Superman II (1980) - Review
Originally published June 2016Superman II is often considered the best of the original Superman films starring Christopher Reeve. While I don't entirely disagree, it's not like it's up against the stiffest of competition. The original Superman and its sequel were filmed at the same time, allowing them to shoot and add scenes from part 2 to the original, in the hope of having a movie ready to go, should the original movie do well in theaters. Somehow it did, so when Superman II came out, people were ready to eat it up.
It's still aged about as poorly as its predecessor though. There were some slight improvements to the formula of the film to allow for more stuff to actually happen in the movie, but it's still kind of a chore to watch, with the exceptions being when Reeve is playing up his role or when Terence Stamp is hamming up his role as Zod.
Image: Warner Bros.
Pros
More stuff actually happens
Reeve is still great in the role
No more origin story so Reeve is on-screen more often, though still not given top-billing
Terence Stamp is fantastic as Zod simply because of how over-the-top he is and for barely ever breaking his intense stare
One of Luthor's cronies is left behind and barely in the movie
Superman's confrontation with the Kryptonians is appropriately focused on him trying to prevent people from getting hurt, despite being in a city... unlike some other Superman films...
Cons
Superman is, once again, woefully unaware of the villains and doesn't meet them till well after the half-way point
The "climactic" confrontation between them is slow, boring, and limited to the technology of the time
The "love story" thing and him giving up his powers doesn't make sense or work
That. Is. Not. How. Time. Works. Stop using time-travel deus ex machina bs, it makes everything about as useless and pointless as a dream
Lex Luthor serves no purpose other than comic relief
Plot & Thoughts
The best thing about this movie is Christopher Reeve. The second best thing about this movie is Terence Stamp. While Reeve adds the genuine charm needed to make you like the boyscout superhero, Stamp adds the dramatic flair of a villain, which is, frankly, more suitable to stage-acting, but I like it here. It's unhinged and crazy, but Stamp as Zod is just fun. Zod as a character is nothing special; he's just another supervillain who wants to rule things and thinks he's a god. The thing that's great about him is entirely how Stamp makes him. Even though he thinks himself a military genius and all-powerful, he shows no signs of military strategy and he's fooled quite easily, but I'll be damned if I don't love it when he yells out "Kneel before Zod!" There's a reason that has become a quote over the years that is still used in comics and video games about the character.
And that's where the praise ends. Aside from the moments where Stamp is allowed to ham it up and yell out "Zod!" as though he were saying hello, goodbye, or aloha, the rest of the movie is not much fun. Since the origin story is out of the way, to fill the time, our focus is pointed more toward the relationship between Superman and Lois Lane.
Image: Warner Bros.
Lois develops a very probable conspiracy theory that Clark Kent is Superman based on how she can draw Clark's outfit over Superman's image in the newspaper. Genius! Soon, in her brilliance, she starts coming up with dangerous methods of trying to get him to relinquish his secret identity. She goes so far as to jump out the window of a skyscraper, because, if Clark is Superman, he'll save her. What an intelligent woman! The moron, unfortunately, lives, due to Superman's discrete use of his powers, but gives up on her theory momentarily.
Oh, but then Clark and she have to go to Niagra Falls posing as a married couple to expose some fraud that's been happening where people are getting suckered into...something. It doesn't matter. That plot point is dropped as quickly as it starts when her theory rears its head again after Clark Kent disappears for a few seconds and Superman shows up to save some kid who was dangling off the wrong side of the railing at the falls, due to his neglectful parents not paying attention. This was the point where I'd have liked to ask Superman to stop saving all the morons. Essentially, he's just combating natural selection by saving these idiots. If I were him, I think I'd save about half as many citizens, out of principle for how dumb they seem to be.
Image: Warner Bros.
Anyway, Lois becomes convinced, once more, that Kent is Superman, shoots a blank bullet at him, and tricks him into revealing himself. This then allows for them to drop this whole journalism sub-plot that doesn't matter, fly to the Fortress of Solitude at the North Pole, and have sex. It's like superhero speed dating.
Then, for some reason that isn't ever really explained, he gets out of bed after the sex to go talk to Marlon Brando, who still got top billing over him in the credits, even though he's in this movie for less than 10 minutes. For no apparent reason, other than love(?), Superman wants to have his powers removed so he can become human. I don't recall any conversation that led to this decision and it's never explained beyond simply "being in love"—like he couldn't do that and be Superman. It's not like he's protecting Lois by becoming human and using his secret identity, because later on Lex Luthor flat-out calls her Superman's girlfriend, so everyone knows she's a good target already. What's worse, the talking head of his Krypton dad tells him "There's no going back," but then there is because he has to get his powers back to stand a chance against the villains. I'm not really sure what they were trying to accomplish with the power removal thing. It's a stupid plot point that is forced into the movie to give him something up his sleeve for when he faces Zod and his lieutenants.
Image: Warner Bros.
Meanwhile, between all the "love story" bits, Zod and his friends are going around terrorizing people with their new-found powers and ever-inflating egos. The limitations of film-making technology at the time prevent these moments from being exciting, but it is a welcome reprieve from the rest of the movie. It's at least entertaining enough watching the cheese drip from these scenes, and it feels like something is happening, as opposed to the moments in the first movie when Superman wasn't around. Nonetheless, a long time passes before Superman is even aware of their presence, because he's too busy getting laid to notice the world getting smashed by them. When the time finally does come for the villains and hero to face off, we're treated to a lackluster battle of slow-moving people on wires throwing plastic concrete at each other and trying to fist-fight without choreography.
Spoilers to a 40-year-old film. Superman eventually manages to beat the villains using his super-intelligence and forced plot points, but then decides that it just isn't going to work between him and Lois, and decides to do what he did in the first movie and turn back time, again. He flies around the earth, which reverses time somehow, and manages to bring it all the way back to the end of the first movie, where his attempts at destroying Lex Luthor's missiles freed Zod & his friends, and changed that little bit of history. Superman has a lot of powers that make him next to untouchable, but this particular made-up ability is so powerful it destroys film! He basically makes the events of Superman II completely moot, and might as well have been dreaming it up the whole time. What's the point of coming up with elaborate methods of fighting villains if you could just undo them showing up in the first place? By the way, this ability was forbidden by his space-dad in the first movie, but I guess it's okay this time around when it's used for something as petty as breaking up with his girlfriend without hurting her feelings—before texting break-ups were a thing, there was time-travel. He's already done it once, so I guess it doesn't matter at this point.
The only thing I like about this history rewrite nonsense is that I like to think he forgot about some of the people he saved between the events of the two movies that were unaffected by his relationship with Lois or Zod, so Natural Selection was allowed to take its course like the kid that fell off the Niagra Falls railing. At least his parents will have learned that they need to be more aware of their remaining stupid offspring.
Image: Warner Bros.
TL;DR (Conclusion)
Superman II is indeed the best of the original Superman movies with Christopher Reeve in that it has the most things happening. The things that do happen are not very interesting or all that fun to watch, and the ending makes them not matter at all. This movie is super boring, full of super-lazy writing, and would require super-nostalgia to convince me otherwise. At least the performances of Reeve and Stamp give the movie some flair to make up for the shortcomings a little bit.