Superman General

There are several reasons on why he wouldn't like to kill: He has a fairly normal upbringing and has the same normal aversion most people have of killing, he is strong, smart and skilled enough to stop most threats without killing them, his super senses would give him a very detailed view of what happens when someone kicks the bucket...

I know that. I'm just saying that if there's absolutely no other choice, Superman is likely willing to kill. But only as a last resort.

That said, I think his reluctance to kill is less due to being so powerful and having more options and more due to just being Superman. It doesn't always come up, but Supes isn't the only hero in his weight class. Hell, he's not even the most powerful hero. Martian Manhunter has everything Supes has and then some (even having been stated on at least one occasion to have even more power than him), but he's always had a harder edge to him than Kal. Captain Atom is on Supes' level, but as a trained military operative, he's probably willing to kill if necessary. And let's not get started on the Spectre. Supes may be a heavyweight, but if anything's stopping him from killing, it's more due to who he is than anything else.

edited 7th Jun '18 6:02:05 PM by kkhohoho

Regarding the subject of making a Superman video game, I've said for several years that the easiest thing to do is give him a mana bar representing how much sunlight he's absorbed and which most of his powers are tied to. Green K, red sunlight, etc, lower the bar, and weaken his abilities in the process.

The Superman returns tie in actually had a cool idea of giving the city a life bar but it wasn't executed properly

Speaking of Toyman, what ever happened to The Prankster?

Oh, they turned him into The Riddler◊.

edited 9th Jun '18 1:11:12 AM by AnotherGuy

Vic Sage will be returning in Bendis' Action Comics

https://www.newsarama.com/40276-the-question-returns-thanks-to-brian-michael-bendis.html

Keep in mind that Bendis didn't say whether or not it was Vic. Just that it was the Question. So it could easily be Renee Montoya or even that literally faceless version the Nu 52 gave us.

Didn't they turn question into some kind of cosmic entity

The literally faceless version, yes.

I'll still bashing my head into a wall over the sheer stupidity of it.

Okay, let's get his over with: Superman killing is stupid.

For the record, I hate the "superheroes should kill because villain keep coming back" crap. Outside of being sooo cliched and boring, they are basically making a capital punishment argument because of something that doesn't exist in real life. Why waste our time on serious moral polemics on something with no real life application? And why is it even their responsibility, why doesn't the state kill them? I also hate the "robots or sufficiently freaky aliens we have no reason to assume are not sentient" loophole and above mentioned story was written by Grant Morrison, who clearly realized how bullshit it is, given Supes refuses to kill Brainiac in his Action Comics run.

Anyway, the problem is people are looking at this only from in-universe stand point, ignoring that these are characters that are there to tell stories. And Superman killing is not an interesting story.

First of all, Superman isn't just a normal superhero, he's The Cape, the Ideal Hero, the moral paragon of his world. Not that he needs to be perfect, or that he should never fail, but to have him kill while other, weaker heroes don't? It's just depressing, to have him fail in such a way, to go against the whole fantasy of the character, to prove a no damn point.

In-universe, dismissing murder from the get go, it's perfectly valid for Superman to have a no-killing code. Outside of having a great compassion and empathy, partially connected to his powers-when someone dies in front of him, he can see their lungs slowing down and their muscles start to stiffen, hear the neural crackle in their brains fizzle out and the rush of blood halt, smell and taste the decay in the air as they start to putrefy. Moreover, he's extremely powerful and has ability to stop his villains without the need to resort to it.

Now, are there instances where it would be necessary for him to kill? Sure. I would argue Man of Steel is one. Except you would have to contrive the situation so hard to make it the only right option, that him killing would tell you nothing about him or anything. Okay, so Superman would kill Zod in that situation. So would Batman. So would Ellen Ripley. So would Spock. So would Woody the Woodpecker.

And for what? So we could have him be sad for while until he returns to normal making the whole thing pointless? Or to have him just kill normally now, meaning the greatest hero alive can't do better than Guy fucking Gardner? Yes, Superman not killing is a limitation, but so is Spider-Man not getting killed off in a random supervillain brawl, Reed Richards not solving all problems ever or Joker getting cured. We accept constraints on art to achieve certain effects for certain works; that’s not a handicap, that’s the way stories are made. And Superman killing doesn’t match the effect his story as a whole is generally trying to achieve, which is as much of a consideration as anything else.

