Atom Man vs. Superman
Dir: Spencer Gordon Bennet
1950
*****
The second Superman mini-series is just as cheesy as the first, nothing much is new as far as the characters, pace, story etc is concerned but it does feel like Kirk Alyn has toned it down a bit, maybe a sign he didn't want to do it again quite early on. Noel Neill and Tommy Bond are still on form as annoying sidekicks though. The only thing that puts this series slightly higher than the first is the introduction of Lex Luthor (Atom man) played rather well by Lyle Talbot. The repeat of old footage does get annoying but it's B-movie making at its best.

Superman (1948 Mini-series)
Dir: Spencer Gordon Bennet, Thomas Carr
1948
*****
Fifteen glorious 17min serials, I can only imagine how excited young boys of the 1940s would have been to go see each weekly installment. The acting is crummy, the effects are pretty bad, most of the action scenes are repeated again and again, the story makes no sense, the props are the same in every shot, you can see the reflection of the camera man, you can see the shadow of the boom stick, Superman looks directly into the camera when he changes, I could go on and on about the problems with this series but it would take a whole lot longer to tell you why I love it so much. Might be quicker to just watch it for yourselves. You can quite clearly see Richard Donner was a fan and where he got a lot of his ideas from. I'm so grateful that this is available on DVD and has been reproduced so well. The Spider Lady was quite the vixen, she could definitely be updated and brought back for the new films. A must for Super fans!