Superman III and the Neca Christopher Reeve Superman review

Neca Christopher Reeve Superman

So my NECA Christopher Reeve Superman finally arrived. I lucked out on this action figure via the Warner Brothers online store and what could I say? It's just like a mini Hot Toys Christopher Reeve Superman action figure. The figure's likeness is just plain awesome. But before we tackle on the action figure, let us look back at the third Superman movie as I continue my series of Superman movie reviews. Was the movie really a failure as many pundits had labeled it to be? Or was there a chance that the movie could have been made better? Read on...

Superman III

Superman II replacement director Richard Lester finally had the opportunity to direct a Superman movie to his liking. However, key actors from the previous two Superman movies decided to boycott this film due to the harsh treatment of Richard Donner (Original Superman 1 and 2 director) by Superman producers Alexander and Ilya Salkind. Gene Hackman (Lex Luthor) and Margot Kidder (Lois Lane) led the charge with Hackman entirely skipping the film while Kidder was forced to just have a cameo role for the film as punishment for her criticizing the Salkinds. Starting from scratch with no prior screenplay to work on (as Warner Bros. rejected the Salkind's plan to use Mr. Mxyzptlk, Brainiac, and Supergirl for this film), Lester decided to make use of his strengths as a director by deciding to go camp in this third Superman movie. Known for movies that have slapstick humors, comedy, and campiness, Lester concocted a story that had Richard Pryor (Gus Gorman) serve as the central character who would deliver the campiness that the movie would require of. The absence of Lois Lane would also give rise to the opportunity to bring Clark Kent/Superman's high school sweetheart Lana Lang (played by Annette O' Toole) to the big screen. The main villain of the movie however were characters specially made for the movie but were actually a pastiche of billionaire businessman turned into mad scientist Lex Luthor as Hackman refused to take part in this movie as his form of protest. There was already a screenplay in place that would have utilized Mr. Mxyzptlk as the comedic character who would drive this movie into campiness, with Brainiac serving as the main villain and Supergirl playing a support role but Warner Bros. rejected the screenplay treatment written by Ilya Salkind. This however did not deter the Salkinds from changing the direction of the movie as they made adjustments to still utilize a Supercomputer as Superman's villain in the movie in lieu of Brainiac.    

Clark Kent v.s. Superman?

The movie opens in camp style as Superman rescues a person who was about to be drowned inside his car when water from a fire hydrant poured into it. The campy scene would simultaneously be seen as the opening credits rolled in, departing from the famous opening credits of the previous two Superman movies where the setting was in space. Gus Gorman is a down on his luck unemployed loser who accidentally discovers that he has a talent for computers. He is hired by Webscoe, a company owned by Ross Webster (played by Robert Vaughn), as a computer programmer. Webster, upon noticing Gorman's computer wizardry, orders him to hack into a weather satellite and create a tornado to destroy a Columbian company's coffee crop for refusing to do business with him. But Superman arrives to save the day which infuriates Webster. Webster orders Gorman to create a Kryptonite so that they could destroy Superman. Meanwhile, Clark Kent manages to convince Perry White to send him to Smallville as he plans to attend his high school reunion. There he meets Lana Lang again, his former high school sweetheart. But their romance could no longer be rekindled as Lana reveals to Clark that she is already married and has a son. She however convinces Clark to let Superman attend her son's birthday party as her son is a huge Superman fan. Gus Gorman on the other hand failed to recreate an exact Kryptonite rock replica as there was one compound missing, substituting it with Tar instead.    

Superman v.s. the Supercomputer

The Smallville community got wind of Superman attending a birthday party decides to hold a homecoming for him. This development reaches Webster and he orders the delivery of the Kryptonite rock. The Kryptonite rock however did not weaken Superman but instead causes him to have adverse effects on his mental state. Superman turns into an aggressive and sadistic individual who uses his powers to create mischief. Under the manipulation of Webster, Superman wreaks havoc on various edifice and goes on a drinking spree which eventually caused him to have a nervous breakdown. Superman crashes on a junkyard and splits into two individuals. One, the immoral and sadistic Superman, and the second one the moral and uptight Clark Kent. The two individuals battles each other out, ending with a triumphant Clark Kent. Kent changes into his Superman costume and heads on to Webster's secret hideout where he finds Webster and Gorman controlling a huge supercomputer. Superman battles the menace of the supercomputer and was about to lose the battle when Gorman decides to help him after Gorman became guilt ridden of the possibility that he would be labeled as the man who has destroyed Superman. Superman destroys the supercomputer and drops Gorman in a coal mine factory as he flew into the sunset, looking forward for more Superman adventures.

