Review of All Star Superman (2011) by Kevin R — 10 Mar 2011

I think this movie was good but better stories have been made and better animation, I enjoyed it nevertheless. Great imagination the creators have.

All-Star Superman begins with a frantic rescue mission near the surface of the sun. You think Superman saved the day, and I suppose he did, but it ends up it was part of an elaborate scheme by Lex Luthor to finally kill Superman. It worked. Superman quickly learns that exposure to solar radiation has increased his powers, but will soon lead to his death. The movie then takes an odd turn into Superman's "bucket list," more or less, as he checks off a bunch of things he always wanted to do, some of which involve giving Lois Lane super powers for a day.

This part of the movie is disjointed, seeming to hop from scene to scene with no real connection to anything else. The entire second act could've been shuffled into a different order and would've made the same amount of sense. There was also this weird segment with Atlas and Samson that seemed to be in the movie specifically to make Lois Lane look like the worst girlfriend in the world. It's certainly possible I'm missing a story arc with Atlas and Samson that wasn't explained in the movie, but it did add to the pointlessness of what was going on.

Thankfully, once the focus shifts to the confrontation between the dying Superman and his killer, Lex Luthor, All-Star Superman makes a confident shift into poignant story telling. These two know each other so well that it's hard to discern throughout who's really outplaying the other. And when the battle resolves, it does so in a way that perfectly embodies who Superman is and how we view him.

At the end, then, I felt satisfied with All-Star Superman despite the meandering middle and some of the cheesiest dialogue imaginable outside the pages of a comic book.

For a guy with only a passing interest in Superman and super heroes, All-Star Superman was an okay way to kill an evening. Some tighter writing and better plot decisions would've saved the entire second act from becoming a pointless trip into Superman's bucket list, but it still kind of works if you approach it with a sense of humor. (My wife and I didn't have good answers for when our daughter kept asking us, "Why are you laughing?") But the build-up to the confrontation with Lex Luthor is very well-executed, and the resolution is ultimately satisfying.