Superman IV: The Quest for Peace (partially lost original cut of DC superhero film sequel; 1987)

Clark Kent at his parents' grave.

Status: Lost

Superman IV: The Quest for Peace (1987) was the fourth and final film in the original Superman movie franchise starring Christopher Reeve as Superman. Suffering greatly from behind-the-scenes wrangling, budget cuts and a heavy-handed, wholly implausible script, the film was released to uniformly negative reviews and lacklustre box office. In a failed last-ditch effort to salvage it, forty-five minutes of footage was cut from the film following a final test screening.

Plot

We open on Clark Kent pondering his decision to sell the family farm in Smallville. Upon returning to Metropolis, Kent finds that the Daily Planet has been bought out by business tycoon David Warfield. Meanwhile, a nuclear crisis is looming between the world's superpowers, forcing Superman to grapple with the question of interference in human affairs. Ultimately, he decides to intervene, working with all nations of the world to collect and destroy their nuclear missiles by hurling them into the sun. At the same time, Clark is working to fend off the advances of Lacey Warfield, the tycoon's daughter and new publisher of the Planet.

Lex Luthor, having been broken out of prison by his nephew Lenny, reacts to the newfound peace by setting himself up as a profiteer with the help of several shady international arms dealers. To protect their efforts (and, naturally, destroy Superman on general principles) Luthor also steals some of Superman's DNA and uses it to create an equally superpowered villain via cloning technology. This accounts for most of the cut footage, as the entire plot thread involving Luthor's first attempt at a 'Nuclear Man' - an utter failure whom Superman easily defeats - was excised from the film. Nuclear Man II, a much more impressive model, is born when Luthor manages to attach the remaining Super-DNA to the last of the missiles heading into the sun. Thus also gifted with radioactive powers, the new NM does in fact manage to seriously wound Superman in their first battle.

Superman is able to recover using the last vestige of Kryptonian power that had been hidden on the farm and sets out to re-engage Nuclear Man, who in the interim has developed a fixation on Lacey - the explanation for this being another casualty of the deleted plot thread, wherein the original NM met her in a club. NM II, accordingly, kidnaps and whisks her into outer space (where she has no trouble breathing, and at one point is seen in freefall). Superman rescues her and manages to defeat Nuclear Man; he then delivers a speech to the world's powers regretting his decision to intervene, and sees Luthor safely back behind bars. As a coda, former publisher Perry White triumphantly announces that he has managed to buy the Daily Planet back from Warfield.

Lost and edited scenes

Besides the extensive edits usual for a film of this scope, at the last minute - reportedly in response to a final disastrous test screening in Los Angeles - Superman IV: The Quest for Peace was cut from two hours 15 min to 90 minutes in an attempt to streamline the plot and focus more on the big setpiece battles. Unfortunately, as noted, this created some serious plot holes that did not help a film already struggling for credibility.

Among the major cuts and changes:

• Extended footage of Clark Kent's trip home to Smallville, including an opening scene in which he visits and places flowers on his parents' grave.
• A montage combining new and repurposed footage of Clark (Kal-El) escaping Krypton as a baby, including his parents Jor-El and Lara placing him in the rocket with the green glowing crystal he rediscovers in the finished film.
• An extended scene of Clark waking up on the morning after his return to Metropolis, in which the earlier Krypton flashback is revealed as a dream. He then hears news of the growing nuclear crisis on the radio, receives a phone message from Lois warning him not to be late for an important meeting (later revealed as Warfield's takeover announcement) and generally bumbles his way out the door.
• A few moments of additional footage featuring Jeremy, the little boy whose letter to Superman asking him to solve the crisis kicks off the central plot dilemma. The scene in the finished film ends with his telling his classmates he's going to write the letter; the original scene extends to him starting to write it.
• Extended footage of Lex and Lenny Luthor at the museum, where they steal Superman's hair from an exhibit.
• All of the lengthy subplot involving Clive Mantle as the original Nuclear Man, who encounters Clark and Lacey while the two are out on the town as part of a new Daily Planet feature, 'Metropolis After Dark'. This NM was evidently patterned after DC villain Bizarro, an awkward, deformed clone of Superman with the same powers but without intelligence. The first NM sexually harasses Lacey and is easily dispatched by Superman tossing him into a power grid, vaporising him. Afterward, we see Lenny Luthor collecting the ashes and returning them to Lex for a second try, explaining the 'organic material' that is later used in NM II's creation in the finished film.
• A quick sequence of Lois and Lacey in a cafe prior to heading to the United Nations meeting. The two bond over their troubles with men.
• A second, much larger section of the plot thread involving Jeremy. In the final movie he is next seen as Superman joins him at the UN to announce his decision to destroy all nuclear weapons; an intervening scene in which Superman visits the boy's classroom to explain why he isn't going to interfere (thus explaining a later Daily Planet headline that adds weight to his change of heart) was removed.
• Various extended shots of the UN representatives from different nations listening to Superman's speech.
• Changes to the second Nuclear Man's look and costume to tone down the resemblance to Superman. Additionally, Gene Hackman's original voice recordings for Nuclear Man (as he was intended to sound like his creator Luthor) were scrapped and actor/model Mark Pillow voiced the character as well as playing him.
• In an early draft of the script, there was a short extension of the scene in which Luthor fires the arms dealers. He asks Nuclear Man II "what's to fear?". NM replies "Destiny!" upon which an upset Luthor grabs an umbrella and shades his creation (who loses power when out of direct sunlight). It's unclear if this was filmed, but most likely was among the lines Hackman originally recorded.
• Nuclear Man's world tour of minor acts of destruction - intended to display his power and slow down Superman - originally began with a tornado destroying a small town; Christopher Reeve's daughter Alexandra plays a little girl he rescues. Possibly to extend the runtime to the required length, this scene appears to have been kept (in various stages of editing) in least some overseas prints of the finished film, and the original TV version.
• Another stop on the tour, after the two return from battling in space: Nuclear Man flies over a military parade in Moscow and re-activates a nuclear missile, aiming it at the crowd. Superman uses his ice breath to disarm the launcher. Again, this scene was kept in a number of versions, probably for the same reason.
• A quick setup sequence of Lois angrily calling Clark and receiving no answer, after Wakefield shows off the 'SUPERMAN DEAD?' headline on the next day's paper. This prompts her visit to Clark's apartment shortly after.
• An alternate ending in which Superman shows up at Jeremy's school to take him flying. On their return to the ground, Jeremy excitedly reports to his classmates that there's no boundaries up there, "It's all one world!"

Availability

Given the overall reception of the film and its notably troubled production history (Cannon Films, the production studio, is long since bankrupt) there is very little interest at this point in a fully restored re-creation.

However, many of the cut scenes - including those comprising Clark's morning routine, the first Nuclear Man plot thread and the extension of Jeremy's involvement - were already fully completed (including post-production effects) at the time they were removed, and have been made extensively available as deluxe DVD extras and on YouTube. Most of the rest survive as screenshots, in scripts or in other media, including a novelization and comic book adaptation of the film.

External Links

• IMDB plot summary for Superman IV: The Quest for Peace.
• The cast for Superman IV: The Quest for Peace.