When we last left off with Mario Puzo’s first draft script for Superman, we saw the Man of Steel going into action, stopping a robbery, on the search for the whereabouts of Luthor Lux, preventing a drug deal from going down, and giving Lois Lane the first interview. Where do we go from here?

Over the next six months Superman becomes an avenging angel in Metropolis, effectively reducing the crime rate to almost nothing. He prevents a mugging in one of the city’s back alleys. He stops a couple of robbers from stealing a television set. He arrives in the nick of time to save Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen from being attacked in Central Park in the daytime. And he stops a jewel burglar along the side of a building.

I want to focus on the scene of Superman stopping the jewel burglar. If this scene sounds very familiar, it should. The differences are two. First, it takes place outside a thirty-story apartment building. Second, Superman has fun at the burglar’s expense, climbing upward alongside the burglar before he catches him on the way down. Otherwise, this is one scene that will go all the way into the final film with some revisions.

Some time later, Clark Kent gives a news report on how crime in Metropolis has fallen by an astounding 75 percent over a six-month period because of Superman. As a result, the President has reached out to Superman and asked if he would be willing to carry out his campaign in other large cities as well.

Meanwhile, Luthor Lux has had a dream about the four Kryptonian villains in the Phantom Zone. He soon reveals his dream to Eve and comments that the only way to stop Superman is with kryptonite, fragments from the planet Krypton that have fallen to Earth. This discussion is similar in spirit to what Tom Mankiewicz wrote for the final film but greatly different in execution.

It is shortly after this discussion that Luthor and Eve make their way to the Metropolis Museum of Natural History, where they spot a sample of kryptonite in the meteorite section of the museum. They return to the museum later and switch the real kryptonite with a fake green meteorite. This moment appears in the final film but changed from Metropolis to Addis Ababa, where they kill two people in the museum there.

Later, Morgan (Martin) Edge sends Clark, Lois, Jimmy, and Steve to Iran to cover a terrorist situation that had begun brewing six months earlier with a group of terrorists threatening to blow up a number of oil refineries. Clark finds the entire situation dangerous, and Edge tells him that he would be an excellent reporter if he had a bit more courage. That bit of dialogue is similar to what Perry White tells Clark in the first Superman film, that he needs aggression and confidence to take charge and let the people know who he is.

Once they arrive in Isfahan, they begin to cover the situation there. It’s during their time that the romance between Lois and Clark begins to blossom, but their affection is interrupted by a terrorist attack on the Peacock Throne. Lois soon recognizes the terrorist group as Luthor Lux and his henchmen, the same group that robbed the bank in Metropolis. Clark soon disappears and changes into Superman in order to confront Luthor. Only now Luthor has the upper hand thanks to a little souvenir from the old hometown.

Luthor soon imprisons Superman with a kryptonite belt around his waist and informs Lois, whom he has also taken hostage, that he wishes to send a message to Morgan (Martin) Edge: he will freely release Superman in exchange for ten million dollars of free advertising on Galaxy Communications’ Channel 15. If not, the kryptonite belt will remain around Superman until it kills him.

Eventually, Jimmy and Steve find out that their Iranian military contact, General Ahmed, is secretly in cahoots with Luthor Lux and wants to see the powerless Superman for himself. Olsen and Lombard soon find their way to where Superman and Lois are being held, and a huge melee ensues with Superman eventually freed from the kryptonite belt and Luthor and Ahmed imprisoned. Thankfully, none of this survived beyond the Puzo draft with the exception of Luthor’s arrest.

Later on, the four reporters return to Metropolis, and Lois invites Clark to her place for dinner. When Clark asks her why, she responds, “I have something very important to tell you.”

Just what is this important thing that Lois has to say to Clark? Find out next time!

(Some of the screenshots in this blog are used courtesy of CapedWonder.com.)