Superdrunkard

Superman III is much criticized by the general public and Superman fans as a failure because of the campy direction that it took. It however in my opinion showed a lot of promise. One of the few saving graces of the movie was Christopher Reeve's portrayal of the evil Superman. Reeve was well loved for his portrayal of Superman but many were surprised with his performance of a character that ran exactly the opposite of Superman. Reeve's acting versatility was clearly highlighted when he effortlessly switched between roles of a good Superman and an Evil Superman. The Supercomputer bit also could have been more appreciated by Superman fans if Warner Bros. allowed the use of Brainiac. I mean we were haphazardly given a Cyborg baddie, I'm sure the movie could have gotten a big boost with Brainiac being the main villain. The movie also could have toned down the campiness of that Gus Gorman character. The character totally changed the whole tone of the movie and instead made the movie focus on Gorman more instead of Superman. The only good thing that came out from this movie was that this was the last time Richard Lester was given a chance to direct a Superman movie. However, Richard Donner was not coming back. And we still have Superman IV to look forward to.    

NECA Superman

The Action Figure: And now, for the best part of this blog entry, the NECA Christopher Reeve Superman action figure review. And I just have to get this out, this definitely is one action figure that every Superman fan should get their hands on. This NECA Christopher Reeve Superman is one great figure to own as it gives us the only Superman movie rendition in 6 or 7 inch scale. Forget about Hot Toys, or NECA's huge 1/4 scale Christopher Reeve Superman. Those two mentioned had it easy when we talk about the sculpted likeness of Christopher Reeve. But at this small scale, you just have to be amazed at how awesome NECA managed to come up with a great sculpted likeness of Christopher Reeve at this size. Neither Mattel nor DC Collectibles was able to give us the definite Christopher Reeve Superman. Mattel failed in their 4 inch experiment of a Christopher Reeve Superman. DC Collectible on the other hand came close by utilizing a Gary Frank Superman art for their Commander El action figure. Gary Frank was a Superman artist who drew his Superman using the likeness of Christopher Reeve. Unfortunately, DC Collectibles never made a figure utilizing the head sculpt of the Commander El figure in a Superman body. I don't know what led them to abandon plans of releasing a complete figure of a Gary Frank Superman. But this however led many toy collectors to customize their own Gary Frank Superman. I was one of those and I decided to customize my own Gary Frank/Christopher Reeve Superman by doing a very simple head swap. But I have since then returned the original head of the History of the DC Universe Superman to its body and utilized instead the body of a spare DC Direct highly articulated Superman. That figure will be shown below.

NECA Superman's cloth cape

The NECA Superman action figure comes free of purchase from a specially packaged Man of Steel DVD. The reasoning behind this move is for NECA to stay clear of exclusive rights toy licensing issues as Mattel and DC Collectibles holds the exclusive rights to outright Superman action figure releases. This is similar to how NECA released their Michael Keaton Batman in the previous year. The NECA Superman comes with a cloth cape which hangs nicely in his back. It even includes the yellow S shield that is printed nicely on its cape. The figure comes with 24 points of articulation namely, a ball jointed head, ball-hinged shoulders, swivel-hinged elbows, swivel-hinged wrists, swivel waist, ball-hinged swivel hips, swivel-hinged knees, and rocker ankle swivel-hinged ankles. The figure also comes with extra open palm hands that you could replaced the closed fists with. I however refrained from using the open palm hands in the figure because this NECA Superman figure is notorious for its brittle joints as many collectors found their figure with broken joints either from out of the box, or through constant movement of the joints overtime. There were no clear explanations for this as some collectors found their figure in sturdy shape but I was unfortunately one of those who ended up with a broken joint. But my brother managed to fix the figure's broken right knee. No worries there as the figure now is in tip top shape and the fixed joints are even sturdier than before. Regardless, this figure is so hard to find and is fetching at a very expensive price in the secondary market that we even could no longer find a replacement figure for this. But I'm not shedding any tears with this because the figure looks and functions brand new to me. I'm just thankful and lucky to own one!

