By Guest Blogger David Lee
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Movie Superman Returns Review:
David Lee is quite possibly the nerdiest comic geek friend I know and I mean that in a cool way. He previously shared with us his review of Despicable Me, here at Rama’s SCREEN. Dave and I and another good friend named Lori, had a discussion other day about 2006′s Bryan Singer-directed SUPERMAN RETURNS starring Brandon Routh, Kate Bosworth and Kevin Spacey as Lex Luthor. I’ve mentioned to all of you before that some of the reasons why I didn’t enjoy the movie were that it didn’t have enough action,.. as iconic as the character Lex Luthor is, in that film he just didn’t seem like a formidable foe,.. and I wasn’t too fond of the whole idea of making Superman seem like Jesus or the savior of men instead of the good ol’ hero who fights for truth, justice and the American way. So I invited Dave to share his thoughts again with all of you. So think of this as a.. look back. After this jump..
Hi kids and welcome back to the second edition of Miscellaneous Ramblings And Rants From The Comic
Vault. Like before, my name’s Dave and before you read any further, a couple disclaimers are in order:
1: There’s gonna be a lot of spoilers in this review, so if you haven’t seen this movie? Don’t read
anymore. See that shiny red X button on the upper right? Yeah..make with the clicky clicky right about
now. Come back when you’ve seen the movie.
2: As you’ve all no doubt seen by now, I’m something of a wiseass. As such, this review will be laden
with sarcasm and strong language. But don’t worry, I promise to keep it as tame as I can, given my usual.
Now that the disclaimers and introduction’s are out of the way, onto the review!
This edition’s review is going to be on one of my guilty pleasure favorites: Superman Returns. Oh, Clark Kent. We all love your bumbling ass, but you can’t ever seem to bumble your Krypto-ass onto our silverscreens due to one mishap or another. To understand Superman Returns, we gotta step back in time
enough to actually see how this movie came to be. EVERYONE IN THE WONKA MACHINE. LORI GET OFF
MY FOOT DAMMIT. Anyways. After the dismal Superman IV: The Quest For Peace (What a goddamn
WASTE that was. Super telekinetics? Did Jor-El bang Jean Grey when I wasn’t looking or something?
So lame.) , the Man of Steel sat on the sidelines for quite some time. IV was released in 1987, and SR
wasn’t released until 2006. Interesting bit of trivia for you all: At the end of IV, Superman looks at Lex
Luthor and says “See you in twenty, Luthor.” It wouldn’t be for another 20 years that Superman and
Luthor would see each other on the big screen. Prophetic, no? To give you kids a brief idea of how long
that is, in that 20 year time span we saw Batman receive 5 big screen releases, only 2 of them being
worth a good goddamn. X-Men got 2 (Which will be the focus of another rant, believe you me.) and
even the Fantastic Four got 1! What the goddamn Hell is wrong with you, Hollywood?! What the Hell
is going on down there? Why, that’s one Hell of a question! For a while, several big name directors
such as McG, Brett Ratner, and even Tim Burton got their hands on the Superman property..and every
single one of them ballsed it off. Kevin Smith wrote a script that had Superman wearing an all black
suit because he felt that Superman’s normal togs were “too faggy”..that’s right. Oh, and he wanted
Superman to fight a giant spider in the third act. Yeah, because a giant SPIDER is what we wanna see?
Thank god Smith smarted up.
When Burton got a hold of the project, he dropped Smith’s script and hired his people to do it. Thank
god for that. Burton almost made the movie. In fact, he was so far into pre-production that teaser
posters of his movie, entitled “Superman Lives!” were made and displayed at the American Toy Fair.
But thank god for all of us, the movie was shitcanned. If you wanna bore yourself to tears and read the
full summary of what happened for the rest of this, check this article here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Superman_%28film_series%29#Proposals_for_fifth_film out and join me in the Men’s room as I puke
my goddamn guts out at the nasty.
