Sunday 27 February 2011

Superman II

General Zod, Ursa and Non escape from their cling film prison in space and come to Earth. They wash up in a small town where they’re confronted by the US army.

With the nation’s media watching their every move they engage in a demonstration of their awesome powers. Having seen off flame throwers, rocket launchers and assorted army vehicles, a helicopter is called up and fires missiles at the Kryptonian trio.

The dreamily evil Ursa [Sarah Douglas] is invited by Zod to “Blow the helicopter a kiss”. This she does sending the chopper spiralling out of control and into a wooden building where it promptly explodes.

Verdict

Perhaps one needs to make allowances for era and the sophistication of the special effects, but this is a disappointing explosion.

Rather than crash into the building, the chopper appears more to dip behind it, whereupon the building explodes in a rather perfunctory manner.

Number of helicopters

1

Relevance to plot

Fine. There’s clearly a solid army presence so the appearance of a helicopter is entirely reasonable. If anything you have to wonder why there’s only one.

Artistic merit

Weak. As the sequel to a successful film there’s a somewhat threadbare feel to a lot of the film. Take for example the bin liners that Zod and the others wear throughout the film.

Exploding helicopter innovation

Possibly the first destruction of a helicopter by superhuman power.

Positives

However, poor the chopper fireball is, the scene does allow Sarah Douglas to demonstrate her deadly allure. Sidling through the film as a dominatrix diva the deadly kiss she blows the helicopter encapsulates her intoxicating evil allure.

Negatives

Sarah Douglas aside the sequence is rather dull, utterly lacking in dramatic tension.

4 comments:

  1. Despite the luckluster quality of the explosion this is my favourite film of the franchise.

    Yes it looks cheap but everything effects driven did back then.

    Now we know that you like a bit of dominatrix action I know what to get you for Xmas.

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  2. It's my favourite of the franchise as well. We're spared all the expository guff of the first film, so can get straight down to action.

    You've got to love Terence Stamp as General Zod. And Sarah Douglas as well obviously.... hmmmm.... Ursa.....

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  3. Harsh! I thought is was a good explosion. Looks pretty realistic to me!

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  4. Yeah, but you don't see much. It just disappears behind a building and you see a fireball which could be from anything.

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