Superman - Not That One...Yet

June 1938. Action Comics #1. A hero was born...Superman.

Wikipedia

But like so many things from the past, it has evolved over the years. If you read the first multiple issues that introduced the Man of Steel to the world, you'd be a little surprised how he acted. He was kind of a jerk. There was very little Blue Boy Scout in this version of Superman. Time went by and he grew into the hero we all know and love. Comics grew over the next few decades. He went to radio and the Max Fleisher cartoons (where he began flying for the first time).

Superman first hit the silver screen back in 1951 with Superman vs The Mole Men. It had the cheesyness that would become par for the course in Adventures of Superman with George Reeves as Superman.

After the series ended it would be more than 20 years for Superman to return outside of the comics.

As a kid, I grew up with Christopher Reeve as Superman. He was and is my benchmark of all those who take on the role. With the new movie a few weeks I decided to go back and rewatch all the modern day Superman movies (1-4, Returns, and Man of Steel) and review them. Looking back without the nostolgia glasses and give my honest take on the films.

We start with the movies that made us believe a man could fly. That was one of the first official superhero movies of the modern era.

Superman: The Movie

DC Database - Fandom

Let's get the obvious part out first...John Williams. Genius. The movie starts as we hurtle through space with the Superman theme playing. Every time I hear it, it's like I'm five years old again, running around the house with a beach blanket around my neck, pretending to fly. It pumps you up and you feel the heroic music with every swell. No matter the movie, Williams understands the assignment and delivers every single time.

The music comes to an end on the giant red sun and the small blue ice planet of Krypton where Jor-El is passing judgement on three Kryptonian criminals: Zod, Ursa and Non. With future knowledge and seeing interviews, turns out top biller Marlon Brando refused to learn lines and would read from the script off the cameras. Both Reeve and Terrance Stamp (Zod) mentioned this when asked about working with the legendary actor. He did seem bored and it felt really dry. Now, Stamp however, in the limited time he was there on screen, ate up the scene.

The three criminals are sent into the Phantom Zone and launched into space. Jor-El warns the council on Krypton the destruction is imminent, but they deny the science and think its fake news...familiar...eerily familiar. Under threat, he agrees to not speak of it and he and his wife would stay on Krypton. He, however, didn't say he promised to keep his baby son on the planet.

Jor-El and Lara send their only infant child into space to Earth, one of the only planets that could sustain him. He's raised by a loving farm family, Johnathon and Martha Kent.

The first third of the movie is Krypton and Clark's early life on earth. Where he lost his father to a heart attack, something he couldn't fight. Something he couldn't stop even with all his abilities. An important lesson he has to learn. That he can't save everyone, no matter how much he wants to.

We finally get the Fortress of Solitude and Clark's 12 year journey of going from boy to Superman. Learning how to use all his powers to the best of his ability. As the first half comes to a close, we finally get a glimpse of Superman as he flies out of the fortress to Metropolis.

There is a lot of school of thought as Clark/Superman. Which is the disguise? Who is the real one? What if I told you both? Granted the mild manner, golly-gee Clark is a bit of a front, but the core of who Superman is isn't because of his time in the Fortress. It's his time in Smallville. Being raised by decent and kind people. Hard working and salt of the earth. A large part of his values and who he is deep down, is because of the Kents. The nerdy part is part of the disguise, but who is as a person (giving half his pay to his sweet silver-haired mother) is Superman without the powers.

The first real look at Superman comes when Lois' helicopter crashes on the side of The Daily Planet building. Costume, pimp approved.

IGN

He saves her and Lois is obviously stunned at the man who flew and lifted a helicopter with one hand. Even though Clark was right in front of her most of the day, she didn't see it was him. Because, yes, Nerdy Clark was a great disguise. When asked by Lois who he was he answered in the simplest and best way possible. It encompasses everything that Superman is..."A friend."

Thus began Clark's first night as Superman. Taking down a jewel thief, robbers, and he even had time to help get a little girls cat out of a tree...the mom hitting that girl because she didn't believe that a man in a blue suit flew and got her cat, I could have done without. There's an added scene that's not in the typical video where Superman is in the fortress, telling his father of what he did. He was prideful, but his father was proud of him. He is out in the world and everyone at the Planet has their assignments to get an interview.

