DC/Marvel Films

[PJTHEDOORS]

Verses destroying a city when it was unnecessary? All Kal_El had to do was leave Metropolis and Zod would have followed him to a less uninhabited place. They could of have pounded each other into oblivion and it would have been just as good a fight and much truer to the Superman story with his value of human life. I think Superman Returns would have been a lot better if they had a different villain than Luthor like Brainiac or Doomsday. They went way too far trying to recreate the Donner films but it was still a better written movie than Man of Steel. Both movies were disappointing to me but Man of Steel was much more so.

So how many deaths are acceptable for you when Supes is facing villians with the same powers as he?

 

[PJTHEDOORS]

Not talking just Zod, but also his entire fleet of troops and even the world machine which was killing people. And even if Supes had left metropolis and went to the North Pole, Zod would have stayed and attacked Martha Kent or people and friends close to Clark to bring him back to Metropolis.

 

[DallasEast]

Did you see Superman Returns? That was 10x worse than Man of Steel.

I'm not quite that hard on Superman Returns. The movie has its moments. My biggest question about Returns remains what did Singer ever see in Brandon Routh? His Clark Kent was slightly wishy-washy and his Kal-El was pretty stiff. He didn't act as blandly as say Eric Bana as Bruce Baner in Hulk but there wasn't a huge difference in the two emotional performances either.

 

[DallasEast]

I did not care for Superman Returns much either but it was a lot better than Man of Steel in my opinion. It has nothing to do with Christopher Reeves as PJ says. I think Man of Steel was VERY poorly written and the battle with Zod in the end is ridiculous. Zod was hell bent on killing Kal-El and would have followed him to the end of the Earth to kill him yet Kal stays right in Metropolis to fight him. That is just stupid writing to me.

That is an interesting take on that scene. I have criticized the scene in two ways. First, the battle between Zod and Kal-El extended into Earth's orbit and then resumed back in Metropolis. The two could have fell back anywhere outside Metropolis. Then again, Zach Synder would have had a much harder time connecting Kal-El and Lois Lang after Zod's defeat, which brings us to my second issue. How does Lois get to the scene of Zod's death so quickly? Now that's hard to explain.

Even so, these are mild to moderate observations of the plot's sequence of events. Before the final fight commenced, the Kryptonian world engine had laid waste to Metropolis. How many people perished and how many billions in property damage was not revealed. Even so, the city had become a literal war zone.

So I'm assuming that some movie observers contend it would be more believable for Superman to have relocated the battle to a desolute area, say, a desert, ocean or the North Pole? I guess that is an alternate battle strategy. It depends on re-seeding the hostile combatant, Zod, who has demonstrated zero compassion for humanity after attempting global genocide with his world engine, from the primary battlezone and planting him into a secondary battle zone. The strategy depends on Zod's lust for killing Superman to supercede any of his other thoughts--like killing everyone on Earth. The strategy also depends on Zod's anger dismissing his assessment of Kal-El that Kal-El will not defend humans because he is fighting Zod--even though the film has already shown Superman singlehandedly fighting multiple Kryptonians in defense of humans in Smallville and Metropolis.

I have a few questions. Hypothetically, what prevents Zod from temporarily halting his pursuit of a fleeing Kal-El, who will not abandon the planet because of Zod, stopping at population centers along Kal-El's flight plan and killing anyone along the way in the process? He has zero love for Kal-El and his human brothers and sisters. This is still Zod after all. He was the supreme military authority on Krypton. Would he not conclude that his enemy would stop retreating and instead, confront him wherever he stopped pursuing him? Also, why would Zod extend his battle outside the theater of destruction he initially created? He can defeat his enemy while extending the least among of effort and then devote his energies towards finishing his genocide of Earth.

I believe Snyder and Christopher Nolan's plot was much more realistic. It works on the premise of how battles have been fought on Earth for thousands of years. Admittedly, the alternative could have been more cartoonish, but I do not believe that was ever their aim for the movie.

