YMMV / Ruby-Spears Superman

• Awesome Moments:
  • "The Beast Beneath the Streets":
    • When a scientist steals his powers, Superman defeats a couple of thugs trying to mug him and Lois with his bare hands and a pair of trash can lids.
    • The powerless Superman, Lois, and Jimmy take on and defeat the superpowered Dr. Morpheus.
  • "By the Skin of the Dragon's Teeth": Lois fights a saboteur sawing through the supports of the lift with her purse while clinging to the wires. She puts him on the defensive pretty well.
• Complete Monster:
  • "Bonechill": Chilton Bone was a former university professor fired for spreading his theories on the occult. Bone steals the Talisman of Olaf from the university and transforms himself into a ghoul named Bonechill who can create monsters. Bonechill creates monsters and sends them to kill some university students who could identify him. Bonechill also kidnaps the Daily Planet staff and puts them into death traps inspired by Edgar Allan Poe after they try to investigate him. Bonechill's end game is to create an army of monsters and have them destroy the university, attempting to kill everyone on the campus.
  • "The Last Time I Saw Earth": Dealmaker is an intergalactic criminal who hires a Bounty Hunter named Starrok to steal a NASA shuttle, with Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen on board. Starrok takes Lois, Jimmy and the rest of the crew to meet Dealmaker at a city he rules over. Dealmaker seems pleasant at first, offering them a feast to eat, but after the feast, he imprisons them in capsules and has his scientists study them. Dealmaker reveals that he is going to sell the Earth to some aliens who will become immortal if they devour humans. When Superman comes to rescue everyone, Dealmaker fills the capsules with poison gas.
• Crazy Is Cool: The tone of this cartoon is firmly in the Silver Age mentality. This means time-traveling despot cyborgs, ancient Chinese dragon-gods, rampaging warbots that combine, humanoid aliens that turn into giant spiders... awesome.
• Funny Moments:
  • Half the reason for the "Superman's Family Album" segments.
  • Also, a lot of Lex's deadpan snarking.
  • "By the Skin of the Dragon's Tooth":
    • Clark falls into the water during the initial bombing attack. After dealing with it as Superman, he crawls back out of the water as Clark...and complains that his Disco Mozart tapes are still underwater. When Lois asks him if he realizes what the attack meant, he answers that obviously, someone in China hates Mozart.
    • A villain starts sawing through the cables while the Daily Planet team is riding the lift. When Jimmy yells for Clark to do something, he gasps and pretends to pass out. Lois snaps that fainting wasn't what she meant.
• Harsher in Hindsight: "To Play or Not to Play" sees Clark try out for high school football, but Pa Kent points out his powers mean it's like an adult playing against children. Clark manages to step back but still help his friends by becoming team manager instead. All well and good, but seven years later came The Death of Clark Kent, where Conduit was motivated by the belief that the super-powered Clark cheated him at assorted games and made him look bad to his father.
• Heartwarming Moments:
  • The other half of why "Superman's Family Album" exists.
  • In "By the Skin of the Dragon's Tooth", Superman pretends the Dragon King turned Clark to stone as a cover. Lois and Jimmy take the statue with them as they look for Luthor (even though that means Jimmy, powering the rickshaw, has to work twice as hard). After Clark returns following the climactic battle, Jimmy glomps him in joy that he's alive. While Lois focuses more on the fact that he scooped her again, her rant about how what's happened to him won't quench her wrath shows that she's pretty happy too, underneath her irritation.
  • In "Cybron Strikes", Superman takes the mechanized Lois and Jimmy to S.T.A.R. Labs to find a way to suppress Cybron's mind control. When he approaches his tied-up love interest and friend with the suppression helmets, Cybron Lois snaps that he'll regret this.
    Superman: Saving you is the last thing I'd regret.

---