Justice League (2017)

Even before I actually started reading comic books on a regular basis, I loved DC Comics. I grew up watching DC's characters in cartoons, TV shows, and movies, and I've always held them very close to my heart even if I hadn't always been familiar with their origins on the printed page. So when I'd heard that Warner Bros. was going to borrow an idea from Marvel Studios and create a shared cinematic universe featuring DC's heroes and villains, I was excited... until I actually saw the movies.

As good as Wonder Woman might have been, the utter awfulness of Man of Steel, Batman v Superman, and Suicide Squad really dampened any sort of excitement I had for what's been named "the DC Extended Universe." But regardless, I was still drawn to Justice League. I mean, how could I not go see it? And while it's certainly a very, very flawed movie, I still enjoyed it for what it was.

Thousands of years ago, Earth was invaded by the warlord Steppenwolf (Ciarán Hinds) and the armies of the dystopian planet of Apokolips. He was ultimately repelled by the combined efforts of humanity, the gods of Olympus, the Amazons, the people of the mythical undersea kingdom of Atlantis, and members of the Green Lantern Corps. Steppenwolf's weapons, three powerful artifacts known as "Mother Boxes," were separated and hidden away.

Fast forward to the present day. Humanity has become more bitter and cynical than ever before in the wake of Superman's death. It is this despair that reactivates the long-dormant Mother Boxes and draws Steppenwolf back to Earth to search for them. Realizing the high likelihood that he might succeed in doing so, Batman (Ben Affleck) and Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot) begin putting together their own team of super-powered individuals to fight him. Their recruits:

• Arthur Curry (Jason Momoa), the half-human heir to the throne of Atlantis
• Barry Allen (Ezra Miller), a nerdy college student who uses his ability to move at superhuman speed to operate as a vigilante known as "The Flash"
• Victor Stone (Ray Fisher), a former college football star whose body was rebuilt with cybernetic enhancements via a Mother Box after a near-fatal accident

And while the team puts up a good fight against Steppenwolf in their first encounter with him, Batman decides that they need a little extra something to bring to their next battle: a resurrected Superman (Henry Cavill). It's a risky plan, one that might not even work, but it might be their only hope.

I entered Justice League with a fair bit of trepidation for a number of reasons. One was the movie's shaky production, which I'll get into later. There's also the fact that DC's movies don't exactly have the best track record lately. Not only have the movies building to Justice League been lousy (with the exception of Wonder Woman), but they've also felt like they're just there to be there, with

When Marvel started their initial build from Iron Man to The Avengers, the majority of the major players got their own individual movies (or plenty of significant screen time if they weren't flying solo) so that the audience would know who they were and connect to them. They took the time to build their universe and mapped out everything, sometimes even years in advance. Each successive movie plants at least some tiny little seed to be expanded upon in later installments, whether we notice it at first or not. And considering that their continued use of that formula has made them billions of dollars at the worldwide box office, I'd be willing to bet that they won't be changing it up much in the future.

DC, on the other hand, hasn't really done any of that. It's really evident that they only had the idea to do a shared universe was something they came up after the success of Man of Steel instead of something they'd planned all along. Their movies seem disjointed, disconnected, none of them remotely feeling like they should or could be taking place in the same world. Yeah, Batman and Flash might've made cameos in Suicide Squad, but the build to Justice League comes across like trying to put together a puzzle with none of the right pieces.

I don't really believe I'm exaggerating when I say I think they've been rushing to get to a movie starring the Justice League but didn't care how they got there. Rather than have a concise game plan from the start, DC has just thrown whatever they could at a wall and ran with whatever they believed would stick. And it's honestly hard to make a connection to these characters when the movie hasn't earned it. Man of Steel and Batman v Superman were the kind of movies you'd have expected to be made by some 16-year-old edgelord who thinks the idea of clearly defined good guys and bad guys is stupid and that idealism is for chumps, while Suicide Squad is basically what you'd get if Guardians of the Galaxy was made inside of a Spencer's Gifts with characters who weren't as developed or likable. Wonder Woman was a fantastic way to let us get to know the character after she showed up in Batman v Superman, but that still leaves us with the rest. Could Warner Bros. and DC not been a bit more patient? Would it have killed them to establish as many major players as they could' before approaching the Justice League?

It wouldn't have hurt anybody if they'd waited another year or two to make this movie. Give the audience something to establish this Flash and show us what sets him apart from the Flash that Grant Gustin plays on that show on The CW. Give the audience something to show that Aquaman is more than just the "lol he talks to fish" jokes that have been told about him for years. Do something, anything, to show us why Cyborg belongs in the Justice League and that he's more than just "that one Teen Titan that says 'booyah.'" (I'm of the opinion that they also should've gone with the Martian Manhunter or one of the Green Lanterns instead of Cyborg, but that's just me.) I'm not saying give them their own solo movies right out of the gate; Marvel's Black Widow and Hawkeye haven't had their own solo movies and I still couldn't imagine the Avengers without them. I'd have just appreciated a little something from the newcomers other than "oh yeah, these guys are here now, we'll fill in the details later if we get the time."

The movie's rocky production did it no favors either. While Zack Snyder is credited as the movie's sole director, he left the movie during post-production to deal with his daughter's tragic suicide. Joss Whedon, who Warner Bros. had previously brought on to rewrite Chris Terrio's script, was tagged with completing the movie. This included not just finishing post-production, but doing extensive reshoots too. You can definitely see Whedon's influence on the final product, especially in the dialogue and in the movie's sense of humor. It doesn't feel anything like the dark, morose movies that Snyder made. Elements of Snyder's typical style are still here, but they're toned down, almost as if Whedon was trying to reign in what he couldn't completely change.

The bad part is that with Whedon taking over only a few months ago, the final product feels rushed. There's the dodgy CGI, for starters. Steppenwolf looks like absolute crap, as does most of the final battle against Steppenwolf and his Parademons. And the less said about the hysterically atrocious work they did removing the mustache Henry Cavill had to grow for Mission: Impossible – Fallout, the better. One also gets the feeling that quite a lot of the movie was left on the cutting room floor to keep the movie at a two-hour running time. Maybe that's where all of Flash, Aquaman, and Cyborg's backstories went?

The movie also suffers from having a ridiculously weak villain. I'd never even heard of Steppenwolf prior to seeing the movie. And the character as he's presented here isn't much. He just doesn't seem like the kind of character that would need the entire Justice League to take him down. Maybe Warner Bros. mandated that they had to save Darkseid for a potential sequel? He probably wouldn't have been half as awesome as the one in the comics, or the one Michael Ironside voiced in the various DC cartoons developed by Bruce Timm and Paul Dini during the latter half of the '90s and early '00s. But still, I'd have loved to have seen Darkseid.

I'll say this much, though: the majority of the cast is great, so the movie at least has that going for it. Ray Fisher is forgettable as Cyborg and Ezra Miller is honestly kinda annoying as the Flash. But everybody else is great. Ben Affleck once again makes a better Batman than people thought he'd be when he was first hired for the role. I spoke of solo movies earlier, and I'd really like to see one starring Affleck's Batman.

Jason Momoa, meanwhile, is a total badass in his first outing as Aquaman. He gives off a vibe of being the coolest guy in the room, and easily makes one forget all the corny jokes about Aquaman being lame. I also thought that Gal Gadot was once again fabulous as Wonder Woman. She plays the role with a ton of heart and conviction, and again reaffirms my belief that they couldn't have hired a better actress for the role.

And then there's Henry Cavill, who finally gets to play the Superman I always dreamed he could be here. Despite how poorly Zack Snyder wrote the character in the past, Cavill has always shown a ton of potential that he could be a fantastic Superman with the right material. And there's some strong glimpses of it here, even if Cavill doesn't have a whole lot of screen time compared to the rest of the cast. Seeing him save the day by laying in a few punches to Steppenwolf before dropping everything to save some civilians in peril, all while Danny Elfman's brief interpretation of John Williams' classic Superman theme from 1978 plays? Oh yeah, I want to see more of that Superman!

A Justice League movie could've happened back in 2007, believe it or not. Mad Max creator George Miller was hired to direct what would've been called Justice League: Mortal, along with a cast. But it was canceled due to a combination of budgetary woes and the Writer's Guild strike. Ten years later, the Justice League have finally hit the big screen and the results are... okay, I guess. It's not a particularly bad movie, but it also isn't that great either. It's one of those movies that's just kinda there. It's at least the second-best entry in the DC Expanded Universe, though that's damning it with faint praise. Could've been worse, though; I could've been stuck watching Batman v Superman again.

Final Rating:**½

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016)

Some of the most heated debates you'll ever see begin with a single question: "Who'd win in a fight?" Pick any two popular fictional characters, and the idea of them doing battle is enough to send any geek's imagination running wild. We'll even occasionally end up with these arguments bearing fruit, with movies like King Kong vs. Godzilla and Freddy vs. Jason hitting theaters and wars between the Alien and the Predator sprawling across comic books, video games, and two movies. But other than James T. Kirk versus Jean-Luc Picard, the one argument I've seen the most is who would win between DC's legendary superheroes, Superman and Batman. It's a battle that's actually happened in the past, most famously in the pages of Frank Miller's seminal comic book The Dark Knight Returns, but never on the scale of the newly released flick Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. But I should have taken the movie's Rotten Tomatoes score (as of this writing, it sits at 30% and will probably drop lower) as a warning, because I don't know if I could have been more disappointed with it.