I also did not like anything about the way they did Krypton or the whole Clark and Lois story where she knew who he was an alien before she even knew he was Clark Kent.

How would you envision an incredibly old, technologically advanced, humanoid species, living in the final days, existing on a planet separated by untold light years of space from Earth? Nolan and Synder created theirs for the movie and it was stunning. What is yours?

To be honest, I do not understand your difficulty with the Clark and Lois story. Why would it be necessary for Lois to first meet Kal-El posing as Clark Kent? My only conclusion is the decades old, Superman's alter ego fools everyone in the world especially Lois, storyline. If that's true, I would suggest that the movie creator's interpretation is more realistic. Since the 1930's or 1940's, Superman's alter ego as a Daily Planet reporter was advantageous. It allowed him be quickly alerted to dangers happening near Metropolis and around the world.

The movie storyline is about Jor-El allowing his son to discover and adopt humanity as his own. He does not know what he wants to do with his life yet. It is only after he has reached the level of maturity both sets of parents hoped he would reach, does he understand what he wants to do and how to do it. It is at that point that he wants to be a reporter.

That said, the movie creators were not obligated to intersect Clark's journey with one of Lois' journalistic investigations. They could have omitted it all together, but it would have delayed or erased all chance of a believable love relationship blossoming between the two characters as the movie progressed. It would have been equally difficult injecting Lois into the defensive effort against the Krytonians since her investigation would have been fruitless without having first run into Clark. I guess it would be plausible for Clark and Lois to start a relationship in the last 30 minutes or so of the movie amid the chaos. Or the creators could have simply copied the 1978 movie in regards to their chance meeting. I don't know. I like Hollywood trying to be innovative and challenge its audiences. Then again, some people really like Singer's Superman Returns which was not very original at all. So I guess it's the old different strokes for different folks conclusion.

I also did not care for the way they used flashbacks to show him growing up in Smallville or the way Clark just shows up to work at the Daily Planet to work after at least half the city was destroyed????? I think it is already time to reboot and go back to the drawing board. The Superman story has so much potential and they screwed it up royally.

Snyder and Nolan presented audiences with scenes of Kal-El journey of discovery and supplemented them with flashbacks giving them relevance. Again, why is it necessary for Clark to work at the Daily Planet early in the movie? Is a Superman movie supposed to be about Clark Kent as a Daily Planet reporter? Or is Superman movie supposed to be about Superman? I don't get the revulsion. It kind of makes me wish the early movies, cartoons and the various television series (except Smallville of course) had never been made. You cannot eliminate the early and golden age of Superman comics from the equation, but even so, I think all of the omissions I mentioned would have not warped the character so badly for 21st century audiences.

 

[DallasEast]

Have you seen the new Captain America yet? I would go this afternoon but my son wants to see it with me and he has to work. We are going tomorrow night.

My wife, daughter and I saw it yesterday. It is certainly better than the original, which was good on its own. It was not better than The Avengers as the latest trailer advertisements state. Nor did it have to be. I'm not sure why studios make such ignorant claims while promoting their movies.

 

[DallasEast]

So how many deaths are acceptable for you when Supes is facing villians with the same powers as he?

Excellent question. It's one which the movie creators thought of, but not one which all of the movie's audience has considered. I'm not sure how much fault for that can be placed on either party as far as its comprehension is concerned.

 

[DallasEast]

Not talking just Zod, but also his entire fleet of troops and even the world machine which was killing people. And even if Supes had left metropolis and went to the North Pole, Zod would have stayed and attacked Martha Kent or people and friends close to Clark to bring him back to Metropolis.

Man. You beat me to it. My long winded reply to cml750 points out the exact same thing.

 

[PJTHEDOORS]

Man. You beat me to it. My long winded reply to cml750 points out the exact same thing.

People have this cemented idea of the jolly good Superman who will prevent anyone from dying. If 1 person dies, then Supes is responsible and hated.

