Bizarro #1 or Mark Pillow's Greatest Work

Well, I was never much a fan of Superman. I always thought he was kind of a boring character. Y'know, indestructible and all that. With some notable exceptions (listed at the bottom) it has been proven that Ol' Supes is pretty damn dull (mostly because of weak writing, Superman Returns NOT excepted). That or some crappy and cheesy chick fantasy show (remember Lois and Clark, bleech). Anyway, I'm not here to talk about Supes but his far superior doppelganger brother/twin (depending on your source and perspective) Bizarro!

His history being what it is, I am only going to focus on his screen personas (small and big). So in no particular order let's go...

The horrible Superman III did have an interesting sub-plot involving red kryptonite and an evil Supes fighting a good Clark. Now, it is easy to argue why this is NOT an incarnation of Bizarro. I, however, believe that it is. Superman's suit is off color (a classic theme of Bizarro's). This guy is also a negative image and personality of Superman. 'Nuff said.


Lois and Clark had their own version but I'll not bore you with the details nor a photo.


What the hell is this!?! Believe it or not, this is an image from Superman IV. Even if you saw this movie (and not many did) you probably don't remember this because it stayed on the cutting room floor. This handsome chap was none other than Nuclear Man #1 and was (supposedly) intended as homage to Bizarro. Yeah, right.



The 88-92 Live Action Superboy (season 1 out now on DVD) also had a version of Bizarro.
Yikes, does this look like high quality television?








Finally, here is Mark Pillow’s finest work as an actor! I give you, Nuclear Man #2! Arguably this is the realization of Lex Luther’s goal when he created Bizarro way back in the late 1950’s. The only problem is that Nuclear Man pretty much sucks. If you blame anyone, blame Golan and Globus for fronting the money for this pile of Phantom Zone crap. His hair does blow convincingly in space, though!



Superman the Animated Series also had their own version of Bizarro and for my dollar, I thought this was the best. This Bizarro is the easiest to relate to also because he always tried to do the right thing for the right reasons he just lacked the facilities to know what right really is. He never meant to but he usually just made things worse. (Symbol and colors altered to reflect the post "Crisis" Bizarro.)



Okay, now some notable exceptions in which Superman was actually interesting…

Superman the Motion Picture
Superman II
Superman the Animated Series season II
The Dark Knight Returns
The Old Fleischer Cartoons (of which I still have a DVD of that I owe Crasskins)
Kevin Smith’s Superman Script (Naw, I’m just kidding about this one, it sucked)