NEW NEW! Superman & 5uperman / More Human Than a Human (Guest Cohost: Moses Olson)

It's a bird! It's a plane! No! It's a NEW NEW REVIEW REVIEW with Guest Cohost Moses Olson, that was edited faster than a speeding locomotive, to wrap up our "Swingin' Seventies Summer Series," with 'Superman: The Movie,' (D. Donner 1978) and "Superman (5uperman)" (d. Gunn 2025). And don't worry, as we have "Brainiac" Ben join to join in on the discourse via the remote from his fortress of solitude to....I have been editing for hours, I can't keep this up right now. Enjoy! 7/13!

**All episodes contain explicit language**
Artwork - Ben McFadden
Review Review Intro/Outro Theme - Jamie Henwood
"What Are We Watching" & "Whatcha been up to?" Themes - Matthew Fosket
"Fun Facts" Theme - Chris Olds/Paul Root
Lead-Ins Edited/Conceptualized by - Ben McFadden
Produced by - Ben McFadden & Paul Root
Concept - Paul Root

Transcript

[Speaker 1]
Wow.
00:00:00 [Speaker 1]
What a shock.
00:00:02 [Speaker 1]
Like, it's like I went fifty years in the future or something.
00:00:06 [Speaker 1]
Thanks, Ben Castor.
00:00:08 [Speaker 1]
I'm Paul and normally you'd hear some chuckle say, well, I'm Ben.

00:00:15 [Speaker 1]
Well, Ben's not here.
00:00:17 [Speaker 1]
It's just me well, it's not just me.
00:00:20 [Speaker 1]
Also, Moses Olsen is here.
00:00:23 [Speaker 1]
It's a review review.
00:00:25 [Speaker 1]
Nunu.

00:00:26 [Speaker 1]
Moses, hello.
00:00:27 [Speaker 1]
I'm so glad you could join me.

00:00:29 [Speaker 2]
Thank you.
00:00:30 [Speaker 2]
Thank you.
00:00:30 [Speaker 2]
Thank you as always for having me.
00:00:33 [Speaker 2]
You know, I love, being a guest here.

00:00:35 [Speaker 1]
It is truly my pleasure as Ben unfortunately cannot join us.
00:00:39 [Speaker 1]
He is in the thick of production on his western rough ways and needs to be doing that and focus all energies on that.
00:00:51 [Speaker 1]
So fortunate to be able to have someone that I would consider a Superman authority.
00:00:57 [Speaker 1]
You have the comics code authority here for Yeah.
00:01:01 [Speaker 1]
For Superman.

00:01:02 [Speaker 1]
And so I'm really psyched.
00:01:04 [Speaker 1]
We are doing a Nunu.
00:01:06 [Speaker 1]
What is a Nunu?
00:01:07 [Speaker 1]
Well, we review review two movies.
00:01:11 [Speaker 1]
Two two two movies, one episode.

00:01:13 [Speaker 1]
We do an original and then either the remake or reboot or legacy sequel, something along those lines.
00:01:21 [Speaker 1]
And today, we have the pleasure of talking about Superman and five Uberman?
00:01:30 [Speaker 1]
Five Upperman?

00:01:32 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:01:32 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:01:33 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:01:33 [Speaker 2]
Let's call it that.

00:01:34 [Speaker 1]
High five.

00:01:35 [Speaker 2]
It's like the fantastic

00:01:36 [Speaker 1]
High five.
00:01:36 [Speaker 1]
Whatever

00:01:37 [Speaker 2]
four with the four in the middle.

00:01:42 [Speaker 1]
With the box with the with the thing.
00:01:45 [Speaker 1]
Of course, that.
00:01:47 [Speaker 1]
We just ended up watching both of these movies, and that's exciting.
00:01:53 [Speaker 1]
But outside of that, Moses, why are you excited?

00:02:13 [Speaker 2]
I'm really bummed actually to not be here with both you and Ben because

00:02:18 [Speaker 3]
this one this one's a big one

00:02:20 [Speaker 2]
for me because I adore Superman.
00:02:22 [Speaker 2]
He's, you know, been my favorite character since forever.
00:02:25 [Speaker 2]
The room that I'm recording my side in is the Media Room AKA Nerd Room, and it's filled with Superman stuff.
00:02:31 [Speaker 2]
I'm a big Superman geek.
00:02:33 [Speaker 2]
I always have been.

00:02:34 [Speaker 2]
Being able to come on to this and chat about a character I love and talk about movies is is like a dream come true.
00:02:41 [Speaker 2]
I'm very excited.
00:02:42 [Speaker 2]
I'm coming off of, some fun work and sadly shelving some work that, you've seen footage too that I'm a little bit bummed about, but that's going on the back burner.
00:02:53 [Speaker 2]
And,

00:02:54 [Speaker 1]
you know, on a note, I just wanna say kudos to you and former guest, Brandon Marino, for so much good work done over a long period of time and dedication and everything that has been done to this point and will be done in the future.
00:03:13 [Speaker 1]
Like, massive kudos, man.

00:03:15 [Speaker 2]
It's the best reason to delay or put on hold a project that, you know, Brandon we are kinda talking about it was this lovely Nightwing project that Brandon was essentially Sisyphus pushing this boulder up the hill and everyone working alongside him and and pushing said boulder uphill with him.
00:03:36 [Speaker 2]
But he's he's going to go to his masters on the other side of the world in acting, and he's

00:03:41 [Speaker 3]
Can So it's like

00:03:41 [Speaker 1]
can we put the masters on blasters that this guy is going to Lambda?

00:03:45 [Speaker 2]
Tell you something.
00:03:46 [Speaker 2]
Lambda.

00:03:47 [Speaker 1]
That's fucking huge.
00:03:48 [Speaker 1]
That's so cool.
00:03:49 [Speaker 1]
We love you, man.
00:03:50 [Speaker 1]
That's so cool.

00:03:51 [Speaker 2]
As much as I have.
00:03:52 [Speaker 2]
So it's it's the best excuse to he and I will continue to work together in the future and I'll have to be home.
00:03:58 [Speaker 2]
This is, this is a whole thing.
00:04:00 [Speaker 2]
But it also does open up now.
00:04:01 [Speaker 2]
There's a few other screenplays that I've kinda been waiting to kinda push forward.

00:04:06 [Speaker 2]
But I wanted to make sure that I put those kind of narrative minded projects on hold because I wanted to make sure that all energies were dedicated to that.
00:04:15 [Speaker 2]
So it's a it's an interesting season.
00:04:17 [Speaker 2]
It's really exciting.
00:04:19 [Speaker 2]
And, yeah, we'll see what's next.

00:04:21 [Speaker 1]
I am excited for a couple things.
00:04:25 [Speaker 1]
One, I want to present a new debate debate.
00:04:36 [Speaker 1]
I would like a listener, a former guest, Ben, someone who is willing to stand on the hill, that Goodfellas over casino, I want to have that conversation with someone.
00:04:49 [Speaker 1]
It's time to

00:04:50 [Speaker 3]
take out the trash I'm

00:04:51 [Speaker 1]
excited for the thought of that conversation.
00:04:54 [Speaker 1]
Because these that's a format that is special.
00:04:56 [Speaker 1]
We don't do it often.
00:04:58 [Speaker 1]
We we know where people stand right where we come in.
00:05:01 [Speaker 1]
I'm on the casino side.

00:05:03 [Speaker 1]
So anyone who wants to talk to me, casino v, Goodfellas, we're talking about it here.
00:05:08 [Speaker 1]
It's being presented now.
00:05:09 [Speaker 1]
The gauntlet has been thrown.
00:05:11 [Speaker 1]
The the hammer has been dropped.
00:05:12 [Speaker 1]
And on that note, Moses, I'm excited because I reread this.

00:05:18 [Speaker 1]
Oh.
00:05:18 [Speaker 1]
I am showing the camera Superman Red Son.
00:05:21 [Speaker 1]
It is a paperback.
00:05:22 [Speaker 1]
It's the only one I've ever owned.
00:05:25 [Speaker 1]
It is so fucking special.

00:05:28 [Speaker 1]
It is such a cool thing.
00:05:30 [Speaker 1]
It is such a great example of brainwashing to brainwashing to brainwashing and blind loyalty of Khalil to, like, an adoptive home.
00:05:43 [Speaker 1]
If he lands in Russia, he's gonna love Russia for whatever period of time.
00:05:47 [Speaker 1]
If he lands in America, he's gonna land in a love and love America for whatever period of time, and it maybe moves beyond that.
00:05:57 [Speaker 1]
I love the world.

00:05:58 [Speaker 1]
I love humanity.
00:05:59 [Speaker 1]
I love peace, whatever that is, and the idea, like, truth justice Soviet way, and how that level of brainwashing and propaganda and this communist lean and that no matter what, this alien's humanity shines through, period.
00:06:17 [Speaker 1]
That is the cool thing where even if you that pod lands in, you know, communist Soviet USSR, the trajectory in a cool way, I think, ends up the same.
00:06:30 [Speaker 1]
He's he's more human than human by nature.
00:06:34 [Speaker 1]
And that's that is my favorite example of let's go really fucking dark with this story of this character and have it be really palatable.

00:06:46 [Speaker 1]
Because as we've talked about a little bit, I want the story to feel triumphant, like, super pure.
00:06:54 [Speaker 1]
That's what I want from this story.

00:06:57 [Speaker 2]
So I think there's also something

00:06:58 [Speaker 1]
So good.

00:06:59 [Speaker 2]
If you ask most proper Superman geeks, Red Sun is one of the iconics right there, but most nerds are gonna put it on the must read list.
00:07:08 [Speaker 2]
I love that you read it before, you know, where we're talking about propaganda.
00:07:12 [Speaker 2]
We're talking about, all these things.
00:07:13 [Speaker 2]
But, you know, Superman's a fascinating character because a lot of writers that do reimaginings of the Superman story or lore usually love to play with the kind of the nature versus nurture of the character.
00:07:26 [Speaker 2]
And what makes Red Son so special is not just that we're talking about Superman in this setting and in this place, but it is an amazing Superman story because we are questioning and challenging the ideologies of the character and and the things we believe about the character.

00:07:44 [Speaker 2]
And at the end of that story, without spoiling anything, he is the Superman we know and love.
00:07:49 [Speaker 2]
Right?
00:07:49 [Speaker 2]
He is the Superman that we respect in in getting to this journey.
00:07:54 [Speaker 2]
There's an amazing journey in that story.
00:07:55 [Speaker 2]
I love the reimagining of Wonder Woman and Batman and

00:07:58 [Speaker 1]
Lex Luthor reimagining is incredible.

00:08:02 [Speaker 2]
Really amazing story for great reason, really great art.
00:08:05 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:08:05 [Speaker 2]
That I love I want us to take that note of, like, questioning the character and the morals of the character and the stands of the characters.
00:08:11 [Speaker 2]
I do think that, obviously, most of these iterations, especially in live action, really try to convey that.

00:08:19 [Speaker 1]
That's a really good point.
00:08:20 [Speaker 1]
I also find that the Superman stuff that hits the best with me is the stuff that feels really romantic, and the stuff that lacks that romance doesn't hit as well with me.
00:08:31 [Speaker 1]
Red Sun is not romantic, and it hits with me really, really well because it's all about oppression and conformity and banality and, peace through fascism, like like communism.
00:08:46 [Speaker 1]
However you wanna put it, folks, it's not a super difficult read.
00:08:50 [Speaker 1]
And as Moses noted, visually, it's also fucking gorgeous.

00:08:53 [Speaker 1]
It's so visually gorgeous in the way it the dialogue shows up on the page.
00:08:59 [Speaker 1]
It's so beautiful.

00:09:01 [Speaker 2]
And, you know, for people that don't like to read comics, there's, the animated adaptation is pretty solid.
00:09:07 [Speaker 2]
And

00:09:08 [Speaker 1]
from the nineties with Tim Daley?

00:09:10 [Speaker 2]
No.
00:09:11 [Speaker 2]
There's an actual movie that came out Oh.
00:09:13 [Speaker 2]
A few years ago.

00:09:14 [Speaker 1]
Well, on that note, Moses, what are we watching?
00:09:35 [Speaker 1]
You literally took it right out of my brain.

00:09:39 [Speaker 2]
I really appreciate one, you talked about casino, and that's really exciting because casino is on my Hall of Shame movies.
00:09:46 [Speaker 2]
I have not ever seen casino.
00:09:48 [Speaker 2]
Okay.
00:09:48 [Speaker 2]
I purchased it though.
00:09:49 [Speaker 2]
So I own it.

00:09:51 [Speaker 2]
I've been waiting for the right time to watch it.

00:09:53 [Speaker 1]
Find three hours to

00:09:55 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:09:56 [Speaker 2]
And it's so I've got this pile of movies.
00:09:58 [Speaker 2]
Casino is in that list.
00:10:00 [Speaker 2]
I own it.
00:10:00 [Speaker 2]
I'm just waiting to watch it.

00:10:01 [Speaker 2]
But I've been attacking my pile.
00:10:03 [Speaker 2]
So some of these movies are movies that I've owned or watched as a kid.
00:10:07 [Speaker 2]
So one of the things that I just watched on top of obviously revisiting, good old Demolition Man, Arrow videos, Demolition Man.

00:10:15 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.

00:10:15 [Speaker 2]
And I had not seen it actually, I've seen it quite quite a bit, but I had not seen the four k version of the film.
00:10:24 [Speaker 2]
And so I was kind of excited to reapproach it.
00:10:27 [Speaker 2]
And this is the the thing I really love about the the not on the podcast Geek Combos with Paul.
00:10:33 [Speaker 2]
You would give me the heads up that you didn't like the sound mix.
00:10:36 [Speaker 2]
And, legitimately, right when the movie started, I was like, man, Paul is so right.

00:10:39 [Speaker 2]
I think it was the first thing What?
00:10:41 [Speaker 2]
That I noticed.
00:10:41 [Speaker 2]
It's a beautiful transfer.
00:10:43 [Speaker 2]
It's a great movie.
00:10:44 [Speaker 2]
You know?

00:10:44 [Speaker 2]
It's gorgeous to look at.
00:10:45 [Speaker 2]
It's it's, like, flawless.
00:10:48 [Speaker 2]
But I think the biggest thing that for me, you know, talking about you know, we could talk about all these amazing things about the movie and how fun it is and how interesting it is in the space in the career of, Stallone specifically.
00:11:01 [Speaker 2]
But I'm all about that movie because Wesley Snipes is just so good in it.
00:11:06 [Speaker 2]
You know, as the kids say a lot of Riz, and I really adore that movie because or I think what?

00:11:11 [Speaker 2]
Riz is probably over with Mara.
00:11:13 [Speaker 2]
Right?
00:11:13 [Speaker 2]
It's like it it's he's just so strong in it.
00:11:15 [Speaker 2]
I really

00:11:16 [Speaker 1]
Frosting him right now.

00:11:18 [Speaker 2]
We're we're

00:11:19 [Speaker 1]
blazing him right now.
00:11:20 [Speaker 1]
Yes.
00:11:20 [Speaker 1]
But he deserves it because he's so he is fucking incredible.
00:11:24 [Speaker 1]
In that movie and in Blade Yes.
00:11:27 [Speaker 1]
Coming off of White Men Can't Jump and, like, all those movies within just a few years of each other.

00:11:32 [Speaker 1]
Liz Ellis, former guest of the pod, has said, if I had to watch one actor's filmography for the rest of my life, it would maybe be Wesley Snipes.

00:11:41 [Speaker 2]
Snipes in his prime is a is a thing to behold.
00:11:44 [Speaker 2]
And so, yeah, that is a that was one of the in that pile, I've just been attacking my queue.
00:11:48 [Speaker 2]
And

00:11:49 [Speaker 1]
That's great.

00:11:49 [Speaker 3]
The

00:11:49 [Speaker 2]
Demolition is most recent.
00:11:50 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:11:51 [Speaker 2]
How about you guys?

00:11:52 [Speaker 1]
I I am going to before I get more in-depth on what I had watched, casino, if you have the time, watch it on Christmas day.
00:12:03 [Speaker 1]
I watch it on Christmas morning when I wake up.

00:12:06 [Speaker 3]
Oh, wow.

00:12:07 [Speaker 1]
I've done it for a few years now.
00:12:08 [Speaker 1]
Hey, baby.
00:12:09 [Speaker 1]
I hear the blue It's really really amazing.
00:12:12 [Speaker 1]
I love that experience.
00:12:14 [Speaker 1]
I know that sounds bizarre.

00:12:16 [Speaker 1]
I also rewatched Superman Red Son.
00:12:19 [Speaker 1]
I remember really liking it quite a bit when I had watched it right when it came out.
00:12:25 [Speaker 1]
Did not disappoint this time.
00:12:27 [Speaker 1]
I specifically like the fight animation and choreography and how, you know, that's all kind of built and executed.
00:12:35 [Speaker 1]
The Superman versus Batman fight, the Superman versus Green Lantern core fight, and the Brainiac stuff, and some of the mixed media stuff throughout the fights, and the way that Wonder Woman is animated.

00:12:50 [Speaker 1]
All this fight stuff in that is really, really great.
00:12:53 [Speaker 1]
The changes that happen at the beginning to the end, I think are necessary.
00:12:59 [Speaker 1]
It's one of those things where you're changing mediums and things are are gonna be a little bit different as you're about to listen to our fight club episode.
00:13:07 [Speaker 1]
We hope you enjoy that.
00:13:08 [Speaker 1]
You will.

00:13:10 [Speaker 1]
Oh, movie also, as you would expect has a great score.
00:13:13 [Speaker 1]
It's really well casted as always with DC animation.
00:13:19 [Speaker 1]
If there's anything to say about DC animation, it's like Batman the animated series and the Superman animated series, which I think in some circles in my life has been underappreciated.
00:13:30 [Speaker 1]
Incredible fucking voice casting.
00:13:32 [Speaker 1]
Some of the best iterations of telling these character stories were those shows at those times in my opinion.

00:13:40 [Speaker 2]
Andrea Romano, she's the best.

00:13:42 [Speaker 1]
Goated.
00:13:43 [Speaker 1]
Well, Moses, it's about the time we're gonna talk about.
00:13:49 [Speaker 1]
It's the Nunu.
00:13:51 [Speaker 1]
Five upper, five ooperman, Superman, Superman.

00:13:57 [Speaker 2]
Archaeology is the search for fact.

00:14:02 [Speaker 1]
2025, '25 Uber?
00:14:06 [Speaker 1]
Warner Brothers, DC, Saffron Company.
00:14:09 [Speaker 1]
It is rated PG 13, and it is two hours and nine minutes.
00:14:13 [Speaker 1]
The budget on this movie, there's a lot of numbers out there.
00:14:16 [Speaker 1]
There have been claims that it was a $180,000,000.

00:14:19 [Speaker 1]
There's a Wikipedia entry as well as a few other entries on the Internet of $363,000,000.
00:14:27 [Speaker 1]
The estimated number with all costs including marketing is about $600,000,000.
00:14:33 [Speaker 1]
The opening day was $56,500,000.
00:14:37 [Speaker 1]
It's a lot of money.
00:14:38 [Speaker 1]
Opening weekend worldwide, $210,000,000 is the estimation that it's gonna be walking away with.

00:14:44 [Speaker 1]
This is right now Saturday evening.
00:14:48 [Speaker 1]
What day is it?
00:14:50 [Speaker 1]
What day of the month?
00:14:51 [Speaker 1]
Help.

00:14:52 [Speaker 2]
Twelfth.

00:14:53 [Speaker 1]
The twelfth.
00:14:54 [Speaker 1]
Thank you, Moses.

00:14:56 [Speaker 2]
Gotcha, baby.

00:14:56 [Speaker 1]
Fantastic.
00:14:58 [Speaker 1]
This has an a minus cinema score at this point.
00:15:01 [Speaker 1]
It is an 82% on Rotten Tomatoes, and it is at a dead solid four on Letterboxd.
00:15:08 [Speaker 1]
You can follow Ben on Letterboxd at run b m c.
00:15:13 [Speaker 1]
That's run b e m c.

00:15:16 [Speaker 1]
Do that.
00:15:16 [Speaker 1]
You can check out his feelings on Superman, but you're gonna hear him too.
00:15:20 [Speaker 1]
Director of this film was James Gunn, Slither, Super, and the Suicide Squad.
00:15:30 [Speaker 1]
Feelings on that movie you enjoy?

00:15:33 [Speaker 2]
The suicide

00:15:34 [Speaker 1]
no.
00:15:34 [Speaker 1]
We we don't have to talk about Suicide Squad.
00:15:36 [Speaker 1]
Don't worry.

00:15:38 [Speaker 2]
Just the the Yeah.

00:15:40 [Speaker 1]
The I am.
00:15:41 [Speaker 1]
Game of the game.

00:15:42 [Speaker 2]
We were in the movie theater, and there was some sequel that popped up.
00:15:48 [Speaker 2]
And I actually told my friend, I was like, I kinda miss when sequels had numbers in them.
00:15:52 [Speaker 2]
And I I feel that way about the Suicide Squad.
00:15:55 [Speaker 2]
I'm looking at you Fast and Furious saga.
00:15:57 [Speaker 2]
So forget about it, Kurt.

