Consume Mate Hero
The people who make movies are about as intellectually creative as a sack of turnips. What have they produced in the last decade which has any originality, is well thought out, has any depth or intellectual vigor? Take the endless rehashing of stories which have been done previously; the Pink Panther, the Parent Trap, Oceans 11(and 12, and 13, and 72). Now we have the ``Return of Superman`` zooming into mediocrity faster than a speeding bullet.
I`ll admit; I haven`t seen the movie, and I`ll probably wait for it to come out on DVD. Still, I can`t imagine anyone doing Superman, when we had the original radio show, the t.v. show, the movie trilogy, television`s Lois and Clark, and Smallville. (You`d think I`d be a bigger fan, since I`ve been to Metropolis, Il., and seen Sup Steelie Dog`s statue.) Leave it to me to misunderestimate the complete lack of creative talent in Hollywood!
Much has been said about the universalization of the Man of Steel in the latest film, and about the attempt to modernize the old neo-Kryptonian. (Superman is about tradition at this point, not modernity, and trying to make him hip is like putting George Washington into a toothpaste commercial, or portraying Abe Lincoln on the big screen with George Clooney.) Apparently Kal-El (that would make a great name for a terrorist by the way; it sounds like Arabic for ``kill-all for Allah``!) has been a naughty boy, and has been experimenting in inter-species sexual relations (wouldn`t that amount to bestiality, or at least sodomy, since Kal-El isn`t human, and Loose Loins, er, Lois Lane, is?)
This from the Federalist Patriot:
"This new Superman may not be strictly American, but he's still unmistakably Western and terribly, terribly modern as he... sires a son... Before leaving Earth for five years in a mysterious exit unexplained to anyone, Superman and gal pal Lois Lane hooked up, as they say. Apparently Superman, like his dorky doppelganger, Clark Kent, is clueless when it comes to men and women, and failed to block certain speeding bullets from reaching their natural destination. Voila. When he returns to save the world, he finds that Lois has a 5-year-old son, Jason, and is living with but is not married to 'the father,' Richard White. Perky Jimmy Olsen explains that, well, you know Lois! She just can't bring herself to consider marriage. All that yucky commitment and stuff. But having a kid out of wedlock is the superwoman way in Metropolis, as most places these days. Who needs a man?... In the absence of a satisfactory moral to the story, we are left to improvise. For my ration of popcorn, one thought emerges with clarity: When it comes to fathers, it's better to have an ordinary man on the ground than have to rely on a flighty narcissist who woos girls on rooftops, and then vanishes in search of self."
Kathleen Parker
The trouble is, our creative geniuses from Hollywood (and in that town one cannot imagine that Holly wouldn`t!) haven`t thought beyond the Man of Steel going all steely for his luscious Lane, and considered the ramifications behind Kryptonian-Human mating.
The great science fiction writer Larry Niven once took a stab at the sex problems of Kal-El in a piece entitled ``Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex``:
Assume a mating between Superman and a human woman designated LL for convenience.
Either Superman has gone completely schizo and believes himself to be Clark Kent; or he knows what he's doing, but no longer gives a damn. Thirty-one years is a long time. For Superman it has been even longer. He has X-ray vision; he knows just what he's missing. (*One should not think of Superman as a Peeping Tom. A biological ability must be used. As a child Superman may never have known that things had surfaces, until he learned to suppress his X-ray vision. If millions of people tend shamelessly to wear clothing with no lead in the weave, that is hardly Superman's fault.*)
The problem is this. Electroencephalograms taken of men and women during sexual intercourse show that orgasm resembles "a kind of pleasurable epileptic attack." One loses control over one's muscles.
Superman has been known to leave his fingerprints in steel and in hardened concrete, accidentally. What would he do to the woman in his arms during what amounts to an epileptic fit?
Consider the driving urge between a man and a woman, the monomaniacal urge to achieve greater and greater penetration. Remember also that we are dealing with kryptonian muscles.
Superman would literally crush LL's body in his arms, while simultaneously ripping her open from crotch to sternum, gutting her like a trout.
Lastly, he'd blow off the top of her head.