 

[cml750]

That is an interesting take on that scene. I have criticized the scene in two ways. First, the battle between Zod and Kal-El extended into Earth's orbit and then resumed back in Metropolis. The two could have fell back anywhere outside Metropolis. Then again, Zach Synder would have had a much harder time connecting Kal-El and Lois Lang after Zod's defeat, which brings us to my second issue. How does Lois get to the scene of Zod's death so quickly? Now that's hard to explain.

Even so, these are mild to moderate observations of the plot's sequence of events. Before the final fight commenced, the Kryptonian world engine had laid waste to Metropolis. How many people perished and how many billions in property damage was not revealed. Even so, the city had become a literal war zone.

So I'm assuming that some movie observers contend it would be more believable for Superman to have relocated the battle to a desolute area, say, a desert, ocean or the North Pole? I guess that is an alternate battle strategy. It depends on re-seeding the hostile combatant, Zod, who has demonstrated zero compassion for humanity after attempting global genocide with his world engine, from the primary battlezone and planting him into a secondary battle zone. The strategy depends on Zod's lust for killing Superman to supercede any of his other thoughts--like killing everyone on Earth. The strategy also depends on Zod's anger dismissing his assessment of Kal-El that Kal-El will not defend humans because he is fighting Zod--even though the film has already shown Superman singlehandedly fighting multiple Kryptonians in defense of humans in Smallville and Metropolis.

I have a few questions. Hypothetically, what prevents Zod from temporarily halting his pursuit of a fleeing Kal-El, who will not abandon the planet because of Zod, stopping at population centers along Kal-El's flight plan and killing anyone along the way in the process? He has zero love for Kal-El and his human brothers and sisters. This is still Zod after all. He was the supreme military authority on Krypton. Would he not conclude that his enemy would stop retreating and instead, confront him wherever he stopped pursuing him? Also, why would Zod extend his battle outside the theater of destruction he initially created? He can defeat his enemy while extending the least among of effort and then devote his energies towards finishing his genocide of Earth.

I believe Snyder and Christopher Nolan's plot was much more realistic. It works on the premise of how battles have been fought on Earth for thousands of years. Admittedly, the alternative could have been more cartoonish, but I do not believe that was ever their aim for the movie.

How would you envision an incredibly old, technologically advanced, humanoid species, living in the final days, existing on a planet separated by untold light years of space from Earth? Nolan and Synder created theirs for the movie and it was stunning. What is yours?

To be honest, I do not understand your difficulty with the Clark and Lois story. Why would it be necessary for Lois to first meet Kal-El posing as Clark Kent? My only conclusion is the decades old, Superman's alter ego fools everyone in the world especially Lois, storyline. If that's true, I would suggest that the movie creator's interpretation is more realistic. Since the 1930's or 1940's, Superman's alter ego as a Daily Planet reporter was advantageous. It allowed him be quickly alerted to dangers happening near Metropolis and around the world.

The movie storyline is about Jor-El allowing his son to discover and adopt humanity as his own. He does not know what he wants to do with his life yet. It is only after he has reached the level of maturity both sets of parents hoped he would reach, does he understand what he wants to do and how to do it. It is at that point that he wants to be a reporter.

That said, the movie creators were not obligated to intersect Clark's journey with one of Lois' journalistic investigations. They could have omitted it all together, but it would have delayed or erased all chance of a believable love relationship blossoming between the two characters as the movie progressed. It would have been equally difficult injecting Lois into the defensive effort against the Krytonians since her investigation would have been fruitless without having first run into Clark. I guess it would be plausible for Clark and Lois to start a relationship in the last 30 minutes or so of the movie amid the chaos. Or the creators could have simply copied the 1978 movie in regards to their chance meeting. I don't know. I like Hollywood trying to be innovative and challenge its audiences. Then again, some people really like Singer's Superman Returns which was not very original at all. So I guess it's the old different strokes for different folks conclusion.

