My Thoughts on Man of Steel

[babydee1]

Loooooong-ass movie review behind cut.

First of all, I think that Henry Cavill makes a fantastic Superman. He really embodies both the tenderness and sensitivity of Clark Kent, and the strength and protectiveness of Superman.  Very in touch with his humanity, yet able to rise to the occasion and be more than just a man when the world needed him.

We got to see him at many stages of his life; as a pre-teen struggling with new abilities; as a teenager having to subdue his emotions and endure bullying; as a young man trying to help the world in any way he fan prior to his discovery of who he was; and finally as the hero the world knows and loves.  He reminded me a lot of Chris Reeve’s Superman at several points.  There was this one shot towards the end when HC!Supes was about to fly up into the probe's energy stream, and he looked so Reeve-like, I thought the shot had actually been spliced with Christopher Reeve’s image.  Really nostalgic. :-)






Having said that, there were times when he just stood there looking clueless...so yeah, there was a hint of TW/BDA!Clark in him! ;-)  Plus, there was an awesome scene where Clark defends a waitress from being mauled by some rowdy trucker, and gets beer poured all over him by the same rowdy trucker. Clark left the joint, and by the time the trucker stepped outside, his semi was upside down and twisted amindst some telephone poles like a pretzel.  Nice call-back to the SV Pilot when Clark stacked all the jocks’s pick-up trucks on prom night. :-)

And Oh my Lawd, Henry Cavill is HOT!!!  I thought all the contours in the costume were part of the suite, but nooooo sirree - that really is all him under there.  If anything, those lean muscles looked bigger and more imposing when he was out of the suit than when he was in it, and there were plenty of shirtless!Clark scenes in the film to keep the movie-going girls happy (and, I’d imagine, some of the boys, too.) ;-)





I quite honestly didn’t miss the Red Knickers.  I never even thought about them (too much gorgeous manflesh to ogle), and they kept that area shaded out most of the time, like in the top image above.  Nor did I miss the Superman Curl; again, the man’s hair and body were beautiful enough in their own right, so the curl was not needed.  What I did miss, however, was the House of El sigil on the back of his cape.  The current cape is several times larger than it’s ever been throughout the history of the character, yet there was no symbol to break up all that red velvet?!?  It just looked like a huge, sprawling curtain for the most part, and I was waiting for some incident to result in the sigil ending up on the cape, but I waited in vain.  Ah, well…can’t win ‘em all, I suppose.




Amy Adams as Lois: excellent job, very convincing.  She wasn't annoying in the slightest, and I could easily believe she was a star reporter (though I was hoping we would see her earn the Pulitzer rather than just hear her pimping it).



To be honest, I wasn't a fan of the character of Lois when I was growing up. She had nothing but disdain for Clark, but would gush over Superman like a slobbery teenager in heat. In the first Donner Superman film, MK!Lois struggled with a gun-toting mugger for nicking her $10 purse - which was empty save for a tube of lipstick. If Clark hadn't been Superman, he'd have been killed. In Superman II, she crawled under an elevator containing an H-Bomb in the Eiffel Tower which was being evacuated. After Superman saved her, she focused all her energy and time to deliberately putting herself in danger so he can come and save her, hoping to publicly out him. I honestly didn't miss her in Superman III, and Superman IV is best never spoken about. Smallville's Lois wasn't my favourite character, either. I never watched The Adventures of Lois & Clark, so I can't say one way or another if Teri Hatcher's Lois was any good, but the order of the day back then was Classic Damsel in Distress, so I guess it followed the standard format.

So I was very satisfied with what Amy Adams did with the character.  She was very pro-active and intelligent, and she never needlessly put herself in trouble or made bone-headed decisions that would lead to a Superman rescue (KB!Lois in Superman Returns, I'm looking at you.  Taking Superman's child onto Lex Luthor's boat, what the hell were you thinking?!?!?) There wasn't a single Lois rescue in Man of Steel that was unjustified, and that's a huge step in the right direction for me. Best of all, she believed in Clark and kept his secret from the beginning, thus getting rid of the dreaded triangle-for-two - also something I hated.


She also played an active part in saving the world with Clark...and I loved that they shared an EPIC!Kiss when the world was ending, just before he went to face Zod for the final showdown. Strikingly similar to another great scene, in my opinion.  ;-)





Snyder & Nolan did shake up a few things which I was okay with.