Eighteen months have passed since the city of Metropolis was left devastated by General Zod and his band of rebel Kryptonians. And while his intervention on that fateful day and his acts of selfless heroism since then have led many to trust Superman (Henry Cavill) as a benevolent force, there are those who are convinced otherwise. Among the doubters is billionaire industrialist Bruce Wayne (Ben Affleck), who witnessed firsthand the death and destruction caused by Superman's battle with Zod and is now fearful of the day that he might switch from savior to conqueror. He's bound and determined to prevent this, using the expertise and equipment he's acquired as the masked vigilante "Batman" to develop a means to neutralize Superman should the need ever arise.

Wayne's paranoia is surpassed, however, by that of Lex Luthor (Jesse Eisenberg), an eccentric businessman who has grown obsessed with proving that Superman is far from the altruistic hero that appears to be. Luthor begins secretly orchestrating ways to sully his enemy's good name and shift the public's perception of him, while using his vast wealth and political connections to get access to the top-secret laboratory built around the wreckage of Zod's ship and find answers to all of his darkest questions about our superpowered visitor from another world. But his primary goal: to subtly stir the tensions between Superman and Batman and manipulate them into a fight, a clash of titans that that he hopes will end with Superman either dead or exposed as the villain Luthor believes him to be.

I wanted to like this movie. I honestly did. I went in thinking to myself, "There's no way it can be that bad." But I was wrong, dead wrong. Batman v Superman is a bloated mess of a movie that tries to accomplish way too much in the time its given yet never really does any of it right. It's painfully obvious that they're trying to play catch-up with the Marvel Cinematic Universe yet missed every single thing that Marvel Studios did well so wildly that it's almost like they were doing it on purpose. The movie practically assaults the audience with all of its failed potential and wasted efforts. Between that, the inconsistent writing, and the oppressively dark tone, Batman v Superman is an absolute chore to get through.

Zack Snyder returns to direct the movie after helming Man of Steel, and I'm not one hundred percent convinced that Warner Bros. was wise to bring him back. Snyder has always been accused of preferring style over substance, a criticism that is none more accurate when applied to Batman v Superman. There's absolutely nothing worthwhile about the movie beyond what's on the surface, and what is on the surface isn't very appealing. The movie's dark, downright bleak tone makes it really depressing to watch, as if the entire project was one big experiment Snyder was conducting in an attempt to discover the antithesis of fun. It's like he was actively trying to make a movie that was utterly devoid of any sort of happiness or glee, instead preferring to make a movie so gloomy and joyless that it makes me simultaneously sad and angry that this was the best Snyder felt that he could do.

It's also relentlessly dull until the climactic fight scenes, because it feels like Snyder and the writers are trying to cram so many things into the movie that nothing really ends up happening. And the fight scenes... oh dear, the fight scenes! By the end, it felt like Snyder was beating me over the head with a pipe while trying to make me go deaf and blind at the same time. It's one giant terrible mixture of cacophonic light and sound, an all-out assault on the senses that stops being entertaining and becomes annoying halfway through.

And then there's the piss-poor script credited to Chris Terrio and David S. Goyer. It feels like Terrio and Goyer just cobbled together pieces from other, better stories without trying to make any sort of coherent narrative out of it all. It feels bloated, trying to cram numerous movies worth of material into one 150-minute project just because the Justice League movie starts filming this summer and they've got to hurry up and get all this stuff out of the way now while they still have a chance. There's just so much going on that it does not allow for any sort of narrative flow at all. The story bounces around like it's trapped inside a pinball machine, with no chance to make any sort of sense of it or to give the audience a chance to care. You'd think that a movie that is ostensibly a sequel to Man of Steel would be more concerned with just being that. But instead we have to clumsily introduce Wonder Woman, shoehorn in cameos from Aquaman, Cyborg, and the Flash, and give Batman the lion's share of the movie's focus.

And honestly, none of it ever goes anywhere. It's setting up for movies down the road without worrying about taking care of itself. Instead of being a self-contained movie where Superman fights Batman, it's basically giving you an entire franchise worth of Cliff's Notes just so Snyder and Warner Bros. can skip straight to the Justice League movie with as minimal effort as possible, and then give all of the characters that aren't Batman or Superman their own movies after the fact. It's a classic case of trying to put the cart before the horse. Rather than treat this movie with love and care, they just slap everything together in a great big rush and shove it out into theaters without really caring how good or bad it is because the Marvel Cinematic Universe has made nearly ten billion dollars combined at the worldwide box office and they want some of that action too. But rather than develop a world a world of heroes and villains and build towards Justice League as the natural payoff towards all of their hard work, it's like they've convinced themselves that people would rather just see all of the characters lumped onto the screen together and have a bunch of monotonous action scenes thrown at them without things like story or character development or good acting getting in the way.

And how about that acting, huh? One almost gets the feeling that even the majority cast realized how awful the movie was going to be and couldn't bother to even half-ass it. The rest were so hampered by the lousy material that even if they'd given their absolute best, they'd have barely made it out intact. Granted, there are a couple of good performances, but the majority of the cast is just disappointing at best. Among the good is Ben Affleck, who is a strong Batman. When his casting was first announced back in 2013, it drew an absolute ridiculous amount of criticism. How dare they hire the guy that played Daredevil? But now that the movie has been released, Affleck shows that he's a lot better in the role than anyone could have anticipated. He approaches the role with a grizzled, jaded demeanor that really suits the character. Affleck's Batman is haunted by years of emotional grief, his fight to protect Gotham City having taken a toll on him. We're only privy to bits and pieces of it ― the broken-down state of Wayne Manor, a desecrated Robin costume kept as a memorial in the Batcave ― but Affleck manages to convey so much through his actions, his facial expressions, his tone of voice. This Batman has been through absolute hell, and it's Affleck who shows us that.

I also really enjoyed Gal Godot as Wonder Woman. She isn't really given a lot to do until the finale (and Wonder Woman is completely irrelevant to the plot, to be honest), but Godot absolutely nails the role. Godot's Wonder Woman is a strong, charismatic heroine, just as she should be. Once she leaps into battle, you can't take your eyes off her. She commands your attention with a ferocity that makes one curious as to why it took so long for Warner Bros. to work Wonder Woman into a movie. But word is that they're making one as we speak with the intention of it coming out next year, which I'm actually excited for because I can't wait to see Godot actually have something to do as the character.

And while the movie does boast those good performances and some decent ones among lesser members of the supporting cast (Jeremy Irons, Laurence Fishburne, and Diane Lane are all fantastic, by the way), they're outweighed by the bad and the ridiculous. Henry Cavill, for starters, certainly looks the part. But the way his character is presented, he's stuck playing a whiny, emo bitch. This is not the big blue Boy Scout we all know and love; it's instead an emotionally conflicted wuss that feels more pathetic than heroic. I get the reasoning behind writing Superman that way, as I'm sure Snyder & Co. felt they were giving him more depth that way. But what's wrong with the traditional depiction? Regardless, Cavill seems to be trying hard, which I appreciate, but he just can't overcome how poorly written the script is. He's not playing a character to believe in, but to pity. And that is no Superman that I want any part of.

And why is Amy Adams even here again? She's dull as dishwater, having absolutely none of the likability, charisma, or spunk that made Lois such a beloved part of the Superman mythos. It doesn't help matters that Adams and Cavill have zero chemistry whatsoever either, but that's more the fault of the casting director than Adams herself. She is a talented actress, don't get me wrong, but Adams honestly doesn't feel like she was the right person for this role. One wouldn't be surprised if the only reason she was playing Lois at all is because someone wanted a multiple-time Oscar nominee in the role.

Speaking of roles that are woefully miscast, Jesse Eisenberg sucks. This has to be one of the absolute worst performances I've seen in quite a while. He's an annoying doofus that does nothing but inspire anger and frustration every time you see him. Eisenberg is painfully inconsistent, wandering all over the place throughout the movie, hitting all points of the map sometimes within a span of a few moments. This isn't Lex Luthor at all, but a schizophrenic hipster instead. Had Superman just torn his head off and punted it into orbit, I'd have been perfectly fine with that just so I didn't have to see Jesse Eisenberg in this movie anymore.

As I said earlier, the whole thing makes me think that Warner Bros. saw Disney raking in cash hand over fist with the Avengers and went into full-blown panic mode. And in doing so, they entrusted the franchise to a director who has made it abundantly clear that he has doesn't have a single clue as to what makes these characters so wonderful. Zack Snyder has given us the cinematic equivalent of all those crappy comic books from the '90s, the ones full of violent, brooding antiheroes because being "darker and edgier" was what they thought was cool, as if all the bright, shiny, happy stuff that had come before it had somehow suddenly become lame. I've loved the heroes of DC Comics since I was a little kid, but Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice makes me want to rethink that. Watching this movie hurts. It hurts a lot. If this is how the road to a shared cinematic universe starring DC's characters gets started, then I should probably just stick with the Avengers.

Final Rating: *½

Man of Steel (2013)

Seventy-five years ago, two cartoonists from Cleveland wrote and drew a story for a new comic book called Action Comics. Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster surely could not have known back in 1938 that their story's protagonist would become a major cultural icon. Decked out in blue tights and a red cape, the character helped put superheroes on the map and changed the face of American comic books. Needless to say, that character is the one and only Superman.

Superman has become so popular over the years that he's transcended comics. He actually has a whole host of fans who've never even touched a comic book, let alone read one. I'd say it's primarily due to his presence in other media. There's a ton of Superman cartoons, Superman TV shows, and perhaps most famously, a number of live-action Superman movies. However, the quality of those movies has been... well, mixed, to say the least. Richard Donner's 1978 movie and its sequel are classics, some of the best superhero movies of all time. But much like what happened when Joel Schumacher took over the Batman franchise from Tim Burton, the third and fourth movies underperformed and effectively ended the franchise. Even Bryan Singer's Superman Returns wasn't enough to resurrect it.

