Kryptonite Found on Earth!!

The mineral was found in Serbia by geologists with Rio Tinto Plc, the world’s third-largest mining company, London’s Natural History Museum said today. After being unable to match the rock to any known mineral, they sought help from Chris Stanley, a mineralogist at the museum. Working with Canada’s National Research Council, the scientists identified the chemical components of the mineral, then turned to the Internet.

`I just typed into Google `sodium lithium boron silicate hydroxide,’ and this match with kryptonite came up. It was really astonishing,” Stanley said in a telephone interview today.

The composition matched the scientific name written on a case of rock containing kryptonite stolen from a museum by the DC Comics hero’s arch-nemesis, Lex Luthor, in the film “Superman Returns.” DC Comics is owned by Time Warner Inc., the world’s largest media company.

“I don’t know of any other instance of something being imagined in fiction and then found in nature.” Stanley said.

The terrestrial mineral only differs from the fictional rock, whose source was Superman’s home planet of Krypton, in that it is white, rather than green, and lacks fluorine, according to the museum. The name displayed on the case in the movie includes the words “with fluorine” after “hydroxide.”

Different Name

“It’s not clear if it’s actually referring to kryptonite itself, or if this is the composition of the rock that actually holds kryptonite,” Stanley said.

“We will have to be careful with it — we wouldn’t want to deprive Earth of its most famous superhero!,” the scientist said in a statement on the museum’s Web site.

The rock will be named jadarite, after Jadar, the place in Serbia where it was discovered, Stanley said. Calling the rock kryptonite would imply the mineral contained the element krypton, which it doesn’t, he said.

The mineral is a potential source of lithium, used in batteries, and boron, used in cleaning products, glasses and hi- tech appliance, according to Stanley. The rock will be put on display tomorrow at the West London museum.

Now I haven’t had a chance to read the book or really find out why Skelton is drawing these parallels. But to me it seems ridiculous to make such comparisons. I mean why ruin a great American icon by bringing in religious symbols. Can’t Superman be just a superhero and not hold any divinity?? I can see where Skelton finds these similarities and I won’t deny that there are some. But I don’t think that Joe Shuster and Jerry Seigal (Superman’s creators), being two Jews from Cleveland intended on telling a story of a Christ figure…do you?

E!-online reporter Kristen Veitch has revelied that the producers of Smallville are planning to kill off one of the major cast members next season! Her April 13th article states that one of the main characters will meet their untimely end in what will certainly be a major plot twist!!

Cast your vote below if you think you know who it will be…

JOURNEY INTO COMICS: THE DEATH OF SUPERMAN

by Mike San Giacomo

So was Superman dead or what?

I teach a comics appreciation class at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland. Recently, the subject came up about the death and resurrection of Superman that occurred 15 years ago (yeah, the death in Superman #75 was cover-dated January of 1993, but it was in stores in November of ’92, so the whole of 2007 is being seen as the 15th anniversary). I parroted what I remembered about the explanation, but I could see they were not buying it. I double checked and saw that I had the story right, but then, in a recent issue of Teen Titans, Kid Eternity blamed the rash of people returning from the dead (Green Lantern, Green Arrow, Jason Todd, er…Bucky?) on Superman.

He explained that when Superman returned from the dead, “he left the door open“ between Hell and Earth.

So that begs the question: Back in 1992, if Superman actually, really died, then how exactly did he come back? And does it poke holes in the minority view that Superman didn’t really die, but only appeared dead to us Earthlings?

Who better to ask, on the 15th anniversary year of that event, than the man who steered that ship, DC editor Mike Carlin?

Carlin, who is in charge of Batman these days, offered some explanation about the death of Superman that put everything in perspective.

“He was dead,” he said simply. “The editors, writers, all of us believed he was dead. There was a lot of pseudo-science and doubletalk at work here, but Superman did indeed die.”

I knew it all along! Those people who said he was merely in a “death-like” state were dead wrong. Excuse the pun.

“Yep, he died,” continued Carlin. “We saw him heading toward the light and then we did not see him for a while. While on that trip to the light, through a combination of his own beliefs and his earthly parents beliefs about what happens to the soul, he sees Jonathan Kent‘s soul. Pa Kent had a heart attack and was having an out-of-body experience. His soul steered Clark‘s soul back to Earth.

Carlin said when you consider that actual human beings do die and return to life on the operating table, the precedent is there.

“Granted, humans die and return to life in a few minutes and it took Superman seven or eight issues, but the premise is the same,” he said. Once his soul was back where it belonged, Superman was barely alive, in that “death-like state” we hear about.

