I’m happy to report that Superman Returns is a wondrous piece of cinema. It swings giddily between moments of reverence — nay, fetishisation — of Richard Donner’s film, and moments of staggering beauty and emotional resonance.

The critics are fairly united behind it (although poor, old Ebert seems to have missed the point again), and as usual Walter Chaw turns in the smartest review of the bunch.

For the True Fans: Be sure to look out for the reference to 1938’s Action Comics #1, and the Aquaman pyjamas in the second-last scene.

Grant Morrison once said that Superman is more real than you or I, because he was around long before we were born and he’ll be around long after we die. If Bryan Singer keeps directing his films, I see no reason to doubt the truth of that statement.

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*********************SPOILERS*******************************

My pet fanboy theory, which I now feel obligated to share with the world, is that we haven’t seen the last of that giant chunk of contaminated crystal. I’m betting it somehow bonds with some surviving Kryptonian technology, becomes sentient and returns to Earth… as Brainiac.

Maybe I’m crazy. But man, that’d be cool.