Superman Returns

A quick confession: I'm not a big superhero fan. I don't know why; maybe it has something to do with my dislike of action films (at least the ones where the action doesn't do anything different or interesting--there's only so many exposions and uncommented-on deaths you can take before it gets old). I didn't even like "Superman II," and considering that lots of people seem to love that, you should see why I'm not big on it.

Nonetheless, I did give "Superman Returns" a chance. It's all right, I guess (and if I revisited "Superman II," I'd probably say that about it, too), but it's not a particularly important film. It's got some good set-pieces, but there's not enough substance to it.

So Superman returns from Krypton, and I have to wonder about that: How did he survive being around the remnants of his homeworld if, on Earth, those same remnants rob him of his powers? Did he need a spaceship? And why did he need to go back? Did I miss something? Because really, if your father recorded a message that tells you that it's destroyed, I'm not sure why you'd need to check it out.

Anyway, Superman returns, and strangely, it seems Lex Luthor hasn't been up to much in the 5 years since he left. So he's romanced an old lady to her death--would that really take five years? Actually, on second thought, it could. Still, all that and he's only come up with one evil plan to take over the world? I don't know about you, but if I were taking five years off from trying to take over the world, I'd be brainstorming for all sorts of new ways to do it. Heck, that could have been interesting: Lex has so many different plans being put into consideration that Superman has to deal with all at once.

Alas, his superplan now is kinda odd: Krypto-Land floods over America and he's got prime real estate. Ignoring the strangeness of plotting to go into real estate, you have to wonder why he'd use kryptonite if what results is so ugly. Why doesn't he put in some grass? At least then, people would want to live there instead of drowning in America (today!). And I have to ask why they seem to make such a big deal out of Parker Posey's character seeming to realize how evil Lex's plan is when nothing ever comes of it; the way they showed her reactions, I expected her to turn on Lex, but the film seems to forget it. (And why is a Queen of Indie-Film Land doing superhero films like this and "Blade 3?" Does she just accept every script her agent sends her?)

Maybe I'm being picky here, and there are logical explanations for everything there, and that's why I'm not good at reviewing superhero films. Or maybe it's all just Comic-Book Science, and I shouldn't ask why all this happens, as long as it does. Hell, I don't know.