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#120. The Substandard on Margot Kidder plus Lois Lane Ranked
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Micro-episode prompted by the death of Margot Kidder at 69 (Tom Wolfe's death is also briefly noted). JVL confesses he spent years confusing Kidder with Karen Allen. All three assess Kidder's Lois Lane — none are particularly enthusiastic, finding the portrayal too aggressive and prone to undercutting Clark Kent. The episode becomes a full ranking of all actresses who have played Lois Lane. Sonny ranks worst to best: Kate Bosworth, Kidder, animated Dana Delaney, Teri Hatcher, Amy Adams. Vic ranks: Bosworth, Kidder, Amy Adams, Teri Hatcher. JVL matches Sonny's list and adds Allison Mack (Smallville) at number five.
Full transcript
Vic00:00:00Hello, and welcome to another micro-episode of The Substandard, sponsored by Wink. With online ordering, quick shopping, and personalized recommendations, the only way Wink could make discovering wine you love easier is if they drank It For You. Because Wink's wine experts select wines matched to your taste, personalized for you, shipped right to your door, and starting at just $13 a bottle. Just go to trywink.com slash substandard, you'll get $20 off your first shipment. That's spelled T-R-Y-W-I-N-C dot com slash substandard for $20 off. I'm Victor Matus, along with Sonny Bunch and Jonathan V. Last. Just a quick reminder that full episodes of TheSubstandard are available every Thursday at 11 a.m., unless we go on vacation. Vic, who did you kill today? You know, I mean, I guess we've talked about Superman. Superman in the past. I don't, maybe I brought up Margot Kidder. I don't know. It's not the same as who I mentioned more recently. You are not on the hook for this. No, I am not. Or for Tom Wolfe. We don't want, it's safe to say, I didn't bring up Tom Wolfe.
Sonny00:01:10Yeah, we'll save that for the main episode.
Vic00:01:12Okay, yes. But we do have some sad news, as JVL mentions, this past Sunday.
Sonny00:01:17The Substandard, the paragon of intellectual, you know, thought here. Goes Margot Kidder one.
JVL00:01:23Margot Kidder.
Sonny00:01:24Tom Wolfe, too. Tom Wolfe will maybe talk.
Vic00:01:26I was later on in there, somewhere there. He was okay, too.
JVL00:01:29Well, the question, but the thing is, Margot Kidder didn't write any books that Vic didn't have to read.
Vic00:01:34Good point. I read a lot of reviews of Tom Wolfe, because I worked at The Weekly Standard. Save it for the show. Okay. Anyway, Margot Kidder died at her home in Montana. Age 69, she was, of course, best known for her role as Lois Lane in the original Superman movies. Very young. I was going to ask you, JVL, when you heard she was 69, did it strike you that she was young or old? Or just right? It struck me.
JVL00:01:56It struck me that she was an old soul. Is that the kind of way of putting it? I guess that is, although I'm surprised. Or just like that the 70s were hard on her.
Vic00:02:05Yes. I was actually surprised that she was almost 70 years old. I cannot imagine these people, you lose track of time, and in my mind, she's not 70s old. Well, the first Superman movie. No, it isn't. Yes, yes, it is. 70 is the new 50. I used to think 50 was old. The first Superman movie came out 40 years ago, right? 1978. Yeah. That's correct. That's depressing. Yeah. I still remember. I still feel like the 90s were five years ago, but that's one of the things. And the other problem, the other unfortunate problem with Margaret Kidder, of course, she had suffered from mental illness. I remember her popping up in the news when she was hiding in somebody's backyard, and she had cut her hair or cut her teeth. At the time, they said bipolar or multipolar or multiple personalities order, but in the variety write-up, they didn't get into specifics, but she did come back. Yeah, she was the working actress for the last few years. If you look, and she got an Emmy, if you look at her IMDb, she kept busy. Anyway- Can I make an embarrassing confession? Go for it.
JVL00:03:02For years, I confused her with Karen Allen, and vice versa.
Sonny00:03:09I can see that. They look kind of- Yes. They have a similar look and like- Yes. Some more affect as well. And have a similar kind of sticky vibe, like the, you know.
