re: The OFFICIAL Man of Steel Discussion and ***SPOILERS*** Thread

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I also found he looked alot like Reeve at times, especially when he was staring up into the world machine's gravity lazer thing

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I noticed this too during the movie. I honestly think they used the lighting filter to smuggle on Reeve's likeness. For a second it REALLY looked like Reeve.

Ok my thoughts:

I liked the characters, I thought Cavill was very solid, Shannon was awesome, and all the support was strong (and kudos to them for putting in three BSG actors). My recent appreciation for Russell Crowe was also satisfied since he brought a certain gravitas to Krypton (A Zod/Jor-El movie could have been glorious).

Set design was pretty great and the aesthetics were strong. Snyder directed the movie with quite panache and flair for visual speed and weight. They did well to convey Superman's strength, speed, etc. Very well done.

I enjoyed the story pieces and overall goal. I enjoyed all the pieces of the film. I thought the attempt was well-intentioned, but... (there's always a but)...

I did not like the way it all came together. That's not to say this was a bad film by any means, it was fun, bombastic, action-packed, and all the good stuff we love from summer films. Cavill was an excellent Superman overall. But I think they missed the mark on presenting the story and they wasted a truly menacing villain. They also spent far too much time in exposition mode.

I'll list it out -

1. Exposition Mode - Do we realize that not only did we have a voiceover of exposition with Lane, but we also sat Kent down twice to talk to him about plans and histories. Twice. That's two times too many really. We got the fall of Krypton THREE times, totally unnecessary. Combine those instances, shorten Superman's origin story even more and give more room for the real meat of the movie...

1. General Zod - What a complete waste. For one, they do the perfect storyline for this kind of film, and then they get one of the most intense modern actors to give a great performance. But they don't use him. Faora has just as much, if not more screen time, he never truly shows his disdain for anything but Kryptons, we stays in the battlesuit the whole time. Just a giant waste of a wonderful performance, villain, and story. What they could have done is put him in a position to give some sort of real threat and reasoning, instead of the virtual powerpoint presentation to Clark, to truly show that nothing means more to him than Kryptons, snapping the neck of some unfortunate human. He should have attacked somewhere to draw superman out also. And he should have battled Superman twice, defeating him once instead of the lame spaceship confrontation. I liked everything about Zod except how they put it all together, just like the film.

3. Love Story - Why even force it, that was unnecessary. Just blah.

4. The wanton destruction - I thought the action sequences were great. But my god, I actually laughed at a couple of points because it was "Destroy Train" "Destroy Building," Destroy another train" Destroy window" Etc. Superman should have drawn them away from people, fight on a mountain or something. No need to find the only satellite above Metropolis and hit it going Mach 7. I like blowing shite up....to a point.

5. The pacing - Just off. We move quick and slow at varying points. The exposition bogs down the speed and the action sequences were often 5 minutes too long. Use that time better to build allow your villain room to do something other than talk about what he is doing.

6. The Perry White Stories - Completely Unnecessary. these did nothing to move the plot forward and slowed everything to a halt. introduce Perry and just let him do what he did to give Lane hell. Nothing else needed. Spend more damn time with Zod!


That's my beef. It was a good version of Superman, a fun film, and competently made. My issues, as usual go down to the writer, and Goyer is hit or miss big time and takes himself way too seriously. The overall structure, and the editing were problematic. I'm not going to lie, I generally like Michael Bay for random explosions, but Snyder took it too far, just way too many.

I can say all that and give it a solid 7.5/10. Better than IM3 and on par with Star Trek so far this summer. None of these films truly lived up to the hype.

Pacific Rim looks to stomp on all other puny films though.

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(A Zod/Jor-El movie could have been glorious).

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this

someone mentioned how it'd be great for them to do a gritty animated prequel type movie showing their relationship and giving a little more background on Krypton and their politics/society

I actually felt the love story wasn't that bad. What would have been bad is if the ship, after he sealed her wound she was all like "OH MY ALIEN HERO!!! muah muah muah". Instead Lois was like "HOLY frick AN ALIEN!!!" and then so on and such. Even though they didn't show everything in the movie, I understood that she got to know what makes him tick, whether it was directly via watching him do it, or hearing from others. She didn't have that Mary Jane in Spiderman moment. Maybe that kiss was just a spur of the moment thing. Who knows. Will find out in the sequel though.

I thought the love story was just as forced as Bruce-Miranda Tate was in TDKR.

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The terminal velocity of a human is around 120 mph, and they wouldn't have reached that speed yet. If Supes cradles them and decelerates, it would be like someone slamming on the breaks on the highway.

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im not talking about the sudden stop from THEIR speed falling

im talking about HIS speed to get to them

it seems like he's flying faster than a speeding bullet

so when someone weighing 250+ lbs (probably more since his mass could be different) hits you at that speed, you should probably break several bones and have some pretty intense internal hemorrhaging

Are we really arguing physics in a Superman movie?

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im talking about HIS speed to get to them

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Right, in classical Superman physics he catches up to the falling person, then slows down to match their speed so there is no sudden collision like you are describing.

He's smarter than every human being and you don't think he accounts for his own momentum?

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Very good, very spoilery review of MoS

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Solid. I can agree.