The complaints about the destruction get to me too. Especially since the film goes out of it's way to not present Superman's direct actions (as opposed to the Gravity Beam attack) as being the cause of any citizen's deaths. He get's knocked into a couple of empty buildings or has Zod heat blast a building's structural supports... Neither of those things are Superman's fault.
On the other hand, even while I disagree with almost all the complaints against the film, I actually find it heartening that Superman as a character engenders such a passionate response. His day in the pop culture sun is far from over it seems. I'd wager that there will be some new mass media Superman project either out or being prepared for release when I'm getting ready to knock on heaven's gate as an old man. (Crossed fingers I make it to old man status.)
you can't win in a complaint. they would say he was directly responsible of leading G. Zod to the earth. therefore, every following things that happened he should be blamed on. Lol.
anyway, i think MOS is a huge success in a way. Donner's / Christopher Reeve's superman was so influential. you can see all the films superman related had have its' influences. MOS managed to stay clear possible from it and create on its own attributes and yet faithful to the characters. that's a huge achievement.
Agreed.
And what shocks me is that I don't see any other hero getting nowhere as much flack that Superman has been getting for both the destruction and for Zod's death.
I mean you have Captain America, someone that most people can agree to have the highest moral compass within the entire MCU regarding its heroes, and yet we've seen the guy kill an Hydra soldier by throwing a knife at the person's back and even throwing an mercenary to his death from the hellcarrier. And yet, do you hear anyone complaining or crying blasphemy about it? Nope.
And when you think about it, with the exception of "Batman and Robin", Batman has been directly responsible for the deaths of his villains within every other film that he's appeared in.
1. Batman: He killed the Joker
2. Batman Returns: He killed several of Penguin's thugs and even unleashed a hoard of Bats at Penguin that caused him to fall to his doom.
3. Batman Forever: Batman threw coins into the air in order to confuse Two-Face, which made Two-Face lose his balance and fall to his death.
4. Batman Begins: He left Ra's to die within the Train as it crashed into the building.
5. The Dark Knight: Pushed Harvey to his death in order to save Gordon's Son. Regarding this scene in particular, the people who have defended Batman have used the same reasons why Superman had to kill Zod. They say that Batman was exhausted, that he had no other choice, and that it was pure adrenaline. Well folks, it was the same thing with Superman and if you try to say otherwise, then clearly, you haven't seen the film and if you really have, then you've just proven the point that you are one bias person.
6. The Dark Knight Rises: Batman pretty much killed one of Talia's drivers and forced Talia to dive to her death.
My point is that Batman pretty much killed people in his last two films, despite the emphasis on his "no kill" policy because the situation demanded it due to the high stakes that were presented at the time.
In "Man of Steel", prior to his fight with Zod, Superman had just destroyed the "World Engine", which took everything that he had, to the point where he was left unconscious and exhausted for awhile before he could regain some of his energy back. Then he crashed Zod's ship into the ground and considering that he wasn't able to get back up until some time afterwards clearly means that it took energy out of him.
And after all of that, Superman had to take on Zod, who was on a killing rampage at the time and who was also someone that's had way more training than Superman in actual combat. And let's not conveniently forget that Superman had only just learned to use his powers in a combative way, let alone cut loose for the first time in his life after having been told several times by his father to suppress them as much as possible due to his fear that Clark would be exposed and shun from humanity.
Yeah, I'll admit that I'm not the biggest fan of an the amount of CGI that was needed for the sequences, especially since we were given such a good take of a realistic looking world at the beginning of the film. However, given the scale of the battle, it was inevitable, and honestly, this crap happens all the time within the comics, where Superman is actually experienced and has training to deal with situations like that.
People don't ***** about that or what they see on television. Hell, if I had a nickel for every time I read someone saying on how they wanted to see superman take on a villain on the big screen like how he took on Darkseid at the end of "Justice League Unlimited", I'd be rich enough to convince Christian Bale to come back for the role of Batman.
And when Snyder finally brings that to the big screen, people cry foul and keep mentioning on the boards on how they hope that their SUPERPOWERED heroes never have to go through a battle of that scale on film (despite the irony that they have within the comics and animated series several times).
It's like people just want to find reasons to be pissed off at Superman or something.
Honestly, I feel like one of the biggest reasons why people are so taken back by the destruction that we saw in the film is due to how Snyder shot it to make it look very realistic in a eerie way. He didn't take the destruction and death toll as some joke or cliche matter like so many other comic book films tend to do. He took it seriously when it came to showing that people were dying by the flocks from Zod's actions and that's why it struck a chord with some people.
For good or for worse, people automatically expect for Superman to save everyone, to always make it in the nick of time and stop such catastrophes from taking place, before we have to see it with our own eyes, but the truth is, he's no God and he can't be everywhere and save everyone at once.
Superman is not Superman for his ability to save everyone and prevent every major disaster from taking place. Superman is superman due to his will to never give up on trying to save as many lives as he can....to never give up trying on saving everyone.