00:15:58 [Speaker 2]
So, you know, the

00:16:00 [Speaker 1]
I'm with you, buddy.

00:16:00 [Speaker 2]
A hard one for me sometimes.

00:16:02 [Speaker 1]
I'm with you, buddy.
00:16:03 [Speaker 1]
I do like the movie.
00:16:05 [Speaker 1]
It is a fun movie that feels like guardians of the galaxy at a lot of points, but it's it's a fun movie.
00:16:15 [Speaker 1]
Writer of this film is James Gunn.
00:16:19 [Speaker 1]
Tromeo and Juliet, the one three three teen ghosts.

00:16:24 [Speaker 1]
13 teen ghosts?
00:16:27 [Speaker 1]
I don't know.
00:16:28 [Speaker 1]
That is that is maybe the most terrifying premise.
00:16:31 [Speaker 1]
Scooby Doo two thousand two, Jerry Siegel, and Joe Shuster, RIP, were the creators of the characters.
00:16:41 [Speaker 1]
Cast, Davin Corrin Davin?

00:16:46 [Speaker 1]
David Corrin sweat played car Kark?
00:16:50 [Speaker 1]
Clark Kent?
00:16:51 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
00:16:52 [Speaker 1]
No shit.
00:16:53 [Speaker 1]
Clark Kent.

00:16:53 [Speaker 1]
You know, Superman?
00:16:55 [Speaker 1]
That the same guy, believe it or not.
00:16:56 [Speaker 1]
Who?
00:16:57 [Speaker 1]
Clark Kent and Superman.
00:16:59 [Speaker 1]
Same guy.

00:17:00 [Speaker 1]
What?
00:17:01 [Speaker 1]
The glass you can't tell because the glasses that they made his yeah.
00:17:05 [Speaker 1]
And the there's a a poofy, like, poodle y, faux hockey thing that happens.
00:17:11 [Speaker 1]
It's very messy.
00:17:12 [Speaker 1]
It's cute.

00:17:14 [Speaker 1]
It's got a cute little poofy thingy.
00:17:17 [Speaker 1]
Pearl, Look Both Ways, and Twisters.
00:17:20 [Speaker 1]
Listen to our Twisters episode.
00:17:21 [Speaker 1]
Why not?
00:17:22 [Speaker 1]
It's really good.

00:17:23 [Speaker 1]
Rachel Brosnahan was Lois Lane, finest hours, patriots day, spies in disguise.
00:17:30 [Speaker 1]
Nicholas Holt played Lex Luthor, Renfield, x men first class, and the order.
00:17:37 [Speaker 1]
Fun facts, the inclusion of Nathan Fillion as Guy Gardner, the green lantern, marks the seventh time that Fillion has appeared in a film directed by James Gunn, continuing the tradition of the actor making an appearance in every one of Gunn's films.
00:17:52 [Speaker 1]
The Superman crest is based on Alex Ross's original design from the Kingdom Come miniseries, but filled with, you know, yellow instead of black.
00:18:03 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.

00:18:03 [Speaker 1]
They just they just kinda

00:18:05 [Speaker 2]
Trace to it.

00:18:06 [Speaker 1]
Microsoft Paint fill.
00:18:07 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
00:18:07 [Speaker 1]
Just filled it in.
00:18:09 [Speaker 1]
This design was previously featured on the crisis on infinite earths crossover as well.
00:18:15 [Speaker 1]
At his largest, the six foot four David Korn sweat gained 40 pounds to play the role of five upper man.

00:18:25 [Speaker 1]
Moses, how did you consume this film?

00:18:30 [Speaker 2]
I saw it yesterday night in IMAX.
00:18:34 [Speaker 2]
It was big, and it was it was an IMAX.
00:18:37 [Speaker 2]
Shit?
00:18:38 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:18:38 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.

00:18:38 [Speaker 2]
It was very loud.

00:18:41 [Speaker 1]
Okay.
00:18:42 [Speaker 1]
I saw this movie yesterday as well, and I saw it in Dolby.
00:18:48 [Speaker 1]
It looked great.
00:18:50 [Speaker 1]
It was loud as shit.
00:18:52 [Speaker 1]
It was super duper loud.

00:18:55 [Speaker 1]
And loud, I think, for Superman movies maybe is good.

00:19:01 [Speaker 3]
Oh.

00:19:01 [Speaker 1]
On the note of that, Moses, we both just watched this film.
00:19:05 [Speaker 1]
Tell me some of your feelings, won't you?
00:19:07 [Speaker 1]
Let's let's share.
00:19:08 [Speaker 1]
Let's talk for a moment.

00:19:09 [Speaker 3]
Suck the movie.
00:19:10 [Speaker 3]
Suck the movie.
00:19:11 [Speaker 3]
Suck the ruby.

00:19:16 [Speaker 2]
And now our feature presentation.
00:19:21 [Speaker 2]
I I felt my, like, heart, like, lock in when you're like, what did I think about the Suicide Squad?
00:19:26 [Speaker 2]
Just because thing I really appreciate, and we've talked about this off, many a time, is that I really enjoy in the podcast is we we you guys, and when I've been a part of it, we spend the energy talking about the film itself and try to stay away from any projected feelings about the filmmakers themselves.
00:19:47 [Speaker 2]
Obviously, that gets wrapped into some of the behind the scenes or, you know, obviously, when we talked about the Alien three episode.
00:19:53 [Speaker 2]
Obviously, the saga of what that meant and and how that Yeah.

00:19:56 [Speaker 1]
Paul Paul has feelings about Alien Theory.

00:19:59 [Speaker 2]
Just a few.
00:20:00 [Speaker 2]
Just a few.
00:20:01 [Speaker 2]
But also how that

00:20:02 [Speaker 1]
feels you

00:20:03 [Speaker 3]
okay?
00:20:03 [Speaker 3]
Are you okay?
00:20:04 [Speaker 3]
I'm

00:20:05 [Speaker 2]
good.
00:20:05 [Speaker 2]
I'm good.
00:20:05 [Speaker 2]
You

00:20:05 [Speaker 1]
need Ben here?

00:20:07 [Speaker 2]
But it is a whole thing.
00:20:08 [Speaker 2]
And this is this is one that I'm I was excited when you had talked about doing this episode.
00:20:15 [Speaker 2]
And and I at that time, it was just as a friend knowing that you were doing the episode.
00:20:19 [Speaker 2]
And and Ben and I have had many a conversation about James Gunn.
00:20:22 [Speaker 2]
So my biggest thing right now jumping in is to try to not project my own feelings about James Gunn's writing or directing.

00:20:29 [Speaker 2]
And also

00:20:31 [Speaker 1]
That's quite a preface, Moses.

00:20:33 [Speaker 2]
It is.
00:20:33 [Speaker 2]
I'm I'm I'm trying to think of it all because I, you know, I want nerds to be able to hear this or cinephiles or people that are just new to this channel to be able to kind of appreciate the conversation, enjoy the conversation.
00:20:45 [Speaker 2]
But one of the difficult ones is most people when saying they don't like a Superman film or do like a Superman film is because they've got really specific things that they're wanting from a Superman film.
00:20:56 [Speaker 2]
And so as of

00:20:57 [Speaker 1]
I I said I have that flaw myself.
00:20:59 [Speaker 1]
I I want this triumphant feeling.
00:21:01 [Speaker 1]
I I have desires from

00:21:03 [Speaker 2]
this.
00:21:04 [Speaker 2]
And so I I'm giving you this big preface because I do have loved almost every iteration, and I've I've been there with both.
00:21:12 [Speaker 2]
I say this right off the bat.
00:21:14 [Speaker 2]
I'll just pull the Band Aid right off.
00:21:16 [Speaker 2]
I did not like this movie at

00:21:17 [Speaker 1]
all.
00:21:18 [Speaker 1]
Oh, woah.
00:21:19 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.

00:21:20 [Speaker 3]
Like Okay.
00:21:20 [Speaker 3]
At all.
00:21:20 [Speaker 3]
And that's why

00:21:21 [Speaker 2]
I've been holding on to, like, as you've been saying everything.

00:21:23 [Speaker 1]
Well, I think we're gonna have an interesting conversation here.
00:21:26 [Speaker 1]
We're not gonna give our ratings away.
00:21:28 [Speaker 1]
But, yeah, it was necessary to preface this.
00:21:30 [Speaker 1]
You're like, listen, I'm coming from a specific place as we enter this conversation.
00:21:36 [Speaker 1]
And, I guess this is appropriate as we were just talking about Alien three and people feeling safe and the titles being evocative in this movie of the original movie from '78.

00:21:51 [Speaker 1]
And I'm already kind of being set up for it's the same but different And that to a level is okay.
00:21:58 [Speaker 1]
I like the new theme.
00:21:59 [Speaker 1]
I told you that one of the things I look forward to in this franchise is the score.
00:22:05 [Speaker 1]
The score to man of steel is, pun intended, bulletproof.
00:22:10 [Speaker 1]
It's fucking fantastic.

00:22:12 [Speaker 1]
I love that score.
00:22:14 [Speaker 1]
Say what you will about the movie.
00:22:15 [Speaker 1]
I I don't think anyone can fucking drag the score.
00:22:19 [Speaker 1]
The kind of tweak on the score, I I like the movie starts with just, like, titles catching us up.
00:22:24 [Speaker 1]
It's like these repeating threes for whatever reason.

00:22:29 [Speaker 1]
This happened in terms of metahumans, and this happened in terms of Superman, and here's the timeline of everything.
00:22:35 [Speaker 1]
And then he comes flying in, and he's been injured.
00:22:37 [Speaker 1]
And then not too long after, there is a fight with a big alien that reminds me of Guardians two.
00:22:43 [Speaker 1]
And I'm like, oh, we're in, like, Superman's in the Guardians of the Galaxy kinda this is the energy with less of the needle drops.
00:22:53 [Speaker 1]
Why couldn't that big monster fight be at I'm a fucking armchair quarterback at very best, and I want to flip that monster fight thing earlier in the movie because it even shows the the thing where it's like, we're in a world where all of the citizens of Metropolis are so well protected by all these superheroes that they're essentially asleep at the fucking wheel as this guy is the insane version of Superman that's like, I will stop everything in the world to save a squirrel.

00:23:26 [Speaker 1]
And I'm like, cool.
00:23:28 [Speaker 1]
I get I'm pretty on board with that.
00:23:30 [Speaker 1]
It's a little weird and jokey, a little fast, and I don't know how much it's earned.
00:23:37 [Speaker 1]
Is that part of, like, what's bugging you?
00:23:39 [Speaker 1]
Is it is it a little too quippy?

00:23:41 [Speaker 2]
It's man, saw it with the the probably the best group of dudes to watch a Superman movie with.
00:23:49 [Speaker 2]
We're all in this thing, and we all kind of had a pretty similar experience.
00:23:55 [Speaker 2]
I thought that was really fascinating that we all felt about the same.
00:24:00 [Speaker 2]
And, again, I wanna make it not an attack on James Gunn's writing style or directing, which I'll just put it out there if someone's, like, you know, wanting to dig at it.
00:24:08 [Speaker 2]
I'm not really the biggest fan of his work.

00:24:11 [Speaker 3]
What?
00:24:12 [Speaker 3]
Like

00:24:12 [Speaker 1]
What?
00:24:12 [Speaker 1]
What?

00:24:13 [Speaker 2]
Shocking.
00:24:14 [Speaker 2]
No.
00:24:14 [Speaker 2]
Are you I know.
00:24:16 [Speaker 2]
Let's You had I just pulled the glasses

00:24:18 [Speaker 1]
off.
00:24:18 [Speaker 1]
New.

00:24:20 [Speaker 2]
It it all just felt very surface level.
00:24:22 [Speaker 2]
Nothing felt earned.
00:24:23 [Speaker 2]
I didn't understand what we weren't challenging the ideas of hope.
00:24:28 [Speaker 2]
I liked most of the cast.
00:24:30 [Speaker 2]
I I didn't like the look of the film.

00:24:32 [Speaker 2]
The biggest disconnect to me was and, again, trying to separate what I want Superman to be.
00:24:38 [Speaker 2]
Right?
00:24:39 [Speaker 2]
Because I I feel like if there's one thing out of many things that I've found with especially the Snyder trilogy is that one of the the greatest detractors from that experience for a lot of people is, again, a preconceived understanding of what they wanted Superman to be in that particular series of films.
00:24:57 [Speaker 2]
And because they didn't get that, there was a lot of pushback.
00:25:00 [Speaker 2]
I wasn't really ready for a Superman film that he was so naive and a little bit of a dumb jock.

00:25:10 [Speaker 2]
It it felt almost like this Superman film where I'll take a step back.
00:25:15 [Speaker 2]
I think something that James Gunn is really good at, especially in his kind of superhero movie era, Guardians and whatnot, is that he'll take characters that not a lot of people know anything about or at all.
00:25:30 [Speaker 2]
I ask almost every time someone's seen a Guardians film if they knew anything about any of those characters going into that film, and 99% of the people that I've asked don't.
00:25:39 [Speaker 2]
Right?

00:25:39 [Speaker 1]
That's what I was

00:25:40 [Speaker 2]
understanding is Yeah.

00:25:41 [Speaker 1]
That's what I was saying earlier is that, like, there's characters and things in there about this that are way over my fucking head because he is an encyclopedia of this shit.

00:25:51 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:25:52 [Speaker 2]
And Superman, I think, is a character that everyone it's the opposite.
00:25:55 [Speaker 2]
It's almost like the other side of the spectrum where everyone has an idea or feeling about this character going into the film.
00:26:02 [Speaker 2]
Whether they think he's corny, whether he thinks he's a boy scout, whether, you know, whatever they think about that character, whether they, again, they only want the 1978 version or whatever that may be.
00:26:11 [Speaker 2]
But I think this kind of surface level naive and I just was like, man, this isn't working for me.

00:26:18 [Speaker 2]
It's not because I don't like the actor.
00:26:20 [Speaker 2]
It's not because I don't like it's just none of this is, like, sticking at all.

00:26:25 [Speaker 1]
You gotta give me a chance to try to change your mind, Lee.

00:26:27 [Speaker 2]
Please do.
00:26:28 [Speaker 2]
Please do.
00:26:28 [Speaker 2]
I'd love to

00:26:29 [Speaker 1]
hear you.
00:26:30 [Speaker 1]
Shot here, maybe.
00:26:31 [Speaker 1]
We'll see.
00:26:33 [Speaker 1]
But the the the Fortress Of Solitude is there immediately.
00:26:38 [Speaker 1]
Superman's been there and operating.

00:26:40 [Speaker 1]
Okay, I know this isn't a part two, it's its own thing, but I almost wish I had rewatched Superman one before this because because this almost feels like a Superman two to a degree, and I know it's not.
00:26:54 [Speaker 1]
And what you were talking about about some of the emotional things that happened with ancillary or literally characters that are not there, where it's like, I'm not gonna get super emotionally attached to a computer generated image of a robot that is, you know, perfectly charming or whatever or quippy, but that's not gonna grab me.
00:27:17 [Speaker 1]
The use of crypto, the super dog, him having this dog, and this also me immediately being like, oh, this dog is going to be involved in the emotional stakes.
00:27:30 [Speaker 1]
Like, I want emotional stakes and whatnot between characters rather than worrying about these animals that aren't and things that aren't really there.
00:27:40 [Speaker 1]
And I get it, and you had made a point.

00:27:44 [Speaker 1]
Things have to be kind of for the masses.
00:27:48 [Speaker 1]
And in the audience that I was in, and I I went solo to this movie.
00:27:51 [Speaker 1]
I enjoy seeing movies by myself.
00:27:53 [Speaker 1]
I'm a strange person.
00:27:54 [Speaker 1]
The audience seemed mostly delighted, and especially people that were clearly younger than me.

00:28:01 [Speaker 1]
I am I am only but 12.
00:28:03 [Speaker 1]
But people that were clearly younger than me or my age, if I'm 12, they seemed to mostly enjoy the movie and the dog and the robots and things like that.
00:28:15 [Speaker 1]
And I'm starting to a degree going, oh, this is like Star Wars.
00:28:20 [Speaker 1]
I have to, like, when this comes through and this isn't, you know, Matt Reeves' Batman, this may not be for me anymore is kind of what I'm thinking at this point.
00:28:33 [Speaker 1]
And it's working for me to a degree it more so in the second act when I'm getting like the thousand monkeys at a thousand typewriters writing the greatest novel of all time.

00:28:46 [Speaker 1]
Or when I like it, I'm like, yay, Simpsons reference or whatever.
00:28:50 [Speaker 1]
Here's where I start to ask more questions about story as we haven't even really talked about Lois Lane, and she has shown up.
00:28:59 [Speaker 1]
And I do feel some chemistry there.
00:29:01 [Speaker 1]
Do you?

00:29:02 [Speaker 2]
Absolutely.
00:29:02 [Speaker 2]
Absolutely.

00:29:03 [Speaker 1]
Okay.

00:29:03 [Speaker 2]
It's one of the better things in the film for sure.

00:29:06 [Speaker 1]
Because I really need that from this story.
00:29:09 [Speaker 1]
And I get a similar thing from this.
00:29:12 [Speaker 1]
This is a spoiler for the second part of this episode y'all.
00:29:15 [Speaker 1]
I get a similar thing at the end of this movie as I do in the original movie.
00:29:20 [Speaker 1]
So a spoiler for a spoiler.

00:29:22 [Speaker 1]
So the video that is left for Superman by his parents who I was like, is that Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga?
00:29:30 [Speaker 1]
It is not.
00:29:31 [Speaker 1]
It's Bradley Cooper.
00:29:33 [Speaker 1]
Another poke poke poke poke Not Lady Gaga.

00:29:36 [Speaker 3]
Poke poke poke Even then just kind of breaking down a little bit of trivia for this film,

00:29:37 [Speaker 2]
the breaking down a little bit of trivia for this film, the logo and the design of his suit.
00:29:45 [Speaker 2]
It's it's such a hodgepodge of Superman things.
00:29:48 [Speaker 2]
It it's a bit of the kingdom come logo, the yellow border around, which is evocative of the thirties and forties Superman logo.
00:29:56 [Speaker 2]
This costume is a mix of the new '52 Jim Lee design.
00:30:01 [Speaker 2]
I also felt like the movie really felt like I want to please every Superman detractor.

00:30:09 [Speaker 2]
I it almost felt like a over course correction from the Snyder stuff.
00:30:14 [Speaker 2]
We're, like, we're not gonna do that because people complained about that.
00:30:18 [Speaker 2]
And we got this movie that was, like even what we're talking about the having miss Tessmacher, having Ultraman, having the way that they went I'm trying to keep it a little bit spoiler free even though I think there's enough stiff stuff here.
00:30:30 [Speaker 2]
You know, even the introduction of Jor El and Lara, all these things that are kinda happening in the movie, there were Superman.
00:30:35 [Speaker 2]
Four references.

00:30:36 [Speaker 2]
There were Superman.
00:30:36 [Speaker 2]
Three references.
00:30:37 [Speaker 2]
There were references, obviously, to all star Superman.
00:30:40 [Speaker 2]
It didn't have any of the depth of those things.
00:30:43 [Speaker 2]
And instead, I felt like we had this weird Frankenstein.

00:30:45 [Speaker 2]
And here is a big disconnect that I want to say about the movie.
00:30:48 [Speaker 2]
Not James Gunn as a writer, but clearly, he wrote the thing, so it's going to be a statement towards that is the movie is just so much show, not tell.
00:30:57 [Speaker 2]
And it's so much over explained.
00:30:59 [Speaker 2]
Characters are saying things not to each other because those characters need to hear it, but because the audience needs to hear that or receive that.
00:31:07 [Speaker 2]
And and it was just so much of that kinda hand holding and pushing throughout the film.

00:31:12 [Speaker 2]
So when I get to this stuff that is supposed to be this reimagining

00:31:17 [Speaker 3]
or re

00:31:17 [Speaker 2]
and we have had that version.
00:31:19 [Speaker 2]
It hits a little harder now with Homelander, you know, and the boys being such a popular character, the invincible in the comics and cartoon now cartoon.
00:31:27 [Speaker 2]
So we've seen this version of a potential dominating fascist, funny enough, Red Sun from from the Kryptonians bit before.
00:31:40 [Speaker 2]
I didn't like it, but I get it because it's kind of a James Gunn thing to kind of play with your your genetic parents aren't really your parents, and the people that raised you are the ones that it's it's quite a it's a theme in a lot of his work.
00:31:52 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.

00:31:52 [Speaker 2]
I Go ahead, please.

00:31:54 [Speaker 1]
To what you're saying about the suit and some of the things about the suit and the homages to things, there is a level, I'm sure, of if you took a 100 people off the street and said, do you know who Superman is?
00:32:11 [Speaker 1]
That they want, like, somewhere near 90% of people understanding what at least a couple of those things are.
00:32:18 [Speaker 1]
Because, I guess, the assumption is that is that it's gonna delight people.
00:32:23 [Speaker 1]
And when you know as much as you do, I think it can almost be an overload where it's like, this is No.

