BvS David S. Goyer IS the Script Writer!

[DA_Champion]

Since I have a little time ...

How was it a failed jesus metaphor? I mean I've heard people say that but never really got anyone's explanation for how it failed.

The Jesus metaphor in the film did not work for me. It may have worked for some people, maybe some very religious christians who have a different worldview, but it struck me superficial. I will list out some complaints. The first five are minor complaints, and I don't think they would matter at all if the Jesus allegory was well-integrated.

1) It's disrespectful of Siegel and Shuster and the source material. They were Jews, and Superman was originally a (soft?) metaphor for Moses.
2) It's a reminder of the painful memory of Superman Returns. Therefore it makes the movie start a little behind since it brings back sour feelings.
3) It leads to a consumption of precious screen time that serves little other purpose. For example, there now needs to be a line telling us Clark is 33 years old, and there needs to be a scene in a church. Would that be in there without Goyer trying to force Superman-as-Jesus? Extremely unlikely. The church scene in particular was kind of dumb, why would he go ask a random priest how to deal with Zod? why not ask Jor-El?
4) It feels like fan-service to fans of Jesus. It doesn't feel genuine, it's as though Goyer is making a Jesus metaphor simply to appeal to a different market.
5) It's not organically integrated into the plot. Clark is 33 years old because that makes for a more apt Jesus allegory, rather than the other way around. The fact is the exact same movie could work if Clark was 26, nobody would notice, in fact that might even be better. A decade of drifting is ridiculous.

Most importantly,

It is implemented superficially. Goyer completely ignored the historical context of Jesus. Jesus of Nazareth works in the Judea of ~20 AD, he wouldn't work in the same way in the America of 2013 as presented by Goyer. When Jesus emerged as a popular figure in Judea, there was a huge amount of unrest and dissatisfaction in the land due to oppression from the Roman Empire. It's historically spectacular that this Roman province (Judea) had not one but two bloody rebellions against the Roman Empire, in 66-73 AD and 132-135 AD, no other province did this. These rebellions were taken seriously by the empire, the first general to siege Judea (Vespasian) became Emperor, and the second general to do so (Titus) also became Emperor. When the rebellion was over they built the Arch of Titus in Rome to celebrate, and you can still find the Arch in Rome. It was a big deal.

The Roman empire was preventing the citizens of Judea from being good Jews -- it was very eager to assimilate away a 1200 year old culture that had enough vitality to last another 2000 years and counting -- and it was taxing the people heavily. There was a huge amount of unrest. The people were looking for a saviour, and indeed they did get saviours previously, against the Greeks and the Persians and the Assyrians.

That's why it makes sense for someone like Jesus to emerge, from nowhere, and to acquire a significant degree of popularity in spite of being at odds with several powerful groups. The people were craving a different ideology, because they knew the system wasn't working for them, he was offering them something else and became popular. This inevitably leads to the authorities assassinating Jesus, as he was a threat. His impact continued. Within the next 250 years, 10% of the Roman Empire had converted to Christianity (wow). Soon after that, the Emperor himself converted. You don't get such a spectacular historical achievement from mundane historical conditions, you get them from links that are deeply rooted and long simmering.

None of this or anything like it in the movie, and it could have been. They have a cardboard cutout of Jesus without mimicking any of the historical conditions that made Jesus relevant. The demand for Superman in the movie's world, if there is one, emerges from the spontaneous and random historical event of Zod's invasion. It is not rooted in some long-simmering sociological malaise, say for example if Superman saw a world suffering from cynicism and despair and that was in need of a symbol of hope, and slowly accrued popularity, one disciple at a time, one miracle at a time, rather than through a big show in downtown metropolis. They could have done that, they did have Maximus-El (the holy ghost) deliver a speech about Kal-El guiding humanity into the light, but they didn't really do it.

It is for this reason that the first Hunger Games movie and the first Matrix movie make a better Jesus allegory than Man of Steel.

 

[Smashlilman]

Since I have a little time ...



The Jesus metaphor in the film did not work for me. It may have worked for some people, maybe some very religious christians who have a different worldview, but it struck me superficial. I will list out some complaints. The first five are minor complaints, and I don't think they would matter at all if the Jesus allegory was well-integrated.

1) It's disrespectful of Siegel and Shuster and the source material. They were Jews, and Superman was originally a (soft?) metaphor for Moses.
2) It's a reminder of the painful memory of Superman Returns. Therefore it makes the movie start a little behind since it brings back sour feelings.
3) It leads to a consumption of precious screen time that serves little other purpose. For example, there now needs to be a line telling us Clark is 33 years old, and there needs to be a scene in a church. Would that be in there without Goyer trying to force Superman-as-Jesus? Extremely unlikely. The church scene in particular was kind of dumb, why would he go ask a random priest how to deal with Zod? why not ask Jor-El?
4) It feels like fan-service to fans of Jesus. It doesn't feel genuine, it's as though Goyer is making a Jesus metaphor simply to appeal to a different market.
5) It's not organically integrated into the plot. Clark is 33 years old because that makes for a more apt Jesus allegory, rather than the other way around. The fact is the exact same movie could work if Clark was 26, nobody would notice, in fact that might even be better. A decade of drifting is ridiculous.

Most importantly,

It is implemented superficially. Goyer completely ignored the historical context of Jesus. Jesus of Nazareth works in the Judea of ~20 AD, he wouldn't work in the same way in the America of 2013 as presented by Goyer. When Jesus emerged as a popular figure in Judea, there was a huge amount of unrest and dissatisfaction in the land due to oppression from the Roman Empire. It's historically spectacular that this Roman province (Judea) had not one but two bloody rebellions against the Roman Empire, in 66-73 AD and 132-135 AD, no other province did this. These rebellions were taken seriously by the empire, the first general to siege Judea (Vespasian) became Emperor, and the second general to do so (Titus) also became Emperor. When the rebellion was over they built the Arch of Titus in Rome to celebrate, and you can still find the Arch in Rome. It was a big deal.

The Roman empire was preventing the citizens of Judea from being good Jews -- it was very eager to assimilate away a 1200 year old culture that had enough vitality to last another 2000 years and counting -- and it was taxing the people heavily. There was a huge amount of unrest. The people were looking for a saviour, and indeed they did get saviours previously, against the Greeks and the Persians and the Assyrians.

That's why it makes sense for someone like Jesus to emerge, from nowhere, and to acquire a significant degree of popularity in spite of being at odds with several powerful groups. The people were craving a different ideology, because they knew the system wasn't working for them, he was offering them something else and became popular. This inevitably leads to the authorities assassinating Jesus, as he was a threat. His impact continued. Within the next 250 years, 10% of the Roman Empire had converted to Christianity (wow). Soon after that, the Emperor himself converted. You don't get such a spectacular historical achievement from mundane historical conditions, you get them from links that are deeply rooted and long simmering.

