Check out some unsettling superhero behaviour in this trailer for the Kevin Smith distributed ALTER EGOS

It’s been quite a while since Kevin Smith has brought either the snoochies or boochies in his directing career. His last couple films just have been pretty hit and miss, leaving him to sit around talking trash with some comic fanboy stereotypes on TV, in between battling to get his ice-hockey movie, Hit Something, made.

But while he may not be making movies himself, he can still lend his name and support to up and coming filmmakers for their own projects, and the trailer for the first film to be released out of his SModcast stable, the twisted superhero comedy Alter Egos, has just been released.

The film is written and directed by Jordan Galland, the man behind the quirky 2009 indie vampire tale Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Undead, and stars a collection of mostly unknown actors and Hyde from That 70’s Show. Yes, really.

Alter Egos takes place in a world in which superheroes have recently lost all government funding and public support. It centers on an underappreciated superhero who jeopardizes a dangerous mission with his own emotional crisis — his girlfriend is cheating on him with his alter ego.

While the definite low-budget, Youtubian fan film feel might put some off, it looks like there may actually be some funny and interesting story beats here. Particularly Kris Lemche’s Fridge’s girlfriend cheating on his civilian identity with his superhero one. That being said, there is a large potential for some of the humour falling completely flat on its masked face, as some of the more awkward moments in the trailer seem to hint at the fact that the film may not quite know if it wants to be a comedy or a drama.

Also, Youtubian is now totally a real word.

Kevin Smith has a massive love of his comics, and has even written a few in his time (his run on ‘Green Arrow’ was probably the only time I ever took the character seriously) so it’s quite surprising that he’s never tackled a capes and tights tale before. And with his directorial output pretty much grinding to a halt, this may just be the closest we ever come to that. We’ll just have to wait and see whether or not that’s a good thing.

The film will getting a limited US release next month, and will available on VOD shortly thereafter.

Last Updated: October 18, 2012