1987's Superman 4: The Quest for Peace was the last film that had Christopher Reeve playing Superman. Something that might seem odd about the film is how short it was. The film was only 90 minutes long. The previous three Superman films were all two hours long at the minimum.

The running time for the theatrical releases of the Superman films:

Superman: 143 minutes
Superman 2: 127 minutes
Superman 3: 125 minutes
Superman 4: 90 minutes

Superman 4 being over a half hour shorter than the other films was surprising. Over thirty minutes of content was cut out of the film. You might be wondering why they'd cut out so much from the film. Apparently, test audiences didn't respond well to the film, so they tried to cut it down as much as they could. Sadly, this led to several important scenes being cut out of the film.

In the film, Superman battles a villain called Nuclear Man. Originally, there was supposed to be two Nuclear Mans in the film. Deleted scenes had Lex Luthor creating a prototype Nuclear Man. The prototype Nuclear Man was much more cheerful but also less intelligent than the other Nuclear Man. The prototype Nuclear Man was made to destroy Superman. He and Superman had a fight scene. As to be expected, Superman didn't get destroyed. He won and defeated the prototype Nuclear Man. That led to Lex Luthor creating the next Nuclear Man.

There was a deleted scene where there was a tornado. A little girl started being taken away by the tornado, so Superman flew by and saved the little girl. The little girl was played by Alexandra Reeve, Christopher Reeve's daughter.

The theatrical release had a subplot involving Lacy Warfield, the daughter of a rich man that was trying to take over the Daily Planet. Lacy started off as a rich, spoiled person, but Clark Kent's modest kindness rubbed off on her and inspired her to become a better person. Sadly, a lot of important scenes were cut out of this subplot. Deleted scenes had Nuclear Man kidnapping Lacy and bringing her to Lex's place. Lex attempted to sneak out, but Superman showed up. That led to some really funny lines from Lex. Lacy helped serve as the bait Superman needed to distract Nuclear Man from his violent rampage. Lacy's last scene was also cut from the film. The scene showed her sharing a tender goodbye with Clark.

Another scene from the end of the film that was cut had Superman taking a boy named Jeremy for a ride around space. The scene had Superman express his hope for things in the world to get better.

All of these scenes were very important to the film, so cutting them out was a mistake. These scenes can be watched as extras on the DVD release of Superman 4. However, it would be great to see the scenes be put back into the film. If these scenes were added back into the film, the film's storylines would make more sense.

Superman 4 was hated by a lot of people. I personally loved the film, but a lot of Superman fans consider it to be the worst Superman film. Considering the film's poor reputation, you might be wondering what the point would be of releasing an extended cut of the film. Well, there have been instances where perfectly good films get chopped into shorter, less coherent films. When these films get an extended version, they tend to get more respect. I believe that it's possible for Superman 4 to win over more fans if the fans got to see the full version of the film.

Christopher Reeve was, still and always will be one of the most popular actors to play Superman. His fans wish that they could see more of him in the role, so seeing a new version of one of his films could be a real treat for them. Superman 4 was Christopher Reeve's final time playing his most iconic role, so I think it's about time that the longer version of the film gets released.