Thomas Wolfe once wrote, “You can’t go home again.” Or can you?

The first time I saw Superman on the big screen was on its opening night on December 15, 1978, at the then-brand new Metrocenter Cinema 4 in my hometown of Jackson, Mississippi. I was all of twelve years old when I went with my parents. The crowds that night were crazy long. We had tried to get tickets for the 7:00 showing, but it was all sold out, and we had no choice but to wait until the next showing, which was around 10:00 that night, I would say. My mom had asked the theater manager to give her a print of the theatrical one-sheet poster to give to me, but he wouldn’t let her have it. And that’s a story for another time. I wound up seeing it at least five times at the Metrocenter Cinema 4 alone. And then I would see it in second-run showings at other theaters in Jackson through the first half of 1979, for at least ten or twelve showings altogether.

Over the years that followed, there would be three more films. There was that first VHS release, sped up, poorly panned and scanned, edited, and cut to fit all in one tape. I spent $70 at Camelot Music in Jackson buying that tape. It would be another four years before we had our first VCR – talk about buying the cart before the horse! But I didn’t care. It was Superman, and that’s all that mattered. There was the HBO broadcast in October 1980 – if anyone out there has a recording of that broadcast, please let me know. There was the extended TV cut on ABC in 1982 – the excitement of more footage! There would be the laserdisc, more VHS releases to follow, the KCOP broadcast in May 1994 with the longest known cut of the film shown on TV at that time.

Then there was Christopher Reeve’s tragic accident in May 1995, and for a while I couldn’t bring myself to watching the Superman movies again. It didn’t seem right. The actor who defined the Man of Steel for my generation, now unable to move or even breathe without assistance. What was wrong with this world? Or maybe it was me.

The next time I saw it was in Atlanta, Georgia. I want to say that it was either May or June of 1998, I forget which one it was. I had driven all the way from Clinton, Mississippi, where I lived at the time. I had gone that weekend to see my girlfriend, who was in Atlanta that weekend, so everything was working out perfectly. Or so it seemed.

Superman had been included as part of a series of nationwide roadshow screenings that year to mark the 80th birthday of Warner Bros., but originally it had not been included in the roadshows. Fans wrote to Warner Bros. and emailed them across the then-relatively new medium called the Internet, asking the studio to include Superman in the lineup for the 80th anniversary roadshow screenings. When it finally arrived, it looked in pretty bad shape. The print that arrived in Atlanta looked faded and sounded almost as bad. It was as if someone at Warner Bros. just got hold of whatever was laying around and sent it on its way, while other Warner films were given much better and more preferential treatment.

That screening was memorable only because of the presence there of a Superman fan who would go on to bigger and better things online and in the Superman community altogether in the years that would follow. His name was Jim Bowers. And in time our friendship would grow even stronger, which happily endures to this day. That would be the last time for a long time I would ever see the film on the big screen. The rest of that weekend was one that I would prefer not to discuss.

Flash forward twenty-five years into the future.

The Superman films would gain new life in the 21st century thanks to DVD and Blu-ray. We would see restorations of the films for home video, followed by the advent of many 4K UHD and digital streaming platforms. These formats would allow fans to view the film series and numerous alternate versions in their own homes.

And then something happened along the way. Anniversary screenings of films began to occur. People who grew up enjoying certain films could now see them again on the big screen, along with newer audiences who had yet to see these classics for the first time. Superman had returned in 2018 for its 40th anniversary, in time for its debut on 4K UHD. I didn’t get to go somehow. I forget why. Maybe it was because I had the DVDs and the Blu-ray of the extended TV cut, and I could watch it in the comfort of my home. Maybe it was the cost of the tickets at that time. I honestly forget why, but all are valid reasons.

But for some reason, this year, something clicked inside me and said, “Go see it.” And I did. The tickets were crazy cheap this time around, only five dollars! I can’t remember the last time I saw a movie at the theater for five dollars.

The closest showing was at the AMC Valley Bend 18 in Jones Valley in south Huntsville, about an hour away from me. When I was married and living in Huntsville, my wife and I would go to the movies there. The biggest one I remember was seeing Avengers: Endgame with a packed house and reservations only. Now it would be the first time back to the theater in two years since the divorce.