-       Perry White & Pete Ross switched ethnicities
-       Jimmy lost the bowtie, grew a vagina and was called Jenny (though I understand her surname was later changed for whatever reason)



-       Lana barely got a few lines in the whole film
-       Whitney was *kind-of* referenced (they called him the Fordham boy rather than Fordman)
-       There was an establishment in Smallville called Sullivan's, but no snarky blonde to go with. Nice of them to sneak that in, though. ;-)

Other things I liked:

-       A decent amount of time spent on Krypton
-       Reasons why Kryptonians always claim to be a superior race fully explained
-       Kal-El was truly a unique individual, both on Krypton and on Earth
-       Clark/Supes = relatable and in touch with humanity
-       Lois = Smart and not annoying
-       Jonathan & Martha = perfect casting


-       Jor-El = Badass (dude had a pet dragon.  A Dragon!!!)



-       Zod = Badass



-       Faora = Magnificent Bitch (and how. She gave Superman a serious kicking!)




-       Script =  bordering on excellent
-       World peril = appropriately terrifying, significantly threatening to humanity, and well-executed
-       Special effects = mind-blowing.  Brilliant, realistic fight & flight scenes. Excellent.  Look out for the kick-ass, cape-swinging hammer-throw carried out by Zod on Supes in the final battle.  Now I know why Edna Mode hates capes! :-D

And now that we’ve covered the good parts, it’s time to move onto the things I *didn't* like about Man of Steel:

-       No Lex *sob* (but then, Zod was plenty bad for the whole movie and then some)

-       No Kryptonite (though I suspect they'll bring that in MoS 2 with Lex.  Someone pointed out to me that the tanker in Clark’s fight scene with the Kryptonians had LexCorp written on the side of it, so that’s some awesome foreshadowing and an excellent set-up for his ‘war’ against alien visitors). There was also a fantastic scene of Clark & Zod torpedoing through the sky over some cornfields that made me smile and think of my Woobie!Lex.  :-)

-       No Fortress of Solitude as such; just Jor-El’s old vessel that was ‘hidden’ years ago on earth

-       Lois kept calling him 'Clark' when he was in hero costume and in front of everyone.  Seriously.  She’s gone to all this trouble to keep his identity a secret, and then she keeps yelling ‘Clark!” whenever Superman gets pummelled.  I kept mentally screaming “Shut up, you silly cow!!!”   It would have made a lot more sense for her to have called him Superman early on, rather than give such an honour to a random extra. Which brings me to my next MoS peeve…

-       I really, really wanted Lois (or Martha) to be the first person to say the word Superman in the movie.  Instead, the honour went to a nameless extra with only two lines in the entire movie.  FAIL.

-       There was a bit too much death & mindless destruction for me; Lawdy-Lawd, Snyder & Nolan really love to blow stuff up. I kept willing Supes to lure Zod & Co away to a less populated area, but he didn't.  I suppose it was necessary to establish just how much of a threat to humanity Zod was, and also to set up Lex’s entrance in Mos II as being very wary of aliens in general, Supes in particular, thus pimping himself instead as earth’s primary defender. 

-       His entrance to the DP was as poorly handled as SV!Clark's. He just walked in, got introduced, pushed up his glasses and smiled. Seriously.  I was like “…dafuq?!?”  After such a brilliant beginning to the movie and a thrilling battle in the middle, tacking that DP entrance on the end was the ultimate let-down.  And those glasses won’t fool anyone. I've already suspended my disbelief enough to allow for a flying alien from another planet.  Don't insult my vision, as well!

-       There are too many people who know him as 'Clark, the guy who did amazing things in Smallville' and ‘the urban legend saviour with the gorgeous face and hot bod’ for his DP cover to stick.  He never exactly hid his face, and there was enough of a trail for Lois to track him down easy.

-       The underground blogger chap who ran the website that published Lois's initial article knew her movements, and should be able to find Clark/Supes in a heartbeat — as well as anyone else with half a brain and enough effort.

-       I wasn’t happy with the manner of Jonathan’s death.  Clark has more than enough speed to get his father out of the path of a hurricane without people seeing him, so there was no reason for him to stand motionless in an underpass and watch his father die, even if his father had forbidden him to save him.  He’d saved everybody else, and I understand Jonathan wanted to keep the secret a secret but still…it was a needless sacrifice, in my opinion.