My favorite scene was his interview with Lois.

Just look at the sly smirk on his face as he casually flirts with Lois. He knows what he was doing. He takes her across the city, flying in the air as their love theme plays. It's a very well done scene if you can put some suspenders of disbelief, Lois wouldn't be flying evenly with him when their arms were outstretched. He'd have to be going pretty darn fast for the wind to give her lift to fly next to him.

The cherry on top was when Clark arrived for a date with her immediately after. With Lois in a daze and none the wiser. As she gets her coat, Clark smiles and takes off his glasses, standing tall. This is the reason why not many people suspect that Clark is Superman. The tiny body cues, the hair, and pitch in voice. They're two different people, same heart. And for a second, you think he's gonna tell her the truth, but then he puts the glasses back on and goes back into Clark-mode.

While all of this is going on we meet our villain of the story, Lex Luthor - greatest criminal mind of our time, played brilliantly by the late, great Gene Hackman. He's got a small team of minions with the oafish Otis and the beautiful MISS TESSMACHER!!!!!! As few scenes as we get with them, you get an idea of what they're planning. It involves hijacking test missiles for their nefarious scheme. With the arrival of Superman, Lex has to find a way to make sure that our hero is out of commission when he enacts it. Using his brilliance, he finds a piece of Kryptonite.

He beckons Superman and reveals his plan, to send a bomb into San Andreas Fault and let the populated part sink into the ocean and his desert land he bought becomes valuable. Lex tricks him into opening the box with Kryptonite. The missiles have been launched and Superman is drowning in a pool with a Kryptonite chain on him.

Luckily, Miss Tessmacher's mother lives where one of the missiles is set to land. So, she helps him if he promises to help her mother first. He's worried about Lois and Jimmy who are currently in California, but he promises and Superman does not break promises.

The next thirty minutes he races to stop the first missile, but the other one goes off. From San Francisco to the Hoover Dam, Superman works to save as many people as he can. And he does. He saves so many people, including Jimmy from falling off the dam.

Lois, however...was buried alive underneath a wave of rocks and dirt. He tries to get to her, but he wasn't and she dies. In his grief, he takes to the skies and prepares to do one of the things he was forbidden to do...interfere with human history. The memory of his Earth father telling him that he's here for a reason, he reverses time.

Now, this is a strange plot point that people love to poke holes in. And to be fair, its understandable. The visual representation of what he was doing makes it LOOK like he was just reversing the rotation of the earth. My entire life, I thought the same thing, then I learned how it looked in the comics. He was basically time travelling like The Flash does just not by going into the speed force.

He was time traveling, but the director and visuals showed it as him going back as everything was going crazy. He stopped it from happening and went back to the present...Lois alive and still trying to start her car.

The love of his life is alive again and now he has a few small things to do...take Lex to prison, fly around the earth, smile for the camera.

There was one bit of Lois dialogue I understood, but even as a child could logic my way through. Off of something Jimmy says she thinks Clark and Superman are never around at the same time...but uh, you're in California, he's 'in New York' at the Planet. Clark's not gonna be around the same time Superman is in wooshing around southern California.

That was Superman: The Movie. Does it hold up?

Despite the old tech and the Silver Age version, yes. I'll get to my problems with Man of Steel when we get there, but even now, here a quarter into the 21st century, we need this version of Superman. Kind and full of hope and charm. A light in the darkness of these times. We don't need a brutal, dark, grounded version of Superman. He's an alien from another planet, sent her to help. He's SUPPOSED to be big and fantastical. It's who is and should always be. Every step of the way, every movie, Christopher Reeve brought that to the character. I know he was done with the character when he had his accident, but I have to wonder what he could have done in future iterations and movies.

This and the sequel are some of my top tier favorite superhero movies. And speaking of the sequel, stay tuned...

SUPERMAN WILL RETURN IN SUPERMAN II - ZOD ENTERS THE CHAT