Snyder and Nolan presented audiences with scenes of Kal-El journey of discovery and supplemented them with flashbacks giving them relevance. Again, why is it necessary for Clark to work at the Daily Planet early in the movie? Is a Superman movie supposed to be about Clark Kent as a Daily Planet reporter? Or is Superman movie supposed to be about Superman? I don't get the revulsion. It kind of makes me wish the early movies, cartoons and the various television series (except Smallville of course) had never been made. You cannot eliminate the early and golden age of Superman comics from the equation, but even so, I think all of the omissions I mentioned would have not warped the character so badly for 21st century audiences.

Wow, really long post. Lets just say I hated the movie. I gave it a second chance with an as open mind as I could possibly have and still hated it. Now I did like it slightly better the second time but still do not care anything about it at all. I will watch any sequels just because I have always been a huge Superman fan. Superman is really the only DC superhero I really cared about even though I thought Nolan's Batman movie were infinitely better than Man of Steel. I know some liked it a lot but I have to apologize to those who did because I did not. If the sequel is as bad as the first(to me), I will complain just as hard. To be honest, I did not care for Batman Begins very much originally although I liked it much better than Man of Steel, but liked Batman Begins a lot better after the trilogy was done. I will hold out hope I end up feeling the same way about the new Superman series. Even though I am not a huge Batman fan, I openly admit The Dark Knight ranks near the top of ALL superhero movies. I truly hope they hit a homerun like The Dark Knight in round two of Superman.

 

[cml750]

So how many deaths are acceptable for you when Supes is facing villians with the same powers as he?

Zod was a villain hell bent on killing Kal-El. He would have followed him anywhere to kill him yet Kal stays in the most populous city in the DC universe???? Kal-El could have flown to the Rocky Mountains or anywhere and Zod would have followed him yet he just stayed in Metropolis??? This just does not follow the Superman I knew and grew up with who valued human life so much. I hope they do much better in the sequel. I am glad you liked it. We are all entitled to our own opinions.

 

[cml750]

People have this cemented idea of the jolly good Superman who will prevent anyone from dying. If 1 person dies, then Supes is responsible and hated.

Were you just exposed to Superman with Man of Steel??? I am not sure how old you are but would expect a Doors fan to be a bit older. Superman ALWAYS valued human life in EVERYTHING Superman I have ever read or seen. I have heard they changed Superman in the newer comics. I am a child of the 70's and 80's and have not read a comic since the early 80's. Maybe the newer comic Superman did not care about human life like the old one. If that is true, I am glad I grew up when I did.

Maybe we can agree that the movie "The Doors" was a good movie????? I know this is not Marvel / DC related but surely there is some common ground??? This is not really an argument as everyone has there own different taste and is entitled to their own opinion.

 

[cml750]

My wife, daughter and I saw it yesterday. It is certainly better than the original, which was good on its own. It was not better than The Avengers as the latest trailer advertisements state. Nor did it have to be. I'm not sure why studios make such ignorant claims while promoting their movies.

My wife and daughter have never cared for the type of movies I like. I wish they did but thankfully my son does. I go watch chick flicks with the wife and daughter and my type of movies with my son. I have been almost begging my wife and daughter to watch The Avengers but heck I couldn't even ever get them to watch the Lord of the Rings which I think is the best trilogy of movies ever created.

 

[PJTHEDOORS]

Were you just exposed to Superman with Man of Steel??? I am not sure how old you are but would expect a Doors fan to be a bit older. Superman ALWAYS valued human life in EVERYTHING Superman I have ever read or seen. I have heard they changed Superman in the newer comics. I am a child of the 70's and 80's and have not read a comic since the early 80's. Maybe the newer comic Superman did not care about human life like the old one. If that is true, I am glad I grew up when I did.

Maybe we can agree that the movie "The Doors" was a good movie????? I know this is not Marvel / DC related but surely there is some common ground??? This is not really an argument as everyone has there own different taste and is entitled to their own opinion.

