Saturday night has become “Superman” night for me. I’ve grown to love watching George Reeves in the 1950s series on MeTV. But it’s not enough for me to enjoy a new and harmless pastime. I want to know why.

After all, I rarely watch TV at all. The only network show I view is “The Big Bang Theory.” While I am as likely as anyone to need an evening to veg out in front of the box, I am more likely to pop in an old Agatha Christie DVD (the ones with Joan Hickson as Miss Marple; they’re the best) than watch “Wheel of Fortune.” I don’t think I’m a culture snob. I watch “Dr. Phil” every chance I get. And I do enjoy series from other countries, like “Vera” (Britain) and “Spiral” (France).

But “Adventures of Superman”? I remember the show from my childhood, specifically that I watched it while lying on my “TV dog.” This was an early version of a body pillow. The dog shape was covered with a cozy material and meant to be plopped down in front of the TV, child atop it. I have a picture of the dog, which I received on my first Christmas, when I was 6 months old. Was I already a Howdy Doody fan by then?

I would have watched “Superman” in reruns as a child, and have no idea what attracted me to the show back then. I’m not interested in superheroes in general, and the only comics I read were “Peanuts” and “Archie.” The latter, of course, would earn the scorn of my favorite “Big Bang” characters.

Now and then, I do like to view an old program I watched as a kid, or skim a much-loved book. It never becomes an obsession, like “Superman” kinda, sorta, has.

I’d like to think I watch it for its vintage flair — the big cars, the hats, the mid-century modern furniture. But “Perry Mason” is much better for that. I enjoy seeing Della Street’s classy little outfits and peep-toe pumps, not to mention Paul Drake’s dazzling white sport coats.

I never wonder about my devotion to “Perry.” It goes way back to reading Erle Stanley Gardner’s books, which I started to dig into around age 13, through practically a lifetime of watching the shows. Mysteries, LA in the 1950s and ’60s, Raymond Burr — what’s not to love?

But “Superman”?

I sat down last Saturday to analyze my attraction. There’s the journalism aspect — Clark Kent, Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen all work at the “Daily Planet” under the gruff (sometimes positively hot-headed) leadership of editor Perry White. I bet Lois gave me, the budding young writer, the bright idea that women could be reporters just as well as men. In hindsight, I probably also was impressed that reporters Lois and Clark have their own offices. As if that ever happens in real-life journalism!

The stirring opening chords of the “Superman” theme song readily suck in viewers. There stands Superman, astride the globe, cape floating in the wind, ready to defend “Truth, justice and the American way.”

I can’t quite believe, though I know it’s true, that just a few short years after watching “Superman” reruns as a youngster, my world would drastically change. The civil rights movement exploded, youth revolted, the war in Vietnam forced Americans to question our values, and the Watergate scandal convinced us there were no more heroes, super or otherwise.

“The American way” was, by then, nothing to crow about.

My generation’s disdain for the status quo, for the notion that we had to follow anybody’s else’s idea of what our lives should be like, for the dictum “love it or leave it,” endured for a long time. But, of course, time changes everything. Who, after the events of Sept. 11, 2001, wanted anything but “truth, justice, and the American way”?

Our lives have become only more insecure since then. The events in France earlier this month put us on notice that Islamic terrorism holds no bounds. I watched the horror unfold with a pounding heart. Cold-blooded murder, brazenly committed, is a revelation — the perpetrators will not stop at anything, because they don’t care if they are caught. They are glad to become martyrs, in fact.

Then, the invasion of the kosher market, the taking of hostages, the chilling admission that the terrorist in that case was “targeting Jews.” Anti-Semitism taken to the extreme, this vicious, dreadful hatred dragged up from the ugliest pits of our history.

Who can make any sense of this? Who can feel safe in this world?

This is precisely the moment when Lois would want Superman to show up. And, of course, he would. The bad guys, instantly recognizable as short, dumb thugs, would have their heads knocked together by the S-man. Their plots would be foiled before anybody else got hurt, and surely before the world blew up (which, in the series, it threatens to do from time to time). Even silly Jimmy would emerge unscathed.

How comforting it is, then, to spend time in Metropolis, where everyone knows who the villains are, and all the perps want is money, diamonds or a secret substance that will destroy Superman. Heck, all I’m looking for is truth and justice. I’m not even insisting on the American way.

Liz Soares welcomes e-mail at lsoares@gwi.net.