00:32:31 [Speaker 2]
But I leave that too much.
00:32:32 [Speaker 2]
That's why I gave that preface as I leave all that because I Okay.
00:32:35 [Speaker 2]
Every version of Superman that I jump into, I'm like, a great example is the new my adventures with Superman cartoon.

00:32:42 [Speaker 1]
Okay.

00:32:42 [Speaker 2]
It is a great entry point for someone that doesn't know anything about Superman.
00:32:46 [Speaker 2]
It's sweet.
00:32:47 [Speaker 2]
It's endearing.
00:32:48 [Speaker 2]
All of this stuff works.
00:32:49 [Speaker 2]
I'm not sitting there going, oh, you know, an issue 52 of this.

00:32:53 [Speaker 2]
Like, that's not the approach.
00:32:55 [Speaker 2]
This is one where it's again, as I was saying earlier, the gun is really great at taking characters and making them fit his needs for that story.
00:33:05 [Speaker 2]
Again, Guardians, the Suicide Squad, most people don't know any of these characters.
00:33:09 [Speaker 2]
And I think with Superman, it was on the opposite side of that, which is I'm taking a character that you think you know.
00:33:16 [Speaker 2]
78 is a really fascinating film because it's in that echelon of movies that even if you've never seen Superman 78, you are aware of it.

00:33:26 [Speaker 2]
Like, it's somewhere in your Sure.
00:33:28 [Speaker 2]
Jaws

00:33:29 [Speaker 3]
A gift.

00:33:29 [Speaker 2]
The exorcist.
00:33:30 [Speaker 2]
There's some Yeah.
00:33:31 [Speaker 2]
There's some movies that are trends in ET.
00:33:34 [Speaker 2]
Right?
00:33:34 [Speaker 2]
They made skinny tea, but they've seen Elliot and the extraterrestrial

00:33:39 [Speaker 1]
Audio frontal.
00:33:40 [Speaker 1]
One of them.
00:33:41 [Speaker 1]
Extraterrestrial.
00:33:41 [Speaker 1]
The extraterrestrial.
00:33:43 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.

00:33:43 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:33:43 [Speaker 2]
Extraterrestrial.
00:33:44 [Speaker 2]
The extraterrestrial.
00:33:44 [Speaker 2]
Right.
00:33:45 [Speaker 2]
These images have been launched into our zeitgeist, and they're, like, a part of our culture in the most wonderful, fascinating way.

00:33:53 [Speaker 2]
You know, even if a cat has not seen jaws, they they know the theme song.
00:33:57 [Speaker 2]
And again, it's John Williams.
00:33:59 [Speaker 2]
Right?
00:33:59 [Speaker 2]
Like, there are people out there that own Superman t shirts that have never seen a Superman thing because it's just it's that iconic.
00:34:05 [Speaker 2]
Right?

00:34:06 [Speaker 2]
It's Of course.
00:34:07 [Speaker 2]
And I think that this is one of those things that he took going.
00:34:09 [Speaker 2]
You have an idea about this.
00:34:10 [Speaker 2]
And for me, the disconnect was that it was everything that I hate people saying about Superman.
00:34:16 [Speaker 2]
And then the hardest thing was for me in this journey, I didn't feel like there was almost any character growth for almost any character.

00:34:25 [Speaker 2]
The one thing that was questioned was, okay.
00:34:29 [Speaker 2]
I thought my parents told me to do this thing.
00:34:32 [Speaker 2]
That's why I'm doing this thing.
00:34:33 [Speaker 2]
That was challenged.
00:34:34 [Speaker 2]
And then his birth parents are like, nope.

00:34:37 [Speaker 2]
You're gonna make the right decision.

00:34:39 [Speaker 3]
The

00:34:39 [Speaker 2]
end.
00:34:40 [Speaker 2]
But there was no if we're talking about hope, we're talking about these things.
00:34:43 [Speaker 2]
For me, the disconnect was and, again, I don't wanna do the thing that is very easy for us as artists to go what they should have done was.
00:34:50 [Speaker 2]
But for Superman not to be a beacon of hope to inspire the Justice Gang, for him not to challenge these ideas for ideologies of these other people, you know, to to be at the end of the film, and we've got people crying out for his help, and he doesn't show up.
00:35:04 [Speaker 2]
Like, these are things that I'm like, I don't know what we're doing here aside from I guess we're saying, oh, my whole life, I did this thing, and now it's this.

00:35:12 [Speaker 2]
But it was such a flip of a switch.

00:35:13 [Speaker 1]
You're not alone.
00:35:15 [Speaker 1]
He's not alone.
00:35:17 [Speaker 1]
There is hope outside of he can't be the one and only.
00:35:21 [Speaker 1]
And that's the thing is, like, I feel like I would like this movie better if I had I not seen the Guardians of the Galaxy movies maybe.
00:35:28 [Speaker 1]
I really enjoy the Lex Luthor performance quite a bit.

00:35:32 [Speaker 1]
I like that he has acolytes, like, almost people that go on to, what's it called?
00:35:38 [Speaker 1]
The fucking what QAnon sites and what it, like, that that are, like, yeah.
00:35:42 [Speaker 1]
I'll do anything to be in the gravity of a billionaire, like, whatever.
00:35:46 [Speaker 1]
I'll I'll be your sycophant.
00:35:47 [Speaker 1]
That's a good really good storyline, I think, and really well acted by Nicholas Sohl.

00:35:51 [Speaker 3]
This is also the thing there's so much stuff in this.

00:35:54 [Speaker 2]
There's so

00:35:54 [Speaker 1]
many characters.

00:35:55 [Speaker 2]
It's so overstuffed.
00:35:57 [Speaker 2]
It's so Okay.
00:35:58 [Speaker 2]
Job should be show, not tell, and this movie is so much tell not show.

00:36:02 [Speaker 1]
I don't disagree with you.
00:36:04 [Speaker 1]
The thing that sings for me outside of the quits that do work, and I do think there is a level of this character going through a process and I don't really love the lack of use of Pa and I don't love the lack of use of Perry or some of these kind of, like, father figures that you see a level of guidance from or what have you in other iterations.
00:36:33 [Speaker 1]
He come overcomes a a basically, like, your culture or your past is one thing or, you know, it's a a thing that, you know, the yellow sun of whatever blah blah blah.
00:36:44 [Speaker 1]
But now you're on Earth, and you're in love with Lois, and I do believe he's in love with her.
00:36:51 [Speaker 1]
And like I said, I need that romantic hook really badly.

00:36:56 [Speaker 1]
And I'm getting that because Earth is not his home.
00:37:03 [Speaker 1]
Lois is his home.
00:37:06 [Speaker 1]
And I get that from this movie.
00:37:08 [Speaker 1]
I get a Simpsons level of like, do it for her, where they have a conversation about the dog and that that there's some dialogue there where it's like, oh shit.
00:37:17 [Speaker 1]
Now you're okay, James Gunn, where it's like we're not just relying on emotional stuff to happen from me because of animals or or what have you or big effects set pieces or whatnot.

00:37:29 [Speaker 1]
Like, this is two actors that are doing something, and I like how it's like the the dimensional imp is like in the background.
00:37:36 [Speaker 1]
And it's funny and it's distracting, but it's like, I'm like, no.
00:37:39 [Speaker 1]
I'm actually pretty locked into this.
00:37:41 [Speaker 1]
This is two actors doing pretty good work.
00:37:45 [Speaker 1]
And if Earth is her home, like, he's gonna fight for that because she's his home.

00:37:51 [Speaker 1]
And I I really do get that.
00:37:53 [Speaker 1]
And I do get the the very triumphant I I like the modernization of a of a lot of things that happen here.
00:38:02 [Speaker 1]
It is repackaged.
00:38:03 [Speaker 1]
There are some new things that do work.
00:38:06 [Speaker 1]
I like some of the humor of the Justice Gang.

00:38:08 [Speaker 1]
Edie Gathegi and Nathan Fillion and, I'm forgetting, Hawkgirl, that actress.
00:38:14 [Speaker 1]
I think there's some good stuff there.
00:38:16 [Speaker 1]
It is a little bit leaned on.

00:38:18 [Speaker 2]
Isabella, Isabella Merced.

00:38:20 [Speaker 1]
Thank you.
00:38:21 [Speaker 1]
It's leaned on a little, but it works.
00:38:25 [Speaker 1]
And I'm trying to also consider, like, this is a global character.
00:38:29 [Speaker 1]
It has to appeal across all sorts of fucking markets and edits and whatever whatever.
00:38:35 [Speaker 1]
And I know that it sucks to have to keep those kind of things in mind, but that's literally the fucking reality.

00:38:44 [Speaker 1]
And I do still get the, Superman is a champion for the oppressed.

00:38:50 [Speaker 2]
So I did not.
00:38:51 [Speaker 2]
And I'm look, man.
00:38:53 [Speaker 2]
I'm a Superman geek, so I'm gonna say it.
00:38:54 [Speaker 2]
Like, I if we get more Superman stuff, I'm good with that.
00:38:58 [Speaker 2]
I want more Superman.

00:38:59 [Speaker 2]
I want more Superman stories.
00:39:01 [Speaker 2]
But I will say that, like, I'm with you.
00:39:03 [Speaker 2]
I did really I thought most of the cast was well cast.
00:39:09 [Speaker 2]
I have a little bit of a disconnect again because I'm aware of the mister Terrific character.
00:39:13 [Speaker 2]
A character like mister Terrific for me, it was, yes, he had probably the most moments out of the Justice King, maybe even more so than even Lois.

00:39:22 [Speaker 2]
He felt like the most

00:39:23 [Speaker 1]
vital support.

00:39:24 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:39:24 [Speaker 2]
He was he kinda handled all this stuff that Superman wouldn't have been able to do in the story.
00:39:29 [Speaker 2]
But he was kinda reduced down to this like, oh, yeah.
00:39:32 [Speaker 2]
Y'all jab turkeys.
00:39:34 [Speaker 2]
We had kind of reduced a character that is not traditionally that in the comics to just the black guy that says the black guy thing in this moment, And it was a little bit hard for me.

00:39:44 [Speaker 2]
I tried to let that go.
00:39:45 [Speaker 2]
As a child of immigrants, there are things that I, connected myself to this character and have, have have strived to be the type of man that this character represents.
00:39:56 [Speaker 2]
But the difficulty, I think, is watching everything that you're saying and and kind of feeling like I won't gatekeep it.
00:40:06 [Speaker 2]
I won't and if 20 people go and read a comic with mister Terrificnow or go into the animated series and see more stories with them, I'm for it.
00:40:14 [Speaker 2]
If someone jumps into this with the character that I love and they wanna read more Superman stories or watch more Superman stuff and and have a different feeling about the character, I'm for them.

00:40:26 [Speaker 2]
I'm all

00:40:27 [Speaker 3]
for that.

00:40:27 [Speaker 1]
The the problem for the move movie for me, the main thing is, like, this the stakes, I don't really feel them.
00:40:35 [Speaker 1]
Maybe I would have felt them more of the monster thing happened and it was like a victory happened first and then a defeat happened, and I don't fucking know.
00:40:43 [Speaker 1]
I'd have to see it.
00:40:44 [Speaker 1]
I can't do that in my mind.
00:40:46 [Speaker 1]
I I also never feel like Lois is any, like, in any real danger.

00:40:50 [Speaker 1]
It is that is that rip in the portal, which I like that he Lexus, like, yep.
00:40:55 [Speaker 1]
Recreated the Hadron Collider thing.
00:40:57 [Speaker 1]
Did it until I got this.
00:40:59 [Speaker 1]
Got into a a pocket dimension.
00:41:01 [Speaker 1]
Is that, like, the negative zone, essentially?

00:41:03 [Speaker 1]
Is he in control of the negative zone?

00:41:05 [Speaker 2]
Like the phantom zone?
00:41:06 [Speaker 2]
No.
00:41:06 [Speaker 2]
I think pocket dimension stuff

00:41:08 [Speaker 1]
Phantom zone.
00:41:08 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
00:41:08 [Speaker 1]
From,

00:41:09 [Speaker 2]
funny enough, him riffing off stuff from all star Superman.
00:41:12 [Speaker 2]
And just leaning into the weird strange sixties era sci fi weirdness stuff, and that's what he which, again, that's Gunn's love.
00:41:21 [Speaker 2]
Right?
00:41:21 [Speaker 2]
Gunn will always jump into the weird stuff.
00:41:24 [Speaker 2]
He liked, you know, Starro in the the Suicide Squad.

00:41:27 [Speaker 2]
Right?

00:41:27 [Speaker 1]
Like Yeah.

00:41:28 [Speaker 3]
Right.

00:41:28 [Speaker 2]
So it's it's a little bit of the weird comic book stuff.

00:41:30 [Speaker 1]
The collector in Guardians of the Galaxy, which this moment feels a little like the like that that the that collector stuff.
00:41:37 [Speaker 1]
There's

00:41:38 [Speaker 2]
That stuff.

00:41:38 [Speaker 3]
There's a

00:41:39 [Speaker 1]
lot of stuff that just feels like guardians, and there's a lot of color.
00:41:42 [Speaker 1]
And this is where I also realized that the toward the end of the movie that it's like, oh, this filmmaker style is very clean.
00:41:51 [Speaker 1]
It's very bright.
00:41:53 [Speaker 1]
It's very colorful.
00:41:55 [Speaker 1]
This is just this is their style.

00:41:57 [Speaker 1]
This is not the Superman world or the Guardians world, which are both really well built worlds.
00:42:03 [Speaker 1]
Absolutely.
00:42:04 [Speaker 1]
I will say that.
00:42:05 [Speaker 1]
Feel like that is one of the big important things in the movie is, like, we're world building.
00:42:08 [Speaker 1]
We're world building to the point where it's like Supergirl shows up at the end, and I'm like, Ay yi yi.

00:42:15 [Speaker 1]
Like, don't make me feel like I have to watch TV shows, and don't set me up for this or that.
00:42:21 [Speaker 1]
But I will say as many things as I dislike about it, and I I do disagree I do agree with you on some of the stuff.
00:42:30 [Speaker 1]
I really like when Superman's like, I love you.
00:42:32 [Speaker 1]
Because I feel like in this generation, maybe, I don't know.
00:42:36 [Speaker 1]
I'm only I'm only about 52 years old.

00:42:39 [Speaker 1]
That's a really hard thing to do to exchange those words.
00:42:44 [Speaker 1]
Like, that's super serious, and I do feel a level of sincerity there between those two actors.
00:42:51 [Speaker 1]
I think David Cornsweatt is also I wanna say I think he's very good.
00:42:54 [Speaker 1]
I think he's my favorite Superman outside of Reeve.
00:42:57 [Speaker 1]
I think he does a really excellent job.

00:42:59 [Speaker 1]
He's super charming.
00:43:02 [Speaker 1]
Moses, you or me first?

00:43:05 [Speaker 2]
I'll I'll go because I do wanna say this.
00:43:07 [Speaker 2]
For me, if you are going into this film and you are going, oh, man.
00:43:12 [Speaker 2]
I'm super excited.
00:43:13 [Speaker 2]
It's James Gunn who came from the MCU doing a Superman film.
00:43:17 [Speaker 2]
And if that is what you like, then that is what you're gonna get.

00:43:20 [Speaker 2]
And if you're like, oh, man.
00:43:22 [Speaker 2]
It's James Gunn coming from the MCU doing a Superman film.
00:43:25 [Speaker 2]
I don't like that.
00:43:26 [Speaker 2]
You're probably gonna feel bad about this.
00:43:29 [Speaker 2]
At best, I'll say it's Superman is like the Guardians of the Galaxy volume two.

00:43:35 [Speaker 1]
I agree with this.
00:43:36 [Speaker 1]
I agree with this.

00:43:37 [Speaker 2]
Overstuffed, overdone, everything in the kitchen sink.
00:43:41 [Speaker 2]
Some really great ideas, nothing feels fully developed, way too many characters, way too much stuff going on, way too much stuff filled where you're like, this is gonna be really cute, emotionally manipulative, all that other stuff.
00:43:54 [Speaker 2]
But in spite of all that, there are really great actors in it.
00:43:59 [Speaker 2]
There's really great characters in it.
00:44:00 [Speaker 2]
For me, nothing really stuck out emotionally.

00:44:03 [Speaker 2]
With all that being said, I'm giving the movie two whistles for crypto out of five.

00:44:11 [Speaker 1]
Oh, wow.
00:44:12 [Speaker 1]
This is a point where even post conversation, were you at a two?

00:44:17 [Speaker 2]
I For pre conversation,

00:44:18 [Speaker 1]
pre conversation, you were at a two?

00:44:20 [Speaker 2]
Pre conversation, I was at a two, and I was really

00:44:23 [Speaker 1]
We did not move the needle.

00:44:25 [Speaker 2]
I was hoping deeply to, one, I wanted to hear everything.
00:44:29 [Speaker 2]
But going in, I was bracing because what I didn't wanna do is just hate on the film.
00:44:34 [Speaker 2]
I do need to do this.
00:44:35 [Speaker 2]
I will say this, and it is very important.
00:44:37 [Speaker 2]
As a Superman geek, I always need to get myself a calibration view, a recalibration view.

00:44:42 [Speaker 2]
So I should see it again knowing all these things that I feel or have felt when I upon initial my initial response.
00:44:51 [Speaker 2]
That being said, it is the first Superman film upon first viewing that immediately leaving the theater I had a feeling.
00:44:59 [Speaker 2]
And as I did the hour drive home, the more and more I thought about it, the less and less I liked it.
00:45:05 [Speaker 2]
Then then I miss you, bro.
00:45:06 [Speaker 2]
Just showing showing love to you here.

00:45:08 [Speaker 2]
Thanks for having me.
00:45:09 [Speaker 2]
It's rough days.

00:45:10 [Speaker 1]
It's rough place.

00:45:11 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:45:11 [Speaker 2]
I'm on the other side of it, which is like, look.
00:45:13 [Speaker 2]
If you really like gun, you're probably gonna like this movie.
00:45:15 [Speaker 2]
Okay?
00:45:16 [Speaker 2]
And if you don't like gun, you're not gonna like this.

00:45:18 [Speaker 2]
And he's not it's not a gun that you've never seen before.
00:45:21 [Speaker 2]
If you like guardians, all of them, and if you think the guardians and many people do.
00:45:25 [Speaker 2]
Many people going into this are going guardians is my favorite series in the MCU.
00:45:30 [Speaker 2]
You are gonna love this thing.
00:45:32 [Speaker 2]
I sadly was not that guy.

00:45:34 [Speaker 1]
Okay.
00:45:35 [Speaker 1]
Well, Moses is at a two.
00:45:37 [Speaker 1]
I will say I'm doing a liberty rule because I'm your guest, and so I can whatever.
00:45:46 [Speaker 1]
Fuck it.
00:45:47 [Speaker 1]
I walked out of the movie theater and into this conversation at a three point seven five.

00:45:54 [Speaker 1]
I rewatched the original and thought about a lot of things.
00:46:00 [Speaker 1]
This conversation has definitely had an effect on me.
00:46:02 [Speaker 1]
I will not lie.
00:46:03 [Speaker 1]
I feel like you're the kryptonite for this movie.
00:46:06 [Speaker 1]
So Maybe.

00:46:10 [Speaker 1]
The kind of tie that I want, like that romantic thing, energy is indestructible kind of feel that I get from it, and that Superman is more human even than a human.
00:46:25 [Speaker 1]
Even with limitless power, he wants to be at the service of others.
00:46:31 [Speaker 1]
A squirrel.
00:46:32 [Speaker 1]
And I like the costume, the Superman costume.
00:46:35 [Speaker 1]
It looks alien.

00:46:36 [Speaker 1]
It looks like a hodgepodge.
00:46:37 [Speaker 1]
It's like, what the fuck?
00:46:39 [Speaker 1]
In even in in comparison to others and the existence of a soul.
00:46:44 [Speaker 1]
This is a creature with a soul, and that still comes through to me more than it had in any other one than the original.
00:46:57 [Speaker 1]
Can I keep my liberty rule?

00:47:00 [Speaker 2]
Go for it, baby.

00:47:02 [Speaker 1]
I do wanna rewatch this movie especially after this conversation.
00:47:05 [Speaker 1]
Isn't that the point?
00:47:07 [Speaker 1]
I'm gonna go to a 3.25.
00:47:11 [Speaker 1]
You and I have discussed how exhausted we are.
00:47:14 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.

00:47:14 [Speaker 1]
Talking about this movie has been a bit exhausting, and I just felt really fucking tired.
00:47:20 [Speaker 1]
Like, after that movie, like, like, do I get a fucking affogato or like, and sometimes I think the crispness of the movie and just the detail and the colors and the loud and the so many things and people and whatever happening can be a bit exhausting.
00:47:38 [Speaker 1]
But I will say as someone who is a bit more of a fly by night Superman fan, I think this movie is definitely worth watching.
00:47:50 [Speaker 1]
And if you haven't seen, this is a weird caveat.
00:47:53 [Speaker 1]
If you haven't seen and or you really enjoy Guardians of the Galaxy, We both agree.

