DC Movie Mark Out 5: Superman 2

I'm sorry, give me a minute here. My cat is afraid of the thunderstorm and being very needy so writing these is taking a backseat to babysitting a frightened pet at the moment...

Okay i'm back. Lets-a-go. 

Superman 2

Superman 2 doesn't exactly come out of the gate blastin. The film begins with a long and totally unnecesary montage recap of the first film. One of the benefits of being a sequel is that you no longer need to devote precious reels to setting up who Superman is, but this goddamn movie chose to waste my time doing it anyway. 

I suppose if you were seeing this in theaters when it came out, with no access to home video, you might appreciate the refresher. But i am watching on HBO max and it's only been 2 days since i saw the first one, so i'd say this particular editing choice has aged poorly. It literally goes on for 9 minutes. The movie. Does not start. Until 9 minutes in. 

Remember the narration at the beginning of Lord of The Rings? Replace that with the entirety of the goddamn Silmerilion and you'll start to get an idea what it felt like sitting through this droning synopsis of events i already saw while my butt slowly accrued bed sores. 

Unforgivable.

Thankfully, by God's divine mercy, the film does get its ass in gear as soon as we're past all that. So have some scissors handy to cut yourself out of your mummy wrappings, and you can finally enjoy the rest of what turns out to be.... wait for it... an absolute fucking masterpiece of cinema. 

Clearly the filmmakers here opted for the old Endless Jess method of making the intro section as pointlessly long and indulgent as possible, in order to filter out normies from the sheer divinity that awaits a dedicated and tenacious viewer. Pretty sneaky, sis. 

After we finally emerge from that timeless void like Christ from his tomb, the actual first scene makes it abundantly clear this film is going to be worth the 3 days in darkness it took to get to this point.

Once the movie is done tediously indulging the canon, it launches itself from that canon like baby clark from Krypton and doesn't look back. The opening scene is so damned lean, efficient, and perfect it makes the already pointless retelling of the its predecessor even more pointless. 

Clark goes in to talk to his boss and is told Lois Lane is on a dangerous assignment. Perry tells Clark he's a good reporter but Lois is better, and Clark responds "but won’t it be dangerous?" 

Clark dips out and rushes to finds an alley where no one can see him switch clothes, and we’re off to the races. In just a single minute we are shown through dialogue and movement everything we need to know about who clark is, who Lois is, and who Superman is. 

He rescues Lois from a conveniently timed falling elevator and throws a bomb into space, but unbeknownst to him the bomb blast just so happens to free some bad Kryptonian ass kickers from the Phantom Zone (space prison), and you better believe these Super jackasses have a big time grudge against the House of El. 

As i stated previously, Christopher Reeve is beyond excellent, but he's not the only one. Margot Kidder, who plays Lois Lane, also knocks it out of the park, and their chemistry together feels so genuine that every scene they share is a delight. 

Lois has a lot more to do in this one, and a lot more agency. We get a sense of her courage when she stands up to the villains, and her intelligence in piecing together Clark's secret. 

A great scene early on has Lois and Clark hanging out at Niagra Falls. She's on to him, and is so confident in her deductions that she throws herself into the water to prove that he's Superman. Clark has to use ingenuity to rescue lois as Clark Kent, without revealing his powers. This dance of Lois coming so close to the truth, only for Clark to just barely improvise his way around getting caught, is taken directly from the comics. It's simple, basic stuff, but it's so good. Classic Superman. 

These events carry over naturally into the next scene where we see the downside of the secret identity game. In their hotel room, Lois is feeling embarrassed and stupid, and we see that while Clark's clever dodging of her suspicions can be fun, it can also be hurtful. 

Just when the ruse is beginning to feel unfair to Lois, it's obliterated by Clark's own clumsiness, when he goofily trips into the fireplace and emerges unburned. As Clark comes clean, both he and the viewer are offered the possibility that just maybe it wasn't his clumsiness that did it, but his love and compassion. This interpretation is offered, but left ambiguous in an excellent exchange of dialogue. 

