Customer Reviews

TV's Best Adventures of Superman 4 [VHS]

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3 star:		(1)
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Any Superman fan can't go wrong with this one! "Crime Wave" is one of the most gripping tales of the 1951 season, complete with stock footage of all of the great fight scenes from that year! "Perils of Superman" is one of the best color episodes, and proves that George Reeves had a great future as a director! The Max Fleischer cartoon is beautifully animated, but it's the two TV episodes that MAKE this video! BUY IT, and see why Reeves is remembered so fondly as the TRUE Man of Steel!

Warner Home Video has issued only a few one-hour volumes of television's "Adventures of Superman," but Volume 2 is by far the best - evoking fond memories of the classic series. "Crime Wave" (1951) and "Perils of Superman" (1957) represent some of the finest b&w and color episodes, with George Reeves in great form as the definitive Man of Steel. Sandwiched between the two episodes is "The Mechanical Monsters" (1941), an excellent Superman cartoon from the Fleischer Studios. Since Warner and DC Comics own the original negatives, the Fleischer short looks terrific. It's nostalgic, fast-paced fun for young and old.

Like the others in this series, Volume 2 of the "Adventures of Superman" series offers up a pair of black & white and color episodes from the syndicated television series starring George Reeves that ran from 1952-1957, along with one of the Fleischer Superman cartoons. "Crime Wave" (Episode #24) finds Superman fighting a crime wave that is sweeps Metropolis only to be exposed to atomic rays. This is one of the absolute classic episodes from this series, but this tape gets even better. "The Perils of Superman" (Episode #103), finds a master criminal planning a series of traps to snare each of Superman's friends: Lois (Noel Neill), Jimmy (Jack Larson), Perry White (John Hamilton, and Clark Kent (George Reeves). Of course, this is a plan that works so well it fails (for obvious reasons). This was the second to last episode of the series and another classic. The Fleischer's Cartoon "The Mechanical Monsters" is from 1941 and the second in the Superman series. The Man of Steel battles an army of giant, flying robots that spew flame in a series of sensational scenes. This is one of the best of the Superman cartoons and the only reason that this best volume in the "Adventures of Superman" series is not #1 is because that tape has the pilot and final episodes on it. But this is the one that will impress you the most from the dramatic opening narration to the final fade out on Reeves and the rest of the cast.

crime wave is probabaly the best episode from the adventures of superman. its clips along at break neck speed, superman kicks bad guy butts, it actually looks grittier in glorious black and white and it has the real lois lane in phyllis coates.
reeves superman may have been padded but he had a grit and non chalance that both the earlier superman (kirk alyn) and the later superman (christopher reeve)lacked.
allans superman was a bit of a goofy jimmy stewart type while christopher reeve overplayed the bumbling nerd part. george reeves kent was a normal, mysterious tough reporter. word was that reeves hated playing the part and if anything it made him give the part an extra dose of efforted dignity it otherwise might have lacked.
too, the first couple of seasons of the adventures of superman were the best. alas, the producers were a little nervous about coate's edgy lane and so they removed her, toned down reeves kick butt attitude and essentialay turned into a little kiddies show. but, even then the series had some decent moments, one of which; the perils of superman, is included here. its a charming homage to the movie serials and deflty directed by reeves himself.
sandwiched in between the two is the incomparable fleischer brothers cartoon mechanical monsters.
appropriately, no celluloid superman best exemplified the fleischer's animated superman better than reeves.

These episodes brought me back to when I was 9 years old, putting everything else aside and devoting 100% of my x-ray concentration time to watching each weekly half hour show with my friends. The music (which is repeated so often over the course of these and all the episodes in the series) really struck a nerve. I understand there are more than 100 episodes in the entire series. I'm sure that many of my brother boomers would agree: What a fantastic DVD package that would make!

I Just wish they would release THE ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN on DVD all 104 episodes! this is an incredible series that I as a babyboomer grew up with and have many fond memories of this series.

Bad guys impersonate Superman and Jimmy Olson on this videotape, which contains two episodes from the "Adventures of Superman" television series starring George Reeves and an animated "Superman" cartoon. In "The Face and the Voice" (B&W Episode #36 November 21, 1953), a gangster has plastic surgery done on his face so he looks like Superman and the Man of Steel gets blamed for a series of crimes he did not commit. Hayden Rorke plays the psychiatrist, just like he will do on "I Dream of Jeannie." In "Jimmy the Kid" (Color Episode 4:6 April 28, 1956), a gang of phony investment operators hire a double for Jimmy Olsen (Jack Larson) to break into the Daily Planet. Both of these episodes feature Noel Neill as Lois Lane. In "Showdown," one of the Superman cartoons produced after the demise of Fleischer Studios, there is a Superman imposter who likes to steal jewels for the crime boss of Metropolis. Clark and Lois catch up with the phony at the opera, where it is up to the real Superman to bring down the curtain on him (sorry, couldn't resist that one). George Reeves was certainly the perfect Clark Kent and the Fleischer Superman has always been my favorite, so this tape provides the best of both worlds. But even as a kid I could not understand how anyone could be fooled by a fake Superman. Everyone knows Superman only does good deeds.

These are remarkably good shows. The basic themes are simple and repeated time and again. But the sense of humor displayed by the writers and the not inconsiderable charismatic persona of George Reeves make this series a cut above.

BUT WHERE'S THE DVD???????????

We love the old "Superman" series. The first season in black and white was deadly serious action-socko stuff, with scary bad guys and action plots, including one grisly episode where Supe basically condemns a crooked couple who won't stop threatening to expose his secret identity to their death by leaving them atop an icy mountain (whoops, they slide off... YEEEAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHhhh--SPLAT). But in the color episodes, the spirit of the show changes to a campy comic book sensibility in the spirit of the "APPROVED" McCarthy era comic censor boards' conception of child-friendly media. This includes one memorable scene where a fleeing villain is retrieved by the Man of Steel not by simply flying a few dozen yards to snatch him up, but by using a powerful magnet to pull him back by aiming it at the "metal plate in his head," through the newly discovered magic of reversing the film. The bad guys in "The Big Freeze" are hysterical. We had taped this one on tv and watched it a hundred times.

What we REALLY need to see is the COMPLETE SERIES on DVD, at least the color seasons (FIRST)... Because of its level of humor and campiness, whichever season included the "Big Freeze" would be a great start if there is only a willingness to leak them out one season at a time, an unfortunate method of DVD'ing old tv shows. Don't they understand that many of those of us who would collect these will wait for the whole series to be offered?

I had bought TV's Best Adventures of Superman Vol. No.1 from another video company and found it to me,to be of extremely delightful Superman entertainment. The Superman cartoon contained within Volume No.1 was the first time I ever saw a Superman cartoon. It was beautiful!! I too was so happy to watch again after such a long time, classic episodes from the classic TV series with George Reeves. It brought back so many Superman memories from my childhood!! I have been a fan and a big fan of Superman since I was a little boy and I still am now at age 35.