00:47:59 [Speaker 1]
You will probably fucking really enjoy this movie.

00:48:02 [Speaker 2]
I will take it.

00:48:04 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
00:48:04 [Speaker 1]
Oh, not enough Paul Kent, not enough Perry White, like Pruitt Taylor Vince and Wendell Pierce.
00:48:11 [Speaker 1]
Wasted.
00:48:11 [Speaker 1]
Totally wasted.
00:48:13 [Speaker 1]
I get like, this is like two fucking nerds where a bunch of people are probably, prude to who?

00:48:18 [Speaker 4]
I think your dude ships sound like damn.

00:48:20 [Speaker 3]
Who are they?

00:48:20 [Speaker 1]
Who are they?
00:48:21 [Speaker 1]
Whatda whatda?
00:48:22 [Speaker 1]
Hey, everyone.
00:48:23 [Speaker 1]
This episode of the review review Nunu is brought to you by the review review podcast.
00:48:30 [Speaker 1]
We're gonna take a short break and we will be back with you.

00:48:33 [Speaker 1]
We're so excited.
00:48:34 [Speaker 1]
Just hold on tight.
00:48:36 [Speaker 1]
We won't let you fall.
00:48:37 [Speaker 1]
We'll be back.

00:48:39 [Speaker 5]
Hey, everybody.
00:48:40 [Speaker 5]
Sorry.
00:48:40 [Speaker 5]
I can't be there for this super sweaty seventies episode.
00:48:45 [Speaker 5]
I am away, and, what's got me excited is that I'm, I'm in the midst of my short film, Roughways.
00:48:52 [Speaker 5]
That is why I cannot be there for this super episode, but I'm so glad that Paul and Moses are there to tackle this, super beast.

00:49:02 [Speaker 5]
Let's go quickly, shall we?
00:49:04 [Speaker 5]
I've been watching Poker Face.
00:49:06 [Speaker 5]
That's right, Rian Johnson's Poker Face, starring Natasha Lyonne.
00:49:10 [Speaker 5]
I really like that show.
00:49:11 [Speaker 5]
It's a fun callback to the mystery shows of yore, like Columbo or Murder, She Wrote.

00:49:17 [Speaker 5]
And I just love Natasha Lyonne and I love Rian Johnson.
00:49:20 [Speaker 5]
I think it's a great, fun, little, story.
00:49:25 [Speaker 5]
And who doesn't love a mystery?
00:49:27 [Speaker 5]
And Johnson's great at them.
00:49:29 [Speaker 5]
That's what I've been watching.

00:49:30 [Speaker 5]
I just got back from watching James Gunn's Superman in Dolby Cinema.
00:49:36 [Speaker 5]
This is a movie that is very James Gunn.
00:49:39 [Speaker 5]
I think that if you like James Gunn, you will probably enjoy it.
00:49:43 [Speaker 5]
If you don't like James Gunn hi, Moses.
00:49:46 [Speaker 5]
I I think you might actually hate it.

00:49:48 [Speaker 5]
And I, I enjoyed it.
00:49:50 [Speaker 5]
I didn't love it.
00:49:51 [Speaker 5]
I think it's a flawed movie.
00:49:53 [Speaker 5]
I think some of the issues that I was concerned about did rear their ugly head, but I also enjoyed some of it.
00:50:00 [Speaker 5]
Mostly, I liked sort of the big bombastic, outlandish, cartoonish, campy stuff that we have never really seen in a live action Superman.

00:50:12 [Speaker 5]
So that's sort of my 2¢.
00:50:14 [Speaker 5]
I'm kind of in the middle of a three or three and a half.
00:50:16 [Speaker 5]
I'm gonna go with three and a half, crypto dogs, which is different from a crypto bro.
00:50:24 [Speaker 5]
So, you know, it's not we're not talking about doges here.
00:50:26 [Speaker 5]
We're talking about dogs.

00:50:27 [Speaker 5]
Right?
00:50:28 [Speaker 5]
Dogs.
00:50:29 [Speaker 5]
And, yes, I I feel very emotionally manipulated by this CG dog, and it got me.
00:50:35 [Speaker 5]
So three and a half crypto doges.

00:50:41 [Speaker 1]
We're gonna we're back from break.
00:50:44 [Speaker 1]
I did have a really good movie theater experience, and the home experience, the theater experience is also there I am holding.

00:50:52 [Speaker 2]
And, Paul, like you, sir, I will do a review of a song made for myself.

00:50:57 [Speaker 1]
That's what we do.
00:50:59 [Speaker 1]
Oh, who knew?
00:51:01 [Speaker 1]
Moses knew.
00:51:01 [Speaker 1]
We're back with Moses Olsen, and we just got done talking about five Uber?
00:51:07 [Speaker 1]
Five upper.

00:51:09 [Speaker 1]
Five up top, man.

00:51:11 [Speaker 2]
Oh, yeah.

00:51:13 [Speaker 1]
That's what that's who he is.
00:51:15 [Speaker 1]
We don't play cinephile right now.
00:51:17 [Speaker 1]
Ben is busy.
00:51:18 [Speaker 1]
He's gone.
00:51:19 [Speaker 1]
He has the cinephile cards with him.

00:51:21 [Speaker 1]
If you want to slay him, you have to get the cinephile cards.
00:51:25 [Speaker 1]
They are the source of his power.
00:51:28 [Speaker 1]
Alright.
00:51:29 [Speaker 1]
We are going to talk a little bit about the Superman film directed by Dickie Don Yeah.
00:51:39 [Speaker 1]
From 1978.

00:51:41 [Speaker 1]
Moe Yeah.
00:51:42 [Speaker 1]
Will you just, like let's let's do this, man.

00:51:44 [Speaker 2]
Let's let's just jump let's fly into this, sir.
00:51:48 [Speaker 2]
This

00:51:48 [Speaker 3]
is gonna be

00:51:49 [Speaker 2]
fun for me.
00:51:50 [Speaker 2]
I, I'll I'll tell you this for free.
00:51:53 [Speaker 2]
Superman 1978 Warner Brothers Pictures, Dove Mead Limited, rated PG, two hours and twenty three minutes.
00:52:01 [Speaker 2]
Its budget was 55,000,000 estimated, adjusted about 270,600,000.0 adjusted.
00:52:10 [Speaker 2]
Its opening weekend was 12/17/1978.

00:52:16 [Speaker 2]
7,400,000.0 adjusted at 36.4 mil.
00:52:21 [Speaker 2]
Final gross in North America was a $134,400,000, adjusted $661,200,000.

00:52:30 [Speaker 1]
Final gross Oh.
00:52:31 [Speaker 1]
For adjustments, this movie needed to make about $575,600,000,000 to today's equivalent to have done well.
00:52:41 [Speaker 1]
It had to have made an insane amount of money.
00:52:44 [Speaker 1]
It's crazy when you just look at the standard budget numbers from that point of time.
00:52:49 [Speaker 1]
But apparently, the new one needs to make 700 plus million.

00:52:53 [Speaker 1]
This one needed to make about 600,000,000 equivalent.
00:52:57 [Speaker 1]
It needed to make a lot of money to be a big success, and it didn't.
00:53:02 [Speaker 1]
Go on, won't you?

00:53:03 [Speaker 2]
And, again, can still consider it a massive hit for Warner Brothers.
00:53:07 [Speaker 2]
Final gross world Huge.
00:53:09 [Speaker 2]
Huge, huge, 300,470,000.00 adjusted.
00:53:13 [Speaker 2]
Again, huge numbers here.
00:53:14 [Speaker 2]
1.4 and $7,000,000,000.

00:53:17 [Speaker 2]
Okay.

00:53:18 [Speaker 1]
Through here.
00:53:18 [Speaker 1]
This this is to the point, Superman has now evolved past truth justice in the American way.
00:53:24 [Speaker 1]
It's now truth justice in the global way, the the worldwide way, the human way, the way of the dollar.
00:53:31 [Speaker 1]
Always the dollars.
00:53:32 [Speaker 1]
The way of appealing to everybody.

00:53:34 [Speaker 5]
Always the fucking dollar.

00:53:35 [Speaker 1]
Give me the dollar.

00:53:38 [Speaker 2]
Show me the money.
00:53:39 [Speaker 2]
Other releases this weekend, Uncle Joe Shannon.

00:53:43 [Speaker 1]
The fuck?

00:53:44 [Speaker 2]
Bro, as a as a movie nerd, I have no idea what this movie is.

00:53:50 [Speaker 1]
The fuck?

00:53:52 [Speaker 2]
And I'm so glad that this exists here because it's going to force me to go look it

00:53:56 [Speaker 1]
up.
00:53:56 [Speaker 1]
Excellent.

00:53:58 [Speaker 2]
Weekend top five, this film was number one following a weekend beaten by every which way but loose, go Clint Eastwood.

00:54:03 [Speaker 1]
Isn't that wild?
00:54:05 [Speaker 1]
Literally.
00:54:05 [Speaker 1]
I mean Look, man.

00:54:06 [Speaker 2]
That's the orangutan one.
00:54:07 [Speaker 2]
Right?

00:54:08 [Speaker 3]
The premise is he's just an orangut.
00:54:11 [Speaker 3]
It's wild.
00:54:12 [Speaker 3]
Look.

00:54:13 [Speaker 2]
Top five films this year domestic were Grease.
00:54:16 [Speaker 2]
Funny little bit that John Travolta was wanted by the studio to play Superman.
00:54:20 [Speaker 2]
National Lampoon's Animal House, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Every Which Way But Loose, Heaven Can Wait, and, Superman again, top grossing film of 1979.
00:54:31 [Speaker 2]
Films of

00:54:32 [Speaker 3]
the came

00:54:32 [Speaker 1]
out just before '79 happened.
00:54:35 [Speaker 1]
So couldn't be the top of '78.

00:54:38 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:54:39 [Speaker 2]
And I I tend to, in my brain, think of it as '79.
00:54:42 [Speaker 2]
But

00:54:42 [Speaker 1]
Sure.
00:54:43 [Speaker 1]
Of course.
00:54:43 [Speaker 1]
Right?

00:54:44 [Speaker 2]
Films of note from '78, Jaws two, Damien, the Omen two.
00:54:48 [Speaker 2]
Fun fact, the director of Superman directed the first Omen.

00:54:52 [Speaker 1]
That's right.

00:54:53 [Speaker 2]
Saturday Night Fever, the eyes of Laura Mars, the Wiz.
00:54:57 [Speaker 2]
Oh, I love the Wiz.

00:54:58 [Speaker 1]
That movie's Shut

00:54:59 [Speaker 2]
up to the Wiz.

00:55:00 [Speaker 1]
Ice Castle.
00:55:01 [Speaker 1]
Jackson, Diana Ross.

00:55:02 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:55:02 [Speaker 2]
Diana Ross.
00:55:03 [Speaker 2]
Rules.
00:55:04 [Speaker 2]
Just a Criterion Collection.
00:55:06 [Speaker 2]
In Lord of the Rings animated, that's the Ralph Bakshi produced one.

00:55:09 [Speaker 2]
Right?

00:55:10 [Speaker 1]
Yes.

00:55:11 [Speaker 2]
Letterbox average, 3.7.
00:55:14 [Speaker 2]
Please find these good looking men on Letterboxd at Paul Axe Badly and at Run BMC.
00:55:23 [Speaker 2]
And look, I'm here and I get to do this, which is weird.
00:55:26 [Speaker 2]
You can follow me at at Foley Moses, w h o l l y m o s e s, on Letterboxd.

00:55:33 [Speaker 3]
Mhmm.

00:55:33 [Speaker 2]
Sysco Niebert gave it two thumbs up.
00:55:36 [Speaker 2]
The Rotten Tomatoes score is 93%.
00:55:39 [Speaker 2]
8086%.
00:55:40 [Speaker 2]
Popcorn meta score average is 82.

00:55:46 [Speaker 1]
7.9 is the score from the users.
00:55:49 [Speaker 1]
Gotcha.
00:55:49 [Speaker 1]
It's like the popcorn score.

00:55:51 [Speaker 2]
And awards and nominations, three Oscar noms, received special Oscar for visual effects, Golden Globe nomination for John Williams score, and Saturn winner for best picture.
00:56:01 [Speaker 2]
The director was Richard Donner.
00:56:04 [Speaker 2]
Rest in peace, the the nice for himself.
00:56:07 [Speaker 2]
They'll be the weapon series, the Goonies, Scrooged, timeline.

00:56:12 [Speaker 1]
And as I said Ben loves timeline.
00:56:14 [Speaker 1]
He'd be so mad that he's not here when we're talking about timeline.
00:56:17 [Speaker 1]
Dick.

00:56:20 [Speaker 2]
Was Paul Walker in timeline?

00:56:22 [Speaker 1]
You betcha.
00:56:23 [Speaker 1]
Jerry Butler.

00:56:24 [Speaker 2]
There it is.
00:56:25 [Speaker 2]
You betcha.
00:56:26 [Speaker 2]
Writers, the Mario Puzo, rest in peace.
00:56:31 [Speaker 2]
The godfather saga, David Newman, rest in peace, who also wrote what's up doc, Leslie Newman, Santa Claus, Robert Benton, writer Kramer versus Kramer.
00:56:43 [Speaker 2]
And, again, much love.

00:56:46 [Speaker 2]
Always a shout out to Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, the creators of this iconic character.
00:56:51 [Speaker 2]
Director of photography was Jeffrey Unsworth.
00:56:54 [Speaker 2]
Rest in peace.
00:56:56 [Speaker 2]
2,001 Space Odyssey Cabaret, Tess.

00:57:00 [Speaker 1]
Home 02/2001.
00:57:01 [Speaker 1]
You don't say.

00:57:02 [Speaker 2]
02/2001.

00:57:03 [Speaker 1]
You don't say.

00:57:05 [Speaker 2]
Music by the John Williams, Raiders of the Lost Ark.

00:57:09 [Speaker 1]
Johnny Bills.

00:57:11 [Speaker 2]
Home Alone two, Lost in New York.
00:57:13 [Speaker 2]
Producer, Pierre Spangler, Revolver, Incubus, Alexander and Ilya Salkind, rest in peace, Alexander.
00:57:21 [Speaker 2]
Most of the Superman saga was through them and even some of the television stuff afterwards.

00:57:26 [Speaker 1]
Mhmm.

00:57:27 [Speaker 2]
The cast, the amazing Christopher Reeve, rest in peace, playing Clark and Kal El, and Superman, speechless, street smart, somewhere in time.

00:57:38 [Speaker 1]
What a fucking performance as you were saying, man.

00:57:41 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.

00:57:41 [Speaker 1]
Truly.

00:57:43 [Speaker 2]
Margo Kidder, again, rest in peace.
00:57:46 [Speaker 2]
Lois Lane, Black Christmas in 1974 version that had four in '79.
00:57:51 [Speaker 2]
Servitude, Gene Hackman, rest in peace.
00:57:55 [Speaker 2]
Lex Luther, Unforgiven, Bonnie and Clyde, Runaway Jury, Ned Beatty, rest in peace, who played Otis Network Deliverance Shooter, Jackie Cooper, rest in peace, Perry White, also in the champ, chosen survivors, the love machine, Glenn Ford, rest in peace, playing Pa Kent, Pocket Full of Miracles, Gilda, Virus, the 1980 version, the Marlon Brando, rest in peace Jor El, Don Juan DeMarco, the island of doctor Moreau, Apocalypse Now, Valerie, Pareen, miss Tessmacher, Slaughterhouse Five, Lenny, the electric horseman.
00:58:34 [Speaker 2]
And it's so insane to say this because we are talking about such an iconic piece of cinema.

00:58:39 [Speaker 2]
Hopefully, not sharing too much of where my rating is going right off when you're jumping into this.
00:58:43 [Speaker 2]
But as of this recording, she is the last surviving principal cast member.

00:58:48 [Speaker 1]
Wow.

00:58:48 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:58:49 [Speaker 2]
In the movie.

00:58:50 [Speaker 1]
Moving from there, let's talk about some fun facts.
00:58:54 [Speaker 1]
This is the appropriate

00:58:54 [Speaker 2]
time.
00:58:55 [Speaker 2]
Fun

00:58:56 [Speaker 1]
facts.
00:58:57 [Speaker 1]
Everybody, it's fun fact time.
00:59:00 [Speaker 1]
Marlon Brando suggested to Dickie Don's director Richard Donner that the cameras roll during rehearsals.
00:59:07 [Speaker 1]
Brando reportedly said, who knows?
00:59:10 [Speaker 1]
We might get lucky.

00:59:11 [Speaker 1]
That was bad.
00:59:12 [Speaker 1]
I didn't commit.
00:59:13 [Speaker 1]
According to Donner, Brando's very first takes were often the ones used in the finished film.
00:59:19 [Speaker 1]
Brando was notoriously lazy and was constantly working to lessen his acting workload.
00:59:27 [Speaker 1]
Christopher Reeve even complained about it in interviews, most famously national television interview late night with David Letterman while promoting the film.

00:59:40 [Speaker 1]
So to obtain the muscular build to convincingly play Superman, Christopher Reeve adopted a bodybuilding regime and was supervised by David Prowse, the man who played Doth Virdall.
00:59:52 [Speaker 1]
In the original Star Wars trilogy, Reeve had gained 40 pounds by the time of filling.
00:59:58 [Speaker 1]
Sound familiar?
00:59:59 [Speaker 1]
Initially, Gene Hackman refused to shave off his mustache to play Lex Luthor.
01:00:06 [Speaker 1]
In early one sheets of the movie, his face is even featured with the mustache.

01:00:11 [Speaker 1]
Before Richard Donner and Hackman met face to face, Donner proposed to Hackman that if he would shave his mustache off, Donner would shave his mustache off too.
01:00:22 [Speaker 1]
Hackman agreed.
01:00:23 [Speaker 1]
Donner never had a mustache.
01:00:26 [Speaker 1]
The finished film from preproduction to release took five years.
01:00:31 [Speaker 1]
At the height of filming, over 1,000 full time crew on 11 units were spread over three studio lots and eight countries.

01:00:40 [Speaker 1]
Over 1,000,000 feet of film was used and it had the highest production budget of any film from the time.
01:00:48 [Speaker 1]
Marlon Brando agreed to be paid 3,700,000.0 plus a percentage of the gross for twelve days of shooting.
01:00:55 [Speaker 1]
After suing Ilya Salkind for missed gross payments, he ultimately received about $14,000,000 for ten minutes of screen time.
01:01:04 [Speaker 1]
Unused and reused footage of Brando shot for this film and the sequel appears in Superman two, the Richard Donner cut and Superman returns.
01:01:12 [Speaker 1]
Moses is a fan of Superman returns.

01:01:15 [Speaker 1]
I I think you should read the log line to this movie.

01:01:18 [Speaker 2]
The log line is an alien orphan is sent from this dying planet to Earth where he grows up to become his adoptive home's first and greatest superhero.

01:01:28 [Speaker 1]
That's pretty damn good.
01:01:30 [Speaker 1]
That's pretty damn good.
01:01:32 [Speaker 1]
This episode is brought to you by the dollar.
01:01:36 [Speaker 1]
The all ID aller.
01:01:39 [Speaker 1]
What?

01:01:39 [Speaker 1]
Oh, the almighty doll.
01:01:41 [Speaker 1]
I get jokes.
01:01:42 [Speaker 1]
This episode is brought to you by the dollar because that's what we're about here people.
01:01:45 [Speaker 1]
The dollars.
01:01:47 [Speaker 1]
Obviously.

01:01:48 [Speaker 5]
Always the dollars.

01:01:49 [Speaker 1]
We'll be back.

01:01:50 [Speaker 5]
Always the fucking dollars.

01:01:52 [Speaker 1]
I've been editing this for like ten or more hours today.
01:01:55 [Speaker 1]
So I'm gonna try

01:01:56 [Speaker 3]
to do this in one take.
01:01:57 [Speaker 3]
No cuts.
01:01:59 [Speaker 3]
Do you believe me, chair in this ad?

01:02:03 [Speaker 4]
Well, it's not.
01:02:03 [Speaker 4]
It's Lair.
01:02:04 [Speaker 4]
Larry Tetherman, unsuccessful share impersonator and finance guy with a license from the Madoff School of Money.
01:02:12 [Speaker 4]
I wanna tell you about Dollar App.
01:02:15 [Speaker 4]
It's the app money account and stock, etcetera, dashboard for all your trading, basing, bonding, junking, trunking, and bunk money needs including all the most up to date shit.

01:02:25 [Speaker 4]
Crypto, crypto, dang, crypto, dang, crypto, do fuck ass mustache, crypt bro, the crypt keep is my bro, ether, Unutia, nizer and coin, coin fuzz, moist coin, only coins, only fans coins, only coin fans, jack o lantern futures, bro crypto, and the euro.
01:02:44 [Speaker 4]
To invest, download or DM me, reach out to these guys here at run b m c and at paul x badly on letterboxed or at reviewx2podcast on Insta on blue sky.
01:02:57 [Speaker 4]
Like, subscribe, all that shit and all those other places.