None of this or anything like it in the movie, and it could have been. They have a cardboard cutout of Jesus without mimicking any of the historical conditions that made Jesus relevant. The demand for Superman in the movie's world, if there is one, emerges from the spontaneous and random historical event of Zod's invasion. It is not rooted in some long-simmering sociological malaise, say for example if Superman saw a world suffering from cynicism and despair and that was in need of a symbol of hope, and slowly accrued popularity, one disciple at a time, one miracle at a time, rather than through a big show in downtown metropolis. They could have done that, they did have Maximus-El (the holy ghost) deliver a speech about Kal-El guiding humanity into the light, but they didn't really do it.

It is for this reason that the first Hunger Games movie and the first Matrix movie make a better Jesus allegory than Man of Steel.

It's a part his character. He trusted in a priest for Moral Guidance. I believe he did it in the comics also when he needed advice.

The problem isn't the parallels to Jesus. It's the overtness of it.

 

[DA_Champion]

If David Goyer's Jesus allegory hadn't been overt, then there wouldn't have been a Jesus allegory.

 

[TheFlamingCoco]

Snyder: Let's keep this background imagery IN FOCUS. Now, Henry stand a few inches to the side so that the images LINE UP so that the allegory isn't lost on the audience

 

[Marvin]

Ah, yes, plot points like Superman killing Zod... oh, wait. Nolan's already stated what his role in MoS was. And he ain't to blame. He did a great job letting Snyder and Goyer roam free... which was a bad decision to me.

Bad decision to you maybe.

You do know this literally puts the blame square on him correct.
No different than a director approving of a creative decision?
Also it's not just that "issue" people have been brought to arms over.

 

[TheFlamingCoco]

^ In hindsight, Supes killing Zod was one of the less problematic aspects of the movie :/

 

[Marvin]

The USB-brain is a made-up concept, and thus the amount of time/energy whatever it takes to make one is entirely up to Goyer. He convinced himself it makes sense to have Jor-El have more lines than all 3 other parents combined... but audiences and critics and myself alike have said "WTF?". It just looks mean and dumb.

I hope Maximus-El never comes back.

So I take that as a No. We don't know how difficult the process is, only that he only did it once. Thanks for answering.

Choosing Earth over Krypton on a "leap of faith", the most important choice in a movie where free will is supposed to be about free will, is completely nonsensical.

1. It's not the most important choice in the entire movie.
2. Him choosing earth even though "it wasn't very nice to him" doesn't argue a single thing about free will. I find my self more and more curious about how you come to some of these conclusions.

 

[Krumm]

1) It's disrespectful of Siegel and Shuster and the source material. They were Jews, and Superman was originally a (soft?) metaphor for Moses.

It's in no way disrespectful. The Jesus allegory has been present almost as long as the Moses, which is long before Goyer ever came along. And the intent of creators doesn't matter as much as the interpretation. There is evidence for both Moses and Jesus because they are both messianic figures and that is really all the matters. You can read Moses, Jesus, Muhammed, hell, even Atheist see him as a secular messiah. To me, that is what makes Superman such a great character because he extends beyond so borders and can be appropriated to anyone's POV.

 

[TheBat812]

DA- how could Lara making the USB ghost after jorel dies make any sense? Doesn't jorel die after Clark's ship is launched? It seemed to me that jorels USB key was something he developed over months of time while Clark was in the womb and he knew kryptons destruction was imminent based on the math. You might call it selfish that he didn't include Lara, but she seemed busy with bein preggers and he seemed more interested in creatin a functioning system to assist kal rather than be fair and include both of them.


Re: him choosing earth. There are tons of reasons he chooses earth of krypton throughout the film. He's seen the good in people as Marvin described earlier in the thread and he's also heard the huge failures of kryptonians society from jorel as well as being told he can bridge both qualities to help humanity avoid the downfalls that plagued them. Why would be choose a totally dead and failed society over one he is now responsible for (activating the beacon to lead zod there) and that he can actually be a symbol of hope for to help them?

I know the movie isn't perfect but sometimes it really feels like people didnt get the movie and then assume it was a problem with the film. It IS an issue that it was so densely packed that you'll probably miss some crucial info along the way, but that's a whole different issue than the story not actually making sense. It's structure is very similar to the tdk trilogy in that way, only difference being Snyder is not one of the best storytellersin film history like Nolan. That is why the execution of the film certainly has its flaws.

 

[Mjölnir]

How'd I know you'd bring up the others kids lol.
The point was there is a very simple logical pathway into her bringing the boy who told her this story to the parents of the boy accused of partaking in her boys eye witness accounts. I'm sure you are familiar with the "my son said your son did this to him in school today" scenario. The one where the mother brings the boy over to retell his story first hand? Which is why she brought her son, doesn't mean she's not at all scared. She's not visiting to sell the kents tomatoes. She's there to confront them on what her son just told her he saw.
What a different conversation the two of us would be having about this had this lady at any point smiled during this blessed confrontation.

Secondly you also keep touching on the "fact" that people's reception to "providence" is seemingly always met with nothing but grace, joy and simply not fear. Given the term actually means divine intervention in our world and people, the ones more inclined to believe in such things(such as small town folk) have a greater emotional response, I refuse to believe that this woman will automatically receive this information with joy and not fear on the simple premise that it's gods will on earth. For example: Does this guy seem happy or "anxious" about providence..

If you knew that, why do you write things that Petey was the only witness? Are you hoping that I'm missing stuff so you can deceive me?

And you also seem to conveniently keep forgetting the nature of the divine intervention. Manifestation of wounds that refer to the mistreatment of Christ is quite a bit different from giving someone the power to save innocent children.

Where did I say there is anything normal about this situation. This is where you keep getting it wrong. I clearly said clark let his mother know that his father was ok due to his insight and his ability to STILL save him if he has to...take two seconds to ask yourself what it martha was thinking in that moment the car crashed down and jon disappeared? And contrast that exact thing with jon's physical st.....yes maybe we have come to the end on this one.
I still don't understand how you can possibly assume clark isn't using his visual powers on his dads progress I mean a whole crowd of people fixated on if Jon Kent is going to make it and this guy

Spoiler

his son, in this exact moment is literally choosing not to use his sensory powers.... and you feel this way because the movie "didn't show" us him using them.

You're going on so much about him thinking about not exposing himself, yet you think that he avoids acting when he could do it by normal means because he could easily do it afterwards by exposing himself. Not very logical.

I've repeated my point about why he's not using his powers many times, and you still haven't gotten it? I said that I don't think he does that because his conclusion is idiotic. I'd rather believe that the movie keeps on with it's plot controlled super senses than that it writes Clark as the biggest moron in the country.

It's an issue if you don't know if you will have to. There is a tornado down just down the road. This isn't a kent farm family dinner situation. Powers might accidentally be exposed.

How? Clark has his powers under control at that point judging from everything we've seen.

But of course you also say that he's waiting to see what happens because he can always save Jon when he absolutely has to use his powers in the most visible way possible. The logic of this argument is going to new lows.

