Superman Returns

We watched Superman Returns last night. This, of course, is the new Superman movie that X-men director Bryan Singer made instead of doing the third X-men movie (which then turned out to be pretty poor). Anyway. The movie itself was pretty good, but one line of dialogue stuck in my craw a little bit.

When Superman finally returns to Metropolis, Daily Planet editor Perry White is rallying his reporters to inspire them to go find out about Superman and write some good articles. "Fashion-is he wearing a new cape? Health & Fitness-has he lost weight?" that kind of thing. He then asks,

"Does he still stand for truth, justice...all that stuff?"

"All that stuff?" You mean, "the American way," as in, "truth, justice, and the American way?" Because that is the original catchphrase, of course. Superman is an absolutely quintessential American creation. He represents America's strength and can-do attitude. They chose to mangle his catchphrase in a most politically correct way...wonder why? Would adding the words "the American way" hurt the foreign box office take or something ridiculous like that? This movie was, on one level, an allegory of the beating America's reputation has taken worldwide in the last few years. (On another level, Superman represents a Christ-figure, and one could argue that the movie has a positive religious message, which is very unusual for a mainstream Hollywood film, but that's another essay.)

I guess my point is that, I know it's considered socially unacceptable in Hollywood to say positive things about the United States. This film, while coming off with a strong pro-America message ("we're still here and we're still needed"), was made by people who were unwilling to actually say so out loud. What a bunch of cowards.