01:03:01 [Speaker 3]
Back to the program now is a share?

01:03:05 [Speaker 4]
Would you be lee Richard?
01:03:07 [Speaker 4]
It's not share.
01:03:08 [Speaker 4]
Legally, I I do have to disclose that.

01:03:11 [Speaker 1]
We're back everyone.
01:03:12 [Speaker 1]
I think it's very important that I say this as it will come up in conversation as we're about to talk about the '78 Superman.
01:03:19 [Speaker 1]
I rate the Superman from this year 2025 pocket dimensions.
01:03:24 [Speaker 1]
Or wait, is that just a, like, a rainbow lady part?
01:03:29 [Speaker 1]
Is that it's just a rainbow?

01:03:31 [Speaker 1]
It's just

01:03:31 [Speaker 2]
It doesn't exist.

01:03:33 [Speaker 1]
Oh, okay.
01:03:34 [Speaker 1]
Right.
01:03:35 [Speaker 1]
It's Lego Neon Lego River.
01:03:37 [Speaker 1]
Whatever it is, I rated those pocket dimensions.
01:03:41 [Speaker 1]
I don't know.

01:03:42 [Speaker 1]
Superman, what was your first experience with this film from '78, Moses?
01:03:47 [Speaker 1]
Like, tell tell me get get nostalgic, please.

01:03:51 [Speaker 2]
As we started this off right, I'm I'm a big Superman fan.
01:03:55 [Speaker 2]
So for me, Superman is one of those characters and and the movie itself is one of the things that's just always been around.
01:04:03 [Speaker 2]
I don't even know, honestly, where and how I saw my first Superman screening.
01:04:11 [Speaker 2]
Maybe a friend's house.
01:04:13 [Speaker 2]
Someone had, like, an old laserdisc.

01:04:16 [Speaker 2]
And I I think at this point, laserdisc weren't even popular or even really in production, but someone had

01:04:22 [Speaker 1]
it.
01:04:23 [Speaker 1]
Moses, laserdiscs were never popular.

01:04:27 [Speaker 2]
That's true.
01:04:27 [Speaker 2]
I mean, I'm, like, not even in production, I should say.
01:04:30 [Speaker 2]
The reality is Superman the movie, especially probably the first three, were always around.

01:04:37 [Speaker 1]
Just omnipresent.
01:04:39 [Speaker 1]
Just yeah.
01:04:39 [Speaker 1]
Like a godlike figure.

01:04:41 [Speaker 2]
Always a part of my in my world somewhere, but I think it was probably blockbuster era, home video era that I think just renting them became more of a thing.
01:04:53 [Speaker 2]
And, obviously, TV, seeing the home video four by three versions on television always chucked up by commercials.
01:05:00 [Speaker 2]
So it's it's just been a thing that's legitimately always been in my life.
01:05:03 [Speaker 2]
Probably that DVD release, that really cool d DVD release when, you know, studios kinda cared about DVDs was probably the first time that it really

01:05:11 [Speaker 1]
Those are the days.

01:05:12 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.

01:05:13 [Speaker 1]
What was your rating at that point in life?

01:05:16 [Speaker 2]
If I was the 18 year old, 20 year old Moses, probably would have given it five stars.

01:05:23 [Speaker 1]
Okay.
01:05:23 [Speaker 1]
That makes a lot of sense.
01:05:24 [Speaker 1]
You just watched this.

01:05:26 [Speaker 2]
Couple nights ago.

01:05:27 [Speaker 1]
Tell me about that experience, and tell me about your current rating having just watched this.

01:05:33 [Speaker 2]
As we kind of started this podcast, I really wanted to go into this particular screening, not trying to be 15 year old or eight year old or five year old Moses that's very familiar with Superman knowing that it's just this part of our zeitgeist and and part of my, like, fiber every fiber of my being and watch it just as a movie and appreciate it just as a movie watching it now.
01:05:59 [Speaker 2]
Because it was home viewing, I watched the director's cut of the film, the non theatrical cut and not the three hour long TV version that I think just recently released.
01:06:10 [Speaker 2]
Uh-huh.
01:06:11 [Speaker 2]
So I went with the director's cut, which has, I think, twenty or thirty minutes added to it.
01:06:15 [Speaker 2]
But it has a scene that I've always thought was really cool and important.

01:06:18 [Speaker 2]
So

01:06:19 [Speaker 1]
I watched watched totally different versions.

01:06:22 [Speaker 2]
Maybe well, the only big thing that I think is different that I always I never understood why they removed it.
01:06:28 [Speaker 2]
It it has this gauntlet scene when Superman drills down into the sewer system.
01:06:33 [Speaker 2]
There's this whole barrage of him getting hit with bullets and fire and ice, and I never understood why that was removed.
01:06:39 [Speaker 2]
And so that sequence is one of the big that was a selling point when they did this director's cut.
01:06:44 [Speaker 2]
So I coming out of that, knowing that there's just a few added scenes with, Jor El talking and this and that, I'm giving you a solid four exploding planets.

01:06:56 [Speaker 1]
That's a good rating, y'all.
01:06:58 [Speaker 1]
That's a a movie you own, a movie you rewatch, a movie that you will mostly recommend to almost anyone pretty proudly, and a movie that if it's not winning big awards deserves those nominations.
01:07:12 [Speaker 1]
That's what

01:07:12 [Speaker 3]
you're saying?

01:07:13 [Speaker 2]
Deserves to be seen.
01:07:14 [Speaker 2]
If you don't know anything about it and you're checking off not just a comic book nerd list, but a list of movies that,

01:07:22 [Speaker 1]
don't This supersedes that, you're saying.
01:07:24 [Speaker 1]
Okay.
01:07:24 [Speaker 1]
Yes.
01:07:25 [Speaker 1]
I wanna come from a lot of the same angles that you just established.
01:07:29 [Speaker 1]
So I'm gonna go ahead and yank your cape.

01:07:33 [Speaker 1]
Keep you from flying.

01:07:34 [Speaker 3]
Take this

01:07:34 [Speaker 2]
off gym though.

01:07:35 [Speaker 1]
In this movie, I'll do my best.
01:07:37 [Speaker 1]
I also this is omnipresent in my life.
01:07:41 [Speaker 1]
One of my earliest memories is being plopped on a couch by a parent while, like, a party's happening and seeing Superman in that pool trying to swim with the stone around his neck.
01:07:54 [Speaker 1]
And the first five or six times that I watched this movie, I mean, for me, it was also like a five, undoubtedly.
01:08:02 [Speaker 1]
It was a movie that could go on almost any time, or I'd catch it almost any time, that three hour TV version.

01:08:08 [Speaker 1]
Great.
01:08:08 [Speaker 1]
Let it roll.
01:08:09 [Speaker 1]
Sounds good to me.
01:08:10 [Speaker 1]
I watched this movie, oh, boy, many, many years ago.
01:08:17 [Speaker 1]
I think maybe I must have been four.

01:08:20 [Speaker 1]
So when that DVD version that came out that you watched was probably about then, And I would have given it three and a half dog whistles.
01:08:29 [Speaker 1]
Amazing that you rated the first one.
01:08:33 [Speaker 1]
The dog whistles.
01:08:35 [Speaker 1]
So I rate Okay.
01:08:36 [Speaker 1]
I rated this three and a half dog whistles at that point.

01:08:41 [Speaker 1]
I watched this today.
01:08:44 [Speaker 1]
I agree with you.
01:08:45 [Speaker 1]
It supersedes, like, comic booky kind of shit.
01:08:49 [Speaker 1]
I think that's a thing that I didn't realize that I wanted when I watched the other Superman movie because that's kind of the stuff that, like, I remember is that kind of era.
01:09:02 [Speaker 1]
It hits a more nostalgic button for me without trying to do it, without wanting to do it.

01:09:07 [Speaker 1]
It is that, and it's so strong in that.
01:09:11 [Speaker 1]
And holy shit is this movie edited so well.
01:09:18 [Speaker 1]
It does feel really long at times.
01:09:22 [Speaker 1]
There are there are points that it like, this movie feels every bit, you know, it's age for lack of a better term.
01:09:29 [Speaker 1]
But especially with effect shots and lighting shots, Stuart Baird and Michael Ellis, like, I like, thank you.

01:09:37 [Speaker 1]
Like, incredible, incredible, incredible editing as we're going film nerdy here.
01:09:42 [Speaker 1]
I watched this on HBO.
01:09:45 [Speaker 1]
Right now, it has no commercials.
01:09:46 [Speaker 1]
I don't pay for the no fucking commercials plan, but they're not showing commercials on anything Superman right now.
01:09:52 [Speaker 1]
And so it breezed by as much as a two hour and twenty two minute movie can breeze by, I think.

01:09:59 [Speaker 1]
Especially from the seventies, movies were pasted a different way, executed a different way, so on and so forth.
01:10:05 [Speaker 1]
I really thought I enjoyed this was part of the thing that's so rough about watching this one after the new one?
01:10:14 [Speaker 1]
Maybe?
01:10:15 [Speaker 1]
I don't know.
01:10:15 [Speaker 1]
Maybe I would have felt the same way.

01:10:17 [Speaker 1]
The flying sequences in this movie are fucking dazzling, Moses.
01:10:22 [Speaker 1]
Dazzling at many points.
01:10:25 [Speaker 1]
And I thought I was mildly dazzled by some of the flying stuff in the new one, and I guess I hadn't really thought about it again until this moment.
01:10:33 [Speaker 1]
I thought I would bring it up when we talked, and I didn't.
01:10:37 [Speaker 1]
And I'm bringing up now before I'm giving you my current rating.

01:10:41 [Speaker 1]
Moses, we're both at a four.
01:10:46 [Speaker 1]
This is just a really fucking good movie, period.
01:10:51 [Speaker 1]
Moses at a four.
01:10:52 [Speaker 1]
I'm at a four.
01:10:53 [Speaker 1]
We're all about the money, y'all.

01:10:55 [Speaker 1]
We're gonna talk about this

01:10:56 [Speaker 3]
Stack the movie.
01:10:57 [Speaker 3]
Stack the movie.

01:10:59 [Speaker 1]
This is already the nostalgic thing for me that just existed at that time is that fucking great Saul Bass Warner Brothers logo.

01:11:07 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.

01:11:08 [Speaker 1]
That is so fucking great and kind of the comic book intro, tombstone does this and a few other movies do this post this movie.
01:11:16 [Speaker 1]
Hey, here's the backstory to a degree and also we're going to show you not tell you.
01:11:23 [Speaker 1]
Here's a quick version and here's this specific story.
01:11:28 [Speaker 1]
Let's see both.
01:11:29 [Speaker 1]
And that transition into the titles, Moses, I shook the earth with my fucking home theater, dude.

01:11:36 [Speaker 1]
It was violent.
01:11:39 [Speaker 1]
Things fell over.
01:11:40 [Speaker 1]
That score and those titles and the stars and the whole thing

01:11:47 [Speaker 2]
I think that there's something we should talk about even right before we hit the one of the most legendary cinema scores in the history of cinema,

01:11:54 [Speaker 1]
American cinema.

01:11:56 [Speaker 2]
Is that that opening with the curtain separating and we get this black and white, you know, almost, right, like, kind of doing a Wizard of Oz thing with the black and white, the kid voice over, turning of the comic pages.
01:12:11 [Speaker 2]
And something I think people tend to forget because it's transcended all these other things in cinema, and it's transcended all these other things in comic dom.
01:12:19 [Speaker 2]
And straight off the bat, even as you're talking about the score, this film specifically is that this movie is legitimately the blueprint for comic book movies.
01:12:30 [Speaker 2]
Right?
01:12:30 [Speaker 2]
It is the barometer.

01:12:33 [Speaker 2]
But what's fascinating is that that opening that is so lovely and has this sense of childlike wonder and is somewhat deemed by today's standards completely unnecessary.
01:12:47 [Speaker 2]
What's really fascinating about that is that I think modern audiences forget that Richard Donner and company were ushering Superman into a then modern era.
01:12:59 [Speaker 2]
They were taking a character that people had known from the forties that had a feeling or understanding, and belief because at this point, they probably had the Kirk Allen Superman.
01:13:09 [Speaker 2]
Right?
01:13:09 [Speaker 2]
They had Okay.

01:13:10 [Speaker 2]
Superman would fly was an animated character doing the flying.
01:13:13 [Speaker 2]
Right?
01:13:13 [Speaker 2]
They had the serials.
01:13:14 [Speaker 2]
They had the Paramount cartoons.
01:13:16 [Speaker 2]
But there was nothing else there.

01:13:18 [Speaker 2]
I do think that that's a really beautiful thing.
01:13:20 [Speaker 2]
And, again, talking a little bit about that, the the newest version of the film.
01:13:24 [Speaker 2]
But that he's taking an audience that may have a preconceived idea.
01:13:28 [Speaker 2]
He promised them in the posters, you'll believe a man can fly.
01:13:32 [Speaker 2]
And he takes all this time by by hugging the original audience, the original fans, and saying, hey.

01:13:39 [Speaker 2]
We respect you.
01:13:40 [Speaker 2]
We love you.
01:13:41 [Speaker 2]
We know what you've been through.
01:13:42 [Speaker 2]
Here we go.

01:13:43 [Speaker 1]
Well, it's really cool that this movie takes a long time to build to these things that are still so fantastical.
01:13:55 [Speaker 1]
Flying is so fantastical.
01:13:57 [Speaker 1]
Picking up a car is so fantastical.
01:14:00 [Speaker 1]
These things are treated in this movie as insane as those things are.
01:14:08 [Speaker 1]
And I really like how grounded the approach is to the power of Superman and how the cat has a zoom.

01:14:21 [Speaker 1]
She just like, it's gonna get violent in here, people, for me.
01:14:24 [Speaker 1]
And oh, boy.
01:14:27 [Speaker 1]
No.
01:14:27 [Speaker 1]
Is the comic book thing opening, like, necessary as you were saying?
01:14:31 [Speaker 1]
No.

01:14:31 [Speaker 1]
It's not.
01:14:32 [Speaker 1]
But does it pull me into a certain level

01:14:35 [Speaker 3]
of

01:14:35 [Speaker 1]
romanticism?
01:14:37 [Speaker 1]
Yes.
01:14:37 [Speaker 1]
It does.
01:14:38 [Speaker 1]
Like, it feels like it is this is in being treated delicately.
01:14:44 [Speaker 1]
Like, I here's the history.

01:14:47 [Speaker 1]
I didn't feel the the history if I hadn't already known what it was.
01:14:51 [Speaker 1]
Like, you talked about things that were over my head for certain.
01:14:54 [Speaker 1]
Things were happened in that movie that were over my head.
01:14:57 [Speaker 1]
This movie is so beautifully simple.
01:15:01 [Speaker 1]
And in doing those really cool, what we see now is like simple things doing really, really crazy complex things and making them seem so simple.

01:15:12 [Speaker 1]
This this movie feels magical.
01:15:14 [Speaker 1]
That's what I think is so fucking cool about it.
01:15:17 [Speaker 1]
Like, even right when we go to Krypton, it's like, this is just like people wearing fucking foil suits and there are red lights on and so and it's like, it's working.
01:15:27 [Speaker 1]
It's just like hula hoops moving around or whatever.
01:15:30 [Speaker 1]
And and it's models models opening to make it look like people are exposed to space and what and it it's all fucking working for me.

01:15:38 [Speaker 1]
I'm totally in this.

01:15:41 [Speaker 2]
I have to say this film specifically, you feel Richard Warner's love.
01:15:46 [Speaker 2]
Like, you feel

01:15:47 [Speaker 1]
So delicate.

01:15:49 [Speaker 2]
It's so delicate.
01:15:50 [Speaker 2]
There's so much care in every frame.
01:15:52 [Speaker 2]
And what's fascinating, it is three it almost is like three films in one.
01:15:56 [Speaker 2]
We're on Krypton, we're in Smallville, and then we get to Metropolis.

01:16:01 [Speaker 1]
And we meet general Zod.
01:16:02 [Speaker 1]
Not that we, like not that anybody necessarily

01:16:04 [Speaker 3]
knows who they are, but we know they're bad.
01:16:04 [Speaker 3]
Like, it's very clear about the most

01:16:11 [Speaker 2]
history.
01:16:11 [Speaker 2]
Because, again, this

01:16:12 [Speaker 3]
is why this is the

01:16:13 [Speaker 2]
dude.
01:16:14 [Speaker 2]
This is the blueprint.
01:16:17 [Speaker 2]
Richard Donner and company set up a sequel knowing that it would be well received.
01:16:22 [Speaker 2]
Obviously, they were filling one

01:16:23 [Speaker 1]
of these back to They had the assumption.
01:16:25 [Speaker 1]
They knew.
01:16:26 [Speaker 1]
Says at the end

01:16:26 [Speaker 3]
of the movie, see you

01:16:27 [Speaker 1]
in a year.
01:16:28 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.

01:16:28 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
01:16:29 [Speaker 2]
And and for them to to start with that, have an actor with that gravitas, I believe they wanted Christopher Lee originally.
01:16:37 [Speaker 2]
But they wanted someone with screen presence that you're he's on screen for such a small amount of time.

01:16:44 [Speaker 3]
But

01:16:44 [Speaker 2]
the other amazing thing about this is that that opening on Krypton, as you're saying, we're seeing models, and you almost see the strings holding things up.
01:16:53 [Speaker 2]
There's just this labor of love in this,

01:16:55 [Speaker 1]
but it's also this weird

01:16:57 [Speaker 2]
no.
01:16:58 [Speaker 2]
I don't care either.
01:16:58 [Speaker 2]
But it's in that other side, which is it's this weird sixties, almost early seventies sci fi

01:17:05 [Speaker 1]
flick.
01:17:05 [Speaker 1]
Yes.

01:17:06 [Speaker 2]
Right?
01:17:06 [Speaker 2]
It's a little weird.
01:17:07 [Speaker 2]
It doesn't again, as we've said before, it doesn't explain it to you.
01:17:11 [Speaker 2]
The dome opens up.
01:17:12 [Speaker 2]
The hootle things happen.

01:17:14 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.

01:17:15 [Speaker 1]
It's the same VP as 02/2001, and it uses some similar storytelling devices through visuals.
01:17:21 [Speaker 1]
You get to kind of interpret what that is and what that means.
01:17:26 [Speaker 1]
Oh my god.
01:17:27 [Speaker 1]
So underrated.
01:17:27 [Speaker 1]
The The the cool thing about this movie, and we were talking about models and and strings and whatever, there's a level of, like, magical realism.

01:17:37 [Speaker 1]
Like, I was saying about the suit in the new movie.
01:17:39 [Speaker 1]
It feels like alien.
01:17:40 [Speaker 1]
Like, yeah.
01:17:41 [Speaker 1]
Okay.
01:17:41 [Speaker 1]
This is alien enough.

01:17:43 [Speaker 1]
This is different enough.
01:17:45 [Speaker 1]
Where they're like, yeah.
01:17:46 [Speaker 1]
Minimalism and no longer being jealous and following your leadership or whatever, like, where it like, they seem to have a weird society to a degree.
01:17:59 [Speaker 1]
The the lady when Jorrel is like, by the way, everybody here, we're gonna fucking die, y'all.
01:18:05 [Speaker 1]
We thought that general guy was the problem.

01:18:07 [Speaker 1]
No.
01:18:08 [Speaker 1]
This place is just, like, fucked.
01:18:10 [Speaker 1]
And that lady's like, excuse me.
01:18:12 [Speaker 1]
There's just gonna be Well, that's where I see a change in, like, the gravitational pull and polarity and whatever.
01:18:16 [Speaker 1]
And I'm just thinking, like, lady, that's that sounds very bad.

01:18:20 [Speaker 1]
Like, that sounds like your planet is going to explode.
01:18:24 [Speaker 1]
Like, you're one of the smart people, though, I guess.
01:18:27 [Speaker 1]
And they send Jor El and Laura Laura?

01:18:31 [Speaker 2]
Yep.
01:18:31 [Speaker 2]
Laura.
01:18:31 [Speaker 2]
Yep.

01:18:32 [Speaker 1]
Laura.
01:18:32 [Speaker 1]
They send their their only son, Kalel, to Earth because Jor El knows that the yellow sun of the Earth is going to give Kal El, Superman, this great strength and power, and he will he is beyond.
01:18:51 [Speaker 1]
He is the most human of human.
01:18:55 [Speaker 1]
He is concerned about he's the most, most, most moral.
01:19:00 [Speaker 1]
It just is coming off that way.

01:19:02 [Speaker 1]
Even as this the ship on the string escapes and we're going through the space composite photography that feels like 02/2001, and he's being bombarded with this stuff.
01:19:11 [Speaker 1]
It's like, oh, he's just he's being bombarded with knowledge.
01:19:14 [Speaker 1]
This isn't Charlie Blanca on street fighter.
01:19:17 [Speaker 1]
Like, no.
01:19:17 [Speaker 1]
This is this is the just the good parts.

