OK...its time.....Man of Steel vs Superman Returns

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The truth is in Spider-man, Peter Parker is a jerk when he gets his powers. A total and complete jerk. Before he gets his powers, he's just a poor, bullied, nerdy teenager. He wasn't popular and never got the girl. Then he gets these powers, and the first thing he starts doing is striking back at those who tormented him. He's getting the revenge all nerdy kids would love to get on the jocks and bullies. That's part of his character arc. But along the way (and through tragedy) then he learns "with great power comes great responsibility", and that's the theme of his life from then on.
 
Yes, in the original Steve Ditko stories, Peter was bitter and angry at the world. He didn't think that the world gave him anything, so he didn't have to give it anything back. Then Uncle Ben died and things changed. Garfield got that aspects down pat.
 
I feel BB made Bruce a more compelling character you could get behind and understand as opposed to MOS with Clark. I still like MOS but just don't feel it can compare to BB. Perhaps there needed to be better emotional scenes, for me JK dying and Clark talking to his mom about his origins fell flat, it felt like lip service and not real emotional like Thomas going into the cave to save Bruce or Gordon meeting young Bruce and comforting him.
As for ASM I didnt always like Peter in that movie, he came off like a jerk sometimes especially after he got his powers.

I actually liked MOS much more than BB. The emotional beats all hit much harder for me in the former. Even on the third viewing of MOS, I still got choked up at multiple points (the scene in the school with Martha, the parts when young Clark bullied, Jonathan's death).

With BB, though, I never really felt that much emotional connection even when I was supposed to. I guess in that regard, I feel the same way about BB that you do towards MOS.

Even some of the most emotional parts of BB, such as the killing of Thomas and Martha Wayne, seemed more like Nolan just hitting the expected beats. They just didn't "grab" me the way the scenes in MOS did. Did Martha Wayne even have any lines in that movie? The guy who played Thomas Wayne did well enough, but I never felt anywhere near the connection with him that I did with Crowe's Jor-El or Costner's Jonathan Kent. Funnily enough, Thomas came off more like the idealized father figure, whereas Jor-El and Jonathan seemed like real people.

Andrew Garfield was a better Spider-Man than Tobey Maguire due to his quips and smartass attitude, and a better "post-powers" Peter Parker (i.e. a bit cooler and more sure of himself rather than a total dweeb), but I never felt anywhere near the connection with Garfield's version that I did with Maguire. I think a big part of that is just that I'm older now, whereas when the Raimi trilogy first came out I was still in high school and could better identify with a young Peter Parker. Also, Andrew Garfield is too good-looking to really be a believable nerd and social outcast.
 
You don't think good-looking people can be social outcasts (you should visit my old high school, or college for that matter). Peter was an outcast because he had trouble interacting with people because of what happened when he was a child. Also, one of my problem's with Tobey is that his character never really grew or evolved (more the scripts fault than his). SM 2 was supposed to be about him putting his past behind him and become stronger and more confident. Then we got SM 3 and those same problems came back AGAIN and he got all mopey again, negating the character arc for the second film (god I hate SM 3). I thing BB and MOS both did a good job on the character front. Bruce's philosophy on life being so tied to his dad made sense to me. Likewise, Clark's struggles with fitting in also worked.
 
In my opinion, SR was a case of "too little, too late." Had it come out during the Burton Batman years, it may have had better success. Whether the movie is better or not than MOS is (as has been said many a time on this forum) subjective, MOS was at least financially successful enough to give us a sequel (something SR didn't deliver on, even though that's what Singer hoped for).

People can say SR was trying to be more than just a popcorn flick, which I agree, and at the time I appreciated the approach and eagerly awaited the result, but the thing is I don't see the Citizen Kane of superhero movies when I watch it. I simply see a sincere but badly-executed plan to show audiences why he's the greatest.

Bryan Singer didn't do for Superman what he did for the X-Men. He and his writers were too love-struck over the past to leave it behind. Coming out one year after Batman Begins only made it worse.