One of the people who would be there for the anniversary screening was my friend Matthew Morelli. He’s a fellow member of the Superman Autograph group and the CapedWonder group, and he lives in Huntsville, so it was great to finally get to meet him and his fiancée Emma.

Then the lights went down and the movie started.

Right away I could tell that it was what I had seen a couple of people post on Facebook a few days earlier: this was the original theatrical version but with the 2001 special edition sound mix. The details are particularly noticeable when you hear the almost muted curtains part at the start of the film, the hard crash when the S shield hits the screen, the changes in the swooshes of the title credits, and so forth. It had been a long time since I’d seen the film with the 2001 sound mix, as I’m more of a purist myself that prefers the original 1978 sound mix in the theatrical release and the extended TV cut.

Hearing the sound mix through the film was a little unusual this time around, as the music tended to overpower incidental dialogue in several places, including the helicopter rescue and the super feats montage toward the end of the film. Basically put, some of that incidental dialogue that made the film so believable originally is now gone in this mix. I don’t know if it’s the 4K mix, but this is definitely something that I found myself missing in the film.

On the other hand, in places the sound mix is encompassing. In the moment when Lex Luthor reaches out to Superman with his sonic greeting, the sound of the dogs barking really fills the theater all around. That’s a nice little improvement in my book.

As far as the picture quality goes, the colors of Superman’s costume really leaps out like never before. Bright blues and reds as the costume should be, no teal whatsoever. This is a nice improvement in the film and one area that the colorists got right. And when Superman pushes the rocket into outer space, the image of Superman inside the rocket exhaust is extremely detailed and noticeable, the most I’ve ever seen in the film.

I had also seen a couple of people on Facebook comment that the image quality of the scenes on Krypton had changed somewhat, but I honestly cannot be sure of that. During the first thirty minutes I found myself crashing and nodding off unfortunately. Maybe it was due to the fact that I was awake at 5:30 in the morning and ready for this day. Or maybe it was the two cups of orange lemonade that I drank before the film began. So I cannot honestly comment about the Krypton scenes or the first thirty minutes, and that’s my fault.

The Smallville and Fortress scenes looked great, as did most of the film, and flesh tones were for the most part good in this transfer. There were a few moments when it did come off a little waxen, as skin and facial nuances were no longer there, and in a couple of places they actually looked a little darker. I’m not a technical expert, I’m just calling them in layman’s terms.

Overall the quality of the film looked pretty good in my opinion. And at the end of the film, seeing the final title card “Next Year: Superman II” was perfect, meaning that the remastering team cared enough about the film to preserve the original film as much as possible. But it was that musical re-editing as that title card appeared, as the film went to black, that left me scratching my head. They’d removed the special edition end credits that listed how Michael Thau had produced the restoration back in 2001, but the musical extension was still there. That’s something that should have been corrected by the remastering team to preserve the true quality of the film.

Shockingly, there were only seven or eight people who were there for the screening, including me, Matthew and Emma, and a few others. Why a film of this caliber got such a near empty audience is beyond me. It reminded me of when I got tickets for the opening day showing of Star Wars: The Force Awakens and there were only four or five people at most in the theater. Maybe the appeal of Super Mario Bros. was more interesting than Superman. Maybe more people didn’t know that it was showing. I can’t answer that question.

But one thing stood out above them all. For this fan, seeing Superman on the big screen again after all of these years made me believe once again in the magic of filmmaking that I did when I first saw the film at the young age of twelve. It made me think of simpler times in my life. And it made me think about my parents again.

Afterwards, Matthew and I had messaged each other and commented that Warner Bros. needs to do something big for the film’s 50th anniversary in 2028. I hope they do a full-on anniversary release and not a couple of screenings. Superman more than deserves it. Granted, they may be all about this new technology and storytelling and everything, but they need to honor the legacy that the Salkinds, Richard Donner, Tom Mankiewicz, Christopher Reeve, and the cast and crew gave this film back then. If Kevin Feige can encourage his teams in the Marvel franchise to go back and watch Superman to see how they got it right, then DC and Warner Bros. should do likewise. It’s still the measuring stick for all comic book films, DC and Marvel alike. It always will be.