Man of Steel. Nolan Superman Reboot.

It's actually fascinating how much this movie emphasizes Superman's alien nature.

Every other piece of media, from the movies to the cartoon to freakin' Smallville, focus on Superman as a human being, how him being raised by human parents has made him so detached from his Kryptonian ways. Yet in this movie Clark seems to do nothing but reject his human parentage. One of his last lines to Pa Kent is "I'm not your son". He jokes about being an alien after kissing Lois. He shows more joy finding out about Jor-El than he ever does with his parents or with his peers. I agree with that one review in that I didn't really buy it when he says "I'm from Kansas."

Likewise. I greatly prefer it when it's clear that Clark considers himself human in all but biology.

I don't really feel like it's even appropriate to call this iteration Clark. He's much more Kal-El than he is Clark.

Which is a shame, because I felt it was easier to empathize with the young Clark who was surprised to discover his heritage and just wanted to stay with his family. He was indeed the more human/relatable.

^^ I don't even think it'd be right to call this version Kal-El either, since he ends up rejecting Krypton to an extent at the end as well. The only thing he really adheres to in the end is his role as savior.

He's not Clark, he's not Kal-El. He's just... Superman. It's weird.

edited 26th Jun '13 4:16:46 PM by KnownUnknown

He's..... Emo Superman?

I wouldn't even call him emo, just lost. It is really the point they are trying to go with him, that without understanding where he came from and why he has these abilities he doesn't have a purpose. Jonathan knows there is a greater destiny in store for Clark but he didn't want to push that on him. Once Clark finds the scout ship and learns about his heritage he finally has some direction. It is interesting that when Jor-El tells him up front "You can save them, you can save them all" it is a revelation to Clark, and it's a nice touch that the first person he saves as Superman is Lois.

His final moment talking about being as American as you can get is a nice touch, and it continues the whole adoption sub-theme. I have a few family members who are adopted and when they turned 18 they made an effort to find their birth parents. I found it interesting that despite not sharing blood that they are just as much family as anyone else, and having a better understanding of the sacrifice their birth parents made gave them a greater appreciation for their place in life.

So... that scene where Supes is enjoying himself just flying around the world, did anyone else expect him to suddenly get shot out of the sky by a tank?

Yes I did.

Also so I've seen this and here's my rundown

• You guys weren't exaggerating about all that mayhem dear lord.

• Russel Crowe/Jor-El/Science Batman seemed liked he came from a much better sci-fi movie.

• I can't accept that Superman wouldn't save Jonathan Kent.

• Military guy "How can we trust you?"

Supes "I'M FROM KANSAS!" Flies away

Military guy "Check all the records for irregularities, kids without birth certificates, strange reports everything.

edited 27th Jun '13 7:54:27 AM by zam

The shot of him lifting himself out of the crater after he falls even looks just like Iron Man's!

That last point is a good one. Thinking about it, it should actually be pretty easy for the military to find out Superman's identity, and in turn, you could question how easy it should be for Lex Luthor to find out.

That being said, I think that the way things were framed was more like "I'm on your side, and you couldn't possibly stop me if you wanted to, so leave me alone", so it is plausible that post-the movie, the President and military high command will know Superman's identity, but it will be secret to everyone else.

And as a corollary of the above, I might speculate that stuff would be classified that would expose Clark's identity.

The government will probably do a scrub job on all those irregularities so they don't have to worry about some nutter kidnapping his mom and trying to blackmail him into lighting the white house on fire.

That too. I was thinking along those lines that maybe a sequel could have Lex Luthor wanting to be President because being President would allow him to access that kind of information about Superman.

I would retroactively forgive a lot of Mo S's flaws if they went with "yes, top men in the government know who Superman is. . . and they are smart enough to realize its the most useless secret ever, even if they were maliciously inclined, which they aren't."

I mean, even from a villainous perspective, what does knowing Superman is Clark Kent mean?

1. You know he works at the Daily Planet. . . except everyone *already* knows he's close to Lois Lane, so if you were going to look for hostages or ways to draw him out, you'd already be looking there anyway.

2. You know his mom is Martha Kent. . . which knowing so would inevitably lead to finding out about the Battle of Smallville. "Gee, I wonder what would happen if I threaten Superman's mom?"

It's not like he did a particularly good job covering his tracks or hiding his abilities. It wasn't too hard for Lois to track him down (I'm still laughing about how Pete Ross told her all about it, and then Martha told her where she could find him), and the only reason other people didn't seems to be that other people didn't quite have her drive to follow the trail. Now that he's out as Superman more people will probably be interested in his roots, and it wouldn't be very hard for someone so inclined (like the government or Luthor) to track him down too.

Just saw the movie tonight, in a cinema in the Philippines. I agree that the characters were pretty undeveloped, but I was too busy enjoying the action that's been missing from every live-action portrayal of Superman.

I hope the next film will do a better job with characters. Heck, having Lex Luthor, who's a small-scale villain compared to Superman's other enemies, could do the trick, since being small-scale instead of big and broad like this film was allows for better characterization.

Also, is it just me, or did they incorporate elements of H'el into this 'verse's Zod?

Interesting how the version of Superman that tries his hardest to keep out of the radar is also the one that's easiest to find.

As much as I would really like Luthor as the villain, I'd like to see some variety. Just looking at the main film list, our villains have been Luthor, Zod, Original the Character DO NOT STEAL, Luthor, Luthor, and Zod. I mean, can't we get, like, Brainiac or something?

edited 28th Jun '13 11:02:53 AM by Watchtower

I feel that Brainiac's too "detached" from Superman to work in this 'verse. He's an alien from an entirely different planet than Superman. Lex Luthor can act as a more "personal" villain that lets us see into Clark more than this movie has shown us so far.

They could make it like the cartoon and say Brainiac was a Kryptonian supercomputer.

I had no idea that wasn't from the comics. In retrospect, the cartoon version was sort of like a composite of HAL and Marvel's Ultron.

I just list Brainiac because he can be considered the next most popular villain behind Luthor and Zod. I mean, he was in Super Friends, after all.

The point I'm trying to make is that Superman does have a rogue's gallery to go through. Not extensive like Batman's or Flash's, but still notable.

edited 28th Jun '13 11:12:27 AM by Watchtower

I would have used Brainiac as the first movie villain, myself. Too late now.

How slim do you suppose the odds are of seeing Myxzptlk in a movie?

For Mxy, they could take cues from Q from Star Trek TNG, which is the only way he could work in this 'verse.

Or they could take the Whatever Happened To The Man Of Tomorrow route and make Myxzptlk an Eldritch Abomination.