Ejaculation of semen is entirely involuntary in the human male, and in all other forms of terrestrial life. It would be unreasonable to assume otherwise for a kryptonian. But with kryptonian muscles behind it, Kal-El's semen would emerge with the muzzle velocity of a machine gun bullet. (*One can imagine that the Kent home in Smallville was riddled with holes during Superboy's puberty. And why did Lana Lang never notice that?*)
In view of the foregoing, normal sex is impossible between LL and Superman.
Artificial insemination may give us better results...
I have a few more thoughts on this; do Kryptonians have super venereal diseases which could be passed to the human population? What horrible plagues could be unleased if one should turn up and be passed by Superman? Imagine Lex Luthor getting his hands on Supergonorrhea; it would quickly amplify, and the massive amounts of discharge could flood the Earth, infecting the entire world and dissolving the poor human victims faster than the Wicked Witch of the West. How about a flying Syphilis? It would bore straight through your body and into your central nervous system. A Kryptonian AIDS would be a species exterminating plague...
Furthermore, Lex Luthor would have an easy weapon to use against Superman himself; keep the crazed Kryptonian in a state of constant sexual arousal via taped sexual activity broadcast worldwide (with his super hearing, SM would be unable to avoid listening to it) and our alien friend may be unable to avoid doing something rash. It won`t take the shredding of many women (at least not here in America-especially on college campuses) to turn the public soundly against our hero. (Of course, Sup may be popular in Iran or some such, showing that real men can kill their women whenever they want.) Luthor could ruin Kal-El`s reputation, since tearing women to shreds during copulation is hardly a part of the American Way.
At any rate, you simply have to read the rest of Niven`s essay; it is hilariously funny and shows the sophistry of the makers of ``Superman Returns``.
Hollywood has once again proven that they can create brilliant technical effects, but haven`t got a clue about the way to make a good movie!
I`ll admit; I haven`t seen the movie, and I`ll probably wait for it to come out on DVD. Still, I can`t imagine anyone doing Superman, when we had the original radio show, the t.v. show, the movie trilogy, television`s Lois and Clark, and Smallville. (You`d think I`d be a bigger fan, since I`ve been to Metropolis, Il., and seen Sup Steelie Dog`s statue.) Leave it to me to misunderestimate the complete lack of creative talent in Hollywood!
Much has been said about the universalization of the Man of Steel in the latest film, and about the attempt to modernize the old neo-Kryptonian. (Superman is about tradition at this point, not modernity, and trying to make him hip is like putting George Washington into a toothpaste commercial, or portraying Abe Lincoln on the big screen with George Clooney.) Apparently Kal-El (that would make a great name for a terrorist by the way; it sounds like Arabic for ``kill-all for Allah``!) has been a naughty boy, and has been experimenting in inter-species sexual relations (wouldn`t that amount to bestiality, or at least sodomy, since Kal-El isn`t human, and Loose Loins, er, Lois Lane, is?)
This from the Federalist Patriot:
"This new Superman may not be strictly American, but he's still unmistakably Western and terribly, terribly modern as he... sires a son... Before leaving Earth for five years in a mysterious exit unexplained to anyone, Superman and gal pal Lois Lane hooked up, as they say. Apparently Superman, like his dorky doppelganger, Clark Kent, is clueless when it comes to men and women, and failed to block certain speeding bullets from reaching their natural destination. Voila. When he returns to save the world, he finds that Lois has a 5-year-old son, Jason, and is living with but is not married to 'the father,' Richard White. Perky Jimmy Olsen explains that, well, you know Lois! She just can't bring herself to consider marriage. All that yucky commitment and stuff. But having a kid out of wedlock is the superwoman way in Metropolis, as most places these days. Who needs a man?... In the absence of a satisfactory moral to the story, we are left to improvise. For my ration of popcorn, one thought emerges with clarity: When it comes to fathers, it's better to have an ordinary man on the ground than have to rely on a flighty narcissist who woos girls on rooftops, and then vanishes in search of self."
Kathleen Parker
The trouble is, our creative geniuses from Hollywood (and in that town one cannot imagine that Holly wouldn`t!) haven`t thought beyond the Man of Steel going all steely for his luscious Lane, and considered the ramifications behind Kryptonian-Human mating.
The great science fiction writer Larry Niven once took a stab at the sex problems of Kal-El in a piece entitled ``Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex``:
Assume a mating between Superman and a human woman designated LL for convenience.
