After an absence of four years, along with Christopher Reeve's initial determination he was done with the blue and red tights after Superman III, the Superman franchise was brought back to life for one more entry, but after the release of Superman IV: The Quest for Peace, it's unfortunate that everyone involved hadn't just decided to let things alone. Superman IV is a complete disaster on almost every level, a silly, cheesy and downright cheap looking poor excuse for a film that manages to rank among the worst comic book adaptation films of all time, bested only by such "winners" as The Return of Swamp Thing and the direct-to-video Captain America.
Superman IV finds our hero, Clark Kent (Christopher Reeve), selling off his family farm after his mother has died between performing his normal super duties. He returns to Metropolis to discover that the Daily Planet has been taken over by tabloid king David Warfield (Sam Wanamaker) and his daughter Lacy (Mariel Hemmingway) and are turning it into a salacious rag sheet. Shortly after the takeover, a young boy writes Superman a letter, via the Daily Planet, and asks him for assistance in solving the arms crisis by removing all nuclear weapons from the Earth. Superman initially refuses, taking the stance that he cannot interfere in human affairs (although how this relates to his other helping of humanity is a puzzler). Eventually, Superman changes his mind and begins ridding the world of all nuclear weapons by tossing them into the sun.
Meanwhile, Lex Luthor (Gene Hackman) has escaped from prison with the assistance of his nephew Lenny (Jon Cryer), and hatched a devious scheme: to create a new super villain to defeat Superman by taking a sample of Superman's DNA recovered from a museum exhibit featuring a single hair from Superman's head and attaching it and a computer to the side of one of the missiles that are hurled into the sun by Superman and thus creating Nuclear Man (Mark Pillow, voiced by Gene Hackman), a being with the power of Superman, the voice of Lex Luthor, plus more abilities, powered by the sun. The two match off, but has Superman finally met his rival?
It's not really surprising that Superman IV is terrible movie, considering it was produced by The Canon Group, who may never have released what you could label a "good" movie when they existed in the '80s. And Superman IV is not a good movie. It has an intriguing concept at it's heart, Superman ridding the world of nuclear devices, but everything around that central idea is just a complete mess. The script by Laurence Konner and Mark Rosenthal is borderline insipid, featuring some extreme gaps in logic that cause the audience to have to accept some absolutely ridiculous contrivances and just asinine ideas. Superman tosses a missile containing Nuclear Man's basic building blocks into the sun. And how is that not all fried by the sun? Okay, maybe the Superman genetic material may not be (although I don't know if it was ever stated he is able to withstand even the sun), but the computer that will supposedly give Nuclear Man form, along with the barest shreds of material that suddenly grow into clothes to cover his body? Please. And how does he get Lex's voice? Late in the film, a human character is carried into space by Nuclear Man with no oxygen or protective suit, and survives. The complete contempt for the audience the script shows is inexcusable.
With Lois Lane (Margot Kidder) still pulling a mostly supporting role, the writers attempt to inject Lacy as a new love interest, with her eye on Clark instead of Superman. They also try to generate a triangle between them, but none of it works. There is no chemistry between Lacy and Clark, and much of what was there between Superman and Lois seems to be gone or on life support. Yeah, Lex Luthor is back, but he is nowhere near as engaging as he was in Superman and Superman II. Hackman does the best he can with his questionable material, but there is no saving it.
Many of the outstanding aspects of the previous films are just shoddy this time around. The special effects are abysmal, with many generic elements of Superman flying reused over and over again and almost none of it is believable. The action sequences, what few there are, are unspectacular and barely raise your pulse. The film, on the whole, has a rushed and half-complete feeling to it, and you get the impression you are watching a movie made on the cheap, not the latest sequel to a successful, multi-million dollar grossing franchise.
So, after close to ten years and three sequels, Supeman IV is able to do what Lex Luthor could never accomplish: it brought the Man of Steel down, and left him tattered. It would take almost two decades for Superman to fly again, and we can only hope that the next entry is worth your time, because this one wasn't.
Superman IV finds our hero, Clark Kent (Christopher Reeve), selling off his family farm after his mother has died between performing his normal super duties. He returns to Metropolis to discover that the Daily Planet has been taken over by tabloid king David Warfield (Sam Wanamaker) and his daughter Lacy (Mariel Hemmingway) and are turning it into a salacious rag sheet. Shortly after the takeover, a young boy writes Superman a letter, via the Daily Planet, and asks him for assistance in solving the arms crisis by removing all nuclear weapons from the Earth. Superman initially refuses, taking the stance that he cannot interfere in human affairs (although how this relates to his other helping of humanity is a puzzler). Eventually, Superman changes his mind and begins ridding the world of all nuclear weapons by tossing them into the sun.
Meanwhile, Lex Luthor (Gene Hackman) has escaped from prison with the assistance of his nephew Lenny (Jon Cryer), and hatched a devious scheme: to create a new super villain to defeat Superman by taking a sample of Superman's DNA recovered from a museum exhibit featuring a single hair from Superman's head and attaching it and a computer to the side of one of the missiles that are hurled into the sun by Superman and thus creating Nuclear Man (Mark Pillow, voiced by Gene Hackman), a being with the power of Superman, the voice of Lex Luthor, plus more abilities, powered by the sun. The two match off, but has Superman finally met his rival?
It's not really surprising that Superman IV is terrible movie, considering it was produced by The Canon Group, who may never have released what you could label a "good" movie when they existed in the '80s. And Superman IV is not a good movie. It has an intriguing concept at it's heart, Superman ridding the world of nuclear devices, but everything around that central idea is just a complete mess. The script by Laurence Konner and Mark Rosenthal is borderline insipid, featuring some extreme gaps in logic that cause the audience to have to accept some absolutely ridiculous contrivances and just asinine ideas. Superman tosses a missile containing Nuclear Man's basic building blocks into the sun. And how is that not all fried by the sun? Okay, maybe the Superman genetic material may not be (although I don't know if it was ever stated he is able to withstand even the sun), but the computer that will supposedly give Nuclear Man form, along with the barest shreds of material that suddenly grow into clothes to cover his body? Please. And how does he get Lex's voice? Late in the film, a human character is carried into space by Nuclear Man with no oxygen or protective suit, and survives. The complete contempt for the audience the script shows is inexcusable.
With Lois Lane (Margot Kidder) still pulling a mostly supporting role, the writers attempt to inject Lacy as a new love interest, with her eye on Clark instead of Superman. They also try to generate a triangle between them, but none of it works. There is no chemistry between Lacy and Clark, and much of what was there between Superman and Lois seems to be gone or on life support. Yeah, Lex Luthor is back, but he is nowhere near as engaging as he was in Superman and Superman II. Hackman does the best he can with his questionable material, but there is no saving it.
Many of the outstanding aspects of the previous films are just shoddy this time around. The special effects are abysmal, with many generic elements of Superman flying reused over and over again and almost none of it is believable. The action sequences, what few there are, are unspectacular and barely raise your pulse. The film, on the whole, has a rushed and half-complete feeling to it, and you get the impression you are watching a movie made on the cheap, not the latest sequel to a successful, multi-million dollar grossing franchise.
So, after close to ten years and three sequels, Supeman IV is able to do what Lex Luthor could never accomplish: it brought the Man of Steel down, and left him tattered. It would take almost two decades for Superman to fly again, and we can only hope that the next entry is worth your time, because this one wasn't.