Never said it was a give, I said it was a possibility and the specific reason Jon initially told him to stay back.
Like I said, hindsight is 20...

That could just as well just be Jon's protective "man of the family" mentality. If he thought that Clark would have to use powers to get the dog, then why would he go back for it? A dog is very important but the limit does come where a normal person is likely to die to save it.

Nope.

Yes it is. You clearly don't know much about fighting so don't argue about it.

Again, never correlated the mma discussion the the zod fight, that was you guys. My answer to the avg punch etc was about the mma discussion.

Throwing a decent or even excellent punch is very much in the realm of possibility to an average person walking down the street with zero fight training and it's not just a matter of luck either. As I originally said. This would be proven by my taking all the average people walking down the all the streets right now(let's just take half the worlds population for arguments sake) 4billion. Have them one by one, step in to a lab recording studio and have all 4 billion of these people attempt to throw their best punch. This experiment would of course continue until each of these 4 billion people either died or infact achieved said goal.
If you think none of these 4 billion "average" people would ever achieve the act of "throwing an excellent punch" by traditional definition....
In can tell you right now you'd be wrong. Again a discussion on impossibility and you are still talking in absolutes. But that's all beside the point.

Your definition of "average" is very weird and you still have no standards for what an excellent punch is. As I said, a lot of guys competing in the UFC can't throw excellent punches.

In answering my question of if you stand by the statement "there was no doubt that Jor-El was just flat out better than Zod though". I firmly disagree.
I don't think Jor is or was flat out better at anything. Homefield and weapon advantage aside, Jor looked to have slightly edged out the victory that day. Unless you are also of without the same doubt that Jor was flat out better to such a degree that he would for certain handle zod 10 out of 10 times in a fair winner take all fight? That's what you are asserting from that less than a minute exchange. Kind of odd for a mma fight fan to draw anything from 1 minute battle between old friends with weapons, one of which having his baby in the room.

"flat out better"

Homefield? That one made me laugh. They don't have any weapons at all at the point when Zod starts getting beaten up badly. Zod was the one initiating the unarmed fight while Jor was the one trying to shoot people.

And yes, Jor was absolutely dominating Zod. He was blocking all of his strikes and landing pretty much all of his own, resulting in Zod being beaten down to the point where he stops fighting (therefor giving up). That's about as sound of a victory as you can get. In a script, where you have a villain to build up, you really need to be careful with every message you send.

This asserts that zod wasn't at all trying to win and that his spoken threat was empty in all ways other than to motivate Clark. Learning to fly and all that fun stuff...
We'll have to disagree on this as well.

It could be a case of him trying to get revenge but ultimately not having anything left in his heart.

As I said, if he just tries to win with full conviction he should most likely win (again, ignoring the fact that Zod actually doesn't seem to be particularly competent at the time the movie takes place). They even make a point out of that Clark fights poorly.


What you write in the post afterwards, that Jor-El seems to be a well trained soldier and might have a gift for fighting, is pretty much the entire point that's being made here. The movie does an absolutely ****** job of portraying the extremely locked society Krypton is said to be. If Jor-El is the product of thousands of years of genetic manipulation to be a scientist he'd mainly just have such traits.

That's the reason why we humans aren't nearly as strong as earlier stages of our evolution, because we don't need anymore. On Krypton evolution is controlled so they can create perfect people for each role in society, as no one supposedly can strive to be anything other than they were meant to be. The whole thing is just a diffuse mess.

 

[Marvin]

Since I have a little time ...
The Jesus metaphor in the film did not work for me. It may have worked for some people, maybe some very religious christians who have a different worldview, but it struck me superficial. I will list out some complaints. The first five are minor complaints, and I don't think they would matter at all if the Jesus allegory was well-integrated.

That's a whole hell of a lot different than you phrased it before. I personally would not argue with this.

1) It's disrespectful of Siegel and Shuster and the source material. They were Jews, and Superman was originally a (soft?) metaphor for Moses.
2) It's a reminder of the painful memory of Superman Returns. Therefore it makes the movie start a little behind since it brings back sour feelings.
3) It leads to a consumption of precious screen time that serves little other purpose. For example, there now needs to be a line telling us Clark is 33 years old, and there needs to be a scene in a church. Would that be in there without Goyer trying to force Superman-as-Jesus? Extremely unlikely. The church scene in particular was kind of dumb, why would he go ask a random priest how to deal with Zod? why not ask Jor-El?
4) It feels like fan-service to fans of Jesus. It doesn't feel genuine, it's as though Goyer is making a Jesus metaphor simply to appeal to a different market.
5) It's not organically integrated into the plot. Clark is 33 years old because that makes for a more apt Jesus allegory, rather than the other way around. The fact is the exact same movie could work if Clark was 26, nobody would notice, in fact that might even be better. A decade of drifting is ridiculous.

One and two strike me as sarcasm(not sure).

-Three, Clark didn't ask the priest "how to deal with zod". He asked a human that represents humanity for advice on a moral decision of great importance and sacrifice. I'm sure had he asked his alien robot father the same thing that would have done wonders for your rant about JorEl the superhero.
-Four, I've never seen even a failed christian allusion referred to as "fan service". First time for everything I guess.
-Five, a decade of trying to find your place in the world is obscure to anyone that isn't familiar with the current social behaviour studies. A great deal of people, especially in the west have no idea what to do with their lives until they are in their 30's. This is organically amplified when faced with a tragedy fueled catalyst and literally being someone whose decisions can change the world for the better or worse.

but that's my opinion, nothing more.

Most importantly,

It is implemented superficially. Goyer completely ignored the historical context of Jesus. Jesus of Nazareth works in the Judea of ~20 AD, he wouldn't work in the same way in the America of 2013 as presented by Goyer. When Jesus emerged as a popular figure in Judea, there was a huge amount of unrest and dissatisfaction in the land due to oppression from the Roman Empire. It's historically spectacular that this Roman province (Judea) had not one but two bloody rebellions against the Roman Empire, in 66-73 AD and 132-135 AD, no other province did this. These rebellions were taken seriously by the empire, the first general to siege Judea (Vespasian) became Emperor, and the second general to do so (Titus) also became Emperor. When the rebellion was over they built the Arch of Titus in Rome to celebrate, and you can still find the Arch in Rome. It was a big deal.

The Roman empire was preventing the citizens of Judea from being good Jews -- it was very eager to assimilate away a 1200 year old culture that had enough vitality to last another 2000 years and counting -- and it was taxing the people heavily. There was a huge amount of unrest. The people were looking for a saviour, and indeed they did get saviours previously, against the Greeks and the Persians and the Assyrians.

That's why it makes sense for someone like Jesus to emerge, from nowhere, and to acquire a significant degree of popularity in spite of being at odds with several powerful groups. The people were craving a different ideology, because they knew the system wasn't working for them, he was offering them something else and became popular. This inevitably leads to the authorities assassinating Jesus, as he was a threat. His impact continued. Within the next 250 years, 10% of the Roman Empire had converted to Christianity (wow). Soon after that, the Emperor himself converted. You don't get such a spectacular historical achievement from mundane historical conditions, you get them from links that are deeply rooted and long simmering.

