Saturday Night Live parodies Richard Lester’s 1980 Superman II with an awkward DC sketch starring John Mulaney as Superman and Sarah Sherman as Lois Lane. Donner’s Superman is a momentous landmark in comic book movie history, as it established Superman as a believable yet lighthearted superhero long before the golden age of superhero films began. Out of all live-action Superman actors, Christopher Reeve remains the most iconic forty-seven years later.

Shortly after Christopher Reeves’ legacy was homaged in the DC Studios documentary Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story and a few months before James Gunn’s DCU Superman movie hits theaters, Saturday Night Live unveils a “Cut for Time” sketch that pokes fun at Richard Lester’s Superman II. In the sketch, John Mulaney’s Superman and Sarah Sherman’s Lois Lane try to have a sweet moment together, but they’re interrupted by Lois’ nosy roommate Glenn Bechamel, who insists on testing Superman powers. When Zod arrives, Glenn scares him off with her awkward comments. Watch the sketch below:

What The SNL Superman Sketch Means

Christopher Reeve’s Superman Is A Timeless Portrayal

Saturday Night Live’s “Cut For Time” Superman sketch provides an alternate take on Superman II‘s Zod ending, this time defeating the Kryptonian villain with the sheer power of awkwardness. While the sketch is quite short, it nails the look of all three Superman II characters. That’s because Christopher Reeve’s classic Superman suit is perfect in its simplicity, and both Lois Lane and Zod’s wardrobe is emblematic of Margot Kidder and Terence Stamp’s portrayals. It may be inevitable for every live-action iteration of Superman and his supporting cast, parody or not, to have Superman and Superman II as a reference.

Our Take On the SNL Superman Sketch

Christopher Reeve’s Superman Achieved The Right Tone In 1978 And 1980

Richard Donner’s Superman and Richard Lester’s Superman II make it look effortless, but the 1978 and 1980 Superman movies faced a huge challenge in making the Man of Steel look and feel like a real, flesh-and-blood superhero at the time. Superman and Superman II could have easily come off as comedies, or at least as live-action recreations of Saturday morning cartoons like Super-Friends — which was mostly the case with the 1960s Adam West-led Batman series and 1966 Batman movie. But as lighthearted as they may have been, Superman and Superman II achieved the right balance between realism and fantasy to establish characters like Christopher Reeve’s Superman, Margot Kidder’s Lois Lane, and Terence Stamp’s Zod as trailblazers of the superhero movie genre.

Unfortunately, the same couldn’t be said about the lukewarm Superman III and the poorly-received Superman IV: The Quest for Peace. Even without today’s superhero movie catalog as reference, it was evident that Superman III and Superman IV: The Quest for Peace had crossed the line at the time, as their plot, tone, and sense of humor tipped the scale towards parody at the time. The third and fourth Superman installments weren’t bad enough to taint Christopher Reeve’s Superman legacy, but they’re now more widely regarded as something more akin to SNL’s Superman sketch than serious superhero movies like 1978’s Superman and 1980’s Superman II.