The Christopher Reeve-headlined Superman saga taught Hollywood lots of lessons - many of which it ignored… Grounding fantastical elements in a pseudo-realistic world was also mastered by Donner.
Here are the now-common blockbuster problems the original Superman saga highlighted…
Lets start with one of the biggies.
After this initial shoot, Donner shut down production to complete working on the first film.
The rest of the franchise hugely suffered and eventually completely failed as a result of this decision, though.
The terrific bookSuperman Vs Hollywooddetails the story in some depth.
What didnt feel natural was the huge wave of changes, though.
This is where he also fall from a huge height, but landed with no problem.
Maybe, just maybe, weve been on an upturn since then.
In truth, theres still no hint of a great story untold here.
By introducing Nuclear Man, Konner and Rosenthal essentially nullified Hackmans performance.
At the time, perhaps the producers thought Superman would be enough to carry the movie.
That hasnt stopped numerous new films failing to do their baddies justice though.
It feels like Malekith got the chop in post-production…
Either way, many see it as a fairly big goof.
Donner clearly doesnt think giving Superman this ability was a mistake though.
The 2006 re-edit ofSuperman II known as the Donner version saw Supes use the same technique again.
We all know how Hollywood took that lesson…
So who wants to fly around the earth really quickly to go back and warn them?