This is how it broke

Extra hands

Christopher Reeve!

The paint applications of this figure also remains faithful to the onscreen color. The figure is painted with the right hue of blue, red, and yellow. Even the cape's red color is faithful to the onscreen cape color. Thus making this figure look like it literally jumped out of our T.V. sets. And did I just say how awesome the likeness of this figure to Christopher Reeve's face is? The photo on the right clearly shows a human like quality to its face and it is truly faithful to Christopher Reeve's likeness. I think of all the action figures that I've seen in 6 inch scale, this figure has the most faithful rendition from its source material. I could be wrong but NECA seems to have blown the competition away. NECA's movie licensed action figures have even been making huge improvement over McFarlane's much lauded ultra realistic sculpts. And their carefully crafted points of articulation could give Mattel and Hasbro a run for their money. The body down to its waist and crotch by the way is made of rubbery plastic. I'm not sure what NECA was thinking in coming with this type of material but I surely hope that these rubbery plastics don't break in the long run. I've had some unsavory experiences with rubbery plastics as it tends to break overtime maybe due to humidity or for some other reason. Overall this is a great figure to have but I'm not sure if playability is high for this figure. Broken joints due to stuck paints and brittle joints are highly probable. It's like DC Direct all over again. I don't know why beautifully sculpted figures like NECA and DC Direct always have problems with sturdy joint articulations.  But if all else fails however, this figure is such a great looking display piece that it could easily stand on the shelf like forever and not worry about broken joints and the likes. More photos below.

Superman as seen on the big screen and T.V. sets

Superman III

Flight!

Face-Off

Superman v.s. Superman

Has the Evil Superman won?

Superman in danger

The Return

Superman strikes back

Superman triumphant

The world is safer with a real Superman

Christopher Reeve is...

Superman!

The many faces of the modern age Superman

Gary Frank Superman

And like I've mentioned earlier, I've also included in this entry my new Custom Christopher Reeve Superman or should I say my Gary Frank Superman. I utilized the body of the History of the DC Universe Superman in my old custom figure but lately I managed to find a Class A Knock Off DC Direct Superman. I think it is prudent that I should keep the History of the DC Universe Superman figure intact as It is one of the more rarer Superman figures in the market. This bootleg figure shares the same body with this Superman figure. So it features quite a number of points of articulation and I'm happy with how the figure looks like after the simple head swap. I could say this Knock Off figure is very much sturdier than the original one as I've seen the plastic joints utilize sturdier plastics than the clear plastic ones of the original ones that DC Direct is notorious of. The color scheme of the costume also runs faithful to the Gary Frank art or the Superman movies of the 80's. I think for those who failed to get the NECA Superman figure, this custom figure would make be a good substitute as many collectors used to utilize this body when they were customizing a Christopher Reeve Superman. The only downside for this custom figure however is that the DC Direct Commander El figure is hard to find because many collectors snatched multiple items of this figure due to the Christopher Reeve likeness and its custom potential. So I guess we'll just have to wait and see if NECA decides to re-release their Christopher Reeve Superman figure. Or better yet, release a version of the Evil Superman from Superman III. Simple re-paint would do. I mean NECA did initially release a recolored Michael Keaton Batman that was based on the 8 bit Batman Nintendo game.

Christopher Reeve likeness, yes or no?

Ready to fight

Flight

Superman

Up Up and Away

Scale Comparison

Brandon Routh, Christopher Reeve, Tom Welling, and Henry Cavill

Well this wraps up my entry. So we've got one more Christopher Reeve Superman to go and what better way to end up my Christopher Reeve Superman review series by posting my review of the Hot Toys Christopher Reeve Superman. See you in my next entry!