I don't want to see bow-tie Jimmy. I don't want to see Christopher Reeve emulated. I want a different, modern and fresh take on the mythos. SR was a movie that unsuccessfully tried to be something it shouldn't have been. In the 90's maybe, not in this climate. Superman deserved more.
 
In my opinion, SR was a case of "too little, too late." Had it come out during the Burton Batman years, it may have had better success. Whether the movie is better or not than MOS is (as has been said many a time on this forum) subjective, MOS was at least financially successful enough to give us a sequel (something SR didn't deliver on, even though that's what Singer hoped for).

People can say SR was trying to be more than just a popcorn flick, which I agree, and at the time I appreciated the approach and eagerly awaited the result, but the thing is I don't see the Citizen Kane of superhero movies when I watch it. I simply see a sincere but badly-executed plan to show audiences why he's the greatest.

Bryan Singer didn't do for Superman what he did for the X-Men. He and his writers were too love-struck over the past to leave it behind. Coming out one year after Batman Begins only made it worse.

I don't want to see bow-tie Jimmy. I don't want to see Christopher Reeve emulated. I want a different, modern and fresh take on the mythos. SR was a movie that unsuccessfully tried to be something it shouldn't have been. In the 90's maybe, not in this climate. Superman deserved more.

I can't help but agree with this. SR suffered from timing as much as any flaws it had in its story. Since 2000, the CBM genre turned a corner with the release of X-Men, and after 6 years of X-Men films, Spider-Man films, along with other superhero movies, SR was coming in at a time where CBMs were expected to be chockfull of action and story, not just story. As well-designed and well crafted as SR was, it didn't resonate with audience who wanted to see a dynamic Superman doing serious work to a villain. It just left audiences bored.
 
Lot of praise on X-men here which IMO was a terrible movie as all have been to date. The comicy feel of x-men just doesn't resonate in today's movie landscape, it's just mid-par special effects without any decent character development. I'll grant that in First Class, Eric's story was told well enough, except I didn't really connect with his crossover from being vengeful against Nazi's to teaming with other mutants.
SR suffered from Snyder's love affair with the past and he still hasn't realised that people want to see grounded movies, a case of "if this could happen what would it be like in today's world?"
I fear for any CBM movie he is touching.

One of the great things about MOS is that each viewing is more emotional. After the first view just staring in wonder at what I just saw and not really understanding it, each subsequent view the story generates more emotional response. Amazing.
 
The first X-Men was a good movie. People seem to forget that the movie came out in 2000, the only successful SH movie recently was Blade. Studios didn't think the outlandish things from the comics would work (B&R, Superman IV, etc). Today, in 2013, we know that's not the case. But it's not fair to judge a movie made 13 years ago by today's standards. The movie got the main theme of X-Men right (hatred and intolerance). It had great acting (Stewart, McKellen, Jackman, etc). It actually had a small budget compared to today's CB movies, so the special effects were good given what they had to work with. It was good, but X2 was fantastic, one of my favorites.
 
Xmen was another movie that had a story that was quite shallow bu it was still great entertainment and introduced us to the story and main conflict. It's no X2 or TDK but it is more than acceptable. One thing that Xmen had that SR didn't have was a charismatic character that made audiences take a liking to him. Apparently such a liking that 14yrs later they still haven't found anyone better.
 
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The first X-Men was a good movie. People seem to forget that the movie came out in 2000, the only successful SH movie recently was Blade. Studios didn't think the outlandish things from the comics would work (B&R, Superman IV, etc). Today, in 2013, we know that's not the case. But it's not fair to judge a movie made 13 years ago by today's standards. The movie got the main theme of X-Men right (hatred and intolerance). It had great acting (Stewart, McKellen, Jackman, etc). It actually had a small budget compared to today's CB movies, so the special effects were good given what they had to work with. It was good, but X2 was fantastic, one of my favorites.
Of The two X Men films directed by Bryan Singer,
The original was my favorite .
 