None of this or anything like it in the movie, and it could have been. They have a cardboard cutout of Jesus without mimicking any of the historical conditions that made Jesus relevant. The demand for Superman in the movie's world, if there is one, emerges from the spontaneous and random historical event of Zod's invasion. It is not rooted in some long-simmering sociological malaise, say for example if Superman saw a world suffering from cynicism and despair and that was in need of a symbol of hope, and slowly accrued popularity, one disciple at a time, one miracle at a time, rather than through a big show in downtown metropolis. They could have done that, they did have Maximus-El (the holy ghost) deliver a speech about Kal-El guiding humanity into the light, but they didn't really do it.

Thanks for the (biblical)history lesson but I'm afraid that's not how allegory and or metaphor need be enacted to be effective(imo).
Example: Superman has been seen as a judeo christian allegory for the past 30 years at least, and he has done so without meeting your very specific stipulations as mentioned above. How is that? Because it's not about replicating political unrest or a walking "card board cut out" as you put it. It's about alluding to basic concepts, idea and through lines. You get basic allusions such as self sacrificing idealism and more literal concepts such as emerging from a small town or being sent to earth from the heavens by an all knowing father type...

You then started talking about political unrest and a tribalism fueled war of antiquity then accuse goyer of failing as if he's setting out to adapt the new testament.

The point is you are being too specific and or slavish in your requirement for allegory. When the original creators infused the Moses allegory they did so on a basic level. Such as a family sending a baby up a stream to be escape genocide only to climb up a mountain and embrace his greater destiny when he became of age(all present btw, as is the hebrew meaning of Kal-El). However if I were to apply your same stipulation based critical approach here I would then beg the question: So who did Jerry&Jo use to represent the higher class guilty Egyptian family the son was indoctrinated into but later rejects? Where is the political unrest or greater themes of slavery in Action Comics #1? And the conversation would end there. Until a Marvin type responded as such.

It is for this reason that the first Hunger Games movie and the first Matrix movie make a better Jesus allegory than Man of Steel.

No, it's for those reasons that those two properties allude to christian allegory in different ways than Man of Steel. For example at what point did the Hunger or Matrix films achieve the "crucial" aspect of god sending his only begotten son to earth?(this is me doing the replicating your stipulation approach)

Like I said, different.

 

[TheBat812]

Mjolnir - You know that evolution takes much longer than thousands of years right? Nor does it mean you lose every ability you're not using primarily. Just because certainly families were chosen to do specific lines of work doesn't man they're incapable of everything else. It means they showed a gift and inclination in a certain area and maintained that focus to be the best they could be in it. Pretty much an extreme version of how it always worked in human society before industrialization. You'd learn the craft of your father and continue the legacy. Here they're amplifying those strengths genetically, but not getting rid of every other potential ability.

 

[Mjölnir]

Mjolnir - You know that evolution takes much longer than thousands of years right? Nor does it mean you lose every ability you're not using primarily. Just because certainly families were chosen to do specific lines of work doesn't man they're incapable of everything else. It means they showed a gift and inclination in a certain area and maintained that focus to be the best they could be in it. Pretty much an extreme version of how it always worked in human society before industrialization. You'd learn the craft of your father and continue the legacy. Here they're amplifying those strengths genetically, but not getting rid of every other potential ability.

There's no reason why genetic manipulation would take long time, except to perfect the technique, so I don't see any point in you mentioning that evolution takes time. You're of course wrong in that it takes thousands of years (just look at the elephants in Africa), but it's not something you can go in and affect directly in one individual like you can with genetic altering, which would be the relevant thing here.

Apart from that we're told that the system locks you into one field and you can never aspire to be something else (the fact that it required a natural born to break it should mean that it's the genetic altering that does this) it's also inefficient to create a scientist in the same way that you create a warrior. The scientist's body should be focused on not requiring lots of energy, so the person can direct more of it to the parts of him that will be relevant in his field. It's such mediocre thinking to accept that something so powerful as genetic manipulation over thousands of years doesn't amount to much more than than what society structure did here on Earth.

The whole thing is an interesting concept that wasn't thought through enough to be interesting in practice. That goes for most of the writing and design of Krypton though. Things that might look good at first glance but then you see the flaws if you actually stop to think.

 

[TheBat812]

there's not enough evidence to validate your claim that they would actually get rid of certain traits that could be applied elsewhere. All they say is that they're genetically engineered to be good at a specific task. I don't remember them ever saying they're engineered to be good at ONLY one thing. I could be wrong though, haven't seen it in awhile.

To me it was always more of a case of Clark would be the first allowed to be whatever he wanted because of the natural birth, not the first capable.

 

[Marvin]

If you knew that, why do you write things that Petey was the only witness? Are you hoping that I'm missing stuff so you can deceive me?
And you also seem to conveniently keep forgetting the nature of the divine intervention. Manifestation of wounds that refer to the mistreatment of Christ is quite a bit different from giving someone the power to save innocent children.

No, I was hoping you wouldn't grasp at another obvious branch simply to respond. You said she if she was scared she wouldn't bring her son. I said but he's her only witness so it makes sense she would bring him, in spite of being scared. I figured I wouldn't have to explain why she brought her son whom she has power of attorney over, is responsible for and has immediate access to, when I said "her only witness". I suppose if I had said "well she had to bring a witness" that might have avoided this whole thing, but again, I figured my intent was clear. She brought HER son cause HE'S the one that told her the story and when going to accuse the kents of something as fantastical as she does, she wasn't to bring A first hand witness.

And no, I'm being factual, the subjective opinions were taking us in circles so I decided to address the issue head on. We were arguing how people respond to Gods Manifestation on our earthly plane, "Providence". I'm gave you an example in that clip. The man is met with a messenger of god, literally transcribing the word of god and instead of automatic joyous celebrate he has anxiety towards something he doesn't understand.
What you seem to want to do now is shift the discussion over to is the specifics of each act. I'm sure you know where that will lead.

You're going on so much about him thinking about not exposing himself, yet you think that he avoids acting when he could do it by normal means because he could easily do it afterwards by exposing himself. Not very logical.

I've repeated my point about why he's not using his powers many times, and you still haven't gotten it? I said that I don't think he does that because his conclusion is idiotic. I'd rather believe that the movie keeps on with it's plot controlled super senses than that it writes Clark as the biggest moron in the country.

It appears you would rather deem a character idiotic than rationalize the situation any other way. You say he could have saved his father by normal means, yet you can't in fact prove that clark thought that. So instead we find ourselves ignoring what the script shows us and calling calling it a bad decision from our perspective. I got news for you, Superheroes make a lot of calls that you with your audience insight believe or even know to be wrong based on audience insight(especially Parker). Doesn't make them or their scripts stupid. It makes them human.