01:19:20 [Speaker 2]
And the sound is so good the way it plays with that voice over, and the voice over kinda melds into other historical facts or scientific facts with these things.
01:19:30 [Speaker 2]
You really feel the sense of time passing in that ship.
01:19:34 [Speaker 2]
Like, it really doesn't Especially

01:19:35 [Speaker 1]
as he ages.
01:19:36 [Speaker 1]
It's really cool.

01:19:37 [Speaker 2]
As he's aging and and we're just getting with sound and image.
01:19:41 [Speaker 2]
Right?
01:19:41 [Speaker 2]
Like, it's it's a really brilliant way to

01:19:44 [Speaker 1]
Soft colors kinda change.
01:19:46 [Speaker 1]
It's very, very cool.
01:19:48 [Speaker 1]
And that one the one green crystal that he has brought with him, like, which I believe must be Kryptonite because it I mean, it

01:19:56 [Speaker 2]
It's not.
01:19:56 [Speaker 2]
And that always confused me as a kid.

01:19:59 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
01:19:59 [Speaker 1]
Because I thought Kryptonite Superman returns, like, Kryptonite can grow land or some such, I guess.

01:20:05 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
01:20:06 [Speaker 2]
I think that they kinda play with it, and they say it is.
01:20:08 [Speaker 2]
But it's not that type of Kryptonite, and we could get into the nerdom of it.
01:20:12 [Speaker 2]
I just use the word nerd derogatory.

01:20:14 [Speaker 1]
Cryptodome means you're the one that's Cryptodome.
01:20:16 [Speaker 1]
But I will Cryptodome.

01:20:19 [Speaker 2]
The whole nerd description of what that crystal is.
01:20:21 [Speaker 2]
But It's

01:20:22 [Speaker 1]
I invested in crypto.

01:20:24 [Speaker 2]
But five people right now are probably pissed that I'm not breaking down what that crystal actually is.
01:20:27 [Speaker 2]
But yeah.

01:20:28 [Speaker 1]
No.
01:20:28 [Speaker 1]
It's less than that, Moses.
01:20:31 [Speaker 1]
I promise you it's less than that.
01:20:33 [Speaker 1]
The crash for Kalel, who is very soon about to be Clark, the mother and Glenn they're so charming.
01:20:43 [Speaker 1]
Yes.

01:20:43 [Speaker 1]
This is what like, I wanted to spend more time with the parents and the newer one because the all this exposition that happens that's like it's like it's like a montage that's not a montage.
01:20:53 [Speaker 1]
I don't know how to put it.
01:20:54 [Speaker 1]
It's, again, it's, like, magical.
01:20:56 [Speaker 1]
He has this football thing happen, and he has to hide his powers, and he races the train, and nobody sees him, and he beats the bullies home, and all that.
01:21:05 [Speaker 1]
All this is done, like, so quickly where it's like more and more and more of this stuff is gonna happen.

01:21:11 [Speaker 1]
He's gonna lift cars.
01:21:12 [Speaker 1]
He's gonna run fast.

01:21:13 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
01:21:14 [Speaker 2]
Well, it's I think what's really interesting about all of that is we get to his dad, and and this is Glenn Ford is the man.
01:21:25 [Speaker 2]
Oh, and again, as we've talked about this movie almost being three movies.
01:21:27 [Speaker 2]
We've gotten now the weird sci fi flick, and now we're in John Ford, Norman Rockwell painting.
01:21:34 [Speaker 2]
But you've got Glenn Ford here, and I don't even wanna know how much they paid him to be there.

01:21:42 [Speaker 2]
But in the shortest amount of screen time

01:21:45 [Speaker 1]
Worth every penny.

01:21:46 [Speaker 2]
Worth every penny, as you said, brought to you by dollars.
01:21:49 [Speaker 2]
The cash is

01:21:50 [Speaker 3]
exceeded.

01:21:51 [Speaker 2]
There's something about this performance in that moment, and it's the perfect casting for a role that is on screen for probably under six minutes or whatever it is, that we immediately get and this is again why he's the blueprint.
01:22:08 [Speaker 2]
Uncle Ben Peter Parker thing without the heavy handedness of Yes.
01:22:11 [Speaker 2]
Ben Peter Parker thing.
01:22:13 [Speaker 2]
These are lessons again, the Norman Rockwell painting kind of vibes.
01:22:16 [Speaker 2]
These are lessons that Pa Kent just gives his kid on the regular.

01:22:19 [Speaker 1]
I just think it's really beautiful that the kid crashes.
01:22:24 [Speaker 1]
He's like, we gotta find this kid's family.
01:22:27 [Speaker 1]
And his wife is like, we've always wanted a child.
01:22:30 [Speaker 1]
We've prayed for this.
01:22:31 [Speaker 1]
And he's like, no.

01:22:32 [Speaker 1]
We gotta find the family and it's the kid lifts the truck and it's like this kid doesn't have a foot.
01:22:37 [Speaker 1]
Like, let's look at this logically here and he kinda smiles and there's this aw shucks like, well, alright.
01:22:43 [Speaker 1]
As long as like, you know, we're not gonna hand him to the government and it transitions, like, literally to that so quickly.
01:22:50 [Speaker 1]
And it feels nice because he's like, I just wanna do this nice thing because I'm a a good human.
01:22:56 [Speaker 1]
I wanna please my wife.

01:22:57 [Speaker 1]
I wanna please myself.
01:22:58 [Speaker 1]
Like, this isn't hurting anyone.
01:23:00 [Speaker 1]
We just wanna help this helpless child that we think could potentially be in danger based on his power because, yeah, the government got ahold of him at that age.
01:23:10 [Speaker 1]
Like, who knows what happens to him?
01:23:13 [Speaker 1]
So it's like, that's the thing.

01:23:15 [Speaker 1]
And him dying very early in Clark's age, you really by that, you really avoid getting into the territory for me of the, like, he get he gets a god complex.
01:23:28 [Speaker 1]
That was the thing that I think man of steel avoided because I absolutely love the costner performance in that and the death.
01:23:36 [Speaker 1]
And I think Superman experiencing that death of, like, experiencing that level of humanity, that level of adversity is so fucking important.
01:23:45 [Speaker 1]
And it's done shot too.
01:23:47 [Speaker 1]
It's done so well in this movie.

01:23:49 [Speaker 1]
Like you were saying, it's like a morbid Norman Rockwell painting.
01:23:52 [Speaker 1]
Like, there's something Well It's like Well,

01:23:54 [Speaker 2]
and that's that change because he's totally inside the barn.
01:23:57 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
01:23:57 [Speaker 2]
He's inside the barn.
01:23:59 [Speaker 2]
It's dark.
01:24:00 [Speaker 2]
He's lit by that backlight He's for being a barn.

01:24:04 [Speaker 2]
But he he misses it.

01:24:05 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.

01:24:05 [Speaker 2]
It's the it's a Yeah.
01:24:06 [Speaker 2]
A wonderful example of the screenplay really working.
01:24:11 [Speaker 2]
And I know that there was a lot of work to get Puzo's script

01:24:14 [Speaker 3]
Mhmm.

01:24:14 [Speaker 2]
To work.
01:24:15 [Speaker 2]
Puzo, again, we think of him as the godfather.
01:24:17 [Speaker 2]
We think of him writing this epic saga of this family.
01:24:21 [Speaker 2]
But when Puzo wrote the script, the original script was silly.
01:24:25 [Speaker 2]
He was basically writing the sixties Batman television show.

01:24:28 [Speaker 2]
It was campy and corny.
01:24:31 [Speaker 2]
There were, like, a lot of, like, Batman ass camp jokes in the thing.
01:24:35 [Speaker 2]
And somehow, I think with all the writers that came on board, which let's be honest, we both love movies.
01:24:40 [Speaker 2]
When you see more than a few writers' names on a script, it's usually

01:24:43 [Speaker 1]
start to there's anxiety.
01:24:45 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.

01:24:45 [Speaker 2]
But this this is a wonderful example of show not tell, which is we get our first inkling of Clark AKA Superman AKA Kal El missing something.
01:24:58 [Speaker 2]
Because his back has turned to his father.
01:25:00 [Speaker 2]
It's the if I could've, I should have.
01:25:03 [Speaker 2]
And to take that away and his father passed him in the way that he does, and it kick starts the rest of this journey

01:25:09 [Speaker 1]
Well, and he feels so safe.
01:25:10 [Speaker 1]
Really, really important.
01:25:10 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
01:25:10 [Speaker 1]
Like So important.
01:25:12 [Speaker 1]
He's felt so safe until that moment.

01:25:13 [Speaker 1]
That adversity is is really fucking vital.
01:25:18 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
01:25:18 [Speaker 1]
Cheerios.
01:25:18 [Speaker 1]
So the rest of

01:25:19 [Speaker 2]
the story, it leads into right?
01:25:21 [Speaker 2]
Lois later, we get from that point on, do not use your powers for these things.
01:25:25 [Speaker 2]
Do not change

01:25:26 [Speaker 3]
the

01:25:26 [Speaker 2]
course of his you know, like and that thing that he missed it, that he his back was turned.
01:25:31 [Speaker 2]
And the film does a funny thing if you pay attention.
01:25:34 [Speaker 2]
Like, there are times when Clark's back is turned, funny enough, and you brought up the lowest thing.
01:25:39 [Speaker 2]
His back is turned later in Metropolis.
01:25:41 [Speaker 2]
We'll get to there later, but his back is turned, and there's crime happening behind him, and he misses it.

01:25:46 [Speaker 2]
So there's this really fascinating thing about Superman facing adversity.

01:25:49 [Speaker 1]
His focus.
01:25:51 [Speaker 1]
Like, the focus that happens as well.
01:25:53 [Speaker 1]
I I really like it made me think of Elf.
01:25:56 [Speaker 1]
Oh, your friend, little camp.
01:25:57 [Speaker 1]
Clark's on his journey to the, literally, like, the middle of the Antarctic or whatever, and he's got just, like, a jacket and a backpack.

01:26:03 [Speaker 1]
And he throws the green crystal, the crypt dollar, the crypto dollar

01:26:09 [Speaker 5]
Always the dollar.

01:26:09 [Speaker 1]
Into the ice, and the fortress of solitude pops up.
01:26:13 [Speaker 1]
This is all, like, really charming and magical.
01:26:16 [Speaker 1]
Like, the the miniatures and the models and things like that and using close ups and matte paintings and and lighting and shit.
01:26:22 [Speaker 1]
Like, it's all really working for me.
01:26:25 [Speaker 1]
Like, rather than the goal.

01:26:27 [Speaker 1]
And it doesn't feel perfectly clean.
01:26:29 [Speaker 1]
Like, there are things about it that feel of earth very tangible, and I I need that in this story.
01:26:37 [Speaker 1]
I need that tangibility.
01:26:39 [Speaker 1]
And the transitions that are happening, the editing that's happening is this thing is erecting.
01:26:45 [Speaker 1]
I'm just gonna be Dennis Benn.

01:26:47 [Speaker 1]
Awesome and kind of the importance of these crystals, like, the beauty of this glass, these these props that they made for this movie are so great.
01:26:56 [Speaker 1]
And his dad's back, like, as essentially he's, like, some kind of super AI or quantum computer.
01:27:03 [Speaker 1]
Like, he has all the knowledge of the known universe and any question and answer programmed and ready to rock.

01:27:10 [Speaker 2]
It's just a cool thing, and I I love also the call.
01:27:14 [Speaker 2]
Right?
01:27:14 [Speaker 2]
It's it's Joseph Campbell personified.
01:27:17 [Speaker 2]
It's this deep, you know, Ma Kent asked, where are you going?
01:27:20 [Speaker 2]
And he just says north.

01:27:22 [Speaker 2]
There's just something really that the the the call that kick starts.
01:27:25 [Speaker 2]
Him into this journey.
01:27:28 [Speaker 2]
And here he is, and he's absorbing information.
01:27:30 [Speaker 2]
He's taking these things on.
01:27:31 [Speaker 2]
He's again, time passing by the way that the voice over of his father is kinda blending, and we're getting this sense of time and that he's growing again.

01:27:41 [Speaker 2]
Using Jorel as this continual space of him growing is really fascinating.
01:27:45 [Speaker 2]
And we also have to make the, poor Jeff East, I think years later was able to reconcile it, that his voice was dubbed over by Christopher Reeve.
01:27:54 [Speaker 2]
He didn't know that until he saw it in the theater.
01:27:57 [Speaker 2]
He,

01:27:58 [Speaker 1]
told him that his

01:27:58 [Speaker 2]
voice is gonna be dubbed over, his performance would be dubbed over.

01:28:01 [Speaker 1]
Oh, okay.

01:28:01 [Speaker 2]
But it this this growing into Superman thing and and that first time we see him fly, what, forty five minutes into the film?

01:28:10 [Speaker 1]
It takes quite a while.
01:28:12 [Speaker 1]
The end of the first act, the end the big moment in the at the end of the first act is is this great dialogue by Brando.
01:28:19 [Speaker 1]
They have they have the the ability for greatness in them.
01:28:22 [Speaker 1]
They can be I I've sent them you, my only son, fucking awesome lines, awesome delivery, and he does a flyby.
01:28:30 [Speaker 1]
And we're, like, forty eight minutes in the movie, and the big moment is just a flyby.

01:28:37 [Speaker 1]
And it totally fucking works.

01:28:40 [Speaker 2]
It works.

01:28:40 [Speaker 1]
Like, it it takes until forty eight minutes to be in Metropolis.
01:28:43 [Speaker 1]
I'm okay with all this context, all this backstory.
01:28:47 [Speaker 1]
I know we all know the origin story of Superman.
01:28:51 [Speaker 1]
I know that the folks who made the new Superman clearly know that, but there is a level of Clark's having the first day at the daily planet.
01:29:01 [Speaker 1]
And I'm lulled by it's really good.

01:29:05 [Speaker 1]
He's really Reeve is very convincing when we meet him with the bottle.
01:29:11 [Speaker 1]
The physical acting and shit this guy is doing, like yeah.
01:29:13 [Speaker 1]
Obviously, this is a Juilliard trained actor.
01:29:16 [Speaker 1]
This guy is killing it.
01:29:18 [Speaker 1]
And and that's the first real actual physical look we get at him is as Clark unable to open a bottle.

01:29:25 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
01:29:25 [Speaker 2]
Walking into the city, the other really great thing is we're now in this film does a really great job of having these really distinct chapters.
01:29:34 [Speaker 2]
Krypton feels really unique and special and weird and sci fi flick.
01:29:38 [Speaker 2]
Smallville has a really specific vibe.
01:29:41 [Speaker 2]
But the moment we get that first flyby, which I believe that history says that the the crew cheered that first flyby.

01:29:49 [Speaker 1]
Oh, I wouldn't doubt.

01:29:50 [Speaker 2]
Right?
01:29:51 [Speaker 2]
And we hit Metropolis, and the film has a very different rhythm at this point.
01:29:56 [Speaker 2]
Dialogue is super zippy.
01:29:57 [Speaker 2]
Metropolis feels alive.
01:29:58 [Speaker 2]
There's a different rhythm to everything where suddenly the frame is filled with people and objects, and it's busy.

01:30:05 [Speaker 1]
And again stranger in a strange land thing.

01:30:08 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
01:30:09 [Speaker 2]
And it's

01:30:09 [Speaker 1]
just overwhelming.
01:30:10 [Speaker 1]
Like, I need that.
01:30:11 [Speaker 1]
I want that.
01:30:12 [Speaker 1]
Not knowing Lois, not already having this relationship established From

01:30:17 [Speaker 3]
the edge

01:30:18 [Speaker 2]
of their world.

01:30:18 [Speaker 1]
Excitement that exists that's really working.
01:30:22 [Speaker 1]
And, again, I know Superman stuff is, like, common societal knowledge now, but the the execution of it in this iteration is really fucking satisfying.
01:30:32 [Speaker 1]
Some of the, like, we know you know stuff in the new one does work for me.
01:30:37 [Speaker 1]
But stuff like this robbery scene here and the ability giving Christopher Reeve and Margo Kidder, but especially Christopher Reeve this opportunity to do this great work as Clark Kent.
01:30:50 [Speaker 1]
I need to spend a good amount of time with this character as Clark Kent, And this movie does that fantastically.

01:30:57 [Speaker 2]
And I think because Donner came from television.
01:31:01 [Speaker 2]
He was a gun for hire.
01:31:03 [Speaker 2]
He understood right off the bat that the moment we hit Metropolis, the moment we're in Daily Planet, I immediately know who these characters are.
01:31:10 [Speaker 2]
I know who they are by the way they interact, the way that they talk to each other.
01:31:13 [Speaker 2]
This is why Christopher Reeve is such an icon and so beloved is all that physical acting, all that comedic timing, but we also see so much amazing visual storytelling in his performance and the way he takes the bullet, the way he talks down the thing, the smirk after she walks away, you know, the the way that it kinda zips along with him talking about the contents in her purse.

01:31:38 [Speaker 2]
All of it is just so I've said this about Blade quite often.
01:31:42 [Speaker 2]
You know, Wesley Snipes' performance as Blade is so phenomenal.
01:31:46 [Speaker 2]
What he chose in terms of the visuals is so amazing that it changed the comic.
01:31:50 [Speaker 2]
Now the comic character looks like Wesley Snipes because of that.

01:31:55 [Speaker 1]
Oh, sure.
01:31:55 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
01:31:55 [Speaker 1]
Sure.

01:31:56 [Speaker 2]
Christopher Reeves Christopher Reeves' performance as Clark Kent turning Clark into this very distinct bumbling, well, gee, Lewis, well, Lewis stuff was so phenomenal that it changed the comics.

01:32:10 [Speaker 1]
Oh, yeah.
01:32:10 [Speaker 1]
I wouldn't doubt that.

01:32:11 [Speaker 2]
Exist in this way until the his performance.

01:32:14 [Speaker 1]
It's defining arc archetypes really quickly.
01:32:17 [Speaker 1]
The movie does so well.
01:32:18 [Speaker 1]
Like, you know Perry, here you go.
01:32:20 [Speaker 1]
You know Jimmy, here you go.
01:32:22 [Speaker 1]
You see Otis rip off a blind guy.

01:32:24 [Speaker 1]
We know immediately even if you don't know who that character is or what his function is, like, well, this can't be a good guy.
01:32:30 [Speaker 1]
He's trying to rip off a blind person.
01:32:32 [Speaker 1]
Like, the dog had to intercede.
01:32:34 [Speaker 1]
So it's just defining all these people really well.
01:32:37 [Speaker 1]
Boom, boom, boom, boom.

01:32:39 [Speaker 1]
It's a pretty finite amount of people all to keep track of also, which is nice.
01:32:45 [Speaker 1]
And we get into Lex Luthor's lab, and he goes over the why and his land scheme, and how it's like, yeah.
01:32:53 [Speaker 1]
People are always gonna need land, which is totally true.
01:32:57 [Speaker 1]
I like that he, at this point in time in the world, in the seventies, whatever, that this crazy super smart billionaire that's like, I'm a weirdo.
01:33:06 [Speaker 1]
I'm gonna live underground has, like, these two acolytes that are willing to just be abused by him and whatnot.

01:33:12 [Speaker 1]
That works for me at this time.
01:33:14 [Speaker 1]
Having kind of like an army of weirdos now makes sense.
01:33:17 [Speaker 1]
Having a couple weirdos in the seventies makes sense because it predates like, you know, like mass access to email and shit.
01:33:25 [Speaker 1]
What more can anyone ask?
01:33:27 [Speaker 1]
What more can anyone ask?

01:33:28 [Speaker 1]
But the daily planet business that's happening and the camera spins and the dolly shots, as you're saying, Clark is just getting dunked on by everybody, by Lois, by people on the elevator, like, and he's just, like, so clumsy and klutzy and all this shit.
01:33:46 [Speaker 1]
And he's just, like, it's like he's dancing.
01:33:50 [Speaker 1]
He's so great.
01:33:52 [Speaker 1]
When we finally get him saving the chopper and he's actually doing Superman shit, we're an hour and eight minutes into this movie.
01:34:01 [Speaker 1]
It takes a long time to get there, and that's part of why it's good.

01:34:04 [Speaker 1]
It's denying me the satisfaction of it.

01:34:07 [Speaker 2]
Well and it's also right.
01:34:08 [Speaker 2]
Famously, Richard Donner had in his office a sign above their team office that said verisimilitude.
01:34:15 [Speaker 2]
Right?
01:34:16 [Speaker 2]
He wanted

01:34:16 [Speaker 1]
to

01:34:17 [Speaker 2]
absolutely believe that this is real, that this world was real.
01:34:21 [Speaker 2]
And, again, I gotta throw it out there, and this is why it's not five stars for me now.
01:34:25 [Speaker 2]
But it it is very much the belief system or world system from the seventies.
01:34:29 [Speaker 2]
It does feel kind of like a seventies film.
01:34:32 [Speaker 2]
But, again, that labor of love, the way that it's kind of presented.

