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by R.J. Carter Published: September 6, 2007
Hardly anyone expects the animated version to match up to what happened in the comics -- which is a good thing, because precious little of it does. There aren't any other super-characters who appear in this story, and there is only one super-replacement character who seems to be the resurrection of the Last Son of Krypton flying about. Further, the relationship between Superman and Lois Lane is on an entirely different plane than it was in the comics, one that is probably not going to sit well with many Superman fans. "Superman - Doomsday" opens in an almost Donneresque fashion: the viewer virtually flies through the clouds and into the stars, where the cast credits zip up to you from the background to an orchestral opening theme. Then we get our first glimpse of Clark Kent as Daily Planet editor Perry White (voiced by Ray Wise) sends him off on his newest assignment as a foreign correspondent in Afghanistan. He says his goodbyes to Lois (Anne Heche), who has other things on her mind and dismissively wishes "Smallville" luck. Hardly the tearful goodbye we'd expect between the two who were lovers in the comics; so perhaps in this retelling the two have yet to become the item they are? Well, yes and no. Lois and Clark are not an item. But Lois and Superman (Adam Baldwin) are definitely an item, and she weekends with him at his Fortress of Solitude in the Antarctic. It's not explicit in this PG-13 film, but there is enough circumstantial evidence to infer that the two are enjoying an intimate relationship -- and yet it's also clear that while Supes is sleeping with her, he still hasn't revealed his Clark Kent identity to her. For her own safety, he explains, but she feels it's more of a fear of commitment. Of course, no Superman story is complete without Lex Luthor in it somewhere, and James Marsters' take on the evil genius is an insidious one. In this version, Lex has developed simple innoculation cures for Muscular Dystrophy, the bird flu, and AIDS. However, he pays his scientific team to find ways to slow the cures down to a crawl so that he can turn them into lifetime treatments. One of his current projects is an illegal dig outside Metropolis where he's planning to tap the Earth's radiation to provide a source of energy. However, his excavation team uncovers a rocketship deep under the Earth. "Vintage," Lex calls it, when he first sees the item that his own men say is "Before Christ" old. They puncture the hull, and that's all that's needed for the monster inside to punch its way out and then brutally kill them all with bone-crunching finality. Doomsday is free on Earth. As Doomsday continues his killing spree toward Metropolis, Superman is alerted by his robot servent (voiced by Tom Kenny) to the danger. The robot is efficient -- it not only tells Superman where the monster is heading, but where it came from and thus it's history, explaining that it was a killing machine that turned on its creators because they couldn't make it distinguish friend from foe. "It extinguishes all life forms, because it must."
Which, of course, is when it's also lights out for Superman. And in this tragic death scene, with Lois cradling the bruised and bleeding hero, she whispers, "Clark," letting the viewers know that she's known who Superman was, but was waiting for him to tell her. The funeral is a big one, of course, but Lois can't find anyone to connect with who knew Superman as well as she did. Which is when she decides to drive to Smallville and talk with Martha Kent (Swoosie Kurtz). Martha isn't happy to see her, and even less so when Lois tells her she knows Clark's secret. But as Lois lets go of her grief, the two women find common ground on which to build a relationship. Meanwhile, Superman's best pal, Jimmy Olsen (Adam Wylie) has been approached over his photos of the battle scene, and has been given a higher paying job with a tabloid newspaper, where he becomes an unlikeable better-than-you kind of guy. The act doesn't impress Lois, however, when she pulls him into another investigation. And the story is a doozy...
