DC’s cornerstone and oldest character celebrated his 75th birthday, hence yet another reboot after the disappointing Superman Returns, not to mentions Superman III and IV, the latter being the punchline to this joke: What can kill Superman? Kryptonite? No, another sequel? Given the success of the Nolans’ revamped Batman flicks, the Time Warner media barony decided to push their luck. Never mind how overexposed Supes is through a decade of Smallville or the dull Lois & Clark. Movies launched a couple years after TV shows wind down don’t always succeed. See The X-Files, The Last Airbender and Star Trek: Generations.
I really wanted to like this movie despite how much I love Richard Donner’s 1978 version. Rest assured, Zack Snyder failed to seduce me away from the 35-year-old classic. How I hate the word “classic” but for Superman, the noun is appropriate. My gripe is the whole post 9/11 destructiveness crap it mimics from terrible films (anything with Transformers in its title) and other hits (The Avengers). It’s tired. Plus all the prolonged fighting drags this out while trying to cover up the threadbare story.
I want to counter with the elements I liked. Steel does go with John Byrne’s take on the Kryptonians on how alien they are, namely their aversion to natural births. Kryptonian technology is advanced to the point of resembling magic yet it isn’t mysterious enough like Donner’s crystals, Snyder goes with liquid metal. Lastly, Superman’s logo is explained as a hieroglyph for the Kryptonian (or Kryptonese) word for “hope.”
What makes the movie not really worth paying $12 to see in 3-D?
- Russell Crowe’s Jor-El is a borderline action hero too, he just can’t be an overweight scientist like Marlon Brando.
- General Zod is a somewhat sympathetic character a la Darth Vader.
- The Kryptonians have a fetish for HR Giger designs. Maybe they’re related to the Engineers from Prometheus?
- Some crap science, namely how additional mass can come from nowhere.
- I for one am rather tired of seeing Amy Adams in every other blockbuster. Her Lois Lane was blah.
The upcoming DVD on a flat TV will do fine. You can use the extra money to buy/rent/stream the complete Nineties series. Comic book characters are often better treated in the long, serial form.
Alamo Extras: All things Superman: clips from a terrible superdog serial, a Bollywood musical bit, a Bugs Bunny cartoon, George Reeves’ appearance on I Love Lucy, a news report of a guy in the Philippines who is too obsessed, the Max Fleischer cartoon, the scene of the tainted Superman in a bar from Superman III interspersed throughout.