Readers, odds are you know all about Superman’s main powers. We’re talking the flight, the strength, the speed, the invulnerability, the x-ray vision. You knew about those, right? Well, there’s also heat vision, super breath (cold when needed, also can be just windy), and super hearing.

Those are a shitload of powers, aren’t they? I mean, who would want or need more?

Movie Superman, that’s who.

In Superman II, we see the debut of several new powers: astral projection (?), laser finger, and, like, teleportation or something. But the greatest, the most awe inspiring, was the never before and never again seen PLASTIC WRAP SUPERMAN THROWING “S”!!!

But a power perhaps even awe-inspiring-er happens around minute 3:08  of Superman’s “epic” uncut 9 MINUTE AND 35 SECOND fight with the Nuclear Man from Superman IV: The Quest for Peace.

What is this movie Superman ability? None other than… GREAT WALL OF CHINA REBUILDING VISION! Yes, this is an incredibly specific power. He shoots this blue laser out of his eyes that apparently rebuilds the Great Wall of China brick by brick. Does it rebuild other walls? Or just Chinese ones? We don’t know, as this ability hasn’t been sufficiently explored since for my tastes.

That’s just the best part of this slow moving battle, though. If you want to see some truly cheap visual fx and experience how unkind the mid- to late-80s were to the Superman movie franchise, watch the whole thing! (Also worth noting: wind in space.)

It’s been many years since these movies let us know of the Plastic Wrap Throwing “S” and Great Wall of China Rebuilding Vision, but Superman comic book lore has yet to accept these Superman powers. Where would we be if the comics hadn’t adopted Super-flying? (From the Fleischer Studio cartoons of the 1940s.) Or his vulnerability to Kryptonite? (From the radio serial, devised when the voice-actor who played Superman wanted to take a vacation.)

All I know is: if Super-boy-man had thrown a plastic “S” or rebuilt a wall with eye lasers in Superman Returns instead of just being a peeping Tom on skinny Lois and lifting heavy things, the Superman Returns Again would already be out by now.