the big mistake here be the casting of richard pryor and the general shift in tone to silliness and stupid comedy scene . yet the highlight of the film ( similar to spidey 3 ) be the exploration of the dark side of a superhero . the whole sequence in which christopher reeve turn psycho and ultimately split into two persona and have a big fight with himself and be the only reason the movie be worth see and and most people fail to acknowledge that reeve actually do some truly good acting here and good enough so that the bad superman be convince and somewhat scary especially the scene where he be sit in a bar and unkempt and unshaven and break hole in a mirror behind the bar while flick peanut at it ( never mind that alcohol be not suppose to have any effect on superman ) . unfortunately and the rest of the film be garbage . aside from this and the story be not really about any central idea or concept . robert vaughan be just a generic lex luthor with a different name think about it and he even have a blonde bimbo mistress like gene hackman do in the two previous film . what be his grand scheme really all about and and what do he want to achieve . darn if i know . the climactic sequence with the supercomputer be simply bad . the special effect be not very good in this one . and where be margot kidder a lois lane . she be largely absent from the film . although annette otoole a lana lang be a solid substitute and and in term of her character at least the film be somewhat faithful to the comic .