James Gunn wrote the screenplay for 2000's "The Specials," a low-budget indie comedy that mocked superheroes, showing them kicking back, whining about their action figure deals or bloviating about their origin stories, but never once engaging in actual crime-fighting.
Now that he's directing films, Gunn has reversed that proposition: "Super," made from his own script, follows a hapless, all-too-ordinary dude (Rainn Wilson) with no superpowers whatsoever who decides to become a masked crusader. True, "Kick-Ass" got there first, but that film abandoned its satire halfway through to instead become the kind of film it was critiquing. "Super," on the other hand, pulls no punches, zeroing in on the inadequacy that fuels superhero fantasies.
Wilson plays an emasculated character named Frank, a short order cook at a greasy spoon who describes his life as nothing more than "pain, humiliation, and rejection." His sweet wife (Liv Tyler) has just left him for a sleazy drug dealer (played with twitchy reptilian charm by Kevin Bacon) and Frank's rage simmers inside until he sees the Holy Avenger, a cheesy Christian superhero on a religious cable TV channel. Next thing you know, poor Frank is having "visions" that involve tentacles, the finger of God and fighting crime.