I can't help but agree with this. SR suffered from timing as much as any flaws it had in its story. Since 2000, the CBM genre turned a corner with the release of X-Men, and after 6 years of X-Men films, Spider-Man films, along with other superhero movies, SR was coming in at a time where CBMs were expected to be chockfull of action and story, not just story. As well-designed and well crafted as SR was, it didn't resonate with audience who wanted to see a dynamic Superman doing serious work to a villain. It just left audiences bored.

Superman Returns should have been made in the 90s, the late 90s specifically.
If it had been made in the 80s, people would get even more mad at the backlash. Post X2, Batman-Begins, and Spider-Man 2, Superman Returns felt simplistic and dated, and that was at the time of release. Now with game changing films like TDK, Iron Man, and The Avengers, SR feels like a majorly missed opportunity.
 
Superman Returns should have been made in the 90s, the late 90s specifically.
If it had been made in the 80s, people would get even more mad at the backlash. Post X2, Batman-Begins, and Spider-Man 2, Superman Returns felt simplistic and dated, and that was at the time of release. Now with game changing films like TDK, Iron Man, and The Avengers, SR feels like a majorly missed opportunity.

I think it was a missed opportunity. I actually don't mind the continuance of Donnerverse so much as I minded the lack of intensity in the story and the cartoon villain plot of Luthor. But like I said, everything was well drawn, all characters had motivations, the acting was fine, the story had enough conflict. I liked SR, but didn't love it, same with MOS.

MOS needed to have what SR had. Motivation for the main character, conflict from the villain, how decisions affected other decisions which affected the outcome of the story. Oh, and a less moping around hero would have been great.

Still liked MOS though, 7/10, great fun and all....but not a well told story. Were it not for the special effects, the epic fighting and great acting, the movie would have been a disaster as the story was convoluted and messy.
 
I think that X-Men suffered from the fact that the only successful comic book movie in the years prior to it's release was Blade, which wasn't marketed as a comic book film. The rest had been disasters. Singer was given a pretty low budget for a superhero film (especially considering that ALL of the X-Men have powers). He was also under time restraints and wasn't sure if the public would buy into the premise (all of the straight CB films in the late 1990's failed miserably). It's actually quite an accomplishment that the movie succeeded at all. With X2, Singer was given more money and creative freedom to tell the story he wanted. X2 is the movie that most got the themes of the X-Men correct (the entire movie was about fear and intolerance) in the form of both Magneto and Stryker, and to a lesser extent the US President. A bigoted human trying to exterminate every mutant on the planet is something that has happened in the comics quite frequently.
 
I think that X-Men suffered from the fact that the only successful comic book movie in the years prior to it's release was Blade, which wasn't marketed as a comic book film. The rest had been disasters. Singer was given a pretty low budget for a superhero film (especially considering that ALL of the X-Men have powers). He was also under time restraints and wasn't sure if the public would buy into the premise (all of the straight CB films in the late 1990's failed miserably). It's actually quite an accomplishment that the movie succeeded at all. With X2, Singer was given more money and creative freedom to tell the story he wanted. X2 is the movie that most got the themes of the X-Men correct (the entire movie was about fear and intolerance) in the form of both Magneto and Stryker, and to a lesser extent the US President. A bigoted human trying to exterminate every mutant on the planet is something that has happened in the comics quite frequently.

I have had this discussion before, but from the first three X-Men movies, I think X2 is the one that did the least with the themes of fear and intolerance. Not that it did something wrong, but it was all good guys vs bad guys (which, as you say, has happened a lot in comics). Stryker vs our heroes, not society vs mutants, as in X-Men or X-Men TLS.
 