Born 1969. Again, HE can't save everyone. He can't be everywhere at the same time when 1 life is in danger. And as I've said before, he is just learning to use his full powers for the 1st time.

 

[PJTHEDOORS]

Zod was a villain hell bent on killing Kal-El. He would have followed him anywhere to kill him yet Kal stays in the most populous city in the DC universe???? Kal-El could have flown to the Rocky Mountains or anywhere and Zod would have followed him yet he just stayed in Metropolis??? This just does not follow the Superman I knew and grew up with who valued human life so much. I hope they do much better in the sequel. I am glad you liked it. We are all entitled to our own opinions.

Zod was born a Warrior and his goal was to transform Earth into another Krypton, thus killing the entire population of Earth at it's expense. Superman can fly away, won't stop Zod from destroying buildings and killing people.

 

[DallasEast]

Were you just exposed to Superman with Man of Steel??? I am not sure how old you are but would expect a Doors fan to be a bit older. Superman ALWAYS valued human life in EVERYTHING Superman I have ever read or seen. I have heard they changed Superman in the newer comics. I am a child of the 70's and 80's and have not read a comic since the early 80's. Maybe the newer comic Superman did not care about human life like the old one. If that is true, I am glad I grew up when I did.

Maybe we can agree that the movie "The Doors" was a good movie????? I know this is not Marvel / DC related but surely there is some common ground??? This is not really an argument as everyone has there own different taste and is entitled to their own opinion.

Even before they depowered him following the events of the Crisis of Infinite Earths storyline in the mid-80's, DC began having its character explain to their readers that he was not all-powerful. That he had incredible powers but could not save everyone from disease and evil.

It was the right move. The myth of Superman had become almost religious in nature. It made readers believe he was a deity. That was never his creators' intention.

Make no mistake. I doubt anyone on Earth has ever believed the character devalues humanity one iota. However, his destiny has always been to protect humanity from threats it cannot defend itself from. The ugly truth is that even Superman cannot save everyone from evil. Nolan and Snyder's work should not be penalized for not endorsing a falsehood which existed between the 1950's and 1970's. In the comics, Superman fought evil but could not save everyone before and after that era.

The character was never meant to be considered as omnipotent. That character flaw was imposed during that particular two decade long stretch of stupidity. It was never who Superman really was.

 

[cml750]

Zod was born a Warrior and his goal was to transform Earth into another Krypton, thus killing the entire population of Earth at it's expense. Superman can fly away, won't stop Zod from destroying buildings and killing people.

Yes Zod wanted to create his new Krypton but he vowed to kill Superman. The machine he was going to use to transform Earth was already destroyed and he was extremely pissed and focused on killing the man who destroyed his machine. If Superman flew off he would not have stayed to destroy the city he would have followed him.

 

[cml750]

Even before they depowered him following the events of the Crisis of Infinite Earths storyline in the mid-80's, DC began having its character explain to their readers that he was not all-powerful. That he had incredible powers but could not save everyone from disease and evil.

It was the right move. The myth of Superman had become almost religious in nature. It made readers believe he was a deity. That was never his creators' intention.

Make no mistake. I doubt anyone on Earth has ever believed the character devalues humanity one iota. However, his destiny has always been to protect humanity from threats it cannot defend itself from. The ugly truth is that even Superman cannot save everyone from evil. Nolan and Snyder's work should not be penalized for not endorsing a falsehood which existed between the 1950's and 1970's. In the comics, Superman fought evil but could not save everyone before and after that era.

The character was never meant to be considered as omnipotent. That character flaw was imposed during that particular two decade long stretch of stupidity. It was never who Superman really was.