That‘s where the Eradicator comes into the picture. The Eradicator, also known as “The Last Son of Krypton,” was one of the four “Supermen” to emerge after Superman‘s death. He is actually an “it,” a Kryptonian construct that exists to protect all things Kryptonian.

“Using science which we more mortals can not even understand, the Eradicator put Superman in a Kryptonian rejuvenation matrix that massaged him back to life,” Carlin said.

Later, he emerged from the suit and crawled into a Kryptonian battle suit, which he stayed in for a time while his body recovered.

Some of that was done off-camera, so the whole return to life thing was a little confusing at the time.

Also, fans were expecting a red herring and might have not believed that it was the real Superman.

I thought the trick would be that the Superman who was killed was actually the so-called “sand” Superman that fought the Man of Steel by taking on his form years before. The theory going around at the time, bolstered by an inexplicable DC reprint of the early “Sand” story, was that the Superman that won that battle was actually the villain, who believed he was Superman.

That would have paved the way for the return of the “real” Superman, who had been tucked away in a coma somewhere.

But it was not the case. The dead Superman was the real Superman and he came back from the dead.

So what about the Kid Eternity comment about Superman escaping from Hell?

“It‘s always good to have questions,” Carlin said. “I was happy with Kid Eternity saying that and I‘m sure he believes it.”

He slyly declined to talk about the implications of the statement.

Carlin said that the storyline with the four Supermen (Steel, Superboy, the Cyborg Superman and the Eradicator Superman) was a response to the massive media attention over the Man of Steel‘s death.

“Once we saw how big it was getting, we didn‘t think our return to life story would be big enough,” he said. “We felt like we had to come up with something better and thought up the four Supermen angle. And look at the cool characters that came out of it.”

DC is celebrating the 15th anniversary of Superman‘s death with a direct-to-DVD animated movie called “Superman: Doomsday” in September.

It will adapt the death of Superman storyline. The Warner Home Movie video will be rated PG-13 and will star voices of Adam Baldwin (Firefly, Serenity) as Superman; Anne Heche (Men in Trees) as Lois Lane and James Marsters (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) as Lex
Luthor.

CapedWonder.com is commemorating the 10th Anniversary of Christopher Reeve’s Star Ceremony on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

April 15, 2007 is the 10th anniversary of Christopher Reeve’s Hollywood Walk of Fame Star ceremony and party in Hollywood, California. CapedWonder.com is commemorating the occasion with a new gallery of never-before-released photos by Jim Bowers, Jo Addie and other friends; words of rememberance from Jo Addie and Lynn Anderson; and an exclusive "teaser" video from Jim and Jo Addie from their full-length star ceremony documentary available for purchase from their website.

The April 16 issue of TV Guide magazine features an interview with "Progeny" guest star Lynda Carter where she talks about playing Chloe’s mother. The article also includes some quotes from Smallville executive producer Alfred Gough.

Here are some highlights:

- "Carter will be playing Moira Sullivan, the mysterious mother of Chloe (Allison Mack), best friend and confidante to young Clark Kent (Tom Welling)," TV Guide says.

- The article makes mention of the revelation a few seasons ago that Moira was in a mental insitution. "But obviously it was a much bigger secret than that," Al Gough said, revealing that Moira is meteor infected and has the power to mentally control other so-called "Meteor freaks."

- Lynda Carter reveals that Moira isn’t a typical heroine. "The fact that this character was formerly psychotic, that she was in a catatonic state, there’s a wonderful character arc there," she said. "Moria is a bit of a soap opera in one person: love, loss, magic meteorites."

"Progeny" airs on The CW April 19. The new TV Guide should now be hitting newsstands.

Dougherty said that it’s likely he and his Superman Returns writing partner Dan Harris will again work with Singer on the sequel. “We’re talking,” Dougherty said. “We’re bouncing ideas around with Bryan. Big ideas. Action-packed ideas.”

Singer has said the next installment will be along the lines of the second Star Trek film, and Dougherty said the comparison is apt. “I think it’s going to be a more action-oriented film,” he said. “Again, the easy comparison to make was [X-Men] to X2, or Star Trek [The Motion Picture] to Star Trek II. I mean, I know that Bryan has said he’s going to Wrath of Khan it, and by that he means, ‘Let’s take what we’ve already established—we’ve gotten that out of the way—and let’s just make it shorter, tighter and more action-packed.” —Patrick Lee, News Editor  

What must it be like to witness history? Never before in the history of film, has a director who “left” a film during production been given the opportunity to revisit that film nearly 30 years later and complete his original vision! It may sound a bit melodramatic but history was made recently with a screening of Superman II: The Richard Donner Cut and I got to see it projected up on the silver screen at the famous Hollywood Directors Guild Theater.

