FULL breakdown of SUPERMAN II and the DONNER CUT

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kpf3hCUpZKc

Here is the second installment in our SUPERMAN rewatch series! And this one is a doozy, because we're covering two very different versions of the same movie.

If you're unfamiliar with either version of SUPERMAN II, as usual we're spoiling pretty much everything, so be warned!

The story of these two cuts is pretty legendary, but in a rambly nutshell: Richard Donner was hired to direct both the first SUPERMAN and SUPERMAN II simultaneously, but midway through production they decided to put the sequel on the backburner and focus on getting the first one done. Then, after the premiere of SUPERMAN: THE MOVIE, Donner was fired and replaced with Richard Lester (most famous for directing A HARD DAY'S NIGHT and HELP! with the Beatles). In addition to completing the movie, Lester wound up reshooting a lot of things Donner had already shot, simply so he could earn the sole director's credit.

The heartbreaking thing about this was while Donner had a deep respect for SUPERMAN as a character and a unique vision of what a SUPERMAN movie should be, Lester simply just didn't.

And there's more. Marlon Brando's footage was already shot, but the producers didn't want to use it because they didn't want to pay him a percentage of gross U.S. box-office. To make matters worse, after Donner was fired, Gene Hackman, screenwriter Tom Mankiewicz, composer John Williams and several other key members of the cast and crew all refused to come back and finish the sequel. Thankfully, what we wound up with was still a great movie, but not everything it could and should have been.

BUT... many years later, Donner and Mankiewicz were able to put together their version of SUPERMAN II after a huge trove of their footage was rediscovered, thanks mostly to the tireless work of editor Michael Thau.

So... is the Donner Cut an improvement over Lester's theatrical cut?