Vic00:03:20Pete, this happens to a few people. Most famously, Ellen Burstyn, and then the actress from Who Played the Nurse in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, were two different people, and people used to confuse them all the time. Margot Kidder- Really? Yes. Look it up. The dimple, also.
JVL00:03:35Both Margot Kidder and Karen Allen had the dimple in their jam.
Vic00:03:38And Karen Allen, in my mind, was much younger. Obviously, she played a younger student in Animal House. Margot Kidder was actually busy. After she did Superman, she also was Amityville Horror with James Brolin, so that means that she was in my hometown of Tom's River, New Jersey. With Josh Brolin? Ah! Father of. And here's a weird trivia for you. There were actually two women who had portrayed Lois Lane in that first Superman movie. Do you remember? So there was Margot Kidder and the old woman on the train, as young Superman is beating the train, going lightning speed. There's an old lady, and that was Noelle Neal, who played- Oh, from the originals. The original Lois Lane from the George Reed movies.
JVL00:04:26There you go. Did you guys like her, Lois Lane? Margot Kidder's.
Vic00:04:32Okay, Sonny, go.
Sonny00:04:35No. I don't really like the Christopher Reeve Superman movies writ large. I don't talk about the movies. I'm saying about her, Lois Lane. I'm saying, but this is part of it. She was doing this weird kind of damsel in distress, but also like, I'm a working lady. And I just, I don't-
Vic00:04:55That's pretty good, Lois. That's pretty good. That's a pretty good Margot Kidder impression.
Sonny00:04:57Yeah, I just, it never did anything for me. The only one of those movies I like is Superman 2. And she just, she, her Lois Lane, like, I mean, I think we're going to rank Lois Lanes a little bit later. Yes, sure. But I, her Lois Lane has always jumped out at me as like a kind of worst of all worlds. Victorino?
Vic00:05:23She wasn't one that I found personally attractive. I appreciated her as...
JVL00:05:28We're not ranking by hotness.
Vic00:05:30Oh, well, in that case, in that case, I'm not ranking, I'm not ranking then. But she was, as an actress, I thought she was funny, but a very quirky, sassy, raspy, you know, Lois Lane. And she did other, I remember she did, you know, I remember her trying to break out and she had done other movies. She did a play called Bus Stop, which they kept on showing on HBO, along with The Far Pavilion. They just kept on showing it. Never saw it, but I thought, oh, so she's doing other stuff as well. But really, I mean, it was mostly that everyone would remember her for being Lois Lane. The voice is not really my thing. I thought she was fine. She's from Canada. Very quirky. It's like the 70s, you know what I mean? They had, people had weird role, casting choices and things. You know, I wouldn't have thought of her for that role, but okay.
JVL00:06:18I didn't...
Vic00:06:18JVL.
JVL00:06:19Like the, her Lois Lane, whether it's the interpretation or the writing, was sort of Lois Lane as ball buster. Yes. And I think that is the wrong interpretation. Lois Lane is tough, but toughness does not equal ball buster. And we can get into that. And plus, almost like, you know, like a quintessential New York type. I didn't, didn't do it for me. I did not, I did not like her Lois Lane at all. In a movie where I didn't like everything.
Sonny00:06:48Yeah. She kind of emasculated Clark a lot. Oh, often. What was the deal with that? Yeah.
?00:06:55Cock.
JVL00:06:56Cuck. Super cuck is more like it. You know what? Clark Kent, Rubio voter.
Vic00:07:01Whoa.
JVL00:07:02Sorry.
Sonny00:07:03Smug is going to get it. That's it now.
JVL00:07:06My wife said to me a couple weeks ago, she goes, boy, Smug really has a hard on for Rubio, doesn't he? Yeah, he does. Sorry, no more politics.
Vic00:07:14So do you want to just give a ranking then?
JVL00:07:18Well, do you guys want to do it all together? I mean, I have a ranking. Me too. Are we going to spend some time doing one? What do you want to do? How do you want to do it?