Alright. Everyone outta the Wonka. We’re back in 2010, and now we can talk about the movie now that
we know the history. Bryan Singer finally got attached to the movie, and filming got started in March
2005. As you guys know, Singer was responsible for X-Men 1 and 2, which weren’t the worst super-hero
movies in the world. He actually abandoned X-Men 3 and Logan’s Run for Superman Returns. I don’t
know whether I want to punch him in the jaw or kiss him for abandoning X-Men 3 to take up Superman
Returns. WHY DID YOU LET RATNER HAVE IT, SINGER. WRRRRRYYYYYY?!!?!! WHY DID YOU DOOM US
LIKE THAT?! Ahem. My bad. Moving on. Singer had one of the biggest hurdles in Hollywood right off the
bat: Casting Clark Kent AKA Superman. We’ve had people such as Kirk Alyn, George Reeves, Dean Cain,
Tom Welling and the quintessential Superman himself: Christopher Reeve play the role of the Man of
Steel. Now before I discuss who Singer chose, let me say this: I am a STAUNCH fan of Chris Reeve. That
man made me believe that a man could fly, and everytime I saw him, wheelchair or not, I wanted to hug
him and ask him to take me to the Fortress of Solitude. He WAS Superman.
Enter Brandon Routh. A die-hard Superman fan himself, Routh got the job after bumbling and knocking
over a cup of hot coffee during the initial meeting with Singer on accident. Like everyone, I was
like “Fuck’im. I want Reeve.” But Routh did what Hugh Jackman did for Wolverine and he blew our
minds. Not only did he put on 20 pounds of muscle for this movie, he also embodied Clark Kent to the
point of creepiness. Go and look at a picture of Routh and Reeve next to each other. THEY GODDAMN
LOOK ALIKE! Once I saw the initial footage, I was sold. Kevin Spacey was another knock out of the
park when it came to his hiring for Lex Luthor. Another trivia: In 1977 during the filming of Superman,
Gene Hackman refused to shave his head for the role. He wore a bald cap, which you can see. Kevin
Spacey willingly shaved his head bald for the role. Like the Routh and Reeve connection, Spacey was the
embodiment of Hackman as Luthor. They look alike just the same..but that’s where it ends. Sit down,
Hackman…Spacey IS Luthor. Hell, during the filming of the movie Spacey would drive round in a custom
golf cart with a Superman doll being dragged behind it as he yelled on a megaphone that “SUPERMAN
MUST DIE.” That’s dedication. Sam Huntington, Frank Langella (SKELETOR UP IN THIS MOTHERFUCKER!!
), and Kate Bosworth rounded out the cast as Jimmy Olsen, Perry White and Lois Lane respectively. The
first two did good. Bosworth sucked, and I’ll leave it at that. The less said, the better.
And last but not least, I’m going to discuss the suit. Yes, the suit. As we all know, Superman has a
signature costume. Bright blues, reds and yellows. You can’t miss this thing if you tried! Well, in this
movie, they changed it a bit. Gone is the bright yellows and reds, in exchange for a darker tone. The
yellow s-shield is gone from the back of the cape. It’s now on his belt buckle. Stupid idea. What, did
they put that on the belt buckle for the ladies who’re gonna check out his bulge instead of his chest? It
screams “I’m super from the waist down too, ladies. Hubba!” Also redundant. Another change was the
S-Shield on his chest. In the comics and original movie, the shield was large and a part of the cloth itself.
This shield is ICONIC. I grew up with the shield, for god’s sake. For the movie, they decreased the size
of the shield, as well as making small changes to its design. It’s also a raised chestplate itself. At first, I
was throwing crap and going “NO. NO. FUCK THAT.” But then I got to thinking about it..and it’s not that
bad. I don’t like the darker reds, but hey. Fun bit of trivia: The shield is comprised of very small S-Shields,
and the bottoms of his boots are treaded with several small S-Shields as well. SUPER-BOOTPRINT GO!