Either Superman has gone completely schizo and believes himself to be Clark Kent; or he knows what he's doing, but no longer gives a damn. Thirty-one years is a long time. For Superman it has been even longer. He has X-ray vision; he knows just what he's missing. (*One should not think of Superman as a Peeping Tom. A biological ability must be used. As a child Superman may never have known that things had surfaces, until he learned to suppress his X-ray vision. If millions of people tend shamelessly to wear clothing with no lead in the weave, that is hardly Superman's fault.*)
The problem is this. Electroencephalograms taken of men and women during sexual intercourse show that orgasm resembles "a kind of pleasurable epileptic attack." One loses control over one's muscles.
Superman has been known to leave his fingerprints in steel and in hardened concrete, accidentally. What would he do to the woman in his arms during what amounts to an epileptic fit?
Consider the driving urge between a man and a woman, the monomaniacal urge to achieve greater and greater penetration. Remember also that we are dealing with kryptonian muscles.
Superman would literally crush LL's body in his arms, while simultaneously ripping her open from crotch to sternum, gutting her like a trout.
Lastly, he'd blow off the top of her head.
Ejaculation of semen is entirely involuntary in the human male, and in all other forms of terrestrial life. It would be unreasonable to assume otherwise for a kryptonian. But with kryptonian muscles behind it, Kal-El's semen would emerge with the muzzle velocity of a machine gun bullet. (*One can imagine that the Kent home in Smallville was riddled with holes during Superboy's puberty. And why did Lana Lang never notice that?*)
In view of the foregoing, normal sex is impossible between LL and Superman.
Artificial insemination may give us better results...
I have a few more thoughts on this; do Kryptonians have super venereal diseases which could be passed to the human population? What horrible plagues could be unleased if one should turn up and be passed by Superman? Imagine Lex Luthor getting his hands on Supergonorrhea; it would quickly amplify, and the massive amounts of discharge could flood the Earth, infecting the entire world and dissolving the poor human victims faster than the Wicked Witch of the West. How about a flying Syphilis? It would bore straight through your body and into your central nervous system. A Kryptonian AIDS would be a species exterminating plague...
Furthermore, Lex Luthor would have an easy weapon to use against Superman himself; keep the crazed Kryptonian in a state of constant sexual arousal via taped sexual activity broadcast worldwide (with his super hearing, SM would be unable to avoid listening to it) and our alien friend may be unable to avoid doing something rash. It won`t take the shredding of many women (at least not here in America-especially on college campuses) to turn the public soundly against our hero. (Of course, Sup may be popular in Iran or some such, showing that real men can kill their women whenever they want.) Luthor could ruin Kal-El`s reputation, since tearing women to shreds during copulation is hardly a part of the American Way.
At any rate, you simply have to read the rest of Niven`s essay; it is hilariously funny and shows the sophistry of the makers of ``Superman Returns``.
Hollywood has once again proven that they can create brilliant technical effects, but haven`t got a clue about the way to make a good movie!
posted by Timothy Birdnow | 5:54 AM
1 Comments:
One gushy review praised the new Superman movie because it was so much like "the original."
Only it isn't.
It might be like the first one with Christopher Reeve, which stunk to high heaven, mostly because of the director but also because of the script.
The original starred the superlative Kirk Alyn, whom I had the great honor and pleasure to know during the 1970s, shortly after he wrote a book of his life and his career.
I believe it's still available, even though it sorrows me to say Mr. Alyn himself is no longer among us, except as a very fond memory.
Kirk Alyn understood the Superman character, something neither Chris Reeve nor most of the people associated with his abortive series ever did.
Kirk Alyn's Superman left Smallville for the big city specifically to do good.
The second Superman, George Reeves, was probably the best actor to portray The Man of Steel, even better than Bud Collier, the radio Superman.
George Reeves really had a great range as an actor, but cynicism ruled Hollywood even in the '50s and he got no other roles because of being typecast.
The story is he had a major part in "Here to Eternity," but it was cut because of the TV show and the fear people seeing him on the big screen would be distracted.
The earliest years of the TV series, with Phyllis Coates as the best of all the Lois Lanes, are good stuff, and no Christopher Reeve or this new guy whose name I don't remember will ever be able to take the place.
Thanks for the blog, Tim.
Post a Comment
<< Home