Clark: I don't know why I did that

Lois: Maybe you wanted to

Clark: I don't think i did..

Lois: Well maybe you didn't want to with your mind, but maybe you wanted to with your heart. 

I'm not crying, there's kryptonite in my eye. 

Unlike the first film, which felt like it was full of fluff, every scene in this movie means something, and moves the plot forward. Clark's reveal to Lois, a happy occasion, is undercut by a sad necessity. Clark learns he can only be with Lois if he hops in a de-power shower and becomes a regular dude. 

I'll be honest, i don't quite understand why this is necessary, but whatever, it's for the plot. I accept it only because it makes for a great conflict, and leads directly to some truly heavy scenes. 

Just as Lois and Clark are getting their bang on at the fortress of solitude, the Zod Squad roll up on the white house, and at this point the film goes from grand in scope to downright biblical, in more ways than one. Without lifting a finger, the Kryptonian invaders subjugate the Earth, at the precise moment Superman obliviously creampies his powers away. 

To save lives, the Commander In Chief kneels before Zod, and it must be said that the actor playing the president is awesome. The dialogue here is so well written and powerful, so rich with meaning and he pulls it off with just the right amount of emotion, reluctance, and conviction. The tone of the film shifts here, the consequences of Superman's sacrifice are laid as bare as his girlfriend, and the conflict feels epic. 

The stakes have never been higher, and it’s played completely straight. The first half of the movie is all wonder and joy, but it knows exactly when to start taking itself seriously. With Superman missing in action and sapped in the sack, there's no one who can stop these galactic bozos. All the same, the president puts his faith in the blue boyscout, like a man refusing to renounce his God when face to face with the Devil. It's awesome. 

I know i'm just kind of going through the whole movie here but there's another scene i gotta talk about. De-powered Clark takes Lois to a diner, and they get hassled by some hick. This scene has a direct analogue in Zack Snyder's Man of Steel, but i'll give you one guess which film pulls it off better. 

In one, we have a super-powered and totally untouchable clark taking petty revenge in the most irresponsible way imaginable. But here, we have a wimpy Clark standing up for his girl even though he knows he’s gonna get his ass kicked.

i’m not gonna be one of those snobs who says Snyder just totally doesn’t understand the character, but when it comes to nailing the little things, there’s no contest. These Reeve movies are the legit, definitive Superman, and this one in particular totally reeks of perfection.

In all of cinema there is no finer scene than the diner scene, it's one of the best scenes i've seen in all my time on the scene. it’s only a few minutes long but there’s so much that happens and it’s all perfect.

Clark stands up to the numbnuts, brave but overconfident. He's about to learn how truly different things are now. He gets his shit rocked and Lois's reaction is heartbreakingly complex. She fell in love with Superman, but now he's a weak bitch, you can see them both wondering if a mistake has been made, as Clark comes to terms with his aching, busted up face. 

As if to pour salt in the wound, a newscast then reveals the Kryptonian's conquest of Earth, while the president pleas for Superman to return. There's no question now that we done fucked up. Clark realizes he has to give up what he's gained to get Super again, because fuck this Zod guy, what an asshole. 

There’s a ton of richness and depth here. The story is doing so much at once and it all feels important, not only that, it feels cohesive. Events unfold naturally and decisions have consequences that are as devastating as they are complex. 

Everything from Lois's feelings about the man she loves, to Superman's overconfidence and then his crushing realization of his newfound frailty, to his pained certainty that this normal life is one he can never have, and at last his conviction that laying the righteous smackdown on these jabronies is a job for Superman. All of these emotions come rapid-fire, both to the characters and the audience. You feel what they feel, simultaneously. 

Everything is just perfect. The special effects might not blow people away like they did back then, but the emotion, dialogue, acting, and score are unparalleled, and completely effective.