-       There wasn't much in the way of romance, but in all honesty I felt the focus needed to be on the origin story of Superman and not on OMG SEVENTY YEARS OF EPIC LURVE!!!  There was enough intimacy there to establish a connection between Clark and Lois which can easily be built on in the sequel, so I'm more than happy with the little we got.  

-       Superman killed Zod.  Yes, killed.  With his bare hands.  They broke the one cardinal rule of the Superman mythos, and I have no idea where they’ll go from there.  To be honest, I kind of expected it when (1) I heard Nolan was the man in charge, and (2) I saw first-hand how determined Zod was to erase humanity from the earth.  I had hoped they’d be able to re-create the Phantom Zone and banish him there, thus saving an excellent villain for another day, but I guess they have enough enemies lined up for as many sequels as they can envision. Admittedly, Zod was all kinds of evil, and he was on the verge of incinerating a young family right before Clark’s eyes.  Still, the sight of Superman breaking a neck was very jarring.  He did scream in despair immediately afterward, so at least they went some way in showing us just how difficult it was for him to make that awful decision.  And I'd rather see that than have him dither and stare stupidly until someone steps up and does what he can't, and then start berating them for cleaning up his mess. (BDA/SV!Clark, I'm looking at you.)

-       I found it utterly mindboggling that Krypton’s ruling council had essentially prohibited natural conception and birth throughout the planet, yet maintained the presence of males & females and failed to neutralise their reproductive organs.  I can understand keeping penises and vaginas, but ovaries and testes should have been made a thing of the past.  Leaving them intact was a huge tactical error on their part, because it was only a matter of time before someone’s nookie resulted in a baby, and wee Kal-El was the result.  For a super-smart race, they were not so smart. :-/

-       There was no teaser/hint of a sequel at the end of the credits, like you get with Marvel comics movie adaptations. Seriously; I was incensed.  I sat through 15 minutes of credits for a preview of the Lone Ranger featuring Johnny Depp as Tonto…only he bore a strong resemblance to Captain Jack sparrow in speech, attitude and mannerisms. Why didn’t they just get a real Native American actor?  Probably hoping to pull in more viewers with Depp.  If Depp had really brought it and it had worked, I wouldn't mind so much, but a bad Jack Sparrow redux is just an insult.

…But that's not Superman's fault.  :-)

In conclusion:  Man of Steel had its flaws, but that notwithstanding, I thought it was really great.  Not perfect, but great.  I'd easily give it an A- or a strong B+ 

And I’d definitely pay to see it again.  :-)

Comments

Thanks for the long review!

[iolanthealias.livejournal.com]

I never watched The Adventures of Lois & Clark, so I can't say one way or another if Teri Hatcher's Lois was any good,

OMG, Babydee, you have to watch "Lois and Clark"! I like Teri Hatcher the most of all the Loises I've seen (although Dana Delaney from the animated series is probably the next best.) Teri has a great nervous energy as Lois, who puts up emotional walls and lives for her work. But we all know that she's secretly attracted to Clark (Dean Cain, who was much better as Clark Kent than he was as Superman) and the unresolved sexual tension and romantic banter in the first two seasons is unparalleled.

"Smallville's" Lois - Erica Durance - in my house she is the One Whose Name Is Not Mentioned. For me, Chloe Sullivan is really the character who became Lois Lane (she just changed her name, you know.)



I quite honestly didn’t miss the Red Knickers. I never even thought about them (too much gorgeous manflesh to ogle).

I'm definitely in agreement with you there! That manflesh is PRIME.

I also agree with you about Lois and Clark doing their best to blow the secret identity thing right out of the gate. Come on, Lois, when you've driven up to the Kent Farm along with a friendly policeman, when Clark's in the Suit and hugging Martha (right after the alien invaders landed their spaceship in her BACK YARD), you don't need to go and yell "Hey, Clark!" Considering that Jonathan Kent *died* to keep Clark's secret, don't you think you're treating your father's dying wish a little lightly?

[h2osprincess.livejournal.com]

Love the review! Did you recognize Woodburn (the blogger)? Search for the actor and Allison Mack, and you'll see. Even his name is something of a nod.

Loved all of it.

[sheliana.livejournal.com]

I agree with most of your review!

