Superman
- Thread starter urbandefault
- Start date
And I certainly don't have issues with Margot Kidder either. I thought she was a great Lois.
Hackman needed to shave his head.
Betraying Superman at every opportunity was weird too.
There was no profit in siding with Zod since he was probably going to destroy the Earth, or remove humanity.
Although Zod's actual plan should have been to go back in time and manage the evacuation of Krytpton, years before it's final destruction, which would have meant that Kal-El might never have been born if Krypton died from a natural disaster and not some error of Judgment from the science council like tapping the core as a power source.
Betraying Superman at every opportunity was weird too.
There was no profit in siding with Zod since he was probably going to destroy the Earth, or remove humanity.
Although Zod's actual plan should have been to go back in time and manage the evacuation of Krytpton, years before it's final destruction, which would have meant that Kal-El might never have been born if Krypton died from a natural disaster and not some error of Judgment from the science council like tapping the core as a power source.
He was too ridiculous for me to take seriously, like his real estate plan.
She was a nutbag, a shrill voiced chain smoking scatterbrain. Lana from Superman 3 and Lacey in Quest for Peace were both better love interests.
I don't agree. If filmmakers would treat Superman as a multi-dimensional character, instead of a one-note cliche, they would be fine. And right now, "Man of Steel" is my favorite Superman film or TV series. I used to think that the 1978 movie was the best, but I don't feel that way anymore. And over the years, I've noticed some plot points in the Donner film that I had not noticed when I was much younger. Yes, "Man of Steel" had a few flaws, as well. But I still prefer it over "Superman: The Movie".
It's odd, but Bryan Singer had more or less used that same real estate plan for Luthor in 2006's "Superman Returns".
Disco Luthor spent millions buying up worthless land that would be worth billions after the bombs triggered the faultline, but as the perpetrator of a nuclear genocide, he would have been executed even if those contracts were not voided when America fell to pieces and died.
Pedophile Luthor planned on displacing a trillion tons of Water, flooding north, central and south America murdering 100s of millions of people, and every country on the continents would have collapsed economically, and his only plan to take control of the new continent was to plant a flag and call dibs, when the other hundred million Americans he didn't kill, would have lynched him, and taken turns cornholing him.
Stupid plans.
Pedophile Luthor planned on displacing a trillion tons of Water, flooding north, central and south America murdering 100s of millions of people, and every country on the continents would have collapsed economically, and his only plan to take control of the new continent was to plant a flag and call dibs, when the other hundred million Americans he didn't kill, would have lynched him, and taken turns cornholing him.
Stupid plans.
Last edited:
Weisinger-era Superman was often treated as a beacon of hope and virtue (read: the power of the American dream / Santa wish fulfillment / a flying Mount Rushmore), as seen in too many issues of Action and Superman. Yes, there were the 50,000 "will Lois finally marry Superman?", "Ghosts from Krypton" and "Olsen-gets-into-a-situtation / time-to-call-daddy" stories, but the period was by no means limited to that category of story. The overall, branded version of the character had Superman elevated to a very Western construction of the living moral monument--an idea that post-Wolfman writers would return to as a rejection to changes to the character, embracing that aforementioned Santa / Daddy image.
Both were less than interesting plans from the villain perspective, and completely unworkable. As you pointed out in both cases, such mass destruction would have led to either being found guilty in court, which could only end in both being prepped for the drip.
Not for me he isn't. Hackman is excellent in the film. He's a goofy Lex and the modern interpretation of the character hadn't happened yet, and I'm okay with that.
There are precisely zero issues with Superman '78. It's as perfect a pop movie as one could sanely ask for.
Fuck, the last time I saw it I even achieved a state of Zen acceptance of "Can You Read My Mind."
That's actually the one issue I DO have with Kidder.
I mean, if she can't sing...don't SPEAK the song...
Compared to Lana and Lacy, she stunk. But then again, Lois was a nutbag in the comics for decades.
The best female lead in the Salkinds' Superman films was Annette O'Toole's Lana by far--which was the only decent part of the terrible Superman III. Lana felt like a natural fit for Clark, as opposed to the sniping, often self-serving Lois as portrayed by Kidder.
There's also the epic Clark vs. Superman fight.
And Robert Vaughn.
III isn't really all that good. It's also not remotely terrible on the level of human excretion. There is far worse in the superhero movie genre and even in Reeve's tenure as Superman.
Especially one line of dialogue in particular.
III is an odd entry. My favorite tidbit is I had a magazine way back when with pictures of the video game sequence and remarking how one day real world games might look as good as that. As if!
Superman III's problem is that it has great ideas executed terribly. And boneheaded choices, like how Gus Gorman was supposed to be Brainiac but that got changed when they cast Richard Pryor...
...Why not cast someone ELSE as Gorman then, if Pryor was too unbelievable to be Brainiac?
...Why not cast someone ELSE as Gorman then, if Pryor was too unbelievable to be Brainiac?
I 100% agree. Of course Lois had a similar personality in the comics back then. I can't remember who said, but there was at least one comic book writer who argued that Lana was the better fit for Clark--back then adult Lana was a regular in the series and they started dating around the time of Superman III, probably as some kind of cross-promotional editorial choice.
Pryor is money.
But racebending was barely a thing back then.
Brainiac is White.
Actually isn't Brainiac Green?
So in a (more) racist world where Black people are not allowed to play white characters, how can there be any problem with a Black man in greenface, unless the Irish want to raise kain.
Was Richard momentarily "green" in the Wiz?