The real fun is going to be when Disneyland unveils their “Walt Disney” walkaround character, signing autographs and posing for pictures with Jack Sparrow and Mary Poppins.

As a lifelong DC loyalist (who could name all the colors of (who could name all the colors of Kryptonite and their effects before I could walk), my feelings about Man Of Steel 2: Eclectic Super-Crew are…complicated. On paper, such a heaping helping of DC goodness should be appealing to me like Oreos to J’onn J’onzz. But after Man Of Steel, I just don’t trust Zack Snyder with Superman.

(Hell, I didn’t trust Snyder after Watchmen; that one had the vibe of when you get stuck talking to that teenager at the comic shop, the one who doesn’t quite grasp the allegorical or historical allusions, but thinks it’s so cool when Rorschach breaks that dude’s finger!)

The Man Of Steel trailer , with its inspiring voiceover and “symbol of hope” talk had me cautiously optimistic, and even in the theater i started to let my guard down and hope for the best. I mean, Steve Lombard! Pete Ross! Wegthor, man! WEGTHOR

Then…well, we know how that one turned out, don’t we?

So instead, let’s talk about Arrow.

This is a show that delivers. Arrow makes no pretense: it’s an attempt at Nolan’s Batman on a CW budget, but damned if it doesn’t hit pretty close to the mark (you thought I was going to say bullseye, didn’t you?). The show keeps its focus tight and its goals realistic; there’s a reason it focuses on the (eventually-to-be-Green) Arrow in a modern American city, as opposed to, say, Adam Strange on the exotic planet Rann. It’s able to slam-dunk the ball by keeping the basket low. Which sounds like I’m damning the show with faint praise, but honestly, I’ll take that over, say, an attempt at Richard Donner’s Superman movies on a syndication budget.

Though I’ll still take The Adventures Of Superboy over Arrow’s closest relative, Smallville.

Unlike Arrow, where the writers clearly have at least a general idea where their hero’s journey is going, with Smallville the game seemed to be “how can we stretch this out for as long as possible? How can we artificially prolong our ‘no flights, no tights’ policy to the point of absurdity? How many times can our characters witness Clark using his superpowers then conveniently suffer amnesia-inducing head trauma? ” It wasn’t like, say, Gilligan’s Island, where violating the central premise meant the show was over. There are one or two examples of what happens when Clark Kent puts and tights and starts to…flight. You may have heard of them.

I guess what I’m trying to say is, my long, long history with Superman has given me some very specific ideas about the character, ideas that often don’t jibe with what comes out of DC, who seem to be actively embarrassed by those ideas, and indeed by the character himself. That’s why when something comes along like Superman: The Animated Series, or All-Star Superman (or Greg Pak’s current run on Action Comics, about which I twote last week ), something that gets Superman, it’s an event, to be treasured, preserved, and held up for future generations, lest they think Superman is meant to be an emo twat who’s embarrassed by the very name of Superman.

(Also note that I have now used the name “Superman” more times in my silly blog post than they did in the entirety of a movie about Superman)

It’s possible that Snyder will pull it off, and his Batman-Wonder-Woman-Flash-and-time-permitting-also-Superman movie will kick off a new and glorious DC Cinematic Universe. But I’m not holding out much hope. I’ve been burned before.

But not by Arrow. No one understands me like you, Arrow.