Oh. My. God. I have literally, and I mean *literally* had that very same argument. In fact, we spent an entire 2 periods in my physics class discussing the physical inaccuracy of this scene.
Not necessarily the arms of steel chopping Lois in half, but the accleration of her descent verses the timing and speed of Superman's ascent to the building... Superman begins his flight too far away and the building is not nearly tall enough to provide him the sort of time he needs in order to reach Lois and successfully catch her without killling her on impact- he has no time slow down, plus air drag and... now I'm geeking out again.
After this we went on to find physical inaccuracies in various other movies, but no one else seemed to understand the principle behind "willing suspension of disbelief." Cinematic effects are just that- effects. So what if they aren't entirely accurate? (I mean, to a certain extent accuracy is important- but only to the point of keeping up the illusion) It was actually a lot of fun debating it.
Wow, went waaaaayyy off topic there.
Sorry. The take away: I love this show, had forgotten about this episode, laughed really hard, and am glad you posted it here to remind me of it. :p