Sonny00:07:26I have a toss-off ranking, which is, I'll just do that one. Just do it. Yeah, me too. These are from the iterations of Superman that I've seen. So there may be some gaps here. Worst, this is from Worst to Best, Worst Bosworth, Kate Bosworth from Superman Returns. Then Margot Kidder, who, again, I just don't really care for. After that, the cartoon version of Lois Lane from the 1990s Paul Dini animated series. Dana Delaney, I believe, voiced it. Was that Dana Delaney?
JVL00:07:59Yeah, just great. Matt Labash, super fan, Dana Delaney.
Sonny00:08:02And probably the best written version of Lois Lane. I mean, I would put her higher if she wasn't actually a cartoon. I mean, it's almost cheating, really. Because then you would think she was hotter. I don't know what that, I'm not Vic over here. Number two, second best is Terry Hatcher, who only really gets downgraded because TV is a lesser art form than film. And number one, Amy Adams, of course. Amy Adams. In the Zack Snyder Superman movies, the best of the Superman movies. And she gives the best version of Lois Lane, where she's actually like a competent reporter who like only winds up in dangerous situations, you know, kind of incidentally. And also is just the best actress of this whole lot. I mean, she just, like, that is an indisputable fact. But, and the whole reason the Batman vs. Superman director's cut works in ways. That the original doesn't is because they made it 20 minutes shorter by taking out the whole Lois Lane subplot. But you need the Lois Lane subplot for Lex's plan to make sense. It drives me crazy. Every time I think about that movie, it makes me mad.
Vic00:09:10My ranking, Sonny, is rather similar. At the bottom, I have Kate Bosworth, followed by Margot Kidder. I forgot about animated Lois Lane, so I didn't include it. But then I have Amy Adams. I like Amy Adams in everything she does. In everything she does, she's wonderful. And at the top of my list is Terry Hatcher in her sort of prime. Her juicy acting prime. That's what I mean. Because she's such a great actress, as you know. This is definitely a ranking of actresses. Yes.
Sonny00:09:40You know what?
Vic00:09:42She should have gotten an Oscar nom for her role in James Bond. Do you remember that?
Sonny00:09:47I'm frankly shocked that on this ranking of the actressing abilities that you put Kidder above Bosworth. That strikes me as wrong.
Vic00:09:56I grew up with the Margot Kidder and Lois Lane, so I'm a little bit more sentimental. Plus, I didn't see the other one with Kate Bosworth, but I just threw her in the bottom, so to speak.
JVL00:10:04JVL. I'm embarrassed to say that I had the exact same ranking as Sonny's, with one exception. I was very pleased to see you putting Terry Hatcher up there, because I think Terry Hatcher's Lois Lane is close to definitive. Oh, great. She's great. One thing that you left off from the bottom of the list. The alleged sex tribe cult recruiter, Allison Mack, who on Smallville played the Is She Lois, Is She Not Lois character, who all Smallville fans insisted probably was Lois, even though they introduced her as then being Lois' cousin, that everybody really hated the actress. Allison Mack I would put in the five hole, so to speak, and then everything else I would follow exactly the same. And with Amy Adams, Amy Adams then gets exactly right. What I was alluding to was the problem with Margaret Kidder. Amy Adams' portrayal of Lois Lane is tough as nails, but also the type of woman that you could see that any guy would fall for, because she is a heart of gold and super awesome and is not a damsel in distress. Jonathan Vickers Amy Adams is just delightful. Jonathan Vickers Sure is.
Sonny00:11:12Jonathan Vickers Justin, she really is.
JVL00:11:14Jonathan Vickers She is the best.
Sonny00:11:15It was very funny on Twitter. Some of the DC super fans got angry at the Free Beacons' Alex Griswold because he said that Amy Adams was boring in a post about how Margot Kidder was the best Superman, Lois Lane. Is that what Alex said? Yeah, Alex was like, yeah, Margot Kidder is the best. Amy Adams is kind of boring. And then all the Zack Snyder stans were like, how dare you use this poor woman's death to denigrate Zack Snyder's Lois Lane. That is like literally, I was just like, oh, God, you guys are embarrassing. Come on. I love Zack Snyder, too. You got to let this go. That's great. You guys got to let this go. I'm sure it's fine.
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