Superman in film that in his absence Lois Lane has given birth to a son and become engaged. Singer chose to follow Donner's lead by casting relatively unknown Brandon Routh as Superman, who resembled Christopher Reeve somewhat, and more high-profile actors in supporting roles, such as Kevin Spacey as Lex Luthor. Singer brought his entire crew from "X2" to work on the film. Via digitally-enhanced archive footage, the late Marlon Brando appeared in the film as Jor-El. "Superman Returns" received positive reviews and grossed approximately $391 million worldwide. In February 2006, four months before the release of "Superman Returns", Warner Bros. announced a
Superman in film adaptation of the "Flyby" screenplay. Following the departure of Ratner and McG, Bryan Singer, who was said to be a childhood fan of Richard Donner's film, was approached by Warner Bros. He accepted, abandoning two films already in pre-production, "" (which, coincidentally, would come to be directed by Ratner) and a remake of "Logan's Run". The film uses the events of "Superman" and, to less of a degree, "Superman II" as backstory, while completely ignoring the events of "Superman III" and "". Singer's story tells of Superman's return to Earth following a five-year search for survivors of Krypton. He discovers