-Yes MAYBE he could have gotten to his father when Jon was MAYBE stuck and gotten him back WITHOUT MAYBE exposing himself, but unless you can prove that clark didn't doubt this absolute reality than the script and character motivation is sound. Whether you think him stupid and over cautious or not. And plz don't restate that his father's life is on the line cause it will just lead to me restating the greater stakes in the characters head. But fine, call him stupid, I'm sure you would have raced in and everything would have turned out perfect, I don't doubt it. I do doubt your ability to understand how character motivation works however. In this instance anyways.

How? Clark has his powers under control at that point judging from everything we've seen.

But of course you also say that he's waiting to see what happens because he can always save Jon when he absolutely has to use his powers in the most visible way possible. The logic of this argument is going to new lows.

I never said he didn't have control of his powers. I said he didn't have control of whether he'd have to use them or not not. ie what happens if another car falls on them when they are inside? This is a possibility no?
The only lows here are our ability to communicate it seems.

That could just as well just be Jon's protective "man of the family" mentality. If he thought that Clark would have to use powers to get the dog, then why would he go back for it? A dog is very important but the limit does come where a normal person is likely to die to save it.

Good, we're finally talking about Jon again. Simple answer, Jon would rather die than let clark expose himself. As proven. And again, he thought clark might....might have to use his powers. As he wants Clark away from controversy and calamity. It might be risky but he'd take the risk over that other possibility. Again this character motivation is confirmed later.

Yes it is. You clearly don't know much about fighting so don't argue about it.

You said this "My example is one where one guy had skill and the other had all the other advantages (very significant as well, as he's a lot bigger). Skill is the biggest factor in a fight"
I counter with this

Spoiler

What do you define as the biggest factor in a fight? I answer with it's not skill. That requires a level of all other things being equal. I believe the most "significant" factor is advantage and resource.

I also respond to your assertion that I know nothing about fights with a pensive yet deliberate: That's nice. Luckily this discussion requires brains, so I appear to have a fighting chance.

Your definition of "average" is very weird and you still have no standards for what an excellent punch is. As I said, a lot of guys competing in the UFC can't throw excellent punches.

No my definition of average as it pertains to the initial discussion is accurate. An average man walking down the street. And not a trained fighter. Your words: "LOL, just stop it. The average person does not throw an excellent punch. You clearly have no standards. If you still find my statement and it's explanation funny at this point I suppose we'll have to disagree. I personally think you let ego get in the way of the way your read my statements.

Also, that's nice that alot of ufc guys can't throw excellent punches, makes sense it's not boxing. Not sure what that has to do with anything.

Homefield? That one made me laugh. They don't have any weapons at all at the point when Zod starts getting beaten up badly. Zod was the one initiating the unarmed fight while Jor was the one trying to shoot people.

Jor had a laser and Zod had a arm mounted short sword at the start of that battle. Both men have weapons, both men are armed and both men use those arms!
Zod spends a portion of the fight "un-arming" Jor. And the only reason the fight ends is because Jor regains his arms. The only reason Zod wins the conflict is due to being armed and deciding it has to end. Armed combat is very different then Greco roman style combat. The mere fact that zod fights with a dagger in hand changes everything. Was he holding back and how did that affect him? Was he picking his moment and did that play into baiting in the enemy on a tactical level? All questions worth looking into before you procliam that one guy is flat out better than the other based on a 40 second fight.
Again I'm being pragmatic here seeing as our opinions are taking us around in circles.

And yes they are fighting in Jor's house. Not sure what you define home field as. Lastly you seem to be overlooking the simple evidence that throughout that entire prelude, zod never thought Jor beyond reasoning. Jor however had ultimate conviction in what he was to do from the start, Zod changed after Lara pushed the button. Still, that's just implied exposition...means very little in this thread

 

[Marvin]

What you write in the post afterwards, that Jor-El seems to be a well trained soldier and might have a gift for fighting, is pretty much the entire point that's being made here. The movie does an absolutely ****** job of portraying the extremely locked society Krypton is said to be. If Jor-El is the product of thousands of years of genetic manipulation to be a scientist he'd mainly just have such traits.

That's the reason why we humans aren't nearly as strong as earlier stages of our evolution, because we don't need anymore. On Krypton evolution is controlled so they can create perfect people for each role in society, as no one supposedly can strive to be anything other than they were meant to be. The whole thing is just a diffuse mess.

So because Jor is a skilled fighter the movie than does an "absolutely ****** job..."
Sorry but that would require a lot more than just one instance of an extremely motivated anarchist with an undisclosed history holding his own in one instance of physical conflict.

Moreover, the film never explicitly said the society was extremely locked, again that's you. You heard a few words then deemed your own strawman based on your rationalizing of the information you got. The concept fell short of the thing you misinterpreted it to be.

I mean where are you getting this "jor was the product of a thousand years of genetic manipulation" stuff?
And yes I'm being pragmatic again.

 

[Mjölnir]

there's not enough evidence to validate your claim that they would actually get rid of certain traits that could be applied elsewhere. All they say is that they're genetically engineered to be good at a specific task. I don't remember them ever saying they're engineered to be good at ONLY one thing. I could be wrong though, haven't seen it in awhile.

To me it was always more of a case of Clark would be the first allowed to be whatever he wanted because of the natural birth, not the first capable.

It just seems like extremely bad genetic engineering if they can't make their soldiers superior to the rest of the population. Genetic engineering is something that would be a lot more powerful than having a natural athlete and juicing him up with steroids and hormones (for athleticism, used as the example as that's really the only thing we can affect well).

You're of course free to judge things as you want but I think that cheapens the importance of a natural born baby, when Jor-El could just have taken any child and sent him away. It also makes it very hard to explain why Jor and Lara couldn't go with him, as they clearly showed that they could break the cultural bonds of Krypton.

 

[Tempest]

It just seems like extremely bad genetic engineering if they can't make their soldiers superior to the rest of the population. Genetic engineering is something that would be a lot more powerful than having a natural athlete and juicing him up with steroids and hormones (for athleticism, used as the example as that's really the only thing we can affect well).

You're of course free to judge things as you want but I think that cheapens the importance of a natural born baby, when Jor-El could just have taken any child and sent him away. It also makes it very hard to explain why Jor and Lara couldn't go with him, as they clearly showed that they could break the cultural bonds of Krypton.

Two things:

1. What Jor-El says is that everyone has their status in Kryptonian society chosen for them. Their genes are modified to suit their specific tasks, but the genetics don't entirely wipe out free will.

So a scientist who is intelligent could also learn to be a fighter, and a warrior could, if he wanted, learn to be a farmer. Whether they would have been allowed to pursue such options was probably not entirely allowed, unless the circumstances called for it (like a warrior being crippled and needing a new purpose, or a scientist was needed on a ship of warriors while investigating a dangerous area).