1. Henry Cavill was an amazing Superman (and appropriately Super-Hot). The flashbacks into his past were my favourite thing about the movie.

The one thing I particularly liked about him? His reaction to Lois investigating him. Imagine how SV Clark would have reacted!:D He would have lied to her face, called her delusional, or thrown an epic hissy fit. This Clark just shows up in front of her, calm, rational and friendly, and explains why digging into his secret is a bad idea. So refreshing!

2. I really liked Lois. She wasn't obnoxiously over-the-top as SV Lois was. I had my doubts about Amy Adams, to be honest (mostly because I hadn't seen her in anything but SV, and she didn't make much of an impression on me then). But she really pulled off a convincing, professional, intelligent Lois that I was happy to root for. And no triangle-for-two! Yes!!!

3. My opinions are coloured by the fact that I did not grow up with Superman. I was aware of him, of course, but he never was part of my country's popular culture. Prior to seeing "Smallville" I had no idea that his real name was Clark Kent, or that he is an alien from Krypton with a weakness in the form of meteor rocks. I have no attachment to any of the established elements of Superman mythology - things like the red trunks, or the S-curl, or the fact that Superman is not supposed to kill anyone. So I was perfectly fine with him snapping Zod's neck. It was clear he derived no pleasure from it. He begged Zod not to kill an innocent family, but Zod was too psychopathic to listen. Not killing him would have been insane. I've seen people argue that Superman should not have been painted into a corner like that. But if Supes *always* succeeds in not killing the villains, it's unrealistic. It means that there's always some kind of deus ex machina 'round the corner that will save the day. Or, like you mentioned, the other bad guys will have to do Supes' dirty work for him, so that he could remain morally pure (with the bonus option of berating them for being evil). Killing Zod in this context seemed more honest, somehow. After all, this isn't SV where bad guys convert into good guys in a blink of an eye.:)

4. I was bothered that Supes took his fight with Zod to civilian quarters. Some of the deaths were on his hands.

5. The casting overall was perfect. I loved everyone.

That said, I don't think the sequel is going to be very interesting to me. I think it's going to be all Superman/Superheroing/Romance with Lois all the time, with no time for more exploration of Clark Kent's past in Smallville, and this is just not my thing. Besides, after seeing who Zack Snyder wants to cast as Lex Luthor (Mark Strong), I suspect that they're going to go for the classic Supes vs Luthor approach (whereas I kinda hoped they would take another page out of SV book and give the two of them a complex history. But it doesn't seem like it's going to happen, given that Strong is about 20 years older than Cavill. I doubt there's going to be any kind of "past" for the two of them, and that means no more young Clark flashbacks. And I'm really far more interested in Clark Kent than I am in Superman.).

Overall, a solid B from me.:) Too much action and destruction exhausted me, and I could have used a bit more humour.

Sorry for all the rambling. it's just that there's no one in RL who I could talk to about this movie!

[purple-moon123.livejournal.com]

I never watched The Adventures of Lois & Clark, so I can't say one way or another if Teri Hatcher's Lois was any good,

Le WUT??? You haven't seen L&C?? Girl!! You need to get on it!! Whenever I think of Lois it's Teri who I picture with a combination of Dana Delaney from Superman Animated series. And Dean is just the perfect embodiment of Clark.

Trust me you'll enjoy Perry's love for Elvis, you will giggle at Cat Grant 'cause she will remind you of someone, you will love Mayson Drake (season 2), the Christmas episodes will either have you laughing or shedding a few tears and you will love Martha and Jonathan.

[bkwurm1.livejournal.com]

I took my nephew to the movie today so I ended up seeing Man of Steel a second time and there were a few things that popped out at me

In addition to the tanker truck that got smashed with Lex Corp's logo on the side, the bus that drops Clark off at home as an adult had the Lex Corp name as well. I think I also saw a flash of the company name in the skyline as Zod and Clark were destroying the city. (Seriously people - way too much destruction. I feel like it should have taken them years to clean up and go back to business as usual. Maybe Clark had time to go back to school and study journalism.)

If we are talking points of stretched believability may I point to Lois seeing Clark and Zod crash through the roof of Grand Central Station from what looked like a mile away with a ton of debris blocking the way only for her to hoof it there in under five minutes. Talk about super powers. Yeah, yeah, it a movie.