If Kryptonian powers mean that you are much more aware of someone's suffering, does that make Kryptonian villains even bigger assholes than human murderers?

Ask that of the writers who keep bringing it up. It isn't like anyone's asking for these stories necessarily but if the writers are going to discuss this, the least they can do is not chicken out because the logical conclusion makes them a bit uncomfortable.

Can't say I agree with the last part, but even if that's the case, writers don't have to keep bringing it up.

Who says it has to happen when other heroes don't kill? Hell, the DC universe has a number of heroes who don't follow this rule like Wonder Woman and Huntress.

I'd say the typical superhero story of the brutal psychopath continuing to terrorize the populace and not facing any real consequences while Superman maintains an arbitrary moral high ground is a lot more depressing. Call me callous, but Superman being a little sad because he's not as perfect as he thinks he is bothers me less than numerous people dying because of his stupid, code that helps no one but himself.

Do you honestly think that using lethal force and being compassionate and empathetic are mutually exclusive? Do you see Wonder Woman and Captain America as monsters because they don't have a rule against killing?

Contrivances? The idea that Superman never has to resort to killing is itself a contrivance. The idea that he'll be handed a deus ex machina to keep his hands clean. Superhero media typically treats violence with no consequences unless it's a deliberate killing. Batman can toss throwing knives and frag grenades everywhere and tear down a highway with all guns blazing on the Batmobile and we're supposed to think this guy values life. The superhero genre is built on contrivances, why should Superman killing be the one that is taboo?

Also, isn't Superman just being a good guy enough? Why are his power levels considered more important?

Well the message I would get is that he'd acknowledge his limitations and that he cares about human beings more than his code.

Don't tell his fans that.

People will accept constraints in art when they aren't repeatedly pointed out by the artists themselves. Flash and Spider-Man have no killing rules but don't usually talk about it and their villains are typically not so monstrous or powerful that killing is considered. The villains they have that do fit that criteria (Norman, Reverse Flash, Carnage) are so powerful that just stopping them takes effort so even if they decided to kill them, there's no guarantee they'd succeed. Wonder Woman doesn't follow this rule but unlike Superman and Batman, knows the difference between murder and justifiable homicide.

Uh, no. There's a difference between knowing of someone's suffering and actually causing it.

The entire argument is moot. Superman isn't Batman. He has killed when his back is against the wall. Doomsday, Brainiac, and Darkseid have all been on the receiving end of lethal force from him. It happened. So everyone, let it go.

Ultimately, the problem of heroes who don't kill is twofold. One, there are fanboys who use the inherent nature of serial fiction with popular recurring villains as a foundation for snarky remarks that they think make them appear clever. Two, there are writers who feel the need to continually draw attention to those same snarky fanboy arguments, thus giving them far more weight than they actually deserve, because they think doing so adds depth to their stories, and because editors continue to allow them to do so.

So yeah, new Superman group editor Brian Cunningham doesn't like the marriage

welp

I don't think that's worrying. He seems to be able to separate his feelings as fan from his job as an editor unlike Quesada.

And he's been very professional about it all..say the same thing to a Marvel employee and they'd bite your head off

So this big Superman-related spoiler just happened. Don't read the URL if you don't want spoilers.

God fucking damn it, Bendis.

What gets me is the part in the article that's like "It’s a bold move, and one that definitely has Superman’s hackles up. Power plays like this keep pumping up what a threat Rogol Zaar truly is." and "Maybe Bendis really has crafted the most deadly Superman villain ever."

Here's another article about it that points out something I didn't know—Zaar hadn't really done anything up to that point.

edited 14th Jun '18 1:26:24 PM by lalalei2001

Well he's certainly done something now

I can't wait for him to snap Jimmy Olsen's neck.

Bendis has been saying Lois and Clark will begin to develop non-traditional family values in his run...heaven knows what that means.