2. The natural born baby is completely free of genetic modification. Granted, Clark is very lucky with his genetic makeup, considering that his parents are both products of some fine genetic engineering, but as far as his DNA goes, he was not manipulated into a particular job or status.

So no, Jor-El couldn't have just chosen one random child, because their genetic makeup would have driven them in a certain way, depending on what class they had come from.

Absolute free will was what Jor-El was after.

The reason, I believe he did not go with Clark is probably two-fold. One he states quite clearly in the movie; he and Lara were of the Old Krypton. They were basically choosing death for all their fellow Kryptonians. They were rebelling against the old ways, but they were also repulsed by the idea of choosing bloodlines. By their deaths, they were ensuring an absolute, clean break of the old Kryptonian ways.

Also, I believe that because of this decision, Jor-El and Lara would have both felt that it would have been the height of hypocracy for them to leave the planet.

 

[Mjölnir]

No, I was hoping you wouldn't grasp at another obvious branch simply to respond. You said she if she was scared she wouldn't bring her son. I said but he's her only witness so it makes sense she would bring him, in spite of being scared. I figured I wouldn't have to explain why she brought her son whom she has power of attorney over, is responsible for and has immediate access to, when I said "her only witness". I suppose if I had said "well she had to bring a witness" that might have avoided this whole thing, but again, I figured my intent was clear. She brought HER son cause HE'S the one that told her the story and when going to accuse the kents of something as fantastical as she does, she wasn't to bring A first hand witness.

And no, I'm being factual, the subjective opinions were taking us in circles so I decided to address the issue head on. We were arguing how people respond to Gods Manifestation on our earthly plane, "Providence". I'm gave you an example in that clip. The man is met with a messenger of god, literally transcribing the word of god and instead of automatic joyous celebrate he has anxiety towards something he doesn't understand.
What you seem to want to do now is shift the discussion over to is the specifics of each act. I'm sure you know where that will lead.

Things go a lot better in discussions if you actually write what you mean. You didn't even have to write more text to get it right so it seems like nothing but an unnecessary diversion.

She doesn't have to bring him. It's not like no one's going to believe her on the basis that they don't hear it from the child itself. Children don't have more credibility than adults.

I 've mentioned that it was a positive act more than once before, so don't act like it's something new. Had there been something terrible, like if Clark had gotten mad and destroyed something without meaning to, then I would certainly buy that people are afraid. Not now though.

It appears you would rather deem a character idiotic than rationalize the situation any other way. You say he could have saved his father by normal means, yet you can't in fact prove that clark thought that. So instead we find ourselves ignoring what the script shows us and calling calling it a bad decision from our perspective. I got news for you, Superheroes make a lot of calls that you with your audience insight believe or even know to be wrong based on audience insight(especially Parker). Doesn't make them or their scripts stupid. It makes them human.

-Yes MAYBE he could have gotten to his father when Jon was MAYBE stuck and gotten him back WITHOUT MAYBE exposing himself, but unless you can prove that clark didn't doubt this absolute reality than the script and character motivation is sound. Whether you think him stupid and over cautious or not. And plz don't restate that his father's life is on the line cause it will just lead to me restating the greater stakes in the characters head. But fine, call him stupid, I'm sure you would have raced in and everything would have turned out perfect, I don't doubt it. I do doubt your ability to understand how character motivation works however. In this instance anyways.

Maybe is enough. It's about trying, not about succeeding. You know that since I've said it several times.

If he's worried about exposing himself, take the chance when you might not have to. As you say yourself, he was willing to use his powers to save his father but it makes no sense to wait until it's 100% that he would have to if he doesn't want anyone to see what he can do.

I never said he didn't have control of his powers. I said he didn't have control of whether he'd have to use them or not not. ie what happens if another car falls on them when they are inside? This is a possibility no?
The only lows here are our ability to communicate it seems.

Again, better to try when it's not certain that he has to expose himself. You said that he was waiting until he would absolutely have to save Jon (although I maintain that he was in mortal danger as soon as he was stuck), which also means that he waits until he absolutely has to use his powers.

Good, we're finally talking about Jon again. Simple answer, Jon would rather die than let clark expose himself. As proven. And again, he thought clark might....might have to use his powers. As he wants Clark away from controversy and calamity. It might be risky but he'd take the risk over that other possibility. Again this character motivation is confirmed later.

That doesn't seem like the choice he makes at that point. If the dog was so important that he would die for it (the likely scenario if he expects that Clark has to use his powers to save it) there's no way he'd forget it to begin with. Then it's like forgetting your child.

You said this "My example is one where one guy had skill and the other had all the other advantages (very significant as well, as he's a lot bigger). Skill is the biggest factor in a fight"
I counter with this

Spoiler

What do you define as the biggest factor in a fight? I answer with it's not skill. That requires a level of all other things being equal. I believe the most "significant" factor is advantage and resource.

That has to be one of the dumbest retorts I've ever seen.

No my definition of average as it pertains to the initial discussion is accurate. An average man walking down the street. And not a trained fighter. Your words: "LOL, just stop it. The average person does not throw an excellent punch. You clearly have no standards. If you still find my statement and it's explanation funny at this point I suppose we'll have to disagree. I personally think you let ego get in the way of the way your read my statements.

Also, that's nice that alot of ufc guys can't throw excellent punches, makes sense it's not boxing. Not sure what that has to do with anything.

If an average joe can throw an excellent punch, how do you find words to describe those that actually throw excellent punches? Those that have both the talent and have put in the years of hard work?

I've taught plenty in martial arts. New people always look bad by educated standards, regardless if it's a little nerd or a tough guy that's been fighting on the street.

But since you don't want to tie this to what's happening in the movie there's not really any point in discussing it in a thread that's about a script writer.

Jor had a laser and Zod had a arm mounted short sword at the start of that battle. Both men have weapons, both men are armed and both men use those arms!
Zod spends a portion of the fight "un-arming" Jor. And the only reason the fight ends is because Jor regains his arms. The only reason Zod wins the conflict is due to being armed and deciding it has to end. Armed combat is very different then Greco roman style combat. The mere fact that zod fights with a dagger in hand changes everything. Was he holding back and how did that affect him? Was he picking his moment and did that play into baiting in the enemy on a tactical level? All questions worth looking into before you procliam that one guy is flat out better than the other based on a 40 second fight.
Again I'm being pragmatic here seeing as our opinions are taking us around in circles.

And yes they are fighting in Jor's house. Not sure what you define home field as. Lastly you seem to be overlooking the simple evidence that throughout that entire prelude, zod never thought Jor beyond reasoning. Jor however had ultimate conviction in what he was to do from the start, Zod changed after Lara pushed the button. Still, that's just implied exposition...means very little in this thread

The part where Zod tries to disarm Jor isn't my big problem, although it doesn't help Zod come off as great either.

