For my money the best Superman feature film made was
the first. SUPERMAN AND THE MOLE MEN was released on November 23, 1951
and starred George Reeves as the caped crusader from Krypton and
Phyllis Coates as Lois Lane. This flick led to production of THE
ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN television series. A series that holds a special
place in the hearts of many a Silver Age fan boy. With the success of
the television series there was some talk of a sequel to SUPERMAN AND
THE MOLE MAN. But it wasn't to be. Instead
after the second season of the series, in which Noel Neill replaced
Phyllis Coates as reporter Lois Lane there were several compilation
movies made from episodes of the series with new bridging segments. Of
course Noel Neill was the first live action Lois
Lane appearing in Columbia's two Superman serials SUPERMAN (1948) and
ATOM MAN VS. SUPERMAN (1950). Both serials starred Kirk Alyn as the
Man of Steel and his alter ego mild mannered reporter Clark Kent.
The cool thing about ATOM MAN VS. SUPERMAN is that it featured
Superman's arch enemy from the comic books, Lex Luthor portrayed by
character actor Lyle Talbot. Sadly Talbot never got a chance to reprise
the role on the television series. More's the pity.
But the truth is the television show's half hour format was too
limiting for a villain of Luthor's magnitude. And I'm sure no one wanted
to see Luthor just appearing as someone working for a crime boss. But
what if that sequel to SUPERMAN AND THE MOLE MEN
had been made. Might not criminal scientist Lex Luthor have been
Superman's antagonist in such a movie? Just last week I had a dream in
which I was watching such a flick with Luthor performing experiments on
gorillas. Increasing their strength a hundred fold and outfitting them with mind control helmets to do his bidding.
Insert your own story line to fit your tastes.
CLICK THE PIC TO CHECK OUT OUR "SUPER" SHIRTS^^^^^
Born at the
tail-end of the "baby boom" I grew up on reruns of The Adventures of
Superman.As such there really isn't any other Superman to me other than
George (no relation to Steve) Reeves. Long before the Ilya Salkind
produced movies Reeves made us all believe that "a man could fly". And
more importantly he taught us to believe in "truth , justice and the
American way". But as great as he was as Superman, Reeves may have been
even cooler as Clark Kent.
As a kid you
watch a show titled The Adventures of Superman to see the titled hero
fly, smash through walls, have bullets bounce off him and punch out bad
guys. It was as I grew older I began to appreciate Reeves performance as
Kent. It was Kent who carried the show. He did the leg work. And he was
private eye cool doing it.No one looked quite as casual cool as Reeves
acting with his hands in his pockets. Watching Reeves as the
investigative reporter you could easily imagine him starring in a series
of detective movies for Monogram.
The Clark
Kent as written for Reeves was respected by the police , who in the form
of Metropolis police inspector William Henderson , often sought out his
advice. His employer Perry White , editor of the Daily Planet
completely trusted and respected him as well. Someone else who respected
Kent were the members of the underworld who feared that he would figure
out and expose their nefarious schemes. The only person that didn't
seem to respect Kent was fellow Daily Planet reporter portrayed by Phyllis Coates in the shows 1st season. In subsequent seasons when the
character was played by Noel Neill she respected Kent as much as
everyone else. Though they were rivals.
George Reeves
was far from the Clark Kent created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster
for the comics. But you have to remember they created him at a time when
comic books still had a comic quality. Many adventure features had
comic relief sidekicks. The Superman comic books had Superman as his own
comic relief in the form of Clark Kent. Kirk Alyn and Christopher Reeve
portrayed Kent in that manner. But as for myself and the millions who
grew up with George Reeves we prefer our Clark Kent mild-mannered not
wimpy.
