Superman Returns 8. I am the man who inspects the levees in pre-Katrina New Orleans. I am the enlightened dual comic book/movie expert who heard that Fucking Joel Schumacher was taking over the Batman franchise. I forsee a disaster coming for the comicbook movie genre. That disaster is named Bryan Singer. Like a giant meteor striking the Earth, it's simply a matter of time before this disaster brings the current popularity of comicbook movies to an end. You heard it here first. (Stay tuned, boys and girls, for a special full blown Bryan Singer rant!)

That proclamation of doom aside, I enjoyed Superman Returns. It, thankfully, fails to embarrass the Reeve legacy. It is, of course, almost impossible to live up to the expectations created by the original movie, but I think SR makes an admirable showing. However, like the fall of the Soviet Union, I think an opportunity was missed here... in this case, an opportunity to make a truly spectacular movie. When I saw Matrix: Revolution and watched Keanu flying through the stormy sky, trenchcoat billowing behind him, I thought to myself, "this is what Superman should look like! They've got to get this director." Well, they didn't, and I think it was part of the missed opportunity.

I had no problem with the producers searching for a relatively unknown actor to play Superman, and I would like to personally thank them for resisting the urge to cast Nicholas Cage (as was originally planned... really) or Will Smith (come on... you know it was proposed in a production office somewhere) in the role. I wish they had found someone with just a little more talent and screen presence though. I was originally concerned about Kevin Spacey playing Lex Luthor, but I think he does fine. (He can produce at will that slightly crazy eye-glaze.) I still haven't decided how I feel about them using the somewhat comical, doofus-henchmanned version of Luthor from the original movies rather than a more realistic, sinister version made popular in Smallville. With realism nipping at the rest of the film's edges, it feels almost anacronistic. Whoever it was they cast as Lois Lane (I'm not even going to bother to look it up) is completely forgetable. (I'll spare you my questionable homocentric theory on this movie's casting.)

The story involves Superman suddenly returning after being inexplicably missing for years. The rationale was shoe-horned into the story, and I think they took the right course in just moving quickly past it. For the most part, SR strongly resembles the Reeves original ...perhaps a little too closely, but I can't really bring myself to describe that as a fault. Again, we have a real estate-obcessed Lex Luthor taking a bizarre, destruction-wrought, circuitous route to gaining a vast real estate empire rather than just buying up 1/4 of the US with his vast bank account, this time using Kryptonian technology. Again, Superman must stop him. Along the way, Clark Kent mysteriously returns to the Daily Planet, unquestioned, and learns [gasp!] Lois has moved on with her life. Through the course of the movie we also learn [insert big huge fucking spoiler here... You really wanna know, go find it somewhere else.]. Man oh man, do I have issues with this. Without spilling the beans by proxy, I'll just say that they never ever should have went there with this character. Again, I blame Bryan Singer.

So, a superficial retread though it may be, go enjoy Superman Returns for what it's worth. Get a little choked up when the familiar theme plays, and feel the relief that Christopher Reeve won't have to turn over in his grave.  ¶ 4:09 PM