This next thing isn't a complaint but a surprised observation. Henry Cavil has Tom Welling's smile. There were two points in the film where I literally did double takes.

Did anyone else find the pods Zod and his army were imprisoned in on Krypton rather phallic? Just me? Both times I saw the movie I was snickering to myself about the flock of slowly flying dildos rising in the air.

Since I've already lowered the classiness level on this post let me make one final observation. There is a scene between Zod and Clark (I really do think of him as Clark throughout the movie even if Lois was about to name him Superman before they got interrupted) after the rest of his army is back in the phantom zone (along with poor Dr Emil). Z & C have just flown into an empty office building and Zod looks at Clark and suddenly his eyes are burning up until he just can't hold back a geyser of molten heat and he groans and shouts as his het vision jets out uncontrollably. Now remembering how SVClark's heat vision was first triggered....well you get the picture. ;)

Just to be clear, I really like the movie. :)

[mari2anne.livejournal.com]

Oh, no way, you have NOT seen L&C, TNAoS?

You must! Dean Cain was the best Clark Kent! His disguise as Superman not so convincing; he looked just like Clark! But there was a lot of humor in the episodes. I'll still catch the re-runs whenever I happen to see one is upcoming.

And Teri Hatcher was a perfect Lois. Beautiful. Smart. Bossy. Endless energy. And just enough insecurity and doubts (having come from a broken home) to make her truly interesting. And VERY competitive, always trying to show she was a better reporter than Clark, even doing a few underhanded things. One of my favorite episodes is when Clark decides to teach her a lesson; payback time was priceless! But she learned her lesson and in the end was not afraid to admit that her behavior was not very professional.

Ok, I'll get off the soapbox now....

And thank you so much, again, for the MoS review; it's awesome!
☺

Cosign Lois and Clark is a must watch

[andromedabastow.livejournal.com]

Really it was so fun. I'm glad you liked the movie.

[aquakitty1864.livejournal.com]

I agree with you on almost everything!

When I started I was like oh boy I can't wait for some yummy Clex... but NOTHING! No Lex at all except for that dingy lex sign.

The only thing close to Clark being weakened was when he went to Zod's ship... but that wasn't from kryptonite.. le sigh... no TC for us TC fans ;)

and omg what happened to my innocent Clarkie? he killed Zod... right there in front of Lois... with his hands! I was like all T_T!!

but then the end... "Sorry sir hes kinda hot..." that made me LOL literally

[easilyenraged.livejournal.com]

Lois & Clark Lois is the reason I love Lois, smart, funny, independent and did not treat Clark like he was a fool, a little naive but not a fool. Amy Adams is now my 2nd favourite Lois.

[kitmerlot1213.livejournal.com]

I saw this film yesterday and I thought it was extremely well done and I really liked the feeling of hope that pervaded the entire film.

And I didn't have a problem with his killing Zod with his bare heads--I actually thought it was awesome because Zod was never going to stop until he destroyed the entire Earth.

I also loved just how Chloe-esque Amy Adams's Lois Lane was--not a brown haired drunken bimbo in sight :)

Plus the quick Lex Corp logo scene made me squeal :)

[sweetchiclovesu.livejournal.com]

I loved this movie and I love your movie review, Dee!

How r u? I'm sorry for being MIA. I loved you latest Chollie fic, and I'd thought I'd pop by and wish you... A BELATED birthday!!! I hope it was a good one :) xoxo

[apeygirl.livejournal.com]

It was awesome. I liked at at least as much as Batman Begins (though not as much as Dark Knight because that movie is PERFECT). As an origin story, it just made sense on every level. I loved how much more explained Zod's hate-boner for Clark was. It made it richer, him going after him for something so very specific as Zod's motivations always seemed rather vague to me in most other incarnations. It wasn't just about taking over the world, it was about Clark's very existence going against his long-held ideologies.

And Lois? LOVED HER SFM!

Could have done without the line after the kiss. Real mood killer. Also just 20% less destruction would have been nice.

But a great reboot. I really look forward to the next when Supes can get down to business.., with Lex, please?

[tommy50702.livejournal.com]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I enjoyed reading your review. As for those who compare MOS with the old Superman movies, don’t let nostalgia cloud your reality. Cavill IS Superman.

[babydee1.livejournal.com]

Thanks, Tommy - glad you liked it! :-)