Man of Steel Review (Spoilers)

Hey, all of my Krimsonites! Okay, that was kind of cheesy. I won’t use that term ever again. Anyways, I saw the movie, “Man of Steel”, a couple of weeks ago, and I ‘m here now to give you my review of the movie. Now, I know you’re wondering why I didn’t write this review sooner, but a lot of things came up that prevented me from getting the time needed to write this review. Let me guess, though, that is no excuse, and you’re right. It isn’t so I hope I can make that up to you now.

Well, like I said, I went to see this movie a couple of weeks ago with a few friends which I have to thank one of them for paying my way in. First, I have to admit that I really wasn’t looking forward to this movie. As a lot of people who know me are aware of, I’m not a huge Superman fan. I’ve always had a problem with a character who was designed as almost perfect as he was. He almost had no weaknesses besides what was worked in later (kryptonite, magic, etc.), and he never really had any character flaws until recent times. He was pretty much a super powered boy scout, too perfect for my taste. I guess it also doesn’t help that I’m more of a Marvel fan. I always felt they designed more realistic human characters (with their exceptions) than DC did.

Now, don’t worry. I’m not going to tear this movie apart. Even though I don’t really care for Superman, I did go into this movie with an open mind. I also tried to forget the images I had of the old Superman movie with Christopher Reeve. I’m probably going to get a lot of heat for this, but I thought that movie was terrible. It did a great job of introducing Superman, but the overall story sucked. It was too sappy. He had no real villain to face. The challenges were mediocre at best, and the climatic end where Lois Lane dies was easily overcame by a simple flight around the earth which changed the rotation that apparently reversed time. Anyways, that was the 70s for you. It was your typical campy 70s blockbuster.

I’ll start off by saying this movie definitely surpassed the original 1978 classic. I have to admit that I was taken back by the leaps and bounds this movie had made. This was no boy scout do-gooder. He wasn’t the perfect ideal super hero who never did any wrong. He had doubts about himself. He questioned his father’s wisdom. He made mistakes. He wasn’t perfect which made him a more believable character. Everyone has flaws, even fictional people. It’s all a part of what makes us who we are. For the first time, I felt for the character. He had no idea on who he was, and the decisions he had to make had real consequences from when he had to watch his earth father die to when he had to kill the main villain, Zod.

Speaking of Zod, he was one of the major improvements of the movie franchise. For the first time, there was a villain worthy of Superman’s attention. He wasn’t any bumbling genius (Lex Luthor) who was trying to commit heinous acts just so he could make a buck off of real estate. Zod posed a real threat to the world at large with all of his followers. And his plan wasn’t entirely for evil purposes. He had some what good intentions to save his people from extinction. He just went about it the wrong way in his quest to preserve Kryptonian heritage at the expense of the human race. My possible only gripe about Zod was the fact that the story was in