More than any other comic book hero, Superman has been as defined by his portrayals off
the page as he is within them.
Whether it's the radio show introducing Kryptonite and Jimmy Olsen in the '40s or the way Christopher
Reeve made audiences believe a man could fly in 1978, the men playing the Man of Steel
have shaped how the world views Superman.
But which one did it best?
Here's a look at every live-action version of Superman ranked from worst to best.
Superman Returns
2006's Superman Returns isn't just terrible, it's the kind of terrible that makes you wonder
how it happened.
It's mystifying on every level, starting with the fact that it's meant to be a sequel to
the director's cut of Superman II not the theatrical release, but Richard Donner's original
version, which had only been released on DVD a few years earlier.
That's weird, especially considering it ignores the two sequels to Superman II that already
existed.
Worse, though, the version of Superman that the movie presents us is remarkably unappealing.
After leaving Earth for five years to check and see if Krypton was still blown up, Superman
returns to find that Lois Lane has been spending the intervening years raising their five-year-old
child.
Superman then mopes around, basically stalking his ex-girlfriend for two hours.
The most frustrating part about the whole thing is that Brandon Routh is actually good
in the role.
He's got a great look, he comes off as genuine and heroic, and he's incredibly likable he
just happens to be playing a version of Superman that's none of those things.
It's a Bird...
It's a Plane...
It's Superman
"Hi there America and friendly nations everywhere.
Glad we could get together."
This 1975 TV adaptation of the popular '60s Broadway musical taps into the same campy
vibe that made the Batman TV show such a big hit.
That actually led to some pretty cool stuff, too.
The sets being drawn as flat, comic book-style backgrounds for the actors to play against
complete with panel borders drawn in was a great idea, and there are a few really well-done
gags.
Plus, "You've Got Possibilities," the song in which a vampy femme fatale swings a meek
Clark Kent around the room while undressing him is… something else.
In practice, though, it just doesn't come together, thanks in large part to David Wilson's
Superman.
Like almost everyone else in the cast, he feels like he's constantly winking at the
audience about how goofy this entire thing is.
"Yeah, I know."
He plays Clark Kent just a little too weedy and bored, and his Superman is a little too
much of a blowhard to ever really want to see him win.
Superboy
Before Smallville managed to carve out a solid decade on the airwaves, the story of a younger,
pre-Superman Clark Kent found its way to syndicated television as Superboy in 1988.
Set during Clark's college years in Florida, the first season was shot on a tight budget,
but still managed to tell pretty interesting stories about its title character, played
by John Haymes Newton.
Though the series was a hit, Newton only lasted a single season, after producers used a DUI
as an excuse to replace him after he asked for a pay raise.
"This imposter will be more than happy to sign a full confession to the crimes committed
in my name."
Superman
Here's the weirdest thing about Kirk Alyn's tenure as Superman in the 1948 serial: while
his name did appear on the posters, identifying him as the actor who played Clark Kent, Columbia
Pictures never actually credited him in the serial itself.
Instead, they promoted the film as starring Superman, taking some time off from fighting
crime and saving the world to make his motion picture debut.
Looking back, it seems like a pretty bizarre promotional choice, but in all honesty, Alyn
really did sell it.
His big smile and hell-raiser attitude were a great match for the early iteration of the
character.
There was one truly bizarre thing about the serial version of Superman, though: since
they didn't have the budget for a live-action special effect, all the scenes of Superman
flying were done by showing Alyn's very human form quickly turning into an animated cartoon
that would fly around before landing behind something, so they wouldn't have to animate
the landing.
That's weird!
Süpermen Dönüyor
Is Turkey's 1979 bootleg action epic The Return of Superman good?
No.
No it is not.
Is it, however, absolutely worth watching, if only to see how truly insane it is?
Yes.
Since Turkish laws at the time prevented American blockbusters like Superman from being shown,
enterprising Turkish filmmakers just made their own version.
This resulted in a film in which a suspiciously scrawny Superman comes to Earth from a Krypton
that appears to be decorated by Christmas tree ornaments, and the shots of Superman
flying are done by dangling a Ken doll in a homemade Superman costume on a string.
So no, it's not what you'd call good, but Tayfun Demir's performance is certainly unique,
and incredibly entertaining.
The Adventures of Superboy
After John Newton left the Superboy television show, the title role for the second, third,
and fourth seasons passed to Gerard Christopher, who benefited from joining a show that was
already a success.
As a result, he had a lot more to do than his predecessor, both on and offscreen Christopher
actually ended up writing two episodes of the series himself.
"I want superboy!"
He also had the benefit of being a little older and having a little more experience.
Despite the fact that he was playing a sophomore in college, Christopher turned 30 the year
he landed the role, and the experience he brought to the table shows.
There's a sincerity to his portrayal of Superboy, and his Clark Kent was purposefully a little
nerdier than Newton's, to bring him closer into step with Christopher Reeve's bumbling,
stuttering Clark from the films.