It's what happens after that, when they start to fight on even terms. Zod gets his ass handed to him. Zod tries to hit Jor but is completely ineffective while Jor hits Zod 10+ times before Zod's knocked down and stops fighting because he's hurt. When Zod just lays there Jor calmly picks up his weapon again. I don't see any circumstances shown by the movie that makes me buy that Zod is as bad as he is.

Home field advantage comes not only from being used to the field (in sports where they can differ), it's through home crowd, having an easier time to get to the game, you have your own locker room etc. As I doubt Jor-El spends his days trying to learn how to fight in his lab (or whatever the room is supposed to be) I don't see how anything applies.

Why would it matter that he doesn't think Jor is beyond reasoning? He doesn't have to kill Jor, just beat him down and arrest him for stealing the codex and being a heretic. Just like Jor did fairly easily with him.

But all of this is just details. The issue is about the choices in the writing. About telling and not showing. They have chances to show why it's important that Kal-El is natural born, the have chances to show why Zod is a villain to fear, etc. I think the script at every point of those cases is either weak or even contradictory.

So because Jor is a skilled fighter the movie than does an "absolutely ****** job..."
Sorry but that would require a lot more than just one instance of an extremely motivated anarchist with an undisclosed history holding his own in one instance of physical conflict.

Moreover, the film never explicitly said the society was extremely locked, again that's you. You heard a few words then deemed your own strawman based on your rationalizing of the information you got. The concept fell short of the thing you misinterpreted it to be.

I mean where are you getting this "jor was the product of a thousand years of genetic manipulation" stuff?
And yes I'm being pragmatic again.

No, that's just one thing.

The movie says that every child is predesigned to fulfill a certain role and that Krypton lost something because there was no possibility of choice. It clearly links it to the genetic design, not due to cultural pressure. But of course a person actually being genetically designed for one thing, with no choice to do anything else, isn't locked...

Writing "thousands of years" was me getting a bit mixed up. It should be "hundreds of years", which is what the movie states. Still that single piece of technology was used several times more than than our own world has even seen industry at all, let alone advanced science by our standards. And that's in a culture that had already had extremely advanced technology for over 100 000 years. If they design things I sure as hell expect it to be extremely advanced.

 

[Llama_Shepherd]

To play devil's advocate, nobody specifies how many centuries Kryptonians had been genetically modified, it could have been millennia, for example, nobody refers to the period of history following the year 2000 as the "3rd millennium" but rather the "21st century".

 

[Isearch4dope]

Two things:

1. What Jor-El says is that everyone has their status in Kryptonian society chosen for them. Their genes are modified to suit their specific tasks, but the genetics don't entirely wipe out free will.

So a scientist who is intelligent could also learn to be a fighter, and a warrior could, if he wanted, learn to be a farmer. Whether they would have been allowed to pursue such options was probably not entirely allowed, unless the circumstances called for it (like a warrior being crippled and needing a new purpose, or a scientist was needed on a ship of warriors while investigating a dangerous area).

2. The natural born baby is completely free of genetic modification. Granted, Clark is very lucky with his genetic makeup, considering that his parents are both products of some fine genetic engineering, but as far as his DNA goes, he was not manipulated into a particular job or status.

So no, Jor-El couldn't have just chosen one random child, because their genetic makeup would have driven them in a certain way, depending on what class they had come from.

Absolute free will was what Jor-El was after.

The reason, I believe he did not go with Clark is probably two-fold. One he states quite clearly in the movie; he and Lara were of the Old Krypton. They were basically choosing death for all their fellow Kryptonians. They were rebelling against the old ways, but they were also repulsed by the idea of choosing bloodlines. By their deaths, they were ensuring an absolute, clean break of the old Kryptonian ways.

Also, I believe that because of this decision, Jor-El and Lara would have both felt that it would have been the height of hypocracy for them to leave the planet.

On the money but I also have to agree with Mjolnir on the genetic manipulation aspect being weak and the entire concept not going deep enough if it was going to be of such importance to the story. With that said I absolutely hated that Jor-El could defeat Zod so handily and he is supposed to be the main threat in the movie regardless of kryptonians being able to gain knowledge in other fields on their own outside of the one they were born into. Everything else seemed highly advanced for them to not have come up with a genetic formula that would have kryptonians think twice before even thinking about picking a fight with a warrior class. What's the point of having genetically modified warriors if they can be defeated easily by a scientist who might have trained himself in combat? It's just not a dramatically pleasing scenario and it takes away from Zod's character.

I also wasn't fond of Faora, Nam-Ek and Zod being able to brush off every attack from a Superman whose been absorbing yellow sun radiation for 33 years. They were wearing breathers which means they only had strength due to absorbing the sun's radiation short-term. Them being able to leap far and possessing greater strength than a human is understood because of the gravity and external atmospheric impact on their bodies. It was also inconsistent that Superman was as weak as a human in kryptonian atmosphere that quickly (should have taken days or longer imo). When Zod mastered his senses he was only exposed for a short period of time to earth's atmosphere which still shouldn't have made his strength even close enough to 33 year old Clark's. If so then Clark's life in the sun and him adopting means very little in a story that brings up these scientific questions and seeks to make the character special. The fights were pretty enough but with no attention to physicality and not being able to hurt each other it just felt pointless and inconsequential....no sense of danger=dramatically uninteresting scenario.

 

[Marvin]

Things go a lot better in discussions if you actually write what you mean. You didn't even have to write more text to get it right so it seems like nothing but an unnecessary diversion.

She doesn't have to bring him. It's not like no one's going to believe her on the basis that they don't hear it from the child itself. Children don't have more credibility than adults.

I 've mentioned that it was a positive act more than once before, so don't act like it's something new. Had there been something terrible, like if Clark had gotten mad and destroyed something without meaning to, then I would certainly buy that people are afraid. Not now though.

You asked why she brought him if she was scared, I gave you a solid answer. Not much more I can do after that.

Well at least we are beyond the Providence is met with celebration angle. As for clark doing something good and it being met with fear and apprehension, you can read a hand full of xmen books or even watch a couple of episodes of the kids cartoon to see how simple this concept is to get behind.

Maybe is enough. It's about trying, not about succeeding. You know that since I've said it several times.

If he's worried about exposing himself, take the chance when you might not have to. As you say yourself, he was willing to use his powers to save his father but it makes no sense to wait until it's 100% that he would have to if he doesn't want anyone to see what he can do.


Again, better to try when it's not certain that he has to expose himself. You said that he was waiting until he would absolutely have to save Jon (although I maintain that he was in mortal danger as soon as he was stuck), which also means that he waits until he absolutely has to use his powers.

And as I've said several times, his plan was to let his dad extinguish his opportunity given the stakes of power exposure.
Then when it became absolutely apparent that his dad was going to die, use his powers and save the day. At the last minute he was given no go. His plan was then debunked.

You keep saying why not try when he's not certain that he has to expose himself as if he is tying to save a precious toy that has no chance of freeing itself. That's why he didn't go.
hindsight is 2...