Richard Donner, as any “Superman” film historian knows, shot Superman: The Movie and Superman II at the same time from a huge 500 page script – but as budget and hostilities with the father & son producing team the Salkinds increased, all effort was focused on getting “Superman I” finished with the idea that all would revisit Superman II. Donner was able to shoot roughly 75 percent of Superman II, completed and in the can. When Superman: The Movie was released in 1978, it was a box office smash. So when the Salkinds went back to finish Superman II it was decided that Donner not be asked to return. Donner himself joked after the Nov. 2nd DGA screening that “if ‘Superman I’ had been a flop I would have done ‘Superman II,’ but as it turned into a huge success the Salkinds didn’t need me anymore” – Donner makes no secret that he had a very difficult relationship with the Salkinds all through the production of “Superman.” When he was replaced for the sequel by Salkind favorite Richard Lester (who had recently worked on the their two Musketeer films), Donner caulked it up to one of those “Hollywood things” and moved on and left Superman behind. However, over the ensuing years there have been many hints at what the Donner version of Superman II was and how it differed from the film that was released in 1980. Many different international & TV edits of the film had extended the film(s) with some of the “lost” Donner footage to pad it for television. But, sadly it looked as if a Donner cut would remain a ‘what could have been’ thing – that is until now!

This past thursday night I was lucky enough to attend the world premiere of Superman II: The Richard Donner Cut – billed as “The Version You Have Never Seen.” If you think you have seen Superman II, think again…The film has been restored by Michael Thau, a former assistant to Donner, using the original Superman II shooting script. Once Warner’s gave Thau the green light to move forward with the proposed Donner cut, he traveled to England where the films were shot. Thau went on an Indiana Jones-like quest to dig through the film vaults, ultimately returning with six tons of film and negatives from the Donner “Superman” production. “The film has been completely re-edited not only to incorporate this lost footage, but to adjust it to its original sensibilities,” says Donner.

The result of this once in a lifetime venture was shown on the big screen for the first time at the Director’s Guild Theater in Hollywood. Many “Superman” celebs were there: Donner, Margot Kidder, Shara Douglas, Jack O’Halloran, Marc McClure, Bryan Singer, Brandon Routh… to name just a few! I was amazed how tall Routh was in person and how much he looks like Reeve.

SPOILER WARNING!

The film is dedicated lovingly to Christopher Reeve and features an all-new opening sequence. In the Lester version, the film opens with Lois in Paris and the Eiffel Tower hostage, Superman rescue – elevator bomb into space sequence. The Donner cut opens as originally indented with a recap of the events of “Superman I” finishing up with Superman pushing the first Lex rocket out into space and it sputtering into and exploding the Phantom Zone releasing General Zod and his pals. The film follows with another new sequence where Perry White gives Lois & Clark the assignment to investigate the newlywed racket in Niagara Falls. This new sequence rounds out with Lois teasing Clark with super-this and super-that, suspecting Clark is Superman, and to prove her point, leaps out the window of the Daily Planet knowing Clark/Superman will save her only to have Clark perform a super-speed (very similar to the current Smallville) rescue resulting in Lois landing unharmed on a sidewalk fruit stand. When Lois looks up she sees Clark up in the window in disbelief, how could he be Superman? The scene is very funny and sweet. Another nice scene involves the reveal of Clark as Superman at the Niagara Falls honeymoon suite which plays out very different than what ended up in the Lester version. This sequence never made it officially before the cameras, the footage shot by Donner included here in the film, instead is made up of two screen tests of Reeve & Kidder blended together to complete the sequence. Reeve’s screen test shows him six months before shooting, 30 pounds lighter, his hair very short and acting according to Donner opposite Holly Palance (off screen standing in as Lois). Kidder’s footage, shot many months later, features her with Reeve now bulked up with his familiar longer hair, both are on a set that is bare bones (typical for a screen test, 2 walls a door and minimal set dressing). Nevertheless, the scene is charming, the interplay between Reeve and Kidder is undeniable and one can see why they were both chosen for the parts of Lois Lane and Clark Kent.

It was great to see Christopher Reeve as Superman do that famous fly-over at the end of the film again. “It’s been an incredible experience – almost like having Chris spin the Earth backward, hurtling us back in time to finish a film I loved, as did Chris. I hope you enjoy the film as much as I have enjoyed seeing ‘Superman II’ restored as it was originally conceived and intended to be seen,” Donner added.

Superman II: The Richard Donner Cut hit DVD, Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD on November 28. Special thanks to Jim Bowers at CapedWonder.com. This past thursday night I was lucky enough to attend the world premiere of Superman II: The Richard Donner Cut – billed as “The Version You Have Never Seen.” If you think you have seen Superman II, think again…