Superman wins obviously.
Wellzers. Fashionably late to the party
as always. But the man of steel did indeed hit cinemas at some point
in the immediate past. Never has a community stood so divided as the
geek community dose today. Wells. That's grossly over egging it. The
split is really between comic book fans and the hated normals and
between actual fans of superman and folk that could just take or
leave the big boy scout. Id like to say up front that I did enjoy man
of steal. I thought it was ok. And at points it was even quite fun.
However. This was not the film big supes deserved.
Now before we get in the negatives
there is a fair bit to like about the film. There's HELLA action for
one thing. Now. A lot of folk would say that's a bad thing. And ayes
it is at certain bits but we'll get to that later. Come on now folk.
You need lots and lots of ACTION in a superman film. Like. Come on
now. Its good they went all action. You get to see supes DO stuff.
With a big budget. And for the most part it is awesome. You can call
it dumb if you like but I like that they just went all out with the
fighting and the physical god level craziness.
I quite liked the bits where superman
wasn't superman yet. Now put away your torches and pitch forks and
let me explain. Superman not being superman can get quite hateful. It
was a risk they were always going to run what with it being yet
another origin film but they pulled it off quite nicely if you ask
me. From the trailers it looked like we would be getting quite a bit
of fisherman supes which I think you'll agree looked quite hatefully
hipster. But as it turned out the fisherman shtic was only a vehicle
to get supes to an oil rig to do some life saving. See it COULD have
been hateful but it turned out fine.
There was a fair chunk at the beginning
of the film that took place entirely on krypton. I here that as base
brakery as the film is this part was well received. I put that down
to jor els general pimpness and the fact he rides a dragon at one
point. I mean, I really wasn't prepared for the dragon. I should have
been. What with that one issue of supergirl ware she rides a dragon.
So I should have been aware kyrptonian dragons were a thing. I just
wasn't expecting to see it in the real big deal synder/nolan superman
reboot is all. And oh my it was awesome. Im not really a big dragon
man. Its just the sheer absurd surprise of it the thing.
Jor el himself was quite the lad. Like
he manages to CQC the fuck out of general zod. General zod. Krypton's
legendary soldier. Defeated by a sqwisihe scientist. In hand to hand
combat. Well. I guess you get points for being supermans dad. And
fair play he is killed by zod eventually. Now here's where the
ladness comes in. jor el dose indeed kick the bucket in the opening
act but comes back. As YAMI jor el. If you've followed any of our
coverage of superior spider-man you'll know about our unending love
fer yami pete. God king of the banter. Now yami jor el dose get some
choice bits of banter here and there but he mainly utilises his yami
ness to cut about. I amazingly approve of this.
Superman him sell came off quite well
as a character I think. Well for the most part. Folk just never seem
to shut the shit up about superman being a terrible character to
write for. That because he's such a god he's unrelatable. These
people are actual bastards. Supes is a grate dude. And ayes he's
powerful. Juggling planets and all that. Power dose not make you
unrelatable or just a bad character because of it. There are
countless actual gods cutting about comics that folk love. Its a
trendy double standard to hate on superman. Because he's apparently
cheesy or childish. That said iv seen some encouraging things from
other folks reviews about man of steal that seem to show the myth
that its impossible to do a good superman story is somewhat
vanishing. Good stuff !
Man of steel had a darn solid cast all
right. Your mileage may vary on if that cast was put to good use
though. I herd claims of blandness. I don't see it. But that might
just be my own good actor blindness. I tend to see. If a like a
particular actor in a particular role ill probs be hella forgiving on
the actual acting. That said. Do do think everyone was doing a fairly
good job with what the script was giving them. I thought henry cavill
did a nice job as superman. Like in the scenes ware he was properly
being superman I think he had it locked down. Being so superior to
humans superman walks a very dangerous line of smarmyness that's
sometimes tricky to pull off. Like you need a wee touch of smarm for
the flashiness of the character.
Zod was an all right villain too. I say
all right. At the end of the day he was quite shite. I'm not sure he
won a single fight. Even like I was saying he lost to jor el. Its a
little weird. He is built up as kyriptons greatest warrior so for him
to lose AWW the time is quite weird. Though I guess he IS a general
so I suppose he's not meant to be the absolute best fighty fighter. I
did like him and his gang though. They were quite funky with there
power amour and eventful superman sun powers. Supes fights with them
we're amazingly dragon ball z. though I suppose that's the only way
they could go in this day and age. Its not a bad thing. Even though
I'm kinda making it sound like one.