And now, the plot. Oh man…this plot has caught some Hell, some from yours truly as well. Singer has
gone on record as saying that Superman Returns takes place after the first two movies, but only certain
aspects. It also ignores 3 and 4, thank god. I’ll go ahead and get it out of the way right now: I HATE the
kid. Jason White, aka The Drowned Sewer Rat That Hung Out With The TMNT. Tristan Leabu did a good
job in playing the rat, but for fucks sake. Really? Congratulations, Singer. You’ve taken the symbol of the
DC Universe and turned him into Super Deadbeat Dad. How in the HELL is Superman supposed to raise
this rat when he’s off kicking the everloving crap out of Darkseid, Luthor and Metallo? Oh that’s
right…HE CAN’T. DEADBEAT DAD. That entire subplot was a major misstep in the movie, and it crippled it
for me in a big way. I didn’t even mind James Marsden as Richard White. I thought his role was pretty
cool, actually. I read somewhere that Marsden would like to come back to reprise the role of White as a
villain. I dig. So the main plot goes that Big Blue has been gone for 5 years because apparently Luthor
fooled the entire world into thinking that Krypton was still there. Nevermind that these shards of
radioactive rock have been used against him all these years, and nevermind the fact that his own DAD
said that Krypton was trashed…oh no. It somehow gets found, and Supes is on the go suddenly to go see
it. And in the words of the internet..”SURPRISE! RICKROLLED!”…it’s not there. Everyone say it with
me…DUUUUH. Though if a giant jumbotron screen of Rick Astley rickrolling Supes at the Krypto-
Gravesite was shown, I woulda fallen out laughing. That woulda been funny and you know it. 5 years
pass, and the entire world moves on without Superman. Lois Lane writes an angry editorial which to me,
seemed a lot like trolling, Luthor ends up getting freed on a law technicality, and that’s that. Superman
ends up coming back and he sees what the world has come to. Cue righteous anger here, which I can’t
blame him. This man’s showed the world what they can be if they just try. He goes away and what do
they do? Blow each other the fuck up. Yeah, real smart. At first, Clark’s kinda hesitant. Does he want to
put the suit back on? Can he handle the stress and constant demand? All of these thoughts plague him
as he goes back to Metropolis to resume his life. And no, these little points weren’t in the movie. They
were in the novel, which was a fantastic read. It makes the movie make so much more sense.
So things go on, and the experimental spacecraft Genesis is in danger. THIS LOOKS LIKE A JOB FOR
SUPERMAN! In a scene that was pulled nearly right from the Superman animated series pilot, Superman
saves the jet. I marked out like crazy when I saw this scene and when it came to an end..I was just
like the people in the stadium: Cheering like a mofo. Superman’s back, baby! But like always, there’s
something wrong. Luthor’s up to his no good schemes and OFF WE GO! Personally, I didn’t much like
Kitty Kowalski. She served as a semi-decent foil for Luthor, but meh. I just wasn’t feeling her. The
henchmen were all pretty funny, including the dude with the eyes in the back of his head. I got a giggle
out of that. Luthor figures out that if he jacks some crystals from Superman’s home that he can make his
own continent (nice nod to the 78 movie, Singer! Kudos!), and off they go too. The movie progresses on
and on, with some occasional drama where Superman plays Super-Spy in a decidedly creeper part of the
movie. WTF, Clark. CREEEEEPER. The climax of the movie hits when Luthor reveals his big scheme that
he’s going to wipe out the entire USA and charge out the ear for his own continent. We also learn that
everytime Luthor goes to make a landmass, it sets off a temporary EMP that messes things all up. Can
you imagine being the guy who was watching porn when the EMP went off? “HEY I WAS ALMOST DONE,
MAN!” Superman saves the day, and ends up dying in a very questionable ending over all. Credits roll,
thanks for coming out.
Watch Movie Superman Returns Trailer:
Okay, so now that we have that out of the way, here’s my thoughts. Overall, I enjoyed this movie.
There were several nods and quirks to the original movies, but there were several points I could’ve
done without: DROWNED RAT GO AWAY and Super-Creeper. Those kinda put me off. Another thing
that was brought to my attention by our esteemed owner of the site Rama…there were some serious
Jesus comparisons. Jesus/Superman is given to us as the only son, dies for our sins, comes back to save
the day in the end. I can agree with this to an extent. The similarities are there in a big way. But when
you look at it, it’s like that in the comic too. Only difference is that it’s not really touched on and shown
nearly as much due to over 60+ years of comic canon. It all falls back down to how much you’re gonna
look into that. I really did enjoy the brief actions scenes we did see: The airplane sequence and the
mad flight through Metropolis to save the entire city on his way to the island. Those were AMAZING,
and showed that Routh had his chops as the Man of Steel. What sucked is the fact that we didn’t
get to see Superman really cutting loose against a big nasty baddie. C’mon..think about it. A titanic
smackdown between Superman and say…Metallo? That would’ve been great! Maybe in the new movie.
Overall, I recommend seeing this movie..but make sure when you do, you’re going in with a clean slate
and you’re in it for just a decent time. If you overthink it or are a comic DORK like I am..you’re gonna
end up hollering like an ape, humping the back of a chair and slinging feces at the TV as you rant about
the misgivings like I did. It held to the comic canon for the most part, but some serious missteps prevent
this movie from being up there with Batman Begins.
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