01:34:35 [Speaker 2]
But these things that happen, the way that everything unfolds with Catching the Copter, and then we again, in the same way that Glenn Ford's death as Pa Kent kinda kick starts the these new events, the moment and and you said it, and almost every comic nerd knows that certain cultures always mainstream.
01:34:50 [Speaker 2]
Save Lois first is usually the joke.

01:34:52 [Speaker 3]
You're the one that's out of

01:34:53 [Speaker 2]
the movie, guys.
01:34:54 [Speaker 2]
Jump into this saga.
01:34:55 [Speaker 2]
We jumped or it deeply into the story at this point where Superman is now doing everything that everyone that complains on the Internet that they wanna see Superman do happen in the next few minutes of this film.
01:35:08 [Speaker 2]
It's saving casualties.

01:35:09 [Speaker 1]
I think it's great, though.

01:35:10 [Speaker 2]
And and Oh, yeah.
01:35:11 [Speaker 2]
I'm not saying it as a bad thing.

01:35:12 [Speaker 1]
No.
01:35:12 [Speaker 1]
No.
01:35:12 [Speaker 1]
I know that.

01:35:13 [Speaker 2]
Iconic.
01:35:13 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.

01:35:14 [Speaker 1]
And I think it's great too because it doesn't feel like a montage partly.
01:35:18 [Speaker 1]
It feels like it's happening in real time.

01:35:19 [Speaker 2]
And other movies He stops a

01:35:21 [Speaker 1]
robbery, saves a cat, saves an airplane.
01:35:24 [Speaker 1]
Like, that moment is really satisfying.
01:35:26 [Speaker 1]
The angle of him being the engine is, like, really, really cool.
01:35:30 [Speaker 1]
And I just like that Lex Luthor is swimming, thinking about his horrible evil machinations and what he wants to do with his whole land thing in nuclear weapons and shit.
01:35:43 [Speaker 1]
And also, like, well, I guess I gotta kill Superman, or that's not gonna work out.

01:35:48 [Speaker 1]
Like, I like that he kinda, like, anticipates that move.
01:35:51 [Speaker 1]
And this is what really sells me on this movie, Moses.
01:35:56 [Speaker 1]
And one of the things I like the most about this movie, we as human beings, a lot of the time, not everyone, we're sexual beings.
01:36:07 [Speaker 1]
And in this movie, Superman is a sexual being, and it works for me.
01:36:15 [Speaker 1]
This whole scene and everything that happens, the romance, finding the, like, do it for her, that all Margot Kidder and Christopher Reeve have incredible chemistry.

01:36:28 [Speaker 1]
I like that it cuts pretty quickly in this is like some of the lighting's a little rough and the backdrops are rough.
01:36:33 [Speaker 1]
They know that.
01:36:34 [Speaker 1]
They never let it stick too long or too short.
01:36:38 [Speaker 1]
The edits are so perfect.
01:36:40 [Speaker 1]
It's clearly in New York backdrops, but in this world, New York ended up being called Metropolis for whatever reason, I guess.

01:36:46 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
01:36:47 [Speaker 1]
But I don't

01:36:47 [Speaker 2]
know the comics.

01:36:49 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
01:36:49 [Speaker 1]
Oh, yeah.
01:36:50 [Speaker 1]
Sure.
01:36:50 [Speaker 1]
But when they're sitting with I don't know, Mona.
01:36:53 [Speaker 1]
But when they sit down and when she has that slip and she says, how big are you?

01:36:58 [Speaker 1]
How tall are you?
01:36:59 [Speaker 1]
And he's not put off by that.
01:37:01 [Speaker 1]
And they're the flirting

01:37:04 [Speaker 2]
is all is so strong.

01:37:06 [Speaker 1]
Really good, and it's working for me.
01:37:08 [Speaker 1]
His and it, like, even his s on his chest, I'm like, oh, it almost sounds like a three d effect, like, that I've never noticed at point.
01:37:14 [Speaker 1]
This costume is you know, I like the new one, and I like the cool, like, collar and shit.
01:37:19 [Speaker 1]
And but, like, this costume, especially considering the time or what it is, like, really really great and as they're on the flying date when they float through the clouds it feels like you're in a dream with her.
01:37:33 [Speaker 1]
It's really cool.

01:37:34 [Speaker 1]
Back

01:37:35 [Speaker 2]
because it's 1970, probably May at this point.

01:37:40 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
01:37:40 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.

01:37:40 [Speaker 2]
Here's a dude standing in Front of a girl trying

01:37:44 [Speaker 1]
to tell

01:37:44 [Speaker 2]
him red

01:37:45 [Speaker 1]
underwear.
01:37:45 [Speaker 1]
She love her.
01:37:46 [Speaker 1]
He love him.
01:37:48 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.

01:37:48 [Speaker 2]
And he's standing there in in a blue leotard and red underwear and saying what would be the corniest thing ever.
01:37:57 [Speaker 2]
I stand for truth, justice, and the American way.

01:37:59 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
01:38:00 [Speaker 1]
None of this work.

01:38:01 [Speaker 2]
He should look so it should be so cringey.
01:38:04 [Speaker 2]
You've gotta feel and you said it best.
01:38:06 [Speaker 2]
Like, he's he's a sexual character.
01:38:08 [Speaker 2]
He's a sexual being.
01:38:09 [Speaker 2]
But that has gotta be a very demasculating thing to be in a leotard.

01:38:13 [Speaker 2]
Praise the Lord for Julliard training.
01:38:16 [Speaker 2]
But he is sitting there that should not he should not feel powerful.
01:38:20 [Speaker 2]
He should not feel cool.
01:38:22 [Speaker 2]
He's just sweating the heck out of that thing.
01:38:24 [Speaker 2]
And instead he's sitting there just owning it, looking powerful, looking confident, looking strong.

01:38:31 [Speaker 2]
Again, as you're saying, the the sexual tension, the charisma, the dynamic, you can tell that that was the thing that he they screen tested with each other with.
01:38:38 [Speaker 2]
It it's so leaving out as you're saying, like, the lighting.
01:38:42 [Speaker 2]
It's so funny.
01:38:42 [Speaker 2]
Me being me, I don't see that.
01:38:44 [Speaker 2]
I it's just so I jokingly was like, man, this seems real horny.

01:38:48 [Speaker 4]
But it's so good.

01:38:51 [Speaker 2]
Locked in, and they're so good.
01:38:53 [Speaker 2]
That's the thing that me and the friends joke about all the time.
01:38:56 [Speaker 2]
I I like pink very much, miss Lois.
01:38:57 [Speaker 2]
You know?
01:38:58 [Speaker 2]
Like, you're just like It's cool.

01:38:59 [Speaker 2]
When

01:39:00 [Speaker 1]
he does that and shit, like, he basically says to her, I am a sexual being, and I will say, I don't think he should feel shitty at all.
01:39:08 [Speaker 1]
There are no huge built in muscles in this thing.

01:39:11 [Speaker 2]
There's no but that's why is there's not he's not hiding anything.
01:39:14 [Speaker 2]
That is just

01:39:15 [Speaker 1]
fucking great.
01:39:16 [Speaker 1]
And he, I think, knows he looks fucking great and really owns it.
01:39:21 [Speaker 1]
And I assume Donner was telling him, you look fucking great, Chris, or whatever.
01:39:25 [Speaker 1]
You gotta really feel pretty fucking awesome if you're, you know, six foot four and have that jaw and you have that body and you're like, fucking look at me.
01:39:33 [Speaker 1]
That is one of the things that I really like about this movie and I liked about the new movie to a degree too.

01:39:38 [Speaker 1]
I don't have to see dude naked three quarter half, whatever it is, to know that that guy is a big, strong, fucking powerful dude.
01:39:47 [Speaker 1]
And Christopher Reeve looks like somebody you would not wanna fuck with.
01:39:51 [Speaker 1]
And that's, like, one of the things that I and you can tell that also in the way he moves, especially when he's Superman.
01:39:57 [Speaker 1]
It's really great.

01:39:59 [Speaker 2]
It's also a thing that is very important for me personally as a fan of the character, that didn't enjoy the newest one as much as clearly you did.
01:40:09 [Speaker 2]
But what we what we've gotten in every live action version

01:40:13 [Speaker 3]
of Superman that I

01:40:13 [Speaker 2]
think is a important thing that I really genuinely appreciate, which is every version of Superman that we've ever gotten is a really positive form of masculinity.
01:40:24 [Speaker 2]
Like Yeah.
01:40:25 [Speaker 2]
Sure.
01:40:25 [Speaker 2]
Great example.
01:40:26 [Speaker 2]
Because as you're saying, like, he should be, like, I'm a, but you never get that sensibility from him.

01:40:30 [Speaker 2]
There's a confidence, but there's never a, braggadocious.

01:40:33 [Speaker 1]
No arrogance.
01:40:34 [Speaker 1]
There's no arrogance.

01:40:35 [Speaker 2]
Zero confidence.
01:40:36 [Speaker 2]
There's a confidence, not arrogance.
01:40:38 [Speaker 2]
There's a I never to say I never lie, and, of course, miss Tessmucker calls that off.
01:40:43 [Speaker 2]
Like, he's just

01:40:44 [Speaker 1]
Which he's lying all the time because he's not Clark Kent or is he?
01:40:47 [Speaker 1]
I don't know.
01:40:47 [Speaker 1]
Maybe he

01:40:48 [Speaker 2]
And, again, nerds will

01:40:49 [Speaker 1]
I don't know.

01:40:49 [Speaker 2]
Combo.
01:40:50 [Speaker 2]
Because I feel like he is both of them.
01:40:51 [Speaker 2]
Right?
01:40:52 [Speaker 2]
That that Sure.

01:40:53 [Speaker 1]
There's a duality.

01:40:54 [Speaker 2]
Can occupy And and he plays both of them.
01:40:57 [Speaker 2]
Because I So well.
01:40:58 [Speaker 2]
I'm still kicking.
01:40:59 [Speaker 2]
His version of Clark also

01:41:00 [Speaker 1]
I must be on Broadway.

01:41:01 [Speaker 2]
Is sweet and kind and humble and you know?
01:41:05 [Speaker 2]
So they're amazing again, two sides of the same coin.
01:41:09 [Speaker 2]
I I disagree with the Bill's monologue in Kill Bill volume two that that he is, you know, that this is the disguise.
01:41:16 [Speaker 2]
I do believe that Clark and Kal El and Superman are all all the same person.

01:41:22 [Speaker 1]
I think in this, part of the reason he's so taken with Lois after they go on this flight, which, like, was the drop intentional just to prove he could do it?
01:41:31 [Speaker 1]
Because he drops her while they're flying.
01:41:32 [Speaker 1]
Okay.
01:41:33 [Speaker 1]
I don't think it was either, but it's, like, the idea that he was, like, check out

01:41:36 [Speaker 2]
what I can do.
01:41:36 [Speaker 2]
He teaches

01:41:37 [Speaker 1]
me and how to do

01:41:37 [Speaker 2]
it moments after.

01:41:38 [Speaker 1]
I wasn't being serious, but the poem she says is, like, super duper sensual.
01:41:45 [Speaker 1]
The whole thing where she's talking about, like, can you read my mind?
01:41:48 [Speaker 1]
Can you it's almost like James Woods and Casino.
01:41:51 [Speaker 1]
Can you feel me?
01:41:52 [Speaker 1]
You'll know what I'm talking about.

01:41:54 [Speaker 1]
But this is where I drop

01:41:55 [Speaker 2]
half a star.

01:41:56 [Speaker 1]
I think I think I which I get to, you know, maybe gets a little too sensual or a little too, like, woah.
01:42:02 [Speaker 1]
You two are very sexual beings.
01:42:04 [Speaker 1]
Holy shit.
01:42:05 [Speaker 1]
Glazen.
01:42:06 [Speaker 1]
Oh, okay.

01:42:07 [Speaker 1]
But when he drops her off and when he comes back as Clark and then leaves and she's still so dazzled and he we get the posture change and he's almost gonna tell her, and that's part of the great greatness of the performance.
01:42:22 [Speaker 1]
And this is also solo take notes.
01:42:24 [Speaker 1]
This is how you say, what a Superman.
01:42:27 [Speaker 1]
Like, that's how you do that.
01:42:30 [Speaker 1]
I feel like in this performance, he is most himself when he's Superman.

01:42:37 [Speaker 1]
And that's part of why he gets to be himself very strong, very confident, very smart, etcetera, etcetera, but very caring and kind and this bastion from morality and whatever.
01:42:49 [Speaker 1]
And Lois loves that about him, and I think that's who he loves to be, at least in this iteration.
01:42:55 [Speaker 1]
And so that's part of why the performances work so well.
01:42:58 [Speaker 1]
His even his nasally voice and what he does with his lips, and it's it's I don't know.
01:43:04 [Speaker 1]
I just it's so delightful.

01:43:07 [Speaker 1]
Her love for

01:43:08 [Speaker 2]
Wait a minute.
01:43:08 [Speaker 2]
She faces posture in that moment before the Clark Pretty cool.
01:43:12 [Speaker 2]
Lois.
01:43:13 [Speaker 2]
The reason why most Superman fans would be like, this is why no one knows that Clark is Superman.

01:43:19 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.

01:43:19 [Speaker 2]
Like, that just in camera, in frame, that shift of his shoulders, that movement in his posture

01:43:26 [Speaker 3]
It's enough.

01:43:27 [Speaker 2]
Change of his voice.
01:43:27 [Speaker 2]
It's enough.

01:43:28 [Speaker 1]
And now, like, audiences are so smart and other things, but, like, they have to say, like, well, the the glasses confuse people's faces.
01:43:36 [Speaker 1]
Like, it's some kind of technology or something in the new one.
01:43:39 [Speaker 1]
It's all done through just acting and costuming and things like that in this movie, and it and it's successful.
01:43:46 [Speaker 1]
I will I love Lexus' lair.
01:43:48 [Speaker 1]
It's very successful that this rich megalomaniac eccentric person has this weird lair in this, you know, movie that's about all this, like, very big stuff.

01:44:00 [Speaker 1]
And then he has this library and can research as someone with a 200 IQ.
01:44:06 [Speaker 1]
I'll get this kryptonite stuff.
01:44:08 [Speaker 1]
We'll trap some folks.
01:44:10 [Speaker 1]
We'll get, you know, old Larry Hagman from Dallas and I dream of genie in here.
01:44:14 [Speaker 1]
And the whole deal, this is how we're going to launch our trap to blow up half of San Francisco or San Francisco.

01:44:24 [Speaker 1]
San Francisco, blow up half of California, send it into the ocean.
01:44:28 [Speaker 1]
He's buying all this seemingly worthless land.
01:44:31 [Speaker 1]
It's a land grab, people.
01:44:32 [Speaker 1]
It's a money grab.
01:44:33 [Speaker 1]
It's all about the dollars.

01:44:35 [Speaker 1]
Lois is driving, by the way, with that microphone doing the interview.
01:44:40 [Speaker 1]
It's like, this is reckless.
01:44:42 [Speaker 1]
Also, this is also where I feel like this movie's been going for a while, and it doesn't feel like it's gonna end for a while.
01:44:48 [Speaker 1]
And this is where I lose some of.
01:44:50 [Speaker 1]
And I as as much as I love the editing, that and the score, man, holy smokes.

01:44:56 [Speaker 1]
But this is where it feels a little long.
01:44:58 [Speaker 1]
But the dog whistle wakes me right the fuck back up.
01:45:01 [Speaker 1]
I don't know.
01:45:02 [Speaker 1]
I forgot about that completely, and I was like,

01:45:04 [Speaker 3]
oh, god.

01:45:05 [Speaker 1]
Really got me.
01:45:06 [Speaker 1]
But why does why does Superman do this cool but unnecessary street damage, Moses?
01:45:11 [Speaker 1]
He could've gone to a manhole.
01:45:12 [Speaker 1]
He could've made it in there without drilling a hole through the street.

01:45:16 [Speaker 2]
Drops off a boat next to the police station that no like, this is that stuff where it's, like, the visual they were like, yeah.
01:45:24 [Speaker 2]
But it's cool, and it's Superman.
01:45:25 [Speaker 2]
We need to show people this stuff.
01:45:27 [Speaker 2]
But you're like, you know, you watch it.
01:45:28 [Speaker 2]
That's where that product of its era.

01:45:30 [Speaker 1]
Per movie.

01:45:31 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
01:45:31 [Speaker 2]
It's but not only that right in the best of ways.
01:45:34 [Speaker 2]
It's a comic book.
01:45:35 [Speaker 2]
He's told us that this is a comic book movie.
01:45:37 [Speaker 2]
So Superman is gonna leap.

01:45:38 [Speaker 2]
The reality is Superman will fly back and drop the boat back off or whatever.

01:45:42 [Speaker 1]
Does this movie make Ghostbusters two better?
01:45:44 [Speaker 1]
Because when they drill illegally, they get in trouble.
01:45:48 [Speaker 1]
And it's pretty serious.
01:45:50 [Speaker 1]
So does this you know, this movie makes the new Superman not as good.
01:45:53 [Speaker 1]
Does this movie make Ghostbusters two a little better?

01:45:57 [Speaker 1]
No.

01:45:58 [Speaker 2]
I I like

01:45:58 [Speaker 1]
Well well, I tried, people.
01:46:00 [Speaker 1]
I tried.
01:46:01 [Speaker 1]
I'm trying to get his ratings up somehow for something.
01:46:04 [Speaker 1]
The Lex Luthor also, you want him to say shit like, no.
01:46:08 [Speaker 1]
I wanna cause the death of innocent people.

01:46:10 [Speaker 1]
This performance too is pretty iconic.
01:46:13 [Speaker 1]
It it's a really good Luthor.
01:46:15 [Speaker 1]
The movie's just silly enough.
01:46:17 [Speaker 1]
His character and his cronies are just silly enough.
01:46:21 [Speaker 1]
And I really love the Nicholas Hoult performance.

01:46:24 [Speaker 1]
I like the way it's written.
01:46:25 [Speaker 1]
I like the changes to it, but I really, really enjoy the Gene Hackman and the wigs.
01:46:31 [Speaker 1]
And, like, some of the kookiness that does exist here is fun for me.
01:46:38 [Speaker 1]
I like it.

01:46:39 [Speaker 2]
That's the stuff that, has not aged as well for me personally.

01:46:43 [Speaker 1]
I take

01:46:43 [Speaker 2]
it in with it being great for the era that it is meant to be fun.
01:46:47 [Speaker 2]
I also just think all these things that we're talking about, we talked about the Brando stuff, we talked about the mustache thing with Hackman, you know, Hackman famously not wanting to wear a wig.
01:46:56 [Speaker 2]
So then redoing his hair, like Luther who's famously known being, you know, bald throughout every iteration of the the comics aside from, like, one version.
01:47:04 [Speaker 2]
Now we jump into weird comic stuff.
01:47:06 [Speaker 2]
But, essentially, as we talk about this, like, what is so great about this and we're, you know, we're entering the last act essentially of this movie is none of this should work.

01:47:15 [Speaker 2]
Five years, a movie that's been in production for five years, a movie with that many writers, a movie with producers that are breathing down your back because they bought a thing, hoping that it was gonna be a quick turnaround.
01:47:27 [Speaker 2]
And here you've got Richard Donner doing the thing that I we don't talk enough about really great directors is he's essentially managing egos this whole project.
01:47:38 [Speaker 2]
Him going down this barrage to make Brando work.
01:47:41 [Speaker 2]
Because it is we haven't talked about it earlier, but for me, the Brando thing is Brando's in this movie because of Smiling Brando.
01:47:47 [Speaker 2]
And, again, it set the standard for every live action, Jor El that came after.

01:47:53 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
01:47:54 [Speaker 1]
It really has.

01:47:54 [Speaker 2]
I don't think that Brando's really given the world's greatest performance, and it's definitely not the greatest Brando performance.
01:48:00 [Speaker 2]
But what it is is, Donner doing the best to get a thing out of these actors, and it does work.
01:48:06 [Speaker 2]
And when Brando reaches and touches his son's head and gives the classic monologue, it all is there.

01:48:11 [Speaker 1]
Brando hits the couple lines he needs to hit.
01:48:14 [Speaker 1]
He hit Again he really needs to hit, he hits them okay.

01:48:17 [Speaker 2]
But it's it's not the greatest great as an actor.
01:48:20 [Speaker 2]
Right?
01:48:20 [Speaker 2]
It is not

01:48:21 [Speaker 1]
the stuff.

01:48:22 [Speaker 2]
When I think of legendary, the stuff that Brando is known for as being one of the GOATs is not in this film.
01:48:28 [Speaker 2]
But he is hitting the mark.
01:48:29 [Speaker 2]
He's saying the line.

01:48:30 [Speaker 1]
But he's and he's super known for this film by so many people.
01:48:32 [Speaker 1]
This is the same, like, you can come at this from a really well informed position.
01:48:40 [Speaker 1]
And I know I'm not nearly as informed as you.
01:48:44 [Speaker 1]
I think I'm in a place where I can enjoy these things to a degree a little bit more because I this stuff isn't as precious to me.
01:48:50 [Speaker 1]
Like, I can really remove myself from it.