I think it was a missed opportunity. I actually don't mind the continuance of Donnerverse so much as I minded the lack of intensity in the story and the cartoon villain plot of Luthor. But like I said, everything was well drawn, all characters had motivations, the acting was fine, the story had enough conflict. I liked SR, but didn't love it, same with MOS.

MOS needed to have what SR had. Motivation for the main character, conflict from the villain, how decisions affected other decisions which affected the outcome of the story. Oh, and a less moping around hero would have been great.

Still liked MOS though, 7/10, great fun and all....but not a well told story. Were it not for the special effects, the epic fighting and great acting, the movie would have been a disaster as the story was convoluted and messy.

I meant to say rehash, LOL.
But yes, the elegance of Singer with the spectacle and action of Snyder sounds pretty good. I felt like Superman Returns cared too much about drama, and MOS didn't focus enough on it.

I guess we will have to wait for a sequel to have a "balanced" movie.
 
I actually found Stryker to be more complex than a straight bad guy. He had an understandable motive for hating mutants (which doesn't make him right). The X-Men have dealt with those types of paramilitary threats in the comics several times, so it is comic accurate.
 
I actually found Stryker to be more complex than a straight bad guy. He had an understandable motive for hating mutants (which doesn't make him right). The X-Men have dealt with those types of paramilitary threats in the comics several times, so it is comic accurate.

Comic accurate and having the themes of fear and intolerance right are different things.

Stryker was the classic villain, as many of them have valid motivations. Other than his motivations, he wasn't too complex. Just evil.
 
In some ways, Stryker was similar to Lex. He is an intelligent human who see's an outside force as a threat to humanity. Lex sees Superman as an obstacle to humanity's development and his own role in that development. Stryker sees mutants as dangerous animals who could turn on humanity at any moment and must be destroyed. Of course, Lex didn't have a wife who committed suicide by power drill after being tormented by her mutant son. They are not the same, but their are similarities.
 
I actually found Stryker to be more complex than a straight bad guy. He had an understandable motive for hating mutants (which doesn't make him right). The X-Men have dealt with those types of paramilitary threats in the comics several times, so it is comic accurate.

Isn't that the same thing with Magneto? They both have a good reason for their beliefs and actions, though of course what happened to Eric was much worse. I remember in the X2 novel Stryker's son killed his mother in such a horrible way, or made her kill herself. After that I wonder if he started to hate his son or no longer viewed him as his son which is why he was able to do what he did to him.
 
In some ways, Stryker was similar to Lex. He is an intelligent human who see's an outside force as a threat to humanity. Lex sees Superman as an obstacle to humanity's development and his own role in that development. Stryker sees mutants as dangerous animals who could turn on humanity at any moment and must be destroyed. Of course, Lex didn't have a wife who committed suicide by power drill after being tormented by her mutant son. They are not the same, but their are similarities.

Thing is, Superman is universally cherished and accepted whereas X-Men are not. That's why fear and intolerance belong much more to X-Men than Superman.

X-Men (the first movie) dealt with that beautifully, the Congress was discussing the issue, average people were afraid of those super-powered, Rogue was dangerous if touching people, Senator Kelly was afraid of having become "one of them," etc. X-Men 3 gave it a new great twist when "normal" people society re-defined "mutant" as a disease by presenting a "cure" to it. And many mutants started to feel abnormal, different, dysfunctional.

But what did X2 do about those themes?
 
The cure works great in concept, but was executed horribly in the film (it was never really explored, just mentioned occasionally). They also butchered the Dark Phoenix Saga. X3 tried to do too much in less than 2 hours (DPS, Whedon's Gifted Arc, and a Magneto story). Any on these could have made a great movie on their own, but cramming them together was a disaster (especially in such a short movie). SM 3 had the same problem (cramming in Venom, Sandman, an Harry, but not developing any of them). Hoefully, no Superman movie tries to do that, it would be horrible.
 
