Superman on Television
Superman: The Animated Series - Episode Reviews
Season 1 - Episode 10: "The Main Man - Part 2 of 2"
Original Air Date: November 16, 1996Reviewed by: Jeffrey Taylor
"That's
L and in 'lacerate,'
O as in 'obliterate,'
B as in disembowel, and
O as in ... uh, I guess I can use 'obliterate' twice. What do you think?"
For anyone who hasn't read the review of Part 1 of this episode, I'll just reestablish that I'm not a fan of Lobo. For those of you who have the DVD, the creators did a commentary track for this installment claiming that Part 2 was oh so much better than Part 1. Although I thought the first piece of this story was about average, this one was a step down on many levels. I assume that the creators enjoyed making this one since there were so many alien designs that were almost all completely original. It still had several problems, starting with the high number of disgusting or "just wrong" moments that pepper the visuals.
A brief list of disgusting moments:
1. Lobo skinning the giant serpent, revealing its organs.
2. The robot women with flip-top heads and hoses that expel gas for tongues.
3. Lobo tying the hose/tongues of the robot girls together, making it look like their tongues are tied together before their heads explode from the pressure of the gas.
4. One of The Preserver's robots extended a hose from its lower midsection that looked strangely like a male appendage, which he plugged into a console.
5. Emperor Spooj. I don't really mind that he looked like Jabba the Hutt. I mind that his name is Spooj. If you know what spooge is, you know it's not something for a kid's show. I can't even think of family friendly euphemisms for what it actually is, so let me just say I'm glad he looked like Jabba the Hutt instead of, say, a pearl necklace.
At the time this episode aired, there were talks about developing both a Lobo feature film and a Saturday morning animated show. In all fairness, the writers and artists on these two episodes managed to keep Lobo true to Keith Giffen's original creation from his first appearance back in 1983. It just calls to question: is Lobo the kind of character that should be in a Saturday morning kid's show? I won't give a definitive answer to that because there are valid arguments to both sides. I simply question the wisdom.
The next question is: Did "The Main Man" really need to be two parts? Certainly the story as written wouldn't have fit in a single episode, but why should a character like Lobo warrant a multi-part arc while Brainiac, Parasite, Metallo and even the upcoming Lana Lang only deserve a single shot. Other than the 90 minute pilot, this was the only multi-episode story in the first season.
Rating - 2 (out of 5): When we last left Superman at the end of Part 1, he and Lobo had both been captured by a giant floating egg named The Preserver. Superman had also been dressed in traditional Kryptonian garb and depowered by synthetic red sunlight. In order to get Superman back into his familiar uniform, the show began with Supes thanking The Preserver for having it back. It wasn't the most subtle cover for getting him back in the suit, but I actually question why he was taken out of it at the end of the last episode so the creators wouldn't have to cover it at this point.
The red sunlight apparently only partially depowered Superman. He still had a great deal of strength, invulnerability, X-Ray vision and flight. Wouldn't it have been more interesting if he had no powers? Wouldn't the stakes be considerably raised if getting shot could kill him rather than simply knock him down? I guess we'll never know.
Once Superman managed to leave his cage, he walked right past Lobo's cage with no intention of freeing him. Lobo threatened to escape and destroy the Earth, which was when Superman reluctantly released him. That was also the moment when Lobo tied the hot robot girls' hose/tongues together causing their heads to explode. One of them also exclaimed, "oh, jinkies," which I just can't even comment on.
Lobo swears in alien-speak both in the comics and in this show. Sometimes it's fun, but other times it comes off way too obviously. When Lobo was shot point blank in the face with a robot guard's laser, he responded, "Fragger." Again, a little too obvious. Pay close attention after that moment for a very brief guest appearance of Starro. This was also the point where the robot extended the strangely male-appendage-like hose from its lower midsection and plugged it into a hole in a console.
Cue the disgusting snake-skinning scene.
The bounty hunters chasing Lobo from earlier in the episode reappeared in The Preserver's jungle section of his zoo. The chase sequence here was pretty awful. The characters, Superman and Lobo included, seemed to almost run in place. There was no speed, little tension, and way too much of that cheesy guitar Lobo-theme music I complained about from the previous episode. The music came off more subtly this time around since it was mixed with an orchestra, but it was still unfortunate and unnecessary.
The only redeeming aspect of the chase sequence was when Superman attempted to gain entry to the Dodo enclosure and was shot by the bounty hunters who heard the screech of the Dodos and threw Superman into the cage, thinking he would be destroyed by a monster. The upshot was that since the Dodo was an Earth creature, its enclosure had synthetic yellow sunlight, which repowered Superman. As the audience, it was an unexpected and cool twist since we thought he might be eaten by a giant monster who turned out to be a Dodo, however any tension in the episode ended in that moment. Once Superman had returned to full power, nothing could stop him.
As Lobo tried to escape the ship on his "Hog", The Preserver hatched out of his egg body and showed his true form: A giant boiled crab creature. I can't explain why he would disguise himself as a floating egg. Once Superman appeared and fought Crabby, Lobo opened the airlock, causing the creature to be expelled from the ship out into space. It seemed out of place that Superman wouldn't object to killing. That's part of who Superman is. He doesn't kill and he objects to others doing it. To be fair, the scene abruptly ended at that point, so it's plausible that the conversation could have happened off screen.
At last, in the final moments of the episode we got a better chance to see Superman's Fortress of Solitude which was shown briefly at the end of the "Stolen Memories" episode. This is probably why "The Main Man" aired after "Stolen Memories" despite the continuity errors I pointed out in the review for the last installment. Superman had apparently rescued all of the endangered species that The Preserver had been holding captive. I'm not entirely convinced that they're better off in The Fortress of Solitude than they had been on the ship. The water breathers for instance were still in tiny tanks that restricted movement. I don't suppose it would be possible to let them swim about in bigger enclosures. The Intergalactic Menagerie in Superman's Fortress of Solitude hearkens back to The Fortress as it was portrayed in the comics of the 1950's and 60's.
Some of the alien designs were actually quite good. Gnaww, played by Don Harvey (Tank Girl, The Untouchables), and his little brother Sqweek, played by David L. Lander (Scary Movie, TV's Twin Peaks), appeared in the previous episode, but they were both more readily showcased in this one. The brilliance of their design is the way their faces work. They basically have two faces each, one that's expressionless but with a functional mouth that can eat. The other face appears just over one if their eyes which moves like a mouth when they speak and there are two more smaller eyes over it. The smaller face does all the speaking (and apparently burping) and contains all of the facial expression. It's very hard to explain, but it looks great in the show.
Frank Welker (TV's Robot Chicken, Family Guy, Futurama, Pinky and The Brain, et al. Seriously, look him up) voiced the disgusting serpent that Lobo skinned. Emperor Spooj was voiced by Richard Moll (TV's Night Court and the pilot episode of Highlander). Moll also played Byron's father in "Nocturne" from Season 2 of Smallville.
If you like cheesed up attempts at heavy metal guitar music mixed with an orchestra, you may be able to deal with the music of this episode. Besides the disgusting moments discussed earlier, the animation was mostly average, except for the chase sequence near the end which appeared incredibly slow.
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