Now with al that said. Man of steel
dose have some amazingly hateful unforgivable moments.
Pa kent. Pa kent why. Oh god. Why. What
have you done ? You monsters. You actual monsters. Pa kent in the man
of steal verse is just. I don't even know what. Like I don't quite
comprehend why they made him the way he is. I don't even what to try
because he was so hateful. I should actually say what my beef with
him was. He's not a lad. Not at all. Pa kent is supermans dad. He's
meant to give superman that un shakeable moral compass. He's meant to
inspire clark to be more than an ordinary man. Superman may be a god.
But he gets what makes him a legend from humanity. From the
upbringing the kents gave him. And in this film I don't think I'm far
off the mark in calling there pa kent a monster. There's a bit in the
trailer where pa kent is conserned that kid clark saved a school bus
full of children from drowning. Including all his fiends and bullies.
Kid clark asks if he should have let them drown. Pa kent reply's
maybe. That is unforgivable. Now I get pa kent wanted to keep his son
safe and feared that if the world knew about him they'd probably take
clark away and dissect him. Fuck that. Kid clark can lift a bus from
a lake on his lonesome. He can take who ever rocks up to the farm
looking for him. Now. I can buy that pa kent wants his son safe at
any cost. I can. But any other pa kent wid be disgusted at this
universe one. Pa kent teaches supes to save as many people as he can
BECAUSE he can. Its like pa kents whole deal.
As cool as the final fight in the film
was. As much as it averted short lame boss fights at the end of
current gen super hero movies and movies in general. It was amazingly
stupid. Thousands if not hundreds of thousands of innocent people
MUST have died. Metropolis is now just a crater. It be one thing if
was just because of zod and the villains and that it was unavoidable.
But no. a lot of the damage could have been stopped by superman and
some case's it was superman actively causing the damage. Yes you read
that right. The last fight of the film is between superman and a
fully powered up zod battling in a darn crowded metropolis. They
basically go at it like like neo and smith from the last battle of
the matrix revolutions. That was fine there because everyone in the
matrix was a smith so the collateral damage was lessened and it was
somewhat an end of the world scenario. Here. Supes dosent seem to
give one single fuck for the people of metropolis. Flinging zod threw
buildings and flinging stuff at zod that either impacts around him
causing damage to the surrounding area or explodes. EXPLODES. Now I
feel the hatefulness might be lessoned if it was just two other
random super beings. But this is superman. He would sure as fuck care
about the people of the city. Caring about people is what superman
dose. SAVEING people is what superman dose. Yes. He'd still be
fighting zod but the entire time he'd be thinking about ways of
getting zod away from civilians and he'd be saving folk from the
buildings zod was collapsing and not actively trying to collapse
buildings himself.
Now. We've all trecked threw spoiler
country. I should have probably started of by saying that there would
indeed be spoilers. But its a fair few weeks after the films release
and I feel its common knowledge now. But fair play. I have
encountered a fair few folk that have decided to wait for the dvd
because of its mixed reviews by actual critics. so for the last bit
here. Major ending spoilers.
Man of steel reaches its climax with
supes having zod in a head lock in ruins of metropolis. Superman has
proven that bizarrely he is the better fighter. Zods no looking well.
He's lost his mind just a touch. Well. I suppose he wasn't always
there. But my point is. He's gone full mental. It looks like it all
over but zod bust out his eye beams on this family that just happens
to be standing around. Slowly. Like really slowly. The family could
just run away. But naw. There only very slightly trapped. They COULD
just walk around the eye beams. But naw. They don't. Like the massive
twats they are. Well. my point is. Superman is forced to kill zod. He
just snaps his neck. With a crack of thunder. Now to tell the truth.
Superman killing dosent bother me as much as it should. I'm not to
sure why. It just didn't shock me. I feel like superman has killed
folk in the past. What is was though was a massive downer. Like in
the cinema we saw it in. the kill just sucked all the fun out of the
room. You could totes feel it leave. It was quite the moment. Now I
don't want to bleather on about the rights and wrongs of superman
just killing fools but its certainly one of the things that has
divided folk. I can totes get that. I SHOULD be agreeing with them.
Its probably the worst thing ever. But I dunno. Its just something
that happened.
So. I quite liked it overall. It man of
steel is an all right film spoiled by a few bizarre narrative
choices. Though I would say it worth a watch. But maybe only on dvd
when it comes out. Which isn't something I want to say about a big
new superman film.