That's where Christopher Nolan comes in. After concluding his epic "Dark Knight Saga" last year, he was brought in by Warner Bros. Studios to help reinvigorate Superman much in the way he did Batman. With Nolan assuming the role of producer and Watchmen director Zack Snyder at the helm, Superman is getting his much-ballyhooed (and at this point much-needed) cinematic reboot in the form of Man of Steel. So let's dig in, shall we?

The distant planet Krypton is in dire straits. Jor-El (Russell Crowe), the planet's greatest scientific mind, has discovered evidence of an impending environmental catastrophe that will destroy the planet sooner rather than later. But his attempts to warn the Kryptonian high council are ruined when the planet's military leader, the megalomaniacal General Zod (Michael Shannon), seizes the opportunity to stage a coup and plunge Krypton into civil war. In the midst of the chaos and with precious time remaining before the end of the world, Jor-El straps his infant son Kal-El into a rocket and launches him to the relative safety of Earth.

Baby Kal-El's ship lands near Smallville, Kansas, where he's found by Jonathan (Kevin Costner) and Martha Kent (Diane Lane). The Kents adopt him and raise him as their own, naming him Clark. But try as they might to keep his alien heritage a secret, it becomes harder when he starts developing superpowers during his adolescence. Naturally, that's a weird time to not only find out you have super-strength and X-ray vision, but that you're not even human. It's because of that that the adult Clark Kent (Henry Cavill) doesn't feel like he fits in.

Clark roams the country doing odd jobs, never allowing himself to stay in one area for long as he searches to find his place in the world. But the values and sense of justice that the Kents raised him with always come to the forefront, as Clark routinely finds himself performing good deeds and using his powers to save others from disaster. He tries keeping his identity a secret, but it proves harder than he thinks after an encounter with Lois Lane (Amy Adams), an intrepid reporter investigating an ancient Kryptonian spacecraft found buried in the Arctic.

He tries dissuading her from publicly exposing him, but an even bigger threat soon presents itself. General Zod and his army have escaped the interstellar prison they were left in just as Krypton exploded and followed the ancient spacecraft's signal back to Earth. Believing Clark to be the key to reviving Krypton and their dwindling race, Zod has no qualms with destroying all of Earth to get what he wants. Clark is left faced with the quandary of choosing his heritage or protecting his home.

Judging by the reactions I've seen online, Man of Steel has been a very divisive movie. There have been just as many people singing its praises as there have been people who disliked it. But I'm among the seemingly less-vocal band of moviegoers that thought the movie was somewhere in between. There was quite a bit that I enjoyed, elements that were fun, entertaining, and engaging. But there were also those parts I felt held the movie back from achieving its full potential, thus leaving me disappointed as well.

With Zack Snyder in charge as director, you're pretty much guaranteed that, if anything, the movie's going to be insanely stylish. All of his movies are like that, and Man of Steel is no different. And personally, I thought Snyder's work was great. He keeps the movie rolling at a brisk pace, with even the slower moments never feeling like they're dragging or wasting their time. And he really ups his game during the movie's third act, which sees Superman battle Zod's forces in Smallville and Metropolis. These sequences are very exciting and cool, but the downside is that there's so much carnage on the screen that by the end, it makes you feel burned out. It's like a Michael Bay movie on steroids.

And while Snyder obviously gets what makes Superman such an iconic character and tries crafting an epic tone for the movie, one gets the feeling that some of the cynicism he brought to Watchmen has bled over into this project. The movie comes off a lot darker than I'd expect out of Superman. That sort of thing might work for Batman, but Superman is a character that's all about hope and bringing out the best in people. That idea was paid some lip service and occasionally seems to want to break through, but there's also a feeling that because of Batman's popularity and Christopher Nolan's presence, the movie has to be this so-called "realistic" superhero tale similar to Nolan's Dark Knight trilogy. Does Superman have to be realistic? What's wrong with a little happy-go-lucky fantasy?

I also thought that some parts of the script serve as a stumbling block as well. Writer David S. Goyer is no stranger to superhero movies and to his credit, a lot of his script for Man of Steel isn't bad. Like Snyder, he obviously gets Superman is having a fun time putting his own spin on him, Goyer builds the characters in a way that you become invested in them, but the real problem is that the character development stops dead about halfway through, just as it's getting somewhere. As the third act begins and Superman goes to war with Zod's army, the movie becomes Zack Snyder's attempt to destroy as many buildings as possible before the movie ends. I wanted to see more development because I've seen proof that you don't have to sacrifice characters for action (and vice versa). You can have your cake and eat it too sometimes.

Even the movie's 3D effects are disappointing at times. It's another casualty of a mediocre post-production conversion, with only a few scenes having any sort of real depth. While these moments are admittedly really cool, there are not quite enough of them to justify paying the extra surcharge. If you're not a big fan of 3D, don't feel compelled to see it in that format. You don't need to if you don't want to.

But if there's one element of the movie that I thought was one hundred percent awesome, it's the cast. The actors and actresses are all great in their own ways. Amy Adams isn't given as much to do as I'd hoped, but I still thought she played Lois Lane well. I can also say the same thing for Diane Lane, who is charming and sweet in her role as Superman's human mother, while Antje Traue makes for a damn good villain as Zod's chief lieutenant.

And while Kevin Costner is fine as Jonathan Kent, I liked Russell Crowe a bit more. He brings a stoic wisdom to Jor-El, and you can see just how much his character believes in what he's doing. His Jor-El takes it obvious he loves his son and believes in him, which really gives the character a huge boost.

I also liked Michael Shannon, who abandoned the theatricality Terrence Stamp brought to the role in Superman II and made General Zod his own. He gets a little hammy at times (like the "I will find him!" scene that's in the ads), but Shannon still makes Zod a threatening, sometimes scary villain.

But if Shannon had big shoes to fill as he played the character made famous by another actor, Henry Cavill has even bigger shoes. Cavill doesn't have the same dry humor that made Christopher Reeve so captivating to watch, but then his Superman isn't the same as Reeve's either. Cavill plays the role well, bringing a certain seriousness to it. He does a respectable job conveying how unsure he is with his place in the world, while simultaneously having a compulsion to help people no matter what. Cavill does his absolute best as Superman, and if he had a better script to work with, this probably could have been the better portrayals of the character.

I unfortunately didn't think Man of Steel was all that was hoping it would be. I didn't think it was terrible and I don't regret having seen it. I actually enjoyed some parts, but it's just that the enjoyable parts are weighed down by disappointment. There's talk that the movie is supposed to be the start of the DC Comics equivalent of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and if that's the case, things are off to a rocky start. But to its credit, Man of Steel did leave me wanting to see where a sequel would go, so I guess it succeeded in that aspect. As it stands, though, the movie is okay at best. It's just another run of the mill summer blockbuster where smashing stuff rules above all. Is it so hard to do something more than that?

Final Rating: ***

Superman and the Mole Men (1951)

Unless you've been living under a rock since 1938, you've probably heard of Superman. Perhaps the most famous character to have originated in American comic books, Superman more or less created the superhero genre and helped codify many of its archetypes. The last son of Krypton has been one of pop culture's most enduring figures, having been translated into radio and television shows, movies, cartoons, toys, and practically everything else you can think of.

As far as his live-action portrayals go, everyone most commonly associates Superman with the late Christopher Reeve. But while Reeve's movies introduced the character to a whole new generation of fans, he was not the first person to don the red and blue tights in a feature film. That honor would go to George Reeves, the star of the Adventures of Superman TV series, which aired in syndication in the '50s.

As a trial run for the yet-to-premiere television show, the movie Superman and the Mole Men was produced and released to theaters. With Reeves taking over the role from Kirk Alyn, who played the Man of Steel in a pair of serials in 1948 and 1950, the movie has become something of a forgotten part of Superman's cinematic history. But how does it hold up, though?

Our story takes us to the small town of Silsby, home of the world's deepest oil well. The drilling of said well has drawn the attention of intrepid reporters Clark Kent (Reeves) and Lois Lane (Phyllis Coates), who are covering the story for the Daily Planet.

Unbeknownst to the drillers, the drill has penetrated the subterranean lair of the "mole men," a race of small, odd-looking people. Their strange appearance, coupled with the fact that everything they touch begins to glow, sends Silsby's citizens into a panic. A lynch mob led by the violent Luke Benson (Jeff Corey) quickly forms, and it's up to Kent's alter ego, the heroic Superman, to save the day.

Okay, so the plot isn't very complex. But when you remember that it's more or less a 58-minute test pilot for a television show that wouldn't start airing for another year, a simple plot isn't really all that surprising. That said, Superman and the Mole Men isn't really that much of a movie. It probably would have worked better as an episode of The Adventures of Superman instead. (It actually was re-edited and broadcast as a two-part episode of the show.)

Judging it on its own merits, though, I didn't think it was all that bad. While the special effects are a bit primitive and the makeup for the mole men is kinda cheesy, there's something charming and likable about it. It's an innocent adventure that can be enjoyed by everyone, without the burdens of adult drama or themes like other, more recent superhero movies. And there's not a thing wrong with that.

In the director's chair is Lee Sholem, who would go on to direct fourteen episodes of The Adventures of Superman. He has a rather extensive résumé in the world of television, and his experience is obvious in his work on this movie. It looks exactly like what you'd expect a TV show from the '50s to look like. The extensive use of studio backlots and the way scenes are structured and filmed make that easy to see.

