What are your favorite parts of each Superman-centric adaptation?

[TheBatman]

Fleischer:The animation is beautiful. Still the most quintessential portrayal of Superman in animation.

Adventures of Superman:I like the style/tone of the black and white era. George Reeves is a great Superman.

Superfriends:This is probably the only Justice League related media where it feels like Superman actually IS the leader and "greatest" member of the team. Often in JL media, it seems like they're only paying lip service to that concept.

Donner:Best live action portrayal of Superman and easily the best live action portrayal of the Superman/Clark duality. Stamp is still the best Zod in any medium.

Lois & Clark:Teri Hatcher as Lois Lane.

Superman: The Animated Series-Any episode that involves Darkseid/Fourth World, "The Late Mr. Kent", and the mxy episode.

Smallville:Lionel Luther.

Justice League/Justice League Unlimited:Superman's fights against Darkseid, Mongul, Captain Marvel, and Captain Atom. The episodes "Twilight", "Hereafter", and "For the Man Who Has Everything".

Superman Returns:Superman saving the airplane.

DCEU: The Smallville battle in "MOS".

Arrowverse: Brandon Routh returning as Superman.

[Kuwagaton]

Ha my favorite things about the Superboy tv show and STAS are that they had solid comic adaptations in turn.

Adventures of Superman to me made the core cast (Clark, Jimmy and Lois) feel like real people for the first time.

The Reeve films really drove the character into pop culture. Everyone basically knew who he was but from then on anyone could feel like they had a real grasp

[magha_regulus]

The Superfriends version has the quintessential voice of the character for me.

[Tzigone]

Hard to choose. I haven't really watched them all. But here goes:

The radio show - If I had to pick a very favorite part, it would be that version of Jimmy Olsen.

The 1978 movie - Really hard to choose here: it's either Reeve's performance or just the flat out fun he had in his first sequence as Superman. I couldn't stop grinning at this part last time I watched it. It was just nice to see a hero being happy helping people and stopping bad guys.

Lois & Clark - Really liked TH!Lois. The on-screen chemistry was just fantastic, too. Also quite like the Clark Kent, even if the Superman was not amazing.

Smallville - early seasons Chloe and Clark. Chloe was so Lois-y to me, and Clark so proactive, which faded in the 4-5th seasons, then I quit watching (for the third and final time).

Superman Returns - Richard was awesome. No place for him canon, but he was great.

Man of Steel - I really, really liked that humans did stuff. The first "save" was guy pushing Clark out of the way. The human characters handled part of the battle while Superman the other part. I loved that people that weren't heroes did stuff instead of passively sitting around waiting to be saved. Also adore Lois finding out practically immediately.

[Restingvoice]

...His smile

^^ sorry... but I think that's the most consistent of the live action portrayal I saw... that no matter who's the actor, they all have that Superman smile. Handsome, heroic, amazing, calming smile.

[KC]

Donner Movies: Christopher Reeve as Superman. His charm and likability as both Superman and Clark Kent shine through.


DCEU: The actions scenes. The Superman centric movies are adaptations that I don't actually like because I think they are boring as hell but the actions scenes are great. Not great enough to save the movies as a whole, but still.

[bat39]

Superman TAS

I loved the idea of Brainiac being involved in Krypton's destruction (even if only by hiding the truth from the Council). And the general idea of Brainiac being someone who steals knowledge from civilizations and destroys them/lets them die...rather than literally taking 'bottled cities'.

I also liked the Fortress of Solitide. Its literally just an underground cave in the Arctic. Superman needs to dive into a lake to get there. Understated and brilliant!

Man of Steel

The idea that Lois is in on the secret right from the start, and that she actually tracks down Clark using some good old investigative journalism is a refreshing take on their relationship.

I also liked the idea of Jonathan and Martha Kent being ordinary decent people, but not exactly saints and paragons of virtue. Their first and foremost concern is the wellbeing of their son...not pressurizing him from an early age with some mission to save the world.

I also found the idea that other Kryptonians are overwhelmed by the sensory input from their powers on earth while Clark is used to it because he grew up on earth to be neat. Its so much better than the traditional notion of Kryptonians magically being fully-functional 'Supermen' as soon as they show up on earth. It makes Superman unique, and his human upbringing actually a key part of his abilities. And yes, Zod being able to master his powers in such a short time, inspite of that constraint, really establishes his street cred!

[Vordan]

I do like the idea of the Fortress being hard to reach, that was a good idea from the DCAU. Forgot about that.

[DochaDocha]

Only thing I didn't like about the DCAU FoS was that there didn't seem to be any doors with locking mechanisms. Imagine all the polar bears and walruses that accidentally stumbled upon the FoS because it got lost swimming in one of those Arctic Oceanic ice tunnels.