Animation,  Film,  Uncategorized

SUPERMAN: DOOMSDAY Review

Before I start off
this review, I just want to clarify something. I’ve never been giving the
chance to read Death of Superman, which the movie is supposedly based upon. So
I’m going to approach this as a movie on its own and not how it stands as an
adaptation. I tried to find some means to read it before I watched it, but with
how iconic this comic is, I think you know why I was unable to. With that said,
let’s get to the review.

When LexCorp accidentally releasing a terrible monster named Doomsday, Superman
is up against his most powerful foe yet.

As I said in the beginning. Superman Doomsday is an animated movie adaptation
on the Death of Superman story, the famous comic by the same new published in
1992. A storyline that was a big deal back in the day (if killing of a
character now is like saying that they are going on vacation). To explain
Superman Doomsday the best way, is to call it a competent mixed bag.

The
positive

It’s a really well animated movie, where the action (which this movie focus
heavily on) feels smooth and impactful. It is like looking at an episode of
Justice League Unlimited or Superman: The Animated Series but with a higher
budget (which I guess is a no brainer since Bruce Timm is one of the directors).
The scale of the movie is both bombastic and yet small in scale due to the
personal nature of the story which I highly appreciate.

The voice acting sells the lines fantastic. My favorite voice actor of the
bunch is James Masters (who you might remember as Spike from Buffy or Brainiac
from Smallville) who voices the famous Lex Luthor.

The
negative
When it comes to the negatives, is really only boiling down to two
major reasons. One of them is the dialogue. While opening and closing monologues
from our favorite bald bad guy are really well made, some of the dialogue between
Lois and Clark feels poorly scripted. While it’s not as bad as the difference
of dialogue between the original dialogue in The Killing Joke and the filler
that they used in that movie adaptation, it’s still noticeable. Some might
argue that they made the dialogue rather simplistic due to the nature of where
the source material comes from. However, what an adaptation should do is trying
to enhance and fit the platform that they are working in.

Besides the dialogue, the thing that weights the movie down is the length of
it. Don’t get me wrong. For the running time they had (which is 1 hour and 18
minutes) they made a good job. But through my view of the movie, the feeling
of, this could have used a longer running time. The running time makes the job
if you are a big fan of the character from the beginning. But if you were
someone rather new and watches it early on in your fandom, I don’t think it
would hit as hard. Having some more build up, give the movie some more space in
between would help that issue. Let’s hope that their second attempt in adapting
this storyline use the extra length to its advantage since they split it up
into two parts like another famous adaptation.

Conclusion
At the end of it all, I’m glad that I saw it. Even If I don’t call it
horrible, it’s not a groundbreaking experience that everyone has to watch.  This movie is a fine watch that I gladly give
a 6/10.

Latest posts by Isak Wolff (see all)

Co-host of the Amateur Otaku Podcast. A writer of many things. Loves everything nerdy from anime/manga to comics and video games. Fire Emblem is the greatest of all time.