Superman II - Puzzled (OT)

[DMcCauley]

After being puzzled for some unknown reason after watching Superman II, i decided to watch it again and this time realized what it was that was puzzling me.

There is a scene where Lois Lane believes Clark Kent is superman and to prove the point, she points a gun loaded with blanks at Clark and fires. Clark flinches and then admits he is superman, just before Lois tells him there were blanks in the gun. . .

Well, if Clark was indeed Superman, wouldn't he have realized through his superpowers of x-ray vision and superhuman perception that no bullet came out of the gun ? ? ?

 

[roadkill]

Or he could have used superspeed and dodged the likely
bullets faster than the eye can see....

:duck:

Poor Lois wouldn't even seen him twitch...

 

[DMcCauley]

Or he could have used superspeed and dodged the likely
bullets faster than the eye can see....

:duck:

Poor Lois wouldn't even seen him twitch...

And to quote someone from another favorite movie of mine . . .

"Excuse me while i whip this out . . . "

 

[blackjack2564]

Or as I always say to folks when things don't make sense........

........"it's in the script"

 

[JStarStar]

After being puzzled for some unknown reason after watching Superman II, i decided to watch it again and this time realized what it was that was puzzling me.

There is a scene where Lois Lane believes Clark Kent is superman and to prove the point, she points a gun loaded with blanks at Clark and fires. Clark flinches and then admits he is superman, just before Lois tells him there were blanks in the gun. . .

Well, if Clark was indeed Superman, wouldn't he have realized through his superpowers of x-ray vision and superhuman perception that no bullet came out of the gun ? ? ?

In the original cut of "Superman II," in order to trick Clark into revealing he is Superman, she jumps into the river at Niagara Falls. He uses super-breath to push a floating log near her in the river, then jumps in (as Clark) and helps pull her out. Later that night in the romantic hotel suite, Clark trips and his hand falls into a blazing fireplace and Lois figures out he is indeed Supes.

In the "Richard Donner Cut" (the re-edited version of Supes II which was released in 2006), first, Lois jumps out the window at the Daily Planet in an attempt to sucker Clark into giving himself away. He uses super-breath to push her into landing on a canvas canopy and then on a pile of fruit and vegetables, so instead of getting killed or revealing Clark's secret identity, she ends up splattered with tomatoes.

Later in the "Donner Cut" she pulls the loaded-gun trick, and you are correct: Clark would certainly have known if the gun was loaded or not, used x-ray vision to see if it was loaded, his super-hearing would have heard the hammer connect with the shell, and of course he would have caught/melted the bullet coming out of the chamber as it was fired.

In both cases he reveals to her that he is indeed Superman, but then before the end of the movie he decides to brainwash her with super-hypnotism and make her forget she ever knew the secret (bringing the question up once again: how stupid does Lois Lane -- supposedly an award-winning journalist -- have to be, to swoon endlessly over Superman, and yet never figure out that he's the guy who sits two desks across from her at work?).

The Superman/Lois Lane relationship is very, very strange. They both take turns acting like complete morons, and treating the other with utter contempt.

 

[Zeus-cat]

How exactly does Superman's X-Ray vision work? It certainly does not work like real X-Rays as he sees things an X-Ray machine can't. If I recall correctly he knows the color of Lois' panties in the first Superman movie. How?

 

[Rev Lovejoy]

I would contend that the Donner Cut is indeed, the "original" and that the theatrical release was the replacement. Of course, I never knew of the Donner cut until recently. I sat in my friend's apartment watching it, and at the end I was angry at the studio for releasing the other one originally. As much as I enjoy the Niagara Falls scenes, the Donner vision was a better story. And I am not alone in that belief, obviously, if someone greenlighted spending the money to re-release a decades-old film completely recut.

The glasses-on glasses-off trick that eludes this supposed world class investigative journalist is a problem for the franchise, but I am told by the more knowledgeable comic readers that this was a running theme in the comics. Both versions of S2 have Lois pursuing ironclad proof, but I think that even with the fault initially discussed here, Donner's is the better version. The sequence of events that Superman has to go through at the Daily Planet is complex and makes sense. In the river alternative, (theatrical release), it makes no sense to me that dropping a log in the raging river would save her.

To play the game of make-the-inconsistency in a superhero movie make sense, I always start with - a yellow sun gives powers, so what else are we supposed to believe? Yet I'll give it a go: with criminals, Clark/Supes is spot-on focus. When Lois pulls out the gun, he is so flabbergasted he doesn't think to use x-ray vision. When she fires, raw instinct gets him to move out of the way.

I spent too much time thinking about this, and not just tonight.

 

[Zeus-cat]

a yellow sun gives powers, QUOTE]

Doesn't he fly to Krypton in one of the movies? How? There can't be yellow suns all along the route?

 

[Rev Lovejoy]

In the newest release, Superman Returns, the director attempts to pick up where the Donner movies left off. Definitely similar in tone, forgetting the Richard Pryor incident and Quest for Peace. And there, the plot is that he did indeed go back to find Krypton, but it was destroyed when he got there. I am not sure what the logic of the power source was. But at the same time, I don't think it's the case where he has to be in yellow sunlight or he is powerless. He is still superman at night, so there must be somelevel of "battery charge" effect.

In that lesser movie "Quest for Peace," Lex Luthor uses Superman's destruction of nuclear weapons to create a super villain when the missles hit the sun. the resulting villain can only fight in the direct sunlight. He literally winds down as soon as he enters a shadow. Superman never suffers a problem like this, so I guess the logic would be that he retains power for a length of time. He really wouldn't need a trail of yellow suns in solar systems to fly though.

I really need to go to bed.