Smallville
With 218 episodes over the course of ten seasons beginning in 2001, Smallville's Tom Welling
put more time into playing Clark Kent than any other live-action performer.
But then, that's also the problem.
Smallville famously had an approach rooted in the simple rule: "no tights, no flights."
The idea was that their focus would be on a young Clark Kent in the years before he
decided to become Superman.
The show was such a hit, though, that it took him a whole decade to get around to becoming
Superman.
As a result, Smallville's Clark became a victim of his own success, forced by the rules of
the show into an indecisiveness that even Hamlet would find a little annoying.
The show went on long enough that it even outlasted the original setting of the title,
and Clark ended up doing pretty much everything you'd expect to see a grown-up Superman do.
The thing is, he only did it as "the Red-Blue Blur."
If we ever get around to ranking Red-Blue Blurs, he'll be at the top of the list, but
as Superman, he leaves a little to be desired.
Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman
Smallville erred on the side of putting too much focus on Clark Kent, and the DC's blockbusters
went to the other extreme and barely bothered to include Superman's alter ego at all.
But beginning in 1993, Lois & Clark struck a balance that few other portrayals of the
character have managed to even come close to.
The trick is right there in the title "Lois & Clark" comes first, emphasizing the love
story.
And this didn't detract from the action.
Instead, it did the opposite, adding a level of drama that got fans invested in a kind
of ongoing soap opera without ever letting it get in the way of super-powered action.
The single best thing that Lois & Clark ever did was, after three different fake-outs,
calling the episode where the title characters got married, "Swear To God, This Time We're
Not Kidding."
That said, a close second was the way that Dean Cain's take on the Man of Steel got the
dynamic of the secret identity right: Superman is what he does, Clark Kent is who he is.
"That's ridiculous you are Superman."
No, Superman is what I can do.
Clark is who I am."
And a close third?
"Hey, hey, look over there!"
Man of Steel and the DC Extended Universe
The DCEU may have its origins in an unrelentingly bleak place, but Henry Cavill's arc as Superman
transcends even the dreariest parts.
As Superman, he's pretty much the truest thing you'll ever get to his comic appearance, and
for the first time on screen, he's not just a dude with superpowers, but an alien god.
Sure, his initial arc consists of murdering the villain, getting his butt whupped by Batman,
and then dying pretty dark, but also a great match for Ben Affleck's Batman.
By the end of 2017's Justice League, we got a sunnier and more optimistic version of Superman:
a guy who could joke around with The Flash, and hopefully open the door to a much brighter
DCEU.
What more could you want in a Superman?
The Adventures of Superman
Even though the show was on the air for over a hundred episodes beginning in 1952, the
most defining moment for George Reeves' tenure as Superman on The Adventures of Superman
didn't happen on the screen.
It happened in real life.
Reeves was acutely aware of the fact that kids looked up to him.
He even quit smoking so that he wouldn't be caught by a photographer and set a bad example
for his younger viewers, and pushed for scripts that would give good messages about respect
and tolerance of others.
The downside to that was that when he made public appearances in costume, a few children
would attempt to test Superman's invulnerability with a quick punch or a kick to the shins.
At one appearance, a kid took things much further by bringing his father's pistol in
an effort to see if bullets really would bounce off Superman.
Reeves, thinking quickly, convinced the child to hand over the loaded gun, as immortalized
in the 2006 film Hollywoodland:
"If you did shoot me, and the bullet bounced off, it might accidentally hit someone else.
We don't want that to happen, do we?"
That's the kind of thing Superman himself would have done.
Supergirl
There's a moment in the second season of Supergirl where everyone is eagerly awaiting the arrival
of Kara Zor-El's more famous cousin.
When he does show up, Superman lands, and then spends the next few minutes smiling and
shaking hands with everyone, learning their names and greeting them not as an alien savior,
but someone who sees them as equals.
That's the moment where it was clear that the show's producers understood Superman as
well as they understand his cousin.
Tyler Hoechlin's take on Superman has a warmth and honesty that goes perfectly with the world
the show has created, an affable attitude and humanity that doesn't go away when he
takes off his glasses.
With his first appearance in 2017, he might not have the tenure of some of the other Supermen
on this list.
But what he does have is a note-perfect vision of a hero who's here to help.
Superman
If you go looking for people's thoughts about Christopher Reeve's performance as The Man
of Steel starting in 1978's Superman, the one thing you'll read over and over is that
he looked like he stepped off the pages of the comics and into the real world.
But the truth is that Reeve embodied the idea of Superman so well that the comics had to
change to keep up.
His easy smile, his reassuring confidence; it's all there on screen.
He even made the eye-popping costume look great, and did such a great job with the double
identity that it was easy to believe the citizens of Metropolis would overlook the meek, slouchy
Clark Kent as a disguise for Superman.
Looking back at them years later, the movies themselves can be wildly uneven 3 and 4 aren't
as bad as you remember, and the first two aren't as good
but at least Reeve's performance remains unassailably great in virtually every way.
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