But while Sholem's work (and the movie's obviously low budget) makes it feel more like a TV show than a movie, that doesn't mean he did a bad job. He manages to keep things exciting and entertaining, and doesn't let the movie get boring. And really, that's all you can ask for sometimes.

Handling the writing is "Richard Fielding," a joint pseudonym for Robert Maxwell and Whitney Ellsworth. As I said, the plot isn't very complex at all. It's really just an anti-paranoia morality tale, which was timely in an era where everyone was afraid of the so-called Communist menace. There's not a lot to it beyond that, though, so if you're looking for deep storytelling, I don't think this is where you'll find it.

The best part of the movie, though, is the acting. In the primary roles of Clark Kent and Superman, George Reeves is all aces. He is charming, playing both Clark and Superman with a forceful confidence that makes it hard not to think of him as a hero. Reeves defined Superman for a generation, and in this, his first appearance in the cape and tights, I can see why.

As Lois Lane, Phyllis Coates is engaging, enjoyable, and entertaining. She plays the perfect foil for Clark, and in a nice change of pace, doesn't get all weak in the knees when she's around Superman. Most depictions of Lois outside of the comics have that happen, but Coates goes the opposite way. This allows her to make more of an impression, and the character and the movie are better for it.

The rest of the cast is mostly disposable, but I thought Jeff Corey was great as the movie's villain. He plays the role as the meanest, vilest snake possible, and though he's no Lex Luthor, Corey is a good enough villain for what the movie needed.

While the movie would probably be more comparable to Smallville or Lois & Clark than it would be to the five big-budget movies, Superman and the Mole Men isn't bad at all. At its worst, it's an hour of harmless, inoffensive fun that I'm sure will be a treat for the Superman fans who have yet to actually see it. And even if you don't like it, you'll probably come away thinking it was better than Superman IV.

Final Rating: ***½

Superman Returns (2006)

Of the multitude of characters dreamed up by comic book writers and artists since the medium came into prominence in the 1930s, one of the most important and influential has been the one and only Superman. The creation of Jerry Siegel and Joel Schuster, the last son of Krypton made his first appearance on the cover of DC's Action Comics #1 in 1938 and became a big fat hit. In the decades since his debut, Superman has become the de facto mascot for DC Comics as well as a cultural icon that defined the term "superhero."

And with his popularity, one medium wouldn't be enough for the Man of Steel. The character has popped up on quite a bit of merchandise over the years, along with inspiring radio plays, movie serials, cartoons, and popular television shows. But perhaps the most famous depictions of the character were the four movies starring the late Christopher Reeve. Released between 1978 and 1987, the four movies varied between exceptional and abysmal, but Reeve's charismatic performances in all four cemented him in the minds of many as the definitive real-life face of the beloved hero.

But after the painful box office performance of Superman IV: The Quest For Peace in 1987, it appeared as if there might never be a fifth movie in the franchise. Franchise producers Alexander and Ilya Salkind proposed a movie pitting Superman against his noted foe Brainiac, but when the rights reverted back to DC Comics in 1992, things snowballed from there. Numerous writers, directors, and actors were attached to the project over the course of the next two decades, quite a few of them looking to do an adaptation of DC's famous story arc "The Death and Return of Superman."

Big names like Kevin Smith, Tim Burton, Brett Ratner, Lost creator J.J. Abrams, Charlie's Angels director McG, Anthony Hopkins, Michael Keaton, and Nicolas Cage were all connected to the various projects in some capacity, but for one reason or another, the fifth Superman movie would repeatedly be put on the shelf before it could find its way out of pre-production. After three directors, nine writers, and fifty million dollars spent, X-Men director Bryan Singer was hired and the ball finally got rolling on what would be the first Superman film in nineteen years, the boldly-titled Superman Returns.

Upon hearing that astronomers may have discovered the remnants of the planet Krypton, Superman (Brandon Routh) embarks on a long voyage into space to see the remains of his home for himself. Finding nothing, he returns to Earth and resumes his life in Metropolis as mild-mannered Daily Planet reporter Clark Kent. But five years have passed, and the world he knew has changed drastically. Lois Lane (Kate Bosworth), the woman who'd captured his heart, has moved on with her life. During Superman's half-decade absence, Lois has won a Pulitzer Prize for an editorial titled "Why The World Doesn't Need Superman"; gotten engaged to Richard White (James Marsden), the yuppie nephew of the Daily Planet's editor, Perry White (Frank Langella); and given birth to a young son named Jason (Tristan Lake Leabu). But in spite of Lois's disillusionment in regards to the big blue Boy Scout, Jimmy Olsen (Sam Huntington) theorizes that she still might have some feelings for him after all.

But the more things change, the more they stay the same. Lex Luthor (Kevin Spacey) has been released from prison on a technicality, and he's managed to finagle his way into being the sole beneficiary of a wealthy old woman's money and possessions. Luthor gathers up his henchmen and his female companion Kitty Kowalski (Parker Posey), and using his newfound financial resources, ventures into the Arctic to the abandoned Fortress of Solitude. He acquires a number of the Fortress's crystals, and through the holographic representation of Superman's father Jor-El (archival footage of Marlon Brando), Luthor learns that the crystals can be used to create anything from Kryptonian architecture to enormous landmasses. He tests this by placing a tiny speck of crystal into some water that was part of a model train set in the basement of his newly acquired mansion. In doing so, it causes a sizeable Kryptonian structure to form in the middle of the room.

But Luthor's little experiment also causes an electromagnetic pulse that briefly knocks out all of the electricity on the east coast. This temporary blackout also causes a serious malfunction on a space shuttle and the jetliner hauling it, and the shuttle threatens to drag the jet and everyone on it — including Lois — into outer space. Forced into action, Clark quickly changes into Superman and rescues the plane. He safely deposits the plane in the middle of a baseball stadium during a game, revealing Superman's return to the world. You know, the scene is cool and all, but afterwards, it left me wondering what happened to the wings of the plane. They came right off the plane, so they had to go somewhere, right? It's probably safe to say that they landed safely in the ocean, but what if they crashed onto an orphanage or the Special Olympics or a box full of kittens? Am I the only person that thinks about things like this?

You'd think the return of Superman would put a wrench in the gears of Luthor's grand scheme, but nope, he's got that taken care of. After robbing a museum of a chunk of Kryptonite, he sets his plan into motion. His scheme: to use one of the stolen crystals to create a brand new continent. The continent's growth is projected to wipe out most of North America and kill millions (if not billions) of people in the process. High body count or not, Luthor anticipates scores of people paying boatloads of cash for prime real estate and possible access to alien technology. And just to be on the safe side, he's managed to lace the new landmass with his stolen Kryptonite, just so Superman doesn't get any wise ideas. Kryptonite or not, Superman rushes to stop Luthor and rescue Lois, Jason, and Richard, who have gotten caught in the middle.

Although Superman Returns isn't a flawless movie, it's certainly very good. It has and will probably continue to draw comparisons to Christopher Reeve's films, but I think the movie holds up quite well on its own. It boasts superb direction, writing, and effects, as well as a cast that brings a lot of substance to the movie. While some have argued that perhaps the movie could have gone the way of Batman Begins and restarted the franchise with a clean slate, that wasn't really necessary. Because unlike Batman, Superman already had a perfectly good movie that told his origin story. Besides, making Superman Returns a vague sequel to the first two Reeve movies (while ignoring the existence of the third and fourth ones) brings a strong sense of familiarity to the movie that I feel that it benefits from.

Let's start with the screenplay first. Penned by Michael Dougherty and Dan Harris, the screenplay is solid in spite of a few plot holes and subplots that are left unresolved. The screenplay also hearkens back to the Reeve movies on numerous occasions with various dialogue cues and little moments, which I thought was really entertaining and brought a sort of continuity and familiarity that bridged the old and the new. Dougherty and Harris also crafted characters I thought to be extremely well-written, with the exception of one. I'm going to come right out and say it: This iteration of Lois Lane has absolutely nothing on the one portrayed by Margot Kidder. When Kidder played the role, Lois was strong, spunky, and fun. But instead of that, Lois is to Superman Returns what Kristin Kreuk's Lana Lang is to the Smallville television show.

This movie's Lois is kinda dull and whiny. She treats Superman like dirt for not living up to whatever unobtainable standards she holds him to; she completely disregards Perry's requests to actually do her job; she has no problem with bringing her five-year-old son along as she breaks into a supervillain's private property to get a scoop; she gets upset when anyone dares question her motives; and she generally doesn't serve a whole lot of purpose outside of being a damsel in distress. While Lois isn't as utterly useless and annoying as Lana from Smallville, she's pushing it. But despite her cocky "how dare Superman save me from certain death?" attitude while blowing off Clark like he's some kind of second-class citizen, it's only made funnier when she has to keep being saved over and over by the men in her life — whether it be Superman, Richard, or in one instance, Jason — because she was too stubborn to swallow her pride and admit that she's just not all that.

Moving along, I found the acting the acting to be quite well done. Though the cast seems as if they were all trying to fit themselves into the molds created their predecessors, I must admit that I didn't find any particular performance standing out as anything less than good. Brandon Routh, only really known prior to Superman Returns for his year-long stint on the ABC soap opera One Life to Live, fills Christopher Reeve's shoes well. In spite of the many talented big-name actors that were up for the role during all those years of pre-production, I'm of the opinion that, in retrospect, Routh was the best one for the part. I believe it was a wise decision to follow in the footsteps of the 1978 movie and cast a virtual unknown in the lead role. If someone like Nicolas Cage or Ashton Kutcher or whoever had played Superman, it could have pulled the viewer completely out of the movie. But with Routh in the role, we don't view the title character as "[famous actor] as Superman," we see only Superman. And casting Routh proved to be a good move, as he really holds the movie together with his portrayal of Superman's strength, Clark's meekness, and Kal-El's internal struggle to rejoin a world that has left both of his Earth personas behind.