The cure works great in concept, but was executed horribly in the film (it was never really explored, just mentioned occasionally). They also butchered the Dark Phoenix Saga. X3 tried to do too much in less than 2 hours (DPS, Whedon's Gifted Arc, and a Magneto story). Any on these could have made a great movie on their own, but cramming them together was a disaster (especially in such a short movie). SM 3 had the same problem (cramming in Venom, Sandman, an Harry, but not developing any of them). Hoefully, no Superman movie tries to do that, it would be horrible.

Actually the cure had Beast for one second tasting the wonderful feeling of normalcy, Rogue questioning herself as a mutant and deciding to deny what she was in order to embrace a normal life, had a mutant mutilating himself in shame but ultimately refusing to become what he is not and gave Magneto the ultimate catalyst to gather mutants against humans.

Sure, the Phoenix saga had to be reduced but all in all I still think X3 did much more about the fear and intolerance mutant theme than X2. Btw, you still don't tell me what did X2 about it.
 
Fear and intolerance doesn't have to mean society as whole. You have a man who hates mutants so much that he goes to extremes (faking an attack on the White House) in order to wipe them out. The President was going to take action against mutants until the X-Men intimidated him into stopping. It dealt with fear and intolerance like the other movies, just in a different way. Also, Rogue taking the cure goes against her development in the first two movie, where she saw that her powers, for all the problems they caused her, could be used to help people. In X2, she was much more comfortable with using them and had become a more assertive and confident person. In X3, all that character development was erased and she's a whiny weak-willed person in the middle of a god-awful love triangle, who takes the cure for petty reasons even though Wolverine (indirectly) advises her not to.
 
Fear and intolerance doesn't have to mean society as whole.

In the case of X-Men that was exactly what was interesting and different from the rest.

Otherwise we can argue that Lex Luthor is intolerant to Superman, Batman is intolerant to Joker and so on.

You have a man who hates mutants so much that he goes to extremes (faking an attack on the White House) in order to wipe them out. The President was going to take action against mutants until the X-Men intimidated him into stopping.

Pretty much the average villain who does incredible things to destroy his personal enemies.

It dealt with fear and intolerance like the other movies, just in a different way.

What I call average or same ol same ol.

X-Men, nevertheless, had the characteristic to go to a new level. X2 decided that average was okay.

Also, Rogue taking the cure goes against her development in the first two movie, where she saw that her powers, for all the problems they caused her, could be used to help people.

That's like saying Superman II goes against STM, where Superman was satisfied being a superhero, or TDK goes against BB, because Batman now tries to quit. In general, character development (something X2 could have used) goes against what the character has been previously. And in X2 and X3 Rogue being half-ways into accepting her powers was stated. But her role as a girlfriend was far from being satisfactory for her or her boyfriend.

In X2, she was much more comfortable with using them and had become a more assertive and confident person. In X3, all that character development was erased and she's a whiny weak-willed person in the middle of a god-awful love triangle, who takes the cure for petty reasons even though Wolverine (indirectly) advises her not to.

And that was great. It shows accepting you're different is not a matter of just wishful thinking. One day you really like it and that's it, no further problem shall ever appear. Rogue gets that other poeople might have opinions about it but ultimately it's her life and nobody else's.
 
I have watched MOS twice and enjoyed it, but that's all. It's a Transformers movie. Alien invasion, first hour set-up, second hour endless, numbing CGI destruction. Now I enjoy Transformers movies for what they are, but I hoped for more from Man of Steel.

Superman Returns is one of my favourite movies. I find it genuinely special. It's heartfelt, elegant and poignant. It's really an ode to Superman.

Singer gets Superman. He gets that the main point of Superman is that he is a saviour. He is here to rescue people primarily, not to fight supervillains (that's Batman). The excitement of Superman stories is not, "Who will win this fight?" it's, "Can Superman save Lois/Jimmy/the world in time?".

500px-Superman_Brandon_Routh.jpg


That said, if we're talking Routh vs Cavill, my vote is for neither. The true heir to Reeve is Tom Welling.
 
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