THE ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN
Decades, 12:00 p.m. ET
Another strong weekend marathon courtesy of Decades – and this one is the longest one yet, occupying every remaining half hour of the weekend, late night and early mornings included, once the marathon begins at noon today. The show in question is The Adventures of Superman, and Decades presents selected episodes from the first six seasons. This first DC Comics adaptation for television (Batman and others already had been serialized for Saturday movie matinees) stars George Reeves as Clark Kent, mild-mannered reporter for a great metropolitan newspaper… and his titular alter ego. Earliest episodes were in black and white, but the series quickly made the move to color, so most of this weekend’s episodes from this 1952-58 series will feature our very colorful superhero. But no colorful supervillains – the bad guys in this TV series were run-of-the-mill, gun-toting bad guys. One thing to watch for: the famous sequences in which Superman would stand there, chest out and unblinking, as a gangster would bounce a round of bullets off his ‘S’ insignia, then duck as the same bad guy threw the empty gun at him. Also watch for the Lois Lane switcheroo. Long before Bewitched pulled off the caper of the two Darrins, Superman swapped out one Lois for another. Phyllis Coates played Lois for the first season, then was replaced by Noel Neill for the rest of the show’s run. And, you might ask, was actor Jack Larsen ever replaced as eager young cub reporter and photographer Jimmy Olsen? Gosh, no.