Fantom Comics

Before you read this review, a couple of notes:
1) Beware!! There are spoilers in this review!
2) This review contains an unhealthy level of over-analysis that may make you roll your eyes!
3) This review contains what many of you might call heresy!

Okay, I'm going to review Superman Returns in two parts. The first part is my review of the movie as a movie. The second part is my review of the Superman story and how they chose to tell/retell it in Superman Returns.

The movie itself was entertaining. There was enough eye candy to satisfy even the most demanding geeks, and Kevin Spacey's Luther was fantastic. Perhaps some of Spacey's best work. I kid you not.

On the negative side, the story did drag on a bit, and Spacey aside, the acting could have been better. Let me put it this way, the second best acting in the movie was performed by Kal Penn (Kumar of Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle). And he didn't utter a word the entire movie! Sam Huntington as Jimmy Olsen came in a close third. He managed to do the impossible: make the Olsen character more lovable and funny than he is annoying.

Overall, I recommend seeing this movie. It's a lot of fun.

As to how they handled the Superman story itself, there were serious problems. Granted, many of the weaknesses come from the Superman story itself, and couldn't be helped by the filmmakers. That truth makes these flaws no less bothersome. Let's start with Lois, why not.

When one chooses to see a Superman movie, they have to be prepared to suspend disbelief. Therefore, I can accept that an adult man in a cape and tights can fly and lift entire islands. But even with that mentality I'm unable to accept the fact that Lois Lane, a Pulitzer-prize winner and famous journalist, can't tell Superman from Clark Kent. The man's glasses are his only disguise! I realize this is an old joke, but that makes it no less ridiculous when we see her leave Clark Kent in one room (wearing glasses), and minutes later practically kissing Superman (no glasses) without making the connection. Perhaps she suffers from prosopagnosia.

While density is annoying enough, what really upset me was her utter inability to put anyone else's interests above her own. She has no qualms dragging her 5-year old son with her as she trespasses on private property in the hope of getting a good story. Nor, after escaping death by the thinnest of margins, does she hesitate in forcing her quasi-fiancé Richard to turn his plane around and bring her, him and their son back into the deathtrap they just barely escaped in the hope that maybe she can do something to help Superman!

Which brings me to her final and arguably worst flaw. Her obsession with Superman. Let us not forget that her Pulitzer-prizewinning article, Why the World Doesn't Need Superman, was written not by a professional reporter stating her deep-held beliefs, but by a scorned woman wanting to spite her ex. As soon as Superman is back in the picture, she's prepared to cheat on her fiancé with him and put her child in mortal danger for his sake. Lois has the free will of a Stockholm syndrome victim, and can best be described as the Squeaky Fromme to Superman's Charles Manson.

Lois's fiancé Richard, is a tragic character if there ever was one. Richard is played by James Marsden - Cyclops from the X-Men movies - who seems to be typecast as the nice guy doomed to lose his girl to the hot-shot superhero. Lois kind of likes Richard. That is, until the second Superman is back in her life. True, she doesn't dump Richard, but that's probably so he can continue to support Superman's child, who she never bothers to tell him is not his own.

On that note, a friend of mine and I agreed that if we ever found out our fiancé has the name of her ex-lover as her computer password, she's drop-kicked out the door. Richard must really, really love Lois. Or be a really, really big tool.

The character of Superman, Jr. had problems, too. The son of Lois Lane and (unknown to the child) Clark Kent, seemed completely unfazed that he took a man's life. No matter the rightness of such an act, surely any well-adjusted person would need therapy. Not this spunky tyke. Perhaps he's a sociopath.

Or perhaps he just takes after his Dad, the man who got his mother knocked up before running off and abandoning them for 5 years. The man who, upon finding out the truth, offers Lois no help in raising the child or financial support of any kind. The man who feels perfectly comfortable leaving the poor sucker Richard to raise a child he thinks is his own.

Ah yes, Superman. The man himself. I had a lot of problems with this Superman. First of all, the man has no concept of proportionality. Here's a guy who wastes his time stopping runaway cars while ignoring the truly serious problems the world faces. I notice Superman has no qualms hopping over to France to stop a house fire, but couldn't be bothered with atrocities like the slaughter in Darfur or the madman in control of North Korea!

Which leads us to my biggest problem with Superman. He's willing to help us humans tidy up a bit by stopping the occasional bank robber, but he can't make the time to share the collective wisdom of his native Krypton with mankind? This issue is at the heart of why - up until the point he professed his desire to kill billions of people - I was kind of rooting for Lex Luthor. I found his casting himself as Prometheus, attempting to steal fire (i.e. advanced Kryptonian technology) from selfish gods (Superman) quite inspirational. While I would never advocate the theft of private property for the greater good, Luther's speech did raise an interesting point. Why hasn't Superman used all that advanced Kryptonian knowledge that's collecting dust in his Fortress of Solitude to help the human race? Perhaps he feels we're not enlightened enough to handle the responsibilities of, say, curing cancer or mastering perpetual motion. He must feel we're not as mature as him: a guy who followed Lois Lane to her home, where he used his x-ray vision and super-hearing to spy on her and her family.

Ultimately, the only characters I respected in this movie were Luther and Olsen: a homicidal madman and a half-wit.

On the bright side, the Spider-Man 3 trailer looked awesome!!