The movie was disliked by many because it was very poorly written and way overblown on the mind numbing fight scenes. Too much fighting, too little story and the story that was there was not written very well. There are a lot of people who did not like the movie very much and it wasn't solely due to Superman not being the same guy they grew up with. The Superman story has so much potential and in my opinion they swung and missed on this one. I sincerely hope the sequel is better. I would love to see what Joss Whedon could have done with a Superman movie. You and PJ like the movie,which is fine by me. It is both of yours right to have your own opinions as it is my right to have my own. You know what they say about opinions??

 

[DallasEast]

The movie was disliked by many because it was very poorly written and way overblown on the mind numbing fight scenes. Too much fighting, too little story and the story that was there was not written very well. There are a lot of people who did not like the movie very much and it wasn't solely due to Superman not being the same guy they grew up with. The Superman story has so much potential and in my opinion they swung and missed on this one. I sincerely hope the sequel is better. I would love to see what Joss Whedon could have done with a Superman movie. You and PJ like the movie,which is fine by me. It is both of yours right to have your own opinions as it is my right to have my own. You know what they say about opinions??

I understand the dislike part for the reason you bolded in my reply, but I haven't read or heard as much about the poorly written reaction. Are there any movie critic sites you would recommend which pans the screenplay as much as you have indicated in multiple posts?

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/superman_man_of_steel/

Speaking of a movie critic website, Rotten Tomatoes has a number of posted reviews which shares your dislike of Man of Steel. I believe the following opening paragraph is a typical example of the underlying majority negative opinion:

How do you take your superheroes? I prefer mine light and sweet, but these days they mostly come dark and bitter. In the wake of Christopher Nolan's "Batman" trilogy, Spider-Man has gone all angsty, Iron Man suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder and now we have a brooding "Man of Steel."

http://www.newsday.com/entertainmen...119?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

I believe Mr. Guzman heads the nail on the head concerning much of the negative reaction to the movie. "How do you take your superheroes? I prefer mine light and sweet, but these days they mostly come dark and bitter." I think he's being sincere. It is not so much who a character actually is, but more about what he wants a character to be. This approach to the characters is repeatedly made. The same thing happened to Heath Ledger's performance of The Joker. That's not an exact comparison, of course. Ledger's performance was legendary and Henry Cavill's wasn't. It is a correct conclusion though. Simply put, some people didn't like The Joker in The Dark Knight because he wasn't The Joker they expected to see.

Having read literally thousands of comics (I have a pretty large collection), I know how DC and Marvel writers portray many of the characters intimately. As I have said in earlier posts, the characters have evolved with the times. However, some perceptions of the characters have not. Some people want to see another Christopher Reeve/Superman vs. Terence Stamp/Zod physical conflict, where some concrete was thrown, a few windows were broken and Zod disappears in a mist of fog. That's great, but that concept was from 1980 and a Superman who was retired from comics a long, long time ago.

I'm glad we had this discussion. It helped shed a light on something I just don't get yet. Now, if I can just wrap my head around why DC keeps dragging its feet while Marvel keeps kicking their butts!

 

[Nova]

People have this cemented idea of the jolly good Superman who will prevent anyone from dying. If 1 person dies, then Supes is responsible and hated.

Born 1969. Again, HE can't save everyone. He can't be everywhere at the same time when 1 life is in danger. And as I've said before, he is just learning to use his full powers for the 1st time.

The funny thing is, there's a gaping plot hole in the 1st Reeves Superman film. He "rewinds the world" to save Lois life because he couldn't be in 2 places at once and was saving a small town/neighborhood.

So he rewinds the world and saves Lois instead. Meaning that town was screwed over.

 

[joseephuss]

The funny thing is, there's a gaping plot hole in the 1st Reeves Superman film. He "rewinds the world" to save Lois life because he couldn't be in 2 places at once and was saving a small town/neighborhood.

So he rewinds the world and saves Lois instead. Meaning that town was screwed over.

That town was Hackensack, NJ, which would mean much devastation to he heavily populated NJ/NY area. Perhaps he went far enough back in time to stop the rockets before they were launched. He is fast enough to bend time, so he only needed a few extra seconds to stop both rockets.