History Fridge / SupermanTheMovie

!!Fridge Brilliance

* The first three Film/{{Superman}} films comprise a single narrative {{arc}} that explores the theme of the Superman/Clark Kent duality through the character’s romantic relationships. In ''Film/SupermanTheMovie'', reporter ComicBook/LoisLane develops a crush on Superman, but otherwise looks down her nose at Clark Kent. In ''Film/SupermanII'', Lois learns that Superman and Clark is the same person. She becomes his lover, but before their relationship can be consummated, Superman is required to renounce his powers. This means that Lois ends up being stuck with Clark, even though her true feelings were for Superman. This puts a great deal of strain on their relationship, as is evidenced by Lois’ dismay when Clark is brutally beaten by a bully. Realizing that the relationship is unfeasible, Superman (after regaining his powers) erases Lois’s memories of their relationship and moves on. In ''Film/SupermanIII'', Clark reconnects with his school friend ComicBook/LanaLang. Unlike Lois, Lana seems to genuinely like Clark for who he is, respecting him for his honesty and gentleness. She does not seem to be particularly impressed by the idea of Superman, although her young son is a big fan. Indeed, Lana seems to intuit that Clark and Superman is the same person, but seems to go along with the pretense for the sake of her son. When Superman is exposed to the synthetic kryptonite created by Gus Gorman, it results in a change of behavior, which reveals that the Superman persona is his weaker half. Superman visits Lana’s house as a special treat for her son, but seems to spend most of his time hitting on Lana. He also drinks, destroys public property and engages in other petty anti-social behaviors. This behavior continues until Clark Kent extracts himself as a separate person and kills his Superman half, proving himself the stronger. In this sense, the struggle between Clark and Superman, which has persisted through the three films, is resolved with Clark becoming the ascendant persona.

** When you take into account that the movie was scripted and filmed from 1977 till 1978 you realize that Kent went into seclusion by 1965-1966, before the summer of love and all the hippie crap came out, so it does help explain Clark Kent's quaintness.

*** So in other words, Lex had the second missile programmed to hit RIGHT where he himself was. No wonder he had his hideout built 200 feet below!

** How could he accomplish his plans without help? As TheOtherDarrin pointed out in ''Film/SupermanReturns'', "one needs to make creepy friends in order to survive". The "friends" in that case were career criminals, but still "[[SurroundedByIdiots total nincompoops]]" were preferable to no friends. [[YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness He could still ditch them]] [[YouHaveFailedMe if they were a liability]], like he did with [[TheLoad Otis]] in II ("What else is ballast for?") or [[FedToTheBeast Miss Teschmacher]] in the extended cut.

* Why would a guy like Luthor, who is both intelligent and completely ruthless, align himself with people like Otis and Miss Tessmacher? Psychologically, there is a very good reason. Sociopaths cannot form deep relationships. Most people who hang around someone like Luthor for any amount of time will figure out he's bad news. So he has to have a dummy like Otis and an ExtremeDoormat like Miss Tessmacher as his toadies.

** The intent seems pretty clearly that the Earth's rotation is reversed. In your analysis, why would he need to stop and fly in the direction of normal rotation a few times? And, if simply going fast enough was the idea, it would have been better communicated if he went with the rotation, but the Earth started going backward anyway.

* Listen to Pa Kent's voice when young Clark asks "Is a bird showing off when it flies?" You can hear the panic when he realizes that Clark has begun to think about ''flying''.

* Listen to Pa Kent's voice when young Clark asks "Is a bird showing off when it flies?" You can hear the panic when he realizes that Clark has begun to think about ''flying''.

!!Fridge Logic
* Luthor's scheme to buy up all the land around what will become the new southern West Coast. Unless he's playing the REALLY long game, his profits will be minimal at best. Assuming the US Government doesn't simply snap up the land via [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eminent_domain Eminent Domain]], leaving Lex with little to no profit, he'd have to wait for the new coastline to stabilize, then develop the whole thing, then hope people aren't scared off by the fact that most of California went the way of Atlantis. Not to mention, barring some mad science on his part, he'd be waiting a few hundred years for the new coastline to become more than a series of jagged cliff walls and mud pits.\\
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Oh, yeah. There's also that "nuclear fallout" thing.\\
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This is a rather hideously flawed plan for such a genius as Lex Luthor.
** Nothing says he has to develop it ''himself''. The land that was previously worthless would presumably increase in value by becoming ocean-front property, and Luthor could immediately sell it to developers for an immediate profit.
*** That's assuming anyone in the country, or likely the entire planet, could ''afford'' to buy up all that land at the prices Luthor seems to expect it to be worth. Sinking California would be all but guaranteed to crush the U.S. economy for ''decades'', and give the rest of the world's a Depression-level nasty knock. And that's ignoring the side-effect damage of ''tsunami all over the Pacific rim'' that would be bound to follow Luthor's big quake.
*** And all that assumes the US could simply shrug off the effects of that '''''and''''' the Hackensack nuke [[note]] - The one Superman was able to stop ONLY through Miss Tessmacher's intervention[[/note]] - something that would've rendered New York City (America's financial center) uninhabitable for decades. Think of the fallout from the 9-11 attacks and change the weapon of choice from "airliners" to "nuclear missile". Luthor's master plan looks less tenable with every second glance.

*** And all that assumes the US could simply shrug off the effects of that '''''and''''' the Hackensack nuke[[note]]The one Superman was able to stop ONLY through Miss Tessmacher's intervention[[/note]] - something that would've rendered New York City (America's financial center) uninhabitable for decades. Think of the fallout from the 9-11 attacks and change the weapon of choice from "airliners" to "nuclear missile". Luthor's master plan looks less tenable with every second glance.

*** That's assuming anyone in the country, or likely the entire planet, could ''afford'' to buy up all that land at the prices Luthor seems to expect it to be worth. Sinking California would be all but guaranteed to crush the U.S. economy for ''decades'', and give the rest of the world's a Depression-level nasty knock. And that's ignoring the side-effect damage of ''tsunami all over the Pacific rim'' that would be bound to follow Luthor's big quake.

** Nothing says he has to develop it ''himself''. The land that was previously worthless would presumably increase in value by becoming ocean-front property, and Luthor could immediately sell it to developers for an immediate profit.

This is a rather hideously flawed plan for such a genius as Lex Luthor.

* Luthor's scheme to buy up all the land around what will become the new West Coast has some serious FridgeLogic behind it. Unless he's playing the REALLY long game, his profits will be minimal at best. Assuming the US Government doesn't simply snap up the land via [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eminent_domain Eminent Domain]], leaving Lex with little to no profit, he'd have to wait for the new coastline to stabilize, then develop the whole thing, then hope people aren't scared off by the fact that most of California went the way of Atlantis. Not to mention, barring some mad science on his part, he'd be waiting a few hundred years for the new coastline to become more than a series of jagged cliff walls and mud pits.\\