Clark unfucks his powers and heads off for the showdown in little Metropolis. The entire back half of the movie is one big no holds barred slobberknocker between Superman and the Kryptonian Super-Clique. The villainous trio has been built up so well up to this point. Zod is awesome, the big silent Giant Gonzales looking mofo is both scary and hilarious, and the chick is hot as hell.

The whole movie builds toward this one confrontation and not only does it not disappoint, it outdoes any expectations. You can practically hear the arena sized roar of sweaty wrestling marks chanting "fight forever" as the battling Kryptonians go back and forth, with Superman kicking ass at first, but eventually getting his ass kicked. 

After he gets laid out, there's a very cool scene of the city folk taking matters into their own hands, stupidly but radly marching up to get revenge on Zod with baseball bats and tennis rackets like an army of pissed off Jim Cornettes. 

This is so cool. They just saw these guys take out superman, they know they don’t stand a chance, but they don’t care. That’s their boy, right there. Fuck these space-bully douchebags, let’s fuck em up. Of course they all just get blown away with super-breath but it’s the thought that counts.

Round 1 goes to the Zod Squad, but round 2 takes place at The Fortress of Solitude. Even though Supes got dunked on in the original fight, being on his home turf seems to make him extra OP. His powers and abilities here are completely ridiculous and come out of nowhere. First he throws his S insignia at a guy, which then grows bigger and wraps around the dude like a fruit rollup. Then he straight up does the shadow clone thing from Naruto. At no point were any of these powers established beforehand but you know what...

I could see some modern viewers finding these Super ass-pull powers cheesy, but that's wrong. It's not cheese, it's camp. Glorious, wonderful camp. 

I haven't even mentioned how funny this movie is. It's very funny. There, now i've mentioned it, but i'll elaborate. Richard Donner directed the first and second movie simultaneously, and wanted to go for a grand, mythic feel, which he succeeded at. But for some vague movie studio reason or another, a different dick, Richard Lester, was brought in for reshoots. Much of Donner's footage was scrapped, and Lester added a lot of humor and levity that was missing from the first film. This has echoes decades later when a very similar thing happened with the 2017 Justice League, Ka is a wheel after all. 

But unlike Whedon-league, the humor actually works here, and while i haven't seen the Donner cut, i think the two directors' styles compliment each other very well, rather than clash. It's a much more fun film than it's predecessor, but no less epic. If anything Superman 2 feels more epic. 

Surprisingly, the biggest source of comic relief is Lex Luthor. Gene Hackman returns for the role, and he's actually better in this movie than he was in the first one. In that flick his scenes felt tedious, he seemed a very mundane, ordinary evil businessman, too subdued and realistic to work as a comic book antagonist.

But here in the sequel Lex goes full silver age, and comes into his own as a smirking, manipulative ego maniac with a brazen contempt for humanity that is downright cartoonish. Watching him scheme with no other motive but to be an asshole is highly entertaining and makes his scenes something to look forward to. Instead of dying of boredom whenever Superman isn't on screen, you're now just as excited when Luthor is. He reminds of Paul Heyman, a conniving, weaselly, arrogant but undeniably savvy piece of shit, who loves being a piece of shit. 

In the end, the day is saved, and Superman is back. But just as we're riding that high, we are reminded of what must be sacrificed. Superman can never be with Lois, because reasons. It doesn't really make sense, but it doesn't have to. What matters is the somber, sobering reminder that even Superman can't have it all.

...And then he goes back and beats up the guy in the diner. Hell yeah. Now that's the kind of petty revenge i like. 

God damn, this movie fuckin shreds man. This movie fucks. It's a masterpiece, a tour de force, to the point where it even makes me appreciate the slow moving first one a little bit more. I can’t believe i’ve never watched this flick until now. Superman 2 is easily one of the best capeshit films ever made, a feat that stands as all the more impressive considering it was one of the first.

Even though its only 2 hours long, it took me more like 4 hours to watch it because i kept having to rewind and see shit again, that’s how cool it was. It's not just a Superman movie, it's a Super-movie, man. 

5/5