That doesn't seem like the choice he makes at that point. If the dog was so important that he would die for it (the likely scenario if he expects that Clark has to use his powers to save it) there's no way he'd forget it to begin with. Then it's like forgetting your child.

The dog wasn't Jon, that was someone else, not involved in this circle of decision making.

That has to be one of the dumbest retorts I've ever seen.

You said skill is the most important thing in a fight. I feel I proved you wrong and I felt I needed the point to stick. If you think the worlds greatest fighter(I'm guessing that's Anderson right now) can overcome someone 60 feet tall giant of average skill 10 out of 10 times than stand by your point, if not move on.

If an average joe can throw an excellent punch, how do you find words to describe those that actually throw excellent punches? Those that have both the talent and have put in the years of hard work?

I would describe them as "A guy that can throw and excellent punch."
I'm starting to understand why you read the script a certain way. Not everyone falls into defined boxes I'm afraid.

Why would it matter that he doesn't think Jor is beyond reasoning? He doesn't have to kill Jor, just beat him down and arrest him for stealing the codex and being a heretic. Just like Jor did fairly easily with him.

It speaks to their conviction. Given you were going on about how a highly trained zod could go down to talentless Kal, I would think you'd be attuned to accept this. A trapped animal is twice as dangerous as a man looking to arrest an old friend whom himself has leverage over him(important information).

But all of this is just details. The issue is about the choices in the writing. About telling and not showing. They have chances to show why it's important that Kal-El is natural born, the have chances to show why Zod is a villain to fear, etc. I think the script at every point of those cases is either weak or even contradictory.

1. Their chance to show why clark is a natural birth doesn't hinge on Zod beating up jor.
2. There chance to show why Zod is a villain to fear doesn't hinge on on if JorEl of all people overcomes him a short struggle(in which he later is killed).
But you are free to believe the script could have made the points clearer to you had it gone another way, that's your right.

 

[Marvin]

No, that's just one thing.

The movie says that every child is predesigned to fulfill a certain role and that Krypton lost something because there was no possibility of choice. It clearly links it to the genetic design, not due to cultural pressure. But of course a person actually being genetically designed for one thing, with no choice to do anything else, isn't locked...

Writing "thousands of years" was me getting a bit mixed up. It should be "hundreds of years", which is what the movie states. Still that single piece of technology was used several times more than than our own world has even seen industry at all, let alone advanced science by our standards. And that's in a culture that had already had extremely advanced technology for over 100 000 years. If they design things I sure as hell expect it to be extremely advanced.

If it was just and undefined amount of centuries than at least I won't have to keep reading such and such thousands of years of genetic optimization to be the perfect...etc and perhaps something closer to what was actually in the film and not just in your heads.

This is what Zod says
General Zod: "I was bred to be a warrior, Kal. Trained my entire life to master my senses. Where did you train? On a farm!"
-Notice how he didn't say he was bred to master his senses, that's probably because there are somethings beyond genetics.
-Notice how many times he uses he word train? That sort of implies an element to this beyond genetics. One of societal conditioning and pressure. Hows about we now ask JorEl where he trained, ON A FARM(that's be rich).

Jor also says this "What if a child dreamed of becoming something other than what society had intended? What if a child aspired to something greater? You were the embodiment of that belief Kal"
This can suggest:
-That it is a societal pressure.
-Kal's significance laying in the representational embodiment of Jor's beliefs.

But however this is proven to you, you will seemingly go and say that it's just proof the script was weak in it's ideas. When the reality is the script simply wasn't constrained to yours.

What's interests me is that the codex appears to have the genetic codes of everyone ever to be born, transcribed already. That begs the question of when in fact, the designing actually happens and how they can specialize people for societal needs dynamically.

 

[DA_Champion]

Re: him choosing earth. There are tons of reasons he chooses earth of krypton throughout the film. He's seen the good in people as Marvin described earlier in the thread and he's also heard the huge failures of kryptonians society from jorel as well as being told he can bridge both qualities to help humanity avoid the downfalls that plagued them. Why would be choose a totally dead and failed society over one he is now responsible for (activating the beacon to lead zod there) and that he can actually be a symbol of hope for to help them?

I know the movie isn't perfect but sometimes it really feels like people didnt get the movie and then assume it was a problem with the film. It IS an issue that it was so densely packed that you'll probably miss some crucial info along the way, but that's a whole different issue than the story not actually making sense. It's structure is very similar to the tdk trilogy in that way, only difference being Snyder is not one of the best storytellersin film history like Nolan. That is why the execution of the film certainly has its flaws.

Bat812, Earth has very little to offer Kal-El. That is not my interpretation of the film, that is Zach Snyder's interpretation of the film.

“A very large part of Superman has stayed on Krypton, but he can’t leave his adopted country because if he does the whole world could be destroyed. If he steps in to save everyone, he’ll never be accepted as a normal guy. It’s not an easy choice. Because after all that sacrifice, what does humanity have to offer Clark? You have to admit, it’s not much. In one scene, a priest tells Clark to take a ‘leap of faith.’ And that’s pretty much it for Superman.

http://screenrant.com/zack-snyder-interview-man-steel-superman-metropolis-destruction/

So when some of us say that the lack of warmth and happy times for Kal-El in the movie make it look like he has no reason to save humanity, we're not just simply failing to see what Snyder and Goyer were clearly alluding to have taken place off-screen. It was the director's vision of the film that humanity should have little to offer Clark. That's what they wanted to show: that humanity has very little to offer Clark. From that perspective, it makes sense that they didn't really show a happy childhood for Clark, and that the viewer might think he hasn't had a friend in 15 years other than his mother. I'm not missing any crucial info, my interpretation is backed by the director of the film.

DA- how could Lara making the USB ghost after jorel dies make any sense? Doesn't jorel die after Clark's ship is launched? It seemed to me that jorels USB key was something he developed over months of time while Clark was in the womb and he knew kryptons destruction was imminent based on the math. You might call it selfish that he didn't include Lara, but she seemed busy with bein preggers and he seemed more interested in creatin a functioning system to assist kal rather than be fair and include both of them.

You're thinking about it too logically, as if this is an actual world with its own rules. It's not that complicated.

The USB-brain is a completely made up concept, and the rules are exactly what Goyer wants them to be. As it is, Goyer didn't explain the rules. What we have is that Jor-El sent a copy of himself but not of his wife, it simply looks mean-spirited on the part of both Goyer and Jor-El.

If we need to know about Clark's "nature", then we certainly need to know about his mother contributes half his genes, but all of his mitochondria, early immune system, and various bacteria. We don't learn much about Lara in this movie... and that's clearly because Goyer had this irrational desire to build up Jor-El as much as possible. He was the best developed character in the story, and its greatest hero, he gave the longest lines, he made the most spectacular choices, he showed the greatest smarts across several dimensions, and that's just odd for a Superman story. Superman (or Lois!) should be the most developed character.

 

[HighFivingMF]

"Yeah I trained on a farm. An ass-kicking farm. And it's harvest time!"