Whcih has the strongest 3rd and 4th film?

[Grissom]

I just recently bought the Superman 4-pack (all four films) in one dvd package from Amazon for about 12 bucks. I've seen the first two so far, I was just wondering of the Superman and original Batman series, which franchise had the stronger 3rd and 4th film? I know we are dealing with different heroes and circumstances but of the storyline, acting, action set pieces, finale etc., which had the stronger films?

I honestly am not sure as yet, maybe when I watch Superman 3 and 4 I can then decide.

[johnnygobbs]

I just recently bought the Superman 4-pack (all four films) in one dvd package from Amazon for about 12 bucks. I've seen the first two so far, I was just wondering of the Superman and original Batman series, which franchise had the stronger 3rd and 4th film? I know we are dealing with different heroes and circumstances but of the storyline, acting, action set pieces, finale etc., which had the stronger films?

I honestly am not sure as yet, maybe when I watch Superman 3 and 4 I can then decide.

Superman IV and Batman and Robin, with the exception of a few incidental pleasures, are both pretty bad.  The former suffered from a non-existent budget (whereby various Metropolis scenes ended up being shot in Milton Keynes of all places), whereas the latter arguable suffered from having too much money splashed on it with no regard for any type of restraint.  Not to mention, both scripts were quite poor (and judging by the deleted scenes on the Superman IV dvd it could have been even worse).

So I think the real argument is which is the best between Superman III and Batman Forever.  Both films suffer immensely in comparison to their predecessors however, I would have to favour Superman III on balance. 

I'm a huge Richard Pryor fan and I know that his presence in Superman wasn't to everyone's taste but I thought he was hilarious, especially when he's lecturing the Smallville crowd about "Plastics!".  I also thought Superman III featured one of the series' most interesting plots, i.e. Superman turns bad and has to fight his deadliest enemy...himself.  I thought the humour was generally well-judged (give or take the fighting 'stop' and 'go' traffic signals); Ross Webster may have been a poor man's Lex Luthor but Robert Vaughn managed to add some real nastiness amid the comic relief; and besides, the real villain of the piece, the supercomputer was a pretty deadly threat, especially when it transformed Webster's sister into a robot!

On the otherhand, Batman Forever was a real disappointment for me.  It's not that it's bad exactly, it's just that it came nowhere close to capturing the brilliance of Burton's Batman films.  Jim Carrey has a few funny moments, Val Kilmer acquitted himself well, Kidman and Barrymore were attractive, and I even thought Chris O'Donnell did a half-decent job.  I also liked the flashback sequences regarding Bruce's guilt over his parents death, which to me was the strongest element of this story and one that was only slightly touched upon by Burton.  Yet, overall I can't say I'm a huge fan of this film.  In some ways I actually prefer watching Batman & Robin, since at least that film was a gloriously bad failure, in an almost Ed Wood kind of way, rather than a simply 'ok' film.

This is my ranking of these four films:

1. Superman III
2. Batman Forever
3. Batman & Robin
    Superman IV (a tie)

[gordonblu]

I belive the most disappointing thing about Batman Forever is that it had the potential to be really good. As written the only thing that needed to be fixed is Two-Face's story arche, and the finale; i.e. Batman lecturing Robin about not killing and then turning around and offing Harvey. Having read the script, I felt that many of the lines could stay the same, but add a darker subtext with how it is said. Another thing, is it just me, or is it too early in Robin's career to place him in the two-way trap at the end? Wouldn't Gordon have been a more logical choice? After all, neither Two-Face or Riddler knew about him until they attacked Claw Island, did they set that whole thing up on the fly?


As for Superman III, tonally it sort of matched the established world, I just felt as though the whole film was a string of only slightly connected scenes. I don't really have a problem with Richard Pryor per se, I think the writers (and director) went overboard on the humor. Pryor's character could have been more interesting if they took him a little more seriously. My favorite parts of the film have to do with Superman's "Dark Side", as mentioned before, and the scenes with Lana Lang ( not mention the fact that Annette O'Toole is a fox!).

In conclusion, I think Superman III is slightly better as a sequel than Batman Forever.

As for Batman and Robin vs. Superman IV?

I enjoyed Batman and Robin better, but they were both very bad for very different reasons.