Written by: Susan Granger
www.susangranger.com

One of the world's most beloved superheroes has flown back to Earth. It's been five years since Superman left the Kent farm to find his home planet of Krypton, and a lot has changed in Metropolis. Lois Lane has a new fiancé and a five year-old son. The intrepid reporter is less than enthusiastic about Superman's reappearance, having won a Pulitzer Prize for an essay asserting that the world doesn't need a savior - and neither does she. Meanwhile, dastardly Lux Luthor once again plots world domination, stealing precious crystals from the Fortress of Solitude. So will truth and justice still prevail?

On one level, the story is about whether there's a place for an idealistic superhero in the modern world. But, ultimately, it explores what happens when an old love comes back into your life and takes you on another romantic ride into the starry sky, along with the resonant life continuum as "a son becomes a father and a father becomes a son."

Christopher Reeve-clone Brandon Routh is a bit stiff and lacks charismatic charm but he's certainly convincing in the skin-tight blue body suit with its red "S." While Kate Bosworth doesn't have Margot Kidder's impetuous zaniness, she's convincing as young Tristan Leabu's mother with James Marsden as her devoted lover, as is Frank Langella as Perry White and Sam Huntington as Jimmy Olsen. But Kevin Spacey's deliciously diabolical Lex Luthor steals every scene with ditsy Parker Posey as his companion.

Writer/director/producer Bryan Singer cleverly combines the iconic emotional elements - evoking Marlon Brando's Jor-El - with spectacular, action-packed 21st century scenes. Visually, it's overwhelming, augmented by John Ottoman's score. Script-wise, it could use some tweaking.

But on the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, "Superman Returns" is a terrific, triumphant 10, appealing to the child in all of us. Superman soars!