At least, he appears to be. He looks exactly like the Man of Steel, and he's wearing the same costume and using the same powers. And it's a good thing for Metropolis, which has seen the crime rate soar in the absence of its protector. Even Perry White has been more concerned over Lois's flirtations with danger, warning her that "...he isn't around to pull your ass out of the fire any more!" Superman's apparent return comes when he foils a scheme by the Toyman (presented as a nerd-meets-goth character, voiced by John DiMaggio) who's holding a busload of schoolkids hostage via a giant mechanical spider. Superman does what Superman does best -- busts it up and hands over the bad guy to the police. But Lois isn't quite convinced that this is the man she knew so well. The viewer is treated to who the Dupe-Supes is, and it makes sense given the players in this drama. However, the Dupe-Supes begins to think perhaps he isn't going far enough. When the news reports that Toyman escaped custody, held a day care center hostage, and was later recaptured by police only after a four-year-old girl was killed, Superman gets upset. He flies to the precinct where Toyman is just arriving, takes him from the police, and flies him up into the air for a word. The word is 'goodbye,' as Superman drops Toyman, letting him fall thirty stories onto a police car. We get to see the broken and bleeding body, and there's no doubt that Toyman is kerput. This DVD earns every inch of its PG-13 rating. Of course, fans know that the real Superman has to return sometime, and he does -- in the black suit and with the longer hair and kryptonite cannon, ready to do battle with the duplicate who has imposed a destructive authoritarian rule over the city. This time, it's a fight that Metropolis can't afford to lose. The style of art for this release is slightly different than that which fans are used to from the Justice League Unlimited series. Lex is given a sleeker look, dressed in white always. Superman, by contrast, appears weary, craggy, and haggard, even before he gets into the big fights. The disc contains a number of special features, starting with the feature film commentary track with Bruce Timm, Duane Capizzi, Andrea Romano and Gregory Noveck. The single-disc includes a forty-three minute multi-chapter documentary that takes a detailed look at the original story as it unfolded in the world of comics, with interviews with Superman writers and artists Louise Simonson, Jerry Ordway, and Dan Jurgens, Mike Carlin, Tom Grummett, Jon Bogdanove, and Roger Stern. Whew. But that's not all! Former DC President Jenette Kahn and DC honcho Paul Levitz are also on hand, as they all recount the story building sessions that were done in a heat, as they had to quickly replace the year's plans to marry Superman to Lois at the request of Warner Brothers, who were planning the same thing on the television series, Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman -- but two years down the line. Wizard Magazine editor Brian Cunningham, Ron Hill of Jim Hanley's Universe and Ryan Liebowitz of Golden Apple Comics all recount the media frenzy that suddenly seemed to have rediscovered Superman in the wake of DC's announcement that he was going to be killed, and we see some news footage of the world's reaction. Of particular interest is Simonson's and Carlin's emotional reaction as they recount the death; they really get choked up, and you realize just how important the character is to them. The documentary also delves into the year after Superman's death, which involved the four replacement characters and how they came to be in the story. Conspicuous by his glossing over is Superboy, the clone of Superman from the Cadmus project. He's talked about, briefly, but no pictures of him are shown (as contrasted with the images of Steel, Eradicator, and the Cyborg Superman.) The most you get is a shot of his legs, but that's it. As if that monster featurette wasn't enough, Warner has also packed on a five minute documentary, "Behind the Voices", which includes Andrea Romano talking about the selection process for the voice actors, intentionally choosing actors who hadn't already worked on the Superman series. Wise, Wylie, Kurtz, Heche and Baldwin all provide some comments on the characters they portray. There's also a ten-minute teaser reel for DC's next direct-to-DVD project, "Justice League: The New Frontier." There's a little bit of finished animation here, but it's mostly Timm joined by Darwyn Cooke, Dan Didio commenting on the series, with some sneak-peeks at the voice work being done by Lucy Lawless (as Wonder Woman) and David Boreanaz (as The Flash.) "Superman's Last Stand" is a DVD console game that has three levels of challenge. It's a first-person perspective game, in which the player takes on Doomsday. You're required to hit him before he hits you, with as much power as you can, by hitting the Enter key. The powering-up is the challenge. On the first level, you do so by pressing the up arrow multiple times, with your increasing power measured on a meter. On level two, you have to power up by alternating up and down, and on the third you have to go up, right, down, left in sequence. Each punch given (or received) causes a clip from the animated battle to play, followed by a health-meter status of yourself and Doomsday. By the way, your own health meter goes down a lot faster than will Doomsday's if you manage to get hit. Audio is in English 5.1, with optional subtitling in English. Previews on this disc include "The Last Mimzy," "I Am Legend," Babylon 5: The Lost Tales, Spawn: The TV Series, Blade: House of Chlthon, Smallville - The Complete Sixth Season, and "Blade Runner" - 25th Anniversary. |
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