SUPERMAN II (1980)

SUPERMAN II (1980)

Tagline: The three outlaws from Krypton descend to Earth to confront the Man of Steel in a cosmic battle for world supremacy.

(Action, Adventure, Zod) [PG]

General, would you care to step outside?

In this one, Superman is able to stop a nuclear weapon from going off on earth, but as it detonates in space, it releases three Kryptonian criminals. As they descend on earth with Superman-like powers and start taking over, Superman is busy elsewhere pondering the decision to become human. Good luck at the “Bad Timing Awards” buddy. 

First off, when I was a kid, and even to this day, this was my favorite Superman movie. Nothing “live-action” even really came close to the concept of Superman really meeting his match and being outnumbered until MAN OF STEEL came out. The final act is still to this day one of my favorite movie sequences ever. 

Unfortunately, the actual storyline is rough for a lot of this movie's runtime. The romance segments are fine, but some of Superman’s decisions are ridiculously over the top against his character. Or at least they were up to the point where this movie came out. After this movie came out, Superman has made all kinds of stupid decisions based on whoever is writing the comic or TV show at the time. I will say that at the very least this makes Superman a bit more relatable since one of the major complaints about him for decades before this movie was that he was a bit too perfect. 

Acting-wise this thing is pretty solid. While making “Non” (one of the criminal Kryptonians) basically just a brute wouldn’t have been my first choice, it wall works very well. You want Superman to come kick the faces off these villains. Gene Hackman is good, but I never liked and still don’t like Lex Luther as a character. I just think he’s wildly boring like having someone read you the dictionary when you could have been blasting Skillet. Margot Kidder who plays Louis Lane is fine in this role, but I think especially back in the ’80s there were probably 100 or more actresses they could have gotten that would have been better. In this particular movie though, she is particularly good and sadly that might be because she was actually going through a divorce when this was shooting. It’s either that or she is a better actress than I originally thought. Christopher Reeve plays Superman and to be honest, he is still probably the best Superman we ever had. I really like Henry Cavill in the MCU and even his face reminds me quite a bit of Reeve, but man Christopher was amazing. Terence Stamp makes an amazing ”General Zod” in this movie and came across as quite menacing. Like I wouldn’t even want to be his kid and do the dishes wrong or anything like that. To this day (as of 2021) Stamp is still acting. 

The sets and production are all pretty fun, but when you watch this one today the “flying” sequences do feel a bit “floaty”. There is also one sequence at the beginning that looks like pretty bad animation. The score is iconic almost on a STAR WARS level. I mean this thing is beautifully done. 

Overall this movie is still fun to watch and I still have to give it a solid 6 out of 7. Even just the signs and locations in all their cheesy 80’s glory are worth another look if you haven’t seen this in a while. 

GRAPHICS ARE THE PROPERTY OF THE DOVEMEAD FILMS AND ARE USED FOR REVIEW PURPOSES ONLY. 

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