in a film?
A Small Screen Brainiac Appears on Smallville and Krypton, But Never in a Movie
Superman III producers considered using him for the film, before they dropped the idea for being too expensive. A live-action version did eventually appear on Smallville, in a much more human form, played by Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s James Marsters. The CW series just didn’t have the budget to do a Brainiac akin to his comic book counterpart properly. The Smallville Brainiac was an amalgamation of previous comic book and animated versions. Like in Superman: The Animated Series, he was a Kryptonian A.I. gone rogue, invented by Jor-El. His name stood for “Brain InterActive Construct,” and on Earth, he took on the human form of Milton Fine. A recurring secondary villain in Smallville, the show’s budget prevented them from ever going big with the character.
The 2017 series Krypton would utilize the most comic book-accurate version of Brainiac in live-action thus far. In this Superman prequel series, Brainiac (Blake Ritson) is once again a Coluan “collector of worlds” who has set his sights on Krypton and the House of El. The series presented him in his alien form, a first for live-action. He even had his badass skull ship. The show only lasted two seasons, but it proved comic book-accurate Brainiac was possible on screen. But even so, fans still have never seen him fight Superman. Most recently, Superman & Lois had an appearance from Milton Fine, the human version of Brainiac from Earth. But that was more of an Easter egg than a real role.
Will James Gunn’s Superman Finally Give Us a Cinematic Brainiac?
But aside from animated films, Brainiac has never been in a Superman feature film. The movies keep going back to Lex Luthor and General Zod, seemingly on a loop. While he might have been hard to realize on screen in the ‘80s, there was nothing holding the studio back from visualizing him in the 21st century. He would have been an ideal villain for Superman Returns, or Man of Steel. But for reasons unknown, no one at Warner Bros. had wanted to pull the trigger. It’s a shame, as Brainiac has stood the test of time. He represents both a mental and physical challenge for Superman, as well as a connection to his Kryptonian past. Hopefully, James Gunn realizes that it’s high time Brainiac got his shot at being a movie villain. Rao knows, it is long overdue.