Despite my beef with the way her character is written, I have to admit that I did enjoy Kate Bosworth's performance. If the character hadn't been as poor as I found it to be, I think her performance would have been even better. Bosworth and Routh have a great chemistry together, but due to Lois being written less than satisfactory, I felt that it bogged down Bosworth's performance and made it good, but not great.

I also thought that James Marsden did about as good as could be expected. His character is painted as a perpetual second-banana to Superman in the minds of both Lois and the viewer, but I thought he made a good romantic foil for Superman. You can see through Marsden's performance that Richard wants to be there for Lois and Jason even though he knows Ms. Lane would leave him for Superman in a heartbeat. And how about Tristan Lake Leabu as Jason? Not a whole lot is asked of him aside from standing there and looking cute, but he pulls it off like a pro. Frank Langella and Sam Huntington are also quite good, despite being super-minor roles. Both of them are well-suited for the roles, and both are quite entertaining.

Parker Posey is great as well. The character of Kitty Kowalski is essentially a clone of Miss Tessmacher from the first two Reeve movies, but Posey plays the role with a passion and humor that's needed for the role to work. As I said, Kitty is a modernized version of Miss Tessmacher, which raises the question, "Why does Lex Luthor surround himself with such ditzy women?" And I think the answer is simple. Luthor's intelligence and narcissism are vast, and keeping a dim-witted woman by his side makes him look even smarter by comparison. It's totally within the realm of the character. And last but not least is Kevin Spacey as Lex Luthor. The role could not have been better cast, because Spacey is nothing short of excellent. Spacey plays the role with just a touch of the humor Gene Hackman's Luthor had, but there is more menace than silliness to be found here. His Luthor is megalomaniacal, vicious, egocentric, and sarcastic, everything one would expect from the Man of Steel's archenemy.

Perhaps the most spectacular things about the movie, however, is its music and direction. The previously mentioned sense of familiarity brought by the screenplay is greatly enhanced by John Ottman's wondrous score, which borrows memorable motifs from the brilliant music composed by John Williams for the first two Reeve movies (including the legendary theme song). This, along with Ottman's impressive original music, gives Superman Returns a sound that is as grand and epic as the rest of the movie.

And I must admit that Bryan Singer's direction is outstanding. Singer is no stranger to superhero movies, and he uses that experience to craft a movie that can please fans of the old movies and wow a new generation of moviegoers who didn't grow up with them. His affection for the original movies is readily seen, evidenced by his use of the same style of opening credits from the originals, and his use of the same shot that closed all four previous movies. He delicately balances the drama with the humor and action, and I think he succeeded. And with a little help from cinematographer Newton Thomas Sigel and a team of special effects wizards, Singer's also given the movie a tremendous visual upgrade. The special effects are, without a doubt, astounding. Though we know that quite a few of the effects are computer-generated, they're not distracting, but quite believable and enjoyable.

As I said above, Singer balances the humor, drama, and action effectively. But what he also does is use the movie as an intriguing religious allegory. Superman is a metaphorical Christ figure, the only son of a father who sent him to Earth to become a hero for millions. This comparison is noted on numerous occasions in the film, with moments such as Jor-El's opening monologue, Superman snatching a large sign that reads "grace" and catching an enormous globe as it falls from the roof of the Daily Planet (essentially holding the whole world in his hands, like the song kids sing in Sunday School), and pretty much the entire climax and epilogue. Superman even says to Lois at one point, "You wrote that the world doesn't need a savior, but every day I hear people crying for one." The comparisons come close to hitting us over the head at times, but they do make for an interesting subtext that isn't usually explored in the various depictions of Superman.

Superman Returns may or may not be remembered thirty years from now as a classic along the lines the first two Reeve movies, but I found it to be an impressive, high-quality film. I thought it was everything that it should have been. Sure, it has its flaws, but what movie doesn't? However, the movie does excel in spite of its imperfections, and breathes new life into a franchise that at one time looked like it was headed nowhere fast. And even if the movie sucked, it certainly couldn't be any worse than Superman III or Superman IV, could it?

Final Rating: ***½

Supergirl (1984)

Anyone who hasn't been living under a rock since 1938 will more than likely tell you that perhaps the greatest comic book superhero of all time is Superman. Since his first appearance, he has become a pop culture icon, up there with baseball and apple pie as a true symbol of America. Superman was a big fat hit almost immediately, and DC Comics was quick to snap up copyrights on nearly every potential spinoff they could think of.

One of these spinoff characters was Kara Zor-El, better known as Supergirl. The long lost cousin of Superman, she made her first true appearance in Action Comics #252 in 1959. Her existence has been a rocky road, as she got her own short-lived comic books in 1972 and 1982, but never really reached A-list status before being killed off in 1985 during DC's Crisis on Infinite Earths storyline. (But of course, since nobody stays dead in comics, Supergirl was resurrected two years ago.)

Following the disappointing box office returns of Superman III, Christopher Reeve vacated his starring role in the franchise, and at the time had no interest in returning. Producers Alexander and Ilya Salkind, who owned the film rights to the entire Superman family, decided to tread unfamiliar waters by starting a new franchise starring Supergirl. What resulted was a movie that didn't even recoup half of its budget, yet has developed both a cult following and a reputation that it perhaps does not completely deserve.

As our tale begins, we learn that Superman was not the only survivor of his home planet's destruction after all. While baby Kal-El rocketed towards Earth, a fragment of Krypton was hurtled into "inner space." That fragment would become known as Argo City, a virtual utopia crafted by Zaltar (Peter O'Toole), the city's founder. One of his little creations is the Omegahedron, Argo City's primary energy source. It's basically this little glowing ball that looks rather unimpressive, but can apparently bring inanimate objects to life if used properly. I guess Kryptonian technology is light years ahead of human technology, since I don't believe we've harnessed the power of the Superball yet.

But anyway, Zaltar decides that he's going to take the Omegahedron out for a walk one day, in order to better flesh out his artwork. He's not really supposed to have it, so he passes it off to his protégé, Kara (Helen Slater), for safekeeping before he can get caught with it. Silly Kara decides she's going to goof around with it, obviously not realizing that it's nothing to be trifled with. She creates a dragonfly, which ends up crashing right through one of the community's windows – which looks like a thin layer of cellophane, to be truthful – and causes depressurization that threatens the entire city.

And wouldn't you know it, the Omegahedron gets sucked right out the window into the vacuum of space. Way to go, Kara, you dope. Ten minutes into the movie, and you've doomed the last vestiges of an alien civilization. Argo City is only going to last a few days without the Omegahedron, so Kara takes it upon herself to track it down and bring it back home.

The Omegahedron somehow makes its way to Earth, where it falls into the hands of all the wrong people. It lands in the possession of Selena (Faye Dunaway), a wannabe witch with aspirations of world domination. And apparently, yellow suns affect Kryptonian technology as much as they affect actual Kryptonians, because this thing pretty much does whatever Selena wants it to. Start the car without any keys? Sure. Set a turkey on fire? Why not? Make some random guy fall in love with you? Well, I don't think that's such a bright idea, but I guess you could do that. We'll get into that later.

So with the Omegahedron in tow, Selena and her sidekick Bianca (Brenda Vaccaro) decide to throw a little soirée to celebrate Selena's newfound power and recruit a coven. Something like that, I'm not too sure. I should also point out that Selena and Bianca apparently live in the haunted house ride at an abandoned carnival. What, is she a Scooby-Doo villain

Anyway, the party is eventually broken up by Nigel (Peter Cook), a warlock and occasional boyfriend of Selena. He warns Selena that she might have acquired a little too much power a little too quickly, and says that she should be careful. Of course, she's a totally over-the-top villain that wants to conquer the world, so what does she care? But Nigel's a huge buzzkill, and he totally ruined the party, so he's gotta go.

Meanwhile, Kara arrives in the Illinois town of Midvale, near where the Omegahedron landed. And she's fully decked out in her Supergirl costume with full cognizance of her powers. It took Superman years to accomplish all that, and she can do these things plus have a costume in twenty seconds on Earth? ...Okay.

Regardless, Kara enjoys her new powers, especially being able to fly, until she stumbles upon an all-girls school. She figures, "Hey, I'll just go blend in for a while." And that's exactly what she does, by somehow becoming a brunette and changing into one of the school's uniforms by apparently willing the changes into existence. Well, isn't that a convenient power? You know, if Superman could randomly change his appearance at will, he'd have no need for phone booths. Not only is it convenient, it's useful too. But since Superman doesn't have that power, I guess there's just something in Argo City's water. It's probably the same reason why Superman could throw big cellophane sheets at people in Superman II.

The newly-disguised Kara makes her way to the principal's office, where she tries to pass herself off as a student under the name "Linda Lee." The principal, Mr. Danvers (David Healy), is suspicious at first, since he's never seen her before in his life. As she tries explaining her situation, the math teacher – Nigel, of all people – interrupts and calls Mr. Danvers out of the room. While the principal is gone, Kara (or Linda, or Supergirl, whatever) uses her super-speed to type up a letter of recommendation before slipping it into a filing cabinet.

