A review by Hank Wagner

The big question we all had going in to Superman Returns was, could Bryan Singer do for Superman what he did for The X-Men? The answer to that question is yes, I mean no, I guess I mean almost.  My initial reaction was that Superman Returns was a wonderful motion picture, long on spectacle and action.  Upon subsequent reflection, however, I noticed some flaws in the film which, while not fatal, did detract from my overall enjoyment.

The film is well paced; although some have said it is slow in the beginning, some exposition was clearly needed to get us all back in the groove, if only to establish what has been going on for the past five “movie years”.  So, we have several scenes in order to reestablish the characters of Lex Luthor, Lois Lane, and Clark Kent.  The payoff of the leisurely build up is an incredible air disaster sequence, which ends with Big Blue stopping a falling airliner mere inches from impact on the pitcher’s mound of a major league baseball stadium.  Superman gets a standing ovation from a crowd shocked but overjoyed to see him again.  Americana simply oozes from the screen: America’s number one fictional icon working his magic during an exhibition of America’s national pastime, captured on America’s favorite obsession, a huge TV screen. 

The movie moves very quickly from that moment on, as Luthor’s plan unfurls.  No need to describe the subsequent action, suffice it to say that the ending feels as if it comes just a little too fast, and that, as Martha Stewart is apt to say, is a good thing.

Overall, the film virtually ignores character development, but that is forgivable, as we all already intimately know the players. It also falls a little short in the humor department, which was a key part of the charm of both Superman and Superman II.  (Example: Lois: Any more at home like you? Clark: Uh, not really, no.)

Superman Returns is mainly about homage, mostly to the first two Christopher Reeve films: the film utilizes John Williams’ original score, and picks up on situations covered by those two films.  Marlon Brando’s talking head is back, and Manhattan once again stands in for Metropolis.   Brandon Routh slavishly imitates Christopher Reeves, even going so far as to deliver Reeve’s line from the first film about flying being statistically safer than any other form of travel.  Another nod to the first film is the mention of the Kryptonite Meteor from Addis Ababa; yet another is Kevin Spacey paraphrasing Gene Hackman’s immortal lines about real estate:

Luthor: Miss Teschmacher, when I was six years old my father said to me...
Miss Teschmacer: "Get out."
Luthor: Before that. He said, "Son, stocks may rise and fall, utilities and transportation systems may collapse. People are no damn good, but they will always need land and they'll pay through the nose to get it! Remember," my father said...
Otis: "... land."
Luthor: Right.

Other nice touches, unrelated to the first two movies:  Noel Neill is in the first shot of the movie, as the victim of Lex’s machinations. Jack Larson plays a bartender in a subsequent scene.  Frank Langella as Perry White delivers the line “Great Caesar’s Ghost!”  The machine gun sequence is pure Fleischer (the shot to the eye was a GREAT touch).  Did you catch the news photo which recreated the cover to Superman’s first appearance in Action #1?

The Messiah theme?  A bit overdone.  Eva Marie Saint as Ma Kent?  Inspired.  The scenes of mayhem in Metropolis? Spectacular.  Visual and verbal references to Prometheus, Atlas and The Pieta?  Cool.  Young Clark running at super speed through an Iowa cornfield? Priceless.

Now the gripes.  Kevin Spacey is not Gene Hackman.  The only time I really believed he was Lex Luthor was in the scene where Superman is beaten to a pulp, and Spacey delivers the coup de grace with a Kryptonite knife (“Now…fly…”).  Brandon Routh is not Christopher Reeve—he turns in an acceptable performance, but what he really does is make you appreciate Reeve’s charisma in the role.  Finally, Kate Bosworth is not Margot Kidder—her Lois is a cipher, you wonder why Supes finds her attractive.   

My other gripes are solidly grounded in continuity geekdom:

Geek Question #1:  Superman was human during his sexual tryst with Lois, so how could the result of that horizontal mambo exhibit super strength?

Geek Question #2: Superman wiped Lois’ memory clean at the end of Superman II.  How disconcerting was it for her to discover that she was pregnant?  Did she conclude that she had conceived immaculately?  Or that she was merely date raped by an alien who was somehow able to repress her memories?  Yuck. 

Geek Question #3:  Superman is surprised that Lois has a child?  What, she was wearing a lead girdle the day he left earth?

Geek Question #4: Superman’s son takes a life with his first feat of super strength.  Will he need super counseling to get over that?  How does his Dad react to that—he had powers growing up, and yet has never killed anyone. 

Of course, some (like my wife), would ask, “Why do you even care?”  My answer is, I don’t know, I guess it doesn’t matter much in the scheme of things.  But, in the final analysis, I guess I get frustrated because these and other flaws could have been easily corrected, but weren’t (check out the comic book adaptation of the film for proof of this, it’s way more continuity oriented than the film that inspired it).  It’s bothersome that a good movie could have been transformed into an outstanding one if someone had cared enough.  Oh well, I can always hope that this state of affairs will improve with the sequel.   Singer has been quoted as saying that while Superman Returns allowed him to introduce the cast, the sequel would allow him to 'go Wrath of Khan on it.'  Let’s hope he realizes that lofty ambition.

Hank Wagner lives in Northwest NJ with his wife and four daughters. A tax attorney by trade, he’s a comic book aficionado by inclination.  Hank writes book reviews and conducts author interviews for genre-oriented magazines like Mystery Scene, Cemetery Dance, Hellnotes, Horror Garage, The New York Review of Science Fiction and others.  He’s a co-author of The Complete Stephen King Universe: A Guide to the Worlds of the King of Horror, and a contributor to the Buffy the Vampire Slayer Watchers Guide: Volume 3 (he wrote an article about watching Buffy with his girls called “The Family Hour”).  Like Superman, he fights a never ending battle for truth, justice, and the American way