01:48:53 [Speaker 1]
I find the the goofiness of Lex Luthor being a horrible evil person, only being able to have absolute morons that feel like they have no value.
01:49:06 [Speaker 1]
They have no self confidence following him.
01:49:09 [Speaker 1]
And the movie, again, like, probably was still, like somebody was like, well, we should make this, like it's gonna be a PG movie.
01:49:16 [Speaker 1]
We should make this palatable for kids, but it's still, like, way more palatable for me as an adult than the new one is.
01:49:23 [Speaker 1]
Like and the the threat of the missiles as this did happen in the new one too with miss Tessmacher taking selfies and kind of being Lex's undoing is that he's just a really shitty person to the people around him is the thing that kind of undoes him.

01:49:41 [Speaker 1]
Again, another thing that's in both movies.
01:49:43 [Speaker 1]
Right?
01:49:44 [Speaker 1]
Superman gets kryptonite is around his neck.
01:49:46 [Speaker 1]
He's almost drowned.
01:49:47 [Speaker 1]
Lex Luthor, it seems like he's these nuclear missiles are gonna blow up California.

01:49:52 [Speaker 1]
And miss Tessmacher to the fucking Teskew, she saves him because her mother's gonna be killed because she's in New Jersey, and Lex Luthor could not give a shit.
01:50:02 [Speaker 1]
The kiss that she gives him, and he's like, why'd you do that?
01:50:06 [Speaker 1]
And she goes, I didn't think you'd let me later.
01:50:08 [Speaker 1]
By the way, is the worst reason justification ever for any physical contact with anyone?

01:50:15 [Speaker 2]
Where the film remains a little dated for me, but I don't Yeah.

01:50:18 [Speaker 3]
I don't

01:50:18 [Speaker 2]
get it.
01:50:19 [Speaker 2]
I it's just a movie that was made in the nineteen seventies.

01:50:23 [Speaker 3]
Right.

01:50:23 [Speaker 1]
And that I I agree.

01:50:24 [Speaker 2]
I'm okay with that.

01:50:25 [Speaker 1]
But just never have that attitude, folks.
01:50:27 [Speaker 1]
Isn't that that's never okay.

01:50:29 [Speaker 2]
It is not '19 if

01:50:30 [Speaker 1]
that's the answer.

01:50:31 [Speaker 2]
It wasn't made in 1970.
01:50:32 [Speaker 2]
It's definitely not great.

01:50:33 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
01:50:34 [Speaker 1]
But the way this does like the world ripping thing again, the San Andreas Fault, older, world ripping, new.
01:50:43 [Speaker 1]
Looks kind of the same, feels kind of the same in these ways.
01:50:48 [Speaker 1]
I think I just like it in the older one, and it just the nuclear threat does it for me more.
01:50:55 [Speaker 1]
Maybe it's because the cold war era stuff just like really does it for me more.

01:51:01 [Speaker 1]
I just feel like a lot of the echoes that are happening.
01:51:07 [Speaker 1]
When I watch the older one, I don't like the echoes that the new one did as much.

01:51:13 [Speaker 2]
That's fair.

01:51:14 [Speaker 1]
Okay.
01:51:14 [Speaker 1]
I mean, I know you're anything I say about the new one being not great.
01:51:18 [Speaker 1]
Well, no.

01:51:18 [Speaker 2]
No.
01:51:18 [Speaker 2]
Like,

01:51:19 [Speaker 1]
awesome.
01:51:19 [Speaker 1]
Sounds good.
01:51:20 [Speaker 1]
No.
01:51:20 [Speaker 1]
No.

01:51:20 [Speaker 2]
I think what I what I am going into this and and as we're even conversing about it.
01:51:25 [Speaker 2]
Like I said, the big one is I need to watch this not as any of these things that exist.
01:51:31 [Speaker 2]
We've talked about it with Star Wars, Superman, definitely.
01:51:34 [Speaker 2]
Any of these franchise, Ghostbusters, you just made a Ghostbusters joke earlier.
01:51:38 [Speaker 2]
The thing is these these properties that exist that have sequels whether warranted or not, most of the time unwarranted, will never be able to capture the magic of the the first one, a, typically, because it's not just the movie the first movie itself being magical and being special and being lightning in a bottle or whatever it may be.

01:51:58 [Speaker 2]
It's because you can't also and this film out of every one of the Superman films, it's the one that everyone references for a great reason, which is you also can't fight the fact I brought up, I don't remember the first time I saw the film.
01:52:12 [Speaker 2]
I don't remember where it just always has existed.
01:52:15 [Speaker 2]
And that's a really difficult thing to combat and compete with.
01:52:18 [Speaker 2]
So for me jumping into this film, I'm watching it going, can I separate all that?
01:52:23 [Speaker 2]
Can I watch it just as a movie?

01:52:25 [Speaker 2]
And that's why even when I'm talking about this movie should work, I'm praising Richard Donner because that dude and his team and what they built up, the fact that you've got an actor, you know, Hackman's famously said it didn't appreciate his performance in it.
01:52:38 [Speaker 2]
But I love that you're going, I do like this performance.
01:52:41 [Speaker 2]
And that bit when he tells miss Tess or he doesn't even tell her.
01:52:44 [Speaker 2]
When he looks at miss Tessmacher and just kinda shakes his head no and mom's dead, like, that is where you're like, this is why Hackman's one of the greatest.

01:52:51 [Speaker 1]
Not anymore.
01:52:51 [Speaker 1]
But, yeah,

01:52:52 [Speaker 2]
he's Yeah.

01:52:53 [Speaker 1]
It's great.
01:52:53 [Speaker 1]
And, also, it's just like when you were we were talking about a lot of writers and directors.
01:52:57 [Speaker 1]
A director's job in a lot of cases is to put together different script elements from different folks for whatever reason.
01:53:03 [Speaker 1]
I don't know who wrote those first script elements in what draft when Superman is young and he's running fast with a train and whatever.
01:53:13 [Speaker 1]
And then Totally.

01:53:13 [Speaker 1]
When he's early Superman, it's like stopping robbery, saving cats, and and whatever.
01:53:20 [Speaker 1]
It sets it up so well for him to save a train, build a dam, whatever that and all these models again are super great.
01:53:29 [Speaker 1]
But it's like, oh, this guy can achieve pretty much everything, and he can't be defeated.
01:53:36 [Speaker 1]
And then he gets to Lois, and it's like, no.
01:53:39 [Speaker 1]
He couldn't get there in time.

01:53:41 [Speaker 1]
He did he was able to do everything but that.
01:53:44 [Speaker 1]
Breaks the you know, after he tries to give Lois he goes Sade style and tries to give her the kiss of life.
01:53:50 [Speaker 1]
And then he decides, if I could turn back time.
01:53:54 [Speaker 1]
Who's that?
01:53:55 [Speaker 1]
Who who was that?

01:53:56 [Speaker 1]
Who did that Cher.
01:53:57 [Speaker 1]
Turn back time?
01:53:57 [Speaker 1]
Thank you, Cher.

01:53:58 [Speaker 3]
Is that a good Cher?
01:54:00 [Speaker 3]
If I could turn

01:54:01 [Speaker 2]
back time.
01:54:02 [Speaker 2]
Cher right away.

01:54:04 [Speaker 3]
Do you believe it, Cher?

01:54:08 [Speaker 1]
I'm not gonna hurt anybody, at least not that we know of in this movie.
01:54:11 [Speaker 1]
He turns back time and gets Lois back.
01:54:15 [Speaker 1]
And when she when he comes back to present day and her immediate thing is just like, and guess what else happened?
01:54:22 [Speaker 1]
And he just, like, smiles like

01:54:24 [Speaker 2]
I don't think that Superman knew he could do that.
01:54:27 [Speaker 2]
I think when we get to that

01:54:28 [Speaker 1]
just gonna try.
01:54:30 [Speaker 1]
That Yeah.

01:54:30 [Speaker 2]
I know.
01:54:31 [Speaker 2]
I just think in the same way that he felt compelled to go north, that we the meet cute that we get from the dub they call it the double jeopardy scene with the helicopter.
01:54:39 [Speaker 2]
And then, again, that very important moment in in the movie when he and Lewis, we spend all the time, the poem and everything, that connection that they have, the love that he has for her.
01:54:51 [Speaker 2]
I think that it is just a thing that compelled him to it, and I don't think he'd ever do it again, as as a character.
01:54:57 [Speaker 2]
I know, originally, this is a meta thing.

01:55:00 [Speaker 2]
The plan was to do that in part two.
01:55:02 [Speaker 2]
But the fact that this happens here, Lois is dead.
01:55:06 [Speaker 2]
I really do believe that it was a, like, a love of Lois moment that happened, and that's like, I don't think it was a planned thing.
01:55:14 [Speaker 2]
I don't think he'd like, he just did it.

01:55:16 [Speaker 1]
It was emotional.

01:55:17 [Speaker 2]
And when he that when we talk again about how amazing Christopher Reeve is, when he is outside the window of her car and she's trying to start the engine and the look on his face, that is

01:55:28 [Speaker 1]
the the

01:55:28 [Speaker 2]
the look on his face when he flies

01:55:30 [Speaker 1]
I think it's dead.

01:55:31 [Speaker 2]
Pain and that pain in his eyes and the yell, the the powerful yell

01:55:36 [Speaker 1]
Oh, man.

01:55:36 [Speaker 2]
Lands.
01:55:37 [Speaker 2]
And we we literally feel I legitimately feel all that pain, all that joy, all in that look.
01:55:44 [Speaker 2]
It's just

01:55:44 [Speaker 1]
Dude.
01:55:45 [Speaker 1]
An amazing performance.
01:55:46 [Speaker 1]
All that power and all this creature wants is is to be loved and to love and be loved.
01:55:54 [Speaker 1]
And that's the the thing that I do get in the new one a bit.
01:55:58 [Speaker 1]
That's the last time I'm gonna bring it up.

01:55:59 [Speaker 1]
But Lex and Otis get dropped off.
01:56:03 [Speaker 1]
Miss Tessmacher is left her own devices because she ended up being nice in the end kinda.
01:56:09 [Speaker 1]
Again, that's never okay, that justification.
01:56:12 [Speaker 1]
But the movie is, like, it's almost too optimistic, which is basically the point of the fucking movie and the character.
01:56:20 [Speaker 1]
And so the movie is successful in it to me.

01:56:23 [Speaker 1]
And by the way, I don't forget that Zod stuff.
01:56:27 [Speaker 1]
So it's like, I do feel like this movie, as you were saying, is the blueprint.
01:56:32 [Speaker 1]
If anybody wants to get mad about movies, like, planning sequels or whatever outside of, like, James Bond or certain things, like, this movie is one of the absolute foundations of that where it's like, no.
01:56:44 [Speaker 1]
We know.
01:56:45 [Speaker 1]
We we got it.

01:56:46 [Speaker 1]
We know.
01:56:48 [Speaker 1]
Moses, do you have anything to say about the end specifically or anything else about the film?

01:56:54 [Speaker 2]
I just think it's a we've said it before.
01:56:57 [Speaker 2]
We'll say it again.
01:56:58 [Speaker 2]
There's a reason why it is 2025, and we're still talking about a movie 1978.
01:57:04 [Speaker 2]
And whether for me, when I give it four stars, and I'm saying that as a film and, again, I keep trying to say I'm I'm trying to remove myself from being a big old Superman nerd and watching it as just a cinephile that loves

01:57:18 [Speaker 1]
Well, you try.
01:57:18 [Speaker 1]
Just telling.
01:57:19 [Speaker 1]
Whoopsie.
01:57:19 [Speaker 1]
I try.
01:57:20 [Speaker 1]
I try.

01:57:20 [Speaker 3]
I'm I'm

01:57:21 [Speaker 2]
trying real darn hard to.
01:57:22 [Speaker 2]
But the the the real thing to say about this is that if you love movies, if you don't know much about movies, if you're saying that you wanna get through a list of a 100 movies you should watch before you die, Superman, the 1978 film is on that list.
01:57:39 [Speaker 2]
You know?

01:57:39 [Speaker 1]
I agree with you.
01:57:41 [Speaker 1]
I agree with you.
01:57:42 [Speaker 1]
And especially if you're a person who's do you like movies from the seventies or can you and especially ones that feel fast paced cons considering other movies from the time.
01:57:52 [Speaker 1]
Does the movie feel like it's over two hours?
01:57:54 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.

01:57:55 [Speaker 1]
Like, does the movie feel like overlong or like it has a lot of things that aren't important?
01:57:59 [Speaker 1]
No.
01:58:00 [Speaker 1]
I don't think so.
01:58:02 [Speaker 1]
And it only has, like, that one point that I'm kinda, like, wait.
01:58:06 [Speaker 1]
This does have a ways to go, but I'm not upset about it.

01:58:10 [Speaker 1]
So I just wanna make sure, like

01:58:12 [Speaker 2]
this after watching the 2025 version?

01:58:14 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
01:58:14 [Speaker 1]
And that's part of, like, what made the 2025 not as enjoyable for me and liking the new one even that much better.
01:58:22 [Speaker 1]
As we were talking about blueprints and directors and all this stuff, I just have a a new reverence for it, and there is a reason why it's still around.
01:58:31 [Speaker 1]
So I'm very glad.
01:58:32 [Speaker 1]
And and, conversed about so frequently and thought of so highly.

01:58:38 [Speaker 1]
So, Moses, I'm gonna tell you that outside of our and not that you're irregular or strange in any way.
01:58:46 [Speaker 1]
But our regular cohost, Ben McFadden, couldn't be here, but you have heard and will be hearing from him again shortly.
01:58:54 [Speaker 1]
I will thank Moses so much.
01:58:57 [Speaker 1]
We we wanted to keep the talk about the new one to, like, fifteen or twenty minutes, but I really had to try to get Moses's score, like, up to where it's like, you really even thought, like, you shouldn't have even seen the movie because that's about where Atu computes in my mind whether that's true or not.
01:59:14 [Speaker 1]
Thank you for coming on here, and also we actually debated a bit.

01:59:18 [Speaker 1]
We weren't just like, you know, Superman Red Son lockstep there.

01:59:23 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.

01:59:24 [Speaker 1]
So that was good, and we got to talk about Superman a lot.
01:59:28 [Speaker 1]
Our themes are bookended.
01:59:31 [Speaker 1]
Jamie Henwood.
01:59:33 [Speaker 1]
What are we doing?
01:59:35 [Speaker 1]
That's not what it is anymore.

01:59:37 [Speaker 1]
Why are you excited?
01:59:39 [Speaker 1]
And what are you watching?
01:59:40 [Speaker 1]
Our Matthew Foskett.
01:59:42 [Speaker 1]
Fun facts is Chris Olds and our interstitials are Benjamin McFadden.
01:59:46 [Speaker 1]
Please follow us on review x two podcast.

01:59:50 [Speaker 1]
There's an app before that.
01:59:52 [Speaker 1]
On Instagram as well as blue sky.
01:59:55 [Speaker 1]
You can follow Moses on Letterboxd at Holy Moses as well as on Instagram?

02:00:01 [Speaker 2]
Yes, sir.

02:00:02 [Speaker 1]
You can follow me on Letterboxd to mind your own goddamn business.
02:00:05 [Speaker 1]
It's at Paul acts badly.
02:00:07 [Speaker 1]
Ben is at run b b e e m c on Letterboxd.
02:00:13 [Speaker 1]
Listen to us anywhere.
02:00:14 [Speaker 1]
Rate, review, share.

02:00:15 [Speaker 1]
We love your feedback.
02:00:17 [Speaker 1]
Leave your comments.
02:00:18 [Speaker 1]
Ben will never eat peanut butter M and M's on this program ever fucking again.
02:00:22 [Speaker 1]
You can bet your bottom dollar

02:00:24 [Speaker 5]
Always the fucking

02:00:25 [Speaker 1]
as this episode was brought to us by.
02:00:27 [Speaker 1]
Thanks so much for tuning in.
02:00:29 [Speaker 1]
We gotta we gotta fly out of here, Moses.
02:00:31 [Speaker 1]
Are you ready to go?

02:00:33 [Speaker 2]
Ready.

02:00:33 [Speaker 1]
Can I take your hand?
02:00:34 [Speaker 1]
Will you fly me out of here?

02:00:37 [Speaker 2]
Can you read my mind?

02:00:39 [Speaker 1]
I think I did.

02:00:42 [Speaker 3]
Ta ta.

02:00:42 [Speaker 1]
Woah.
02:00:42 [Speaker 1]
Woah.
02:00:42 [Speaker 1]
Woah.
02:00:43 [Speaker 1]
Woah.
02:00:43 [Speaker 1]
Woah.

02:00:43 [Speaker 1]
Woah.
02:00:43 [Speaker 1]
I I know what you're thinking.
02:00:45 [Speaker 1]
I'm so sorry.
02:00:47 [Speaker 1]
It's my fault.
02:00:48 [Speaker 1]
I was running the session.

02:00:50 [Speaker 1]
And you desperately need Ben's thoughts on this film as well.
02:00:54 [Speaker 1]
Right?

02:00:55 [Speaker 3]
But I didn't give you my final rating, Moses' final rating.

02:01:02 [Speaker 1]
Moses ended up at the solid four exploded planets, so not so solid, but a four.
02:01:12 [Speaker 1]
I am going to move to a 4.25, and in case you couldn't tell this is at paulax badly on Letterboxd.
02:01:21 [Speaker 1]
I'm gonna go up just a little little bit.
02:01:24 [Speaker 1]
I think it's very, very cool that this movie for me was still effective at just doing little things that have such a big impact.
02:01:34 [Speaker 1]
Just Superman flying by a camera to transition to an act.

02:01:39 [Speaker 1]
This is the big piece that we've been waiting for, and it kinda works.
02:01:42 [Speaker 1]
Yep.
02:01:43 [Speaker 1]
The movie is not the fastest moving, definitely not faster than a speeding bullet or anything along those lines, but a very solid movie indeed.
02:01:53 [Speaker 1]
And as Moses Moses said, it kind of is the blueprint for a lot of adventure movies in general, fantasy movies in general, but specifically superhero films, which I do enjoy many, many of.
02:02:07 [Speaker 1]
And now, our final thoughts from Ben Handy.

02:02:14 [Speaker 2]
Barry Syngovner.

02:02:16 [Speaker 5]
Here is my confession regarding the 1978 Superman.
02:02:24 [Speaker 5]
I I have never liked this movie.
02:02:28 [Speaker 5]
I I've tried.
02:02:29 [Speaker 5]
I remember renting this movie from Blockbuster on one of those evenings with my mom and my family, and I really wanted to enjoy it.
02:02:37 [Speaker 5]
I I was excited for it.

02:02:38 [Speaker 5]
And I remember being disappointed and feeling kind of let down, and it felt kind of boring.
02:02:44 [Speaker 5]
Now granted, this kind of is not my generation, I suppose.
02:02:49 [Speaker 5]
And it and maybe I was too young to appreciate what it was.
02:02:53 [Speaker 5]
I think that I ultimately felt that it just didn't capture the magic of, of Superman.
02:03:00 [Speaker 5]
And and I was reading Superman comics at an early age.

02:03:05 [Speaker 5]
I, I revisited this movie, last night or so, couple nights ago, and I still I'm still really challenged by it.
02:03:13 [Speaker 5]
It's not a movie that has a lot of nostalgia for me, so I'm there's not that nostalgia pull.
02:03:19 [Speaker 5]
And I I do really appreciate a lot of things.
02:03:22 [Speaker 5]
I like Christopher Reeve.
02:03:24 [Speaker 5]
I think that he's a delightful actor to watch, and I appreciate his performance.

02:03:29 [Speaker 5]
And I I I like Gene Hackman as an actor.
02:03:31 [Speaker 5]
I don't like that version of Lex Luthor, and so ultimately it's a soft.
02:03:36 [Speaker 5]
It's a soft three for me.
02:03:39 [Speaker 5]
Three wigs.
02:03:41 [Speaker 5]
You know how you know I love a wig.

02:03:42 [Speaker 5]
I don't look good in the Shine Heart.
02:03:44 [Speaker 5]
So that's my confession.
02:03:45 [Speaker 5]
It's my nerd confession.
02:03:46 [Speaker 5]
I don't really like this movie.

02:03:48 [Speaker 2]
Up, Up, and Away.

02:03:51 [Speaker 6]
Hi, everyone.
02:03:51 [Speaker 6]
This is JJ, the cofounder of Goodpods.
02:03:54 [Speaker 6]
If you haven't heard of it yet, Goodpods is like Goodreads or Instagram, but for podcasts.
02:03:59 [Speaker 6]
It's new, it's social, it's different, and it's growing really fast.
02:04:03 [Speaker 6]
There are more than 2,000,000 podcasts, and we know that it is impossible to figure out what to listen to.

02:04:10 [Speaker 6]
On Goodpods, you follow your friends and podcasters to see what they like.
02:04:14 [Speaker 6]
That is the number one way to discover new shows and episodes.
02:04:18 [Speaker 6]
You can find Goodpods on the web or download the app.
02:04:21 [Speaker 6]
Happy listening.