Mr. Danvers returns shortly thereafter, and she suggests that maybe there's some paperwork about her in his files. He does discover the forged letter addressed from her cousin, Clark Kent. Mr. Danvers doesn't question the recommendation of a reporter from the Daily Planet, so she's apparently a student after all. Let's not let pesky little details like admissions paperwork or tuition or proper identification or anything like that get in the way. Principal Danvers leads Linda to a dorm room, where she'll be bunking with the tomboyish Lucy Lane (Maureen Teefy). So they've got Clark Kent's cousin rooming with Lois Lane's sister, and both of them have the initials "L.L." Huh.

Classes begin the next day, and for some reason, Selena and Bianca are hanging around in the parking lot reading tarot cards. Selena says the cards say people will do anything for love, so as part of her plan for world conquest, she's going to make everyone love her. She sees one of the school's groundskeepers, Ethan (Hart Bochner), and decides that she's going to start with him. Ethan later arrives at Selena's abode a few hours later under the pretenses of doing a little gardening around the place, but Selena slips him a little Love Potion #9 and knocks him out. It's right around this time that Nigel shows up, looking to play the party pooper once again by continuing to warn Selena that the Omegahedron may be too powerful for her to control.

While he does that, Ethan wakes up and staggers out of the house. He ends up in the middle of Midvale, walking around in the middle of the street like he's hopped up on goofballs. And everybody just yells at him and moves along. You'd think that someone would point him in the direction of the sidewalk, but no. People in Midvale must not be the friendly type.

He ends up getting noticed by Linda and Lucy, who are in town with Lucy's buddy from Metropolis, Jimmy Olsen (Marc McClure). Linda wants to help him, but Jimmy just dismisses him as a junkie that probably has a weapon. So let me get this straight: Jimmy has no problem letting cars mow down some guy that's potentially strung out, just because he thinks he's gonna get shanked if he helps. Geez, Jimmy. You can be a real turd sometimes.

Selena, meanwhile, finally realizes that Ethan's gone. She tracks him down via her magic mirror, then uses the Omegahedron to fire up some huge backhoe to scoop Ethan up and deliver him back to her. The thing does pick him up, but it ends up destroying half of Main Street in the process. And get this, while this backhoe is hunting Ethan down, everybody just clears the streets and lets it go after him. Even after it picks him up and carries him away, nobody tries to help him but Lucy, who gets knocked unconscious in the process. I guess everybody in town is as big a prick as Jimmy. But lucky for Ethan, there's a Kryptonian superhero handy!

Linda switches to her Supergirl costume, and helps fix most of the damage the backhoe caused. As the machine rolls on, Supergirl yanks the bucket off and deposits it safely on the ground. She quickly returns to her Linda Lee persona and opens the bucket, and Ethan – who apparently passed out in all the commotion – wakes up and sees Linda. This ends up finally activating Selena's love potion. He falls head over heels in love with his rescuer, and starts waxing romantic before planting a rather unexpected kiss on Linda. Honestly, if someone ever compiled a list of the most awkward kisses in the history of cinema, Ethan kissing Linda would be right up there. She's all "uh... okay" and rushes off, confused.

Not exactly happy with how things have resulted, Selena calls upon an invisible demon to go take out Linda. But I guess this demon is rather weak, since Supergirl kills it relatively quickly. Supergirl begins to get a signal from the Omegahedron, and she follows the signal straight to the amusement park where Selena lives. Supergirl is ready to throw down, but Selena distracts her by teleporting Ethan into the middle of a bunch of angry bumper cars. She also tries a little spell that makes multiple images of her surround Supergirl. Though truth be told, the effect makes it look like a lame version of Johnny Cage's shadow kick from the Mortal Kombat games. Supergirl is all "yeah, whatever" and snatches up a bumper car Ethan managed to jump inside, then flies off to safety.

But despite Supergirl's best efforts, Selena manages to poof Ethan into her castle high atop a mountain she created in the center of Midvale. She chains him up and forces some more of that love potion on him, and how he only has eyes for Selena. I think she also finally figured out the secrets of the Omegahedron, because she's got a henchman driving her around in this ritzy car so she can pick out random things to destroy. I'm surprised she even knows what the Omegahedron is in the first place, let alone how to use it. There's also anti-Selena protests in the streets, evidenced by Jimmy and Lucy leading some picketers carrying "Down With Selena" signs. I'm not even going to begin to get into all the things that are wrong with this bit of the movie. But I will say that nothing makes sense. Doctor Seuss books make more sense than this. But back to the movie. Every evil villain needs a hostage or three, so she traps Nigel, Jimmy, and Lucy in her castle while she waits for Supergirl.

Supergirl does arrive, only for Selena to put her in the Phantom Zone as soon as she enters the castle. There's no explanation as to how Selena managed to conjure up the Phantom Zone, let alone as to how she even knew what it was in the first place, but nobody ever accused this movie of swerving around any plot holes it happened to come across.

So anyway, Supergirl's in the Phantom Zone, and completely powerless to boot. She wanders into some quicksand, but as she frees herself, she knocks herself out in the process. But all is not lost, as Zaltar comes to her rescue. You may be asking, "Matt, what is Zaltar doing in the Phantom Zone?" Turns out that after the Omegahedron was lost, he figured he'd really screwed up something heavy and had himself put in the Phantom Zone as punishment. And to save a little time, here is a brief summary of Zaltar and Kara's conversation.

Kara: I really need to get out of here.
Zaltar: There is absolutely no way out of the Phantom Zone. That's the whole point of this place.
Kara: I said I really need to return to Earth.
Zaltar: And I said there's no way out.
Kara: But I wanna leave!
Zaltar: Okay, I'll take you to the exit.

They do head to the one possible way out of the Phantom Zone, but they risk death by attempting their escape. Kara does escape, but Zaltar unfortunately dies on the way out. But no matter, Kara's got some evil witch butt to kick. The exit conveniently drops her off back in Selena's castle, where Supergirl and Selena have their final showdown.

As I said earlier, Supergirl has earned something of a bad reputation in the years since it was released. It's been perceived as a horrible movie on the level of Superman IV, as a complete waste of time and effort. And while knocks against the movie may be justified, the movie does manage to bring a certain level of entertainment to the table. I'll agree that the movie could have been lots better, but it's so charming that I can't bring myself to hate it. So help me, I actually had a whole lot of fun watching the movie. Supergirl's reputation dictates that I probably shouldn't, but I did and I'm not going to lie about it.

So let's hit the acting first. Perhaps the movie's biggest saving grace is its lead actress. Helen Slater is quite charming and amiable in the lead role. It's a shame that Supergirl flopped and killed off any hopes for a sequel, because I believe Slater could have carried an entire Supergirl franchise much in the vein of Christopher Reeve's consistent performances as Superman. Essentially playing three roles, Slater is very much up to task. She is convincingly curious and awkward while in the Linda Lee persona, showing a want to learn about human culture yet not really certain how to properly fit in. As Supergirl, Slater is tough, confident, an example of "girl power" before the term existed. I honestly have nothing but good things to say about her.

Faye Dunaway is entertaining if not hammy as Supergirl's nemesis. Her character is so blandly written, so poorly constructed, that Dunaway would have been well within her rights to completely phone in her performance. I'm just going to come right and say it: the Selena character is so lame, she makes me pine for Nuclear Man. But regardless of how awful the role is, Dunaway gives a performance that isn't completely horrible. It's no Mommie Dearest, but then again, what is?

Another main character, Peter O'Toole, is not bad at all. O'Toole, a certifiable Hollywood legend and seven-time Oscar nominee, is above this kind of material, but he brings a particular credibility to the role. Unfortunately, Supergirl doesn't make full use of his talents, and it ended up earning him a Worst Actor nomination at the 1985 Razzie Awards.

Also underused in a thankless role is the late British comedian Peter Cook. Perhaps most recognizable in the United States as "the impressive clergyman" from The Princess Bride, Cook doesn't really get to do a whole heck of a lot. His role could have been greatly expanded upon, but I guess it's too late to go back and change it now.

Supergirl's romantic interest, Hart Bochner, isn't awful, but he seems way too old to fill the role. Perhaps that could be because, if my math is right, Bochner was 27 and Slater was 20 while production was under way. Not that age is always a big deal, but it's kinda creepy. Throw in the fact that he and Slater have an appalling lack of chemistry, and I just didn't have any real use for him at all.

Brenda Vaccaro is acceptable, even a little amusing, as Selena's daffy sidekick. If the character was intended to be a version of Miss Tessmacher from the first two Superman movies, then I think it was a success. And rounding out the main cast, Marc McClure and Maureen Teefy are fun, despite having no real consequence on the plot nor very much screen time.

Sadly, Jeannot Szwarc's direction is flat and uninspired. Despite well-done cinematography by Alan Hume, Szwarc's work just comes across as being somewhat run of the mill. I'm not saying that what Szwarc has done with the movie is awful, because it isn't. I'm just saying that there was plenty of room for improvement. I also wonder if he brokered some kind of funding from A&W Root Beer and STP, because there's product placement like crazy.

However, Szwarc's indifferent direction is improved upon by the terrific score by Jerry Goldsmith, music that suits the movie's tone perfectly. The music never becomes overbearing, and really works well with the fantasy vibe that the movie maintains. Goldsmith manages to create a particular leitmotif akin to what John Williams did with the original Superman movie, even working in Williams's iconic theme song at one point. However, while good, most of the music ends up repeating itself over and over, which is somewhat distracting and disappointing.

David Odell's screenplay is high camp, through and through. While I did find it to be entertaining to a particular point, it's bogged down by instances of brain-dead dialogue and outright preposterous scenarios. For example, why does Kara feel the need to create a secret identity? She should be more concerned with finding the Omegahedron and saving the last city of Krypton, not mingling with us puny earthlings. Yeah, she might be curious about the planet her cousin calls home, but shouldn't she be worried about the fate of her own home?

And I also wonder whose bright idea was it to have Kara change from her "Linda Lee" attire to her Supergirl costume and back by merely thinking it. And who had the forethought to leave a Supergirl costume tailored to Kara's specific measurements in the ship she took to Earth? I know these were done for the sake of convenience, but still, it's glaring things like that that could just confuse somebody to no end.

But I will give Odell a little credit, as he expands on the mythology created by the Superman movie universe by taking us actually into the Phantom Zone. While we merely knew it as a thin pane of black glass in Superman II, we're shown that the world inside it is appropriately desolate and harsh. It's supposed to be a prison for the baddest of the bad, and I believe it. It almost as if it were a glimpse into a Kryptonian would call Hell.

Supergirl is most definitely not Oscar-worthy filmmaking by any means. But it is, however, a harmless fantasy movie that is an acceptable way to kill a lazy Sunday afternoon. The movie is flawed, with lazy directing, an inane script, and acting that is mediocre (for the most part). But it is, however, a perfectly harmless fantasy movie that is an acceptable way to kill a lazy Sunday afternoon.

And if one enjoys this kind of movie, you probably won't go wrong with Supergirl. I can truthfully say that, given its reputation, I didn't think it was completely horrible. It isn't the best movie ever made. Maybe not even fifth best. Truth be told, it's a lame B-movie. But depending on how you look at it, it can still be at least a little entertaining. And remember, as always, your mileage may vary.

Final Rating: **½

Superman IV: The Quest For Peace (1987)

In Hollywood, there's such a thing as "the law of diminishing returns," where as the quality of a long-running film franchise worsens over time, the box office returns drop as well. Sometimes the producers will try to make a quick buck with some kind of gimmick like killing or resurrecting a main character, going for a "fish out of water" feel with an extreme change in setting, or making a movie in 3D.

But in a lot of cases, others don't really try do anything to improve, instead choosing to stay the course. Such was the case the Superman movies. After the poor box office showing of Superman III, you would think they'd ditch the overtly unfunny comedy for something more in the same vein as the classic first two movies (or at the very least, make it a comedy that was actually funny) when it came time to do the next movie. And to their credit, they did in a sense, do things a little differently with it. But now, instead of a lame comedy where Superman fights both a gigantic supercomputer and an evil version of himself, we get a lame story about the horrors of nuclear war in Superman IV: The Quest For Peace.

This tedious exercise in superhero cinema begins in space, as a cosmonaut (Eugene Lipinski) belts out a Russian version of "My Way" while on a space-walk to repair an antenna on their station. He's so wrapped up in his work that he doesn't notice an American satellite heading his way. The collision is brief, but it knocks the Soviet Sinatra out into the darkness of space and sends the space station into a tailspin. However, it all turns out okay, as Superman (Christopher Reeve) shows up and saves the day. Not only does he stand for truth, justice, and the American way, but he doesn't have any problems helping a few Communists in need. What a super man.

Back on Earth, a prison chain gang is working the rock-breaking shift at the local quarry while super-genius Lex Luthor (Gene Hackman) whistles Mozart and waxes poetic on the efficiency of biogenetics as he tends a miniature flower garden. And that sentence ended up being longer than it probably should have been. Anyway, a very ugly convertible pulls up, blaring a Jerry Lee Lewis song as its driver asks the guards for directions to somewhere inconsequential. This turns out to be a ruse, however, as the driver is none other than Luthor's technologically brilliant yet otherwise idiotic nephew Lenny (Jon Cryer). And the guy must dress himself in the dark, because he looks like a Spencer's Gifts store threw up on him. While we the viewer quickly realize what's going on, the idiot guards have no clue, falling victim to Lenny's trap. They get stuck in the car, and in a bizarre moment, Lenny uses a remote control to drive it off a cliff. Luthor and Lenny get the heck out of Dodge, and Luthor is quick to resume his master plan: destroy Superman.

The scene shifts to the bustling city of Metropolis, where strange things are afoot at the Daily Planet. Turns out the Daily Planet's been the victim of a hostile takeover at the hands of amoral tabloid publisher David Warfield (Sam Wanamaker), which really honks off Planet editor and legitimate journalist Perry White (Jackie Cooper). Of course, it doesn't really matter what Perry has to say about it, because he's just been replaced with Warfield's own daughter, the garishly-clad Lacy (Mariel Hemmingway). The meeting to announce the management shakeup is soon interrupted, however, as the President (Robert Beatty) holds a press conference to support nuclear proliferation. Gotta give the President credit, he could have just been sneaky about it. Why acquire nuclear weapons behind the backs of your nation's citizens when you can just announce it on television for God and everybody to see? Though I wouldn't doubt it if the President was bluffing. I would.

We use the President's announcement of mass destruction to segue into some random fourth grade class in some random American town, where the teacher asks the class for their opinions on the political climate. And I'd like to remind you, this is a fourth grade class. I was in third grade during Operation Desert Storm, and we didn't have discussions like this. But then again, I don't think Iraq was threatening to go all Hiroshima on us either. The teacher's suggestion of a discussion gets the typical fourth grade answers... and then there's Jeremy (Damien McLawnhorn), the class daydreamer, who just says they should ask Superman for help. And you know what? That's the only thing in this movie that makes any sense. Why not ask for help from the guy that's immune to everything but a particular green rock? That's a brilliant idea!

Meanwhile, at the Metropolis museum, a tour guide explains to her group that Superman has recently donated a strand of his hair to the museum. And to prove it's Superman's hair, they suspend a thousand-pound weight from it. Lenny and Lex, trying to blend in as members of the tour group, stay behind to smash the glass case containing the hair with a set of bolt cutters and snatch the hair. And people say subtlety is a lost art. While we're here, I might as well point out something. When Lex snatches the hair, it causes the thousand-pound weight to fall and crash through the bottom of the case. But if you watch closely enough, a giant hole (roughly the size of the weight) falls out before the weight even drops. When the filmmakers leave such a blatantly obvious error in the movie, you know you're working with cinematic genius realized. Geniuses, I say!

Moving on, back at the Daily Planet, Lacy flirts with Clark for some ungodly reason, under the guise of proposing he write a new "Metropolis After Hours" column. Why, I don't know. Clark isn't exactly the kind of guy that would troll Metropolis's red light district, unless he got ahold of some of that fake Kryptonite from Superman III and turned evil again. Thankfully, Lois Lane (Margot Kidder) interrupts the Lacy/Clark meeting before it can get any more uncomfortable, and she's got Jeremy's letter to Superman in tow. I guess he hoped the Daily Planet knew Superman's forwarding address. Lacy sees an angle in a little kid wanting Superman to destroy the world's nuclear weapons cache, and the next day, the Daily Planet runs the headline "Superman Says 'Drop Dead' To Kid." Because when you want to sell papers, you can libel the the local superhero. I guess the Warfields majored in yellow journalism at the J. Jonah Jameson School For Defaming Superheroes.

Clark is so upset over the whole nuclear arms race that he retreats to the Fortress of Solitude to get some advice from some creepy celestial talking heads that I guess represent the Krypton Tribal Council or whoever's running the show now. I guess they just decided to say to hell with Marlon Brando after he wanted infinity billion dollars to do five minutes worth of work in Superman II. If that's the case, then at least the movie has thrifty budget management going for it. That's a plus, I guess.

Anyway, seems that the Krypton Tribal Council has something stuck in their craw over the whole "Superman wants to interfere with Earth's proceedings" or somesuch. I can see how that would be an issue, since last time he decided to screw around and tinker with Earth's ebb and flow, there was this whole thing about making the planet spin backwards. So anyway, the Krypton Tribal Council warns Superman to fear betrayal before the scene shifts back to Clark's apartment in Metropolis, where we learn that the Soviet premier is jealous of America and wants some nukes for himself. Man, the President traipsing around all over TV announcing we had the bomb really blew up in his face (no pun intended).

Lois shows up at Clark's apartment and offers a little moral support, and when they step out onto the balcony for some fresh air, Clark takes her hand and jumps over the edge. But just before a seemingly senseless murder/suicide can make the news, Clark is quickly replaced by Superman, who snatches Lois and takes her flying around the world. And just for kicks, he drops (then catches) Lois while flying over the Rocky Mountains. That's real nice. Oh, that Superman, what a cad. Wait until she meets the business end of one of those mountains with her face, and we'll see how freakin' funny it is then. You can only spin the planet backwards so many times before you break something important. And just to make sure she doesn't make any connection between Clark jumping off a building and Superman showing up in his place, Superman gives her one of those amnesia kisses from Superman II and wipes her short-term memory. With Jedi mind tricks like that, you can certainly make sure there aren't any witnesses, if you catch my drift.

From "Can You Read My Mind, Part 2," we transition to the United Nations building, where Jimmy Olsen (Marc McClure) is snapping pictures of Jeremy for the next issue of the Daily Planet. Superman triumphantly arrives, and asks Jimmy to take a walk with him. The pair start across the pavilion, a small crowd growing behind them as they head straight for the UN building. Lacy and Lois soon catch up with the crowd, accompanying Jeremy to the press box as Superman takes center stage in the UN's main chamber and announces that he plans to rid the world of nuclear arms. Both the Soviet and the United States put Superman's plan into effect, firing all their warheads into the air, where Superman snags them into a giant net in outer space (seriously!) and flings the big ball of missiles into the sun. Who has a net that size lying around? That thing must have taken months to construct!

But while Superman is eliminating the world's nuclear stockpile, Luther sets his own plan into effect. Meeting with three black market arms dealers, he arranges a missile of his own to be launched into space. That might not be such a big deal, but there's a hitch. Using the super-hair he stole from the museum, Luthor has created his own genetic goop that he attaches to his black market missile and launches into the waiting arms of Superman. Like the others, this one is shot into the sun too, but moments later, a fireball emerges. The fireball metamorphoses into a new superhuman born of Superman's DNA and powered by the sun, Nuclear Man (Mark Pillow). With long claw-like fingernails, the ability to shoot fireballs from his fists, and a body temperature as hot as the sun itself, he's quite the formidable foe... as long as he's in direct sunlight. So in short, Nuclear Man is like Superman from Hell, only with shadows serving as his Kryptonite.

Back on Earth, Kal-El soon finds himself in quite a predicament: he's somehow been talked into a double date, posing as Clark with Lacy and as Superman with Lois. Needless to say, this love triangle is even more insane than the Clark/Superman/Lois one from the first movie, but only half as intriguing. The double date is soon cut short when Luthor makes use of Superman's super-hearing to call in a bomb threat. Turns out was just a hoax, a ruse to get Superman to arrive at Luthor's new penthouse apartment. How he acquired such an apartment during his stay in prison, I'll never know. Nuclear Man arrives on the scene, and he and Superman throw down. And for some ungodly reason, Nuclear Man stops the fight in order to demolish huge chunks of the Great Wall of China and cause an eruption at Mount Vesuvius in Italy. Superman rebuilds the Great Wall and stops the eruption and moves the fight to the relative safety of the moon.

The pair brawl all over the place, but Nuclear Man gets the upper hand and heads back to Earth, where he picks up the Statue of Liberty and drops it over a crowded city street. You just know Nuclear Man means a little more business than the Evil Superman from Superman III. Straighten the Leaning Tower of Piza? Please. When you blow up the Great Wall of China, cause a volcanic eruption, and drop the Statue of Liberty on Manhattan in order to squash hundreds of people, you've gone from being a minor annoyance to being a complete and total a-hole. Superman catches up and snatches Lady Liberty before she can cause any damage, but just as he's returning the statue to her perch, Nuclear Man sneaks up on him and gives him a rather nasty scratch on the neck with his atomic claws. The scratch is enough to incapacitate Superman, who is unceremoniously booted into orbit by Nuclear Man, leaving his trademark red cape floating in the breeze.

Anyway, enough of that whole Superman thing. Why don't we move along to the business dealings at the Daily Planet? If you're into corporate wheeling and dealing, you're in luck, because Mr. Warfield just named Lacy as the new publisher of the Daily Planet. Lois, quite miffed over the blatant show of nepotism and the speed that the Warfields decided to run the headline "Superman Is Dead!", quits the newspaper while prompting Lacy (now sympathetic to the causes of honest journalists) to tell her father off. Meanwhile, Lois heads to Clark's apartment, where he's reclusively hidden himself as he battles the radioactive flu. She lets herself in and gives Superman a pep talk via Clark, baring her soul (and love for Superman) before presenting Clark with the cape of Metropolis's hero.

Very much near death, Clark turns to a glowing green crystal he took from the Kent farm in Smallville earlier in the movie. Through it, we hear the disembodied voice of his birth mother, Lara (Susannah York), who tells him that the crystal contains all that remains of Krypton's energy, to be used to save his own life. Man, those green crystals do everything, from giving Superman the final energy of a long-dead planet to creating Fortresses of Solitude.

With Superman gone, Luthor declares victory against his greatest foe. Nuclear Man happens to notice Lacy's picture on the cover of the Daily Planet, and he's got himself a nuclear crush. He storms the Planet headquarters and demands to see her, but the rejuvenated Superman arrives just before Nuclear Man can lay waste to any more police cars or SWAT team vans that have arrived on the scene. Superman lures his foe into an elevator (where there's no sunlight), then yanks the elevator car from the shaft and flies out to space, where he drops his cargo on the moon. But stupid Superman didn't fuse the doors shut, as some sunlight seeps in through the edges of the door and gives the incapacitated Nuclear Man his powers back. He tears his way out of the elevator, and on the surface of the moon, Superman and Nuclear Man have one final showdown.

Ugh. Just... ugh. I want to hurt Superman IV, but I can never hurt it the way it hurt me. People say movies cause real-life violence, and for a change, I'm going to agree with them. This stupid, no-good movie just makes me want to punch stuff. I'd rather zap my testicles with a car battery while jamming rusty fishhooks under my fingernails than watch Superman IV again. I hate it that much. I wouldn't wish the horror that is this movie on my worst enemy. I swear, I think there's one section of Hell where the damned are forced to watch Superman IV over and over again for the rest of eternity. I really can't think of a single nice thing to say about the movie. The movie is so full of holes, one would think it was produced in a Swiss cheese factory. How can it be daylight in China, Italy, and the United States all at the same time? Did Earth spawn two or three new suns? Why does the Jeremy character suddenly disappear for no reason? How can people fall in space when there's no gravity? How can humans survive in the vacuum of space without oxygen?

And sweet merciful crap, are the effects bad. If you thought the flying effects looked somewhat unrealistic before, wait until you see this one. With the exception of one or two scenes, you can obviously tell that they simply put the actors in front of a green screen and added the background in later. One would figure that they would improve the quality of the effects as the franchise progressed, but no, they just get worse. And don't get me started on the "Superman drops Lois as a joke" bit. Is it just me, or did it look like Lois was falling horizontally? How can that happen? And not only are the effects bad, but so is the set design. I mean, I can't be the only one who saw the folds in the black backdrop during the moon scene. I've heard of the fabric of space and time, but I didn't think it was literally fabric. If that's the case, I think my high school science teacher and all those sci-fi movies I've watched over the years have some explaining to do.

And like the far better Superman II, they spring a bunch of random powers out of nowhere on us, and we just have us assume that Superman is a telekinetic too. He's got all these other powers, why not? The apparent telekinesis that General Zod showed in Superman II is taken to a far extreme level here, as Superman rebuilds a demolished section of the Great Wall of China by merely looking at the rubble. So now, not only are Kryptonians Jedi masters, but it looks like they took Carrie to heart. If Superman was rebuilding it by hand while moving so fast I couldn't see him, that's one thing. But telekinesis? No.

But perhaps one of the most telling examples of the awfulness of the movie is near the end, when Nuclear Man grabs Lacy and flies into space with her. She's not wearing a spacesuit or an oxygen mask or anything, she's just there. When can humans survive the vacuum of space exposed? I can understand Superman and Nuclear Man, but Lacy is supposed to be a normal human being! I thought humans need oxygen and stuff like that. I know movies about aliens with godlike powers don't exactly subscribe to the laws of nature and physics, but come on.

Just like in Superman III, John Williams's classic soundtrack is poorly performed and hideously underwhelming. It had no flow, no real tie-in to the scenes. Composer Alexander Courage apparently took no pride in his work here, and the score is lacking the triumphant feel of the score from the first two movies. It's almost pitiful in its ineptitude. And then there's the acting. While Christopher Reeve and Gene Hackman are good as always, the rest of the cast is the definition of "letdown." I didn't really want to see or like any one in the movie. Mark Pillow's Nuclear Man is unbelievably generic, and he doesn't even get to really say any lines, since Hackman provides the Nuclear Voice.

And let's not get me started on Sidney Furie's direction or the script. Written by Mark Rosenthal and Lawrence Connor with some input from Reeve, the movie is just a compilation of bits and pieces with no flow or internal logic. If there's anything good that can be said about the other black sheep of the series, Superman III, I can say that it at least it managed to make some kind of sense in the end. But by the end of Superman IV, I had no clue what I'd just seen. The movie was absolutely disjointed and all over the place.

In fact, I'll do a "Synopsis In 60 Seconds" to show what I mean:

"Lex Luthor breaks out of jail. The Daily Planet falls victim to a hostile takeover and turns into a tabloid. A kid wants no nuclear bombs. The kid becomes a big deal, then vanishes. Superman throws missiles into the sun, and Nuclear Man is born. Lacy hits on Clark, Lois hits on Superman, and it goes nowhere. We get a reprisal of the classic Superman/Lois flying scene from the first movie, only crappier and with Superman almost killing Lois just for a laugh. Superman fights Nuclear Man and loses, then does the Rocky comeback and beats him. Before the rematch, Nuclear Man pulls Lacy out into space and she disappears shortly thereafter. Perry White buys the Daily Planet and Superman decides to quit destroying nuclear weapons because it really didn't solve anything anyway."

There. I just saved you ninety minutes that you could spend doing something more interesting. It's like the filmmakers wanted to make the stupidest, most mind-numbingly awful movie ever. Or at the very least, they wanted to make a movie about a superhuman from Krypton that was actually worse than Supergirl. I can forgive Roger Corman's Fantastic Four for being bad, because they had a miniscule budget and the movie was never intended to be released anyway. But this is Superman! He's arguably the most recognizable superhero ever, and this had to be the note the Chris Reeve series ended on?! Ugh, it's like nobody even gave a damn during the making of this movie. And if they can't be bothered to care, I can't either. You win, Superman IV. You broke my spirit, you insulted my intelligence, and you crapped on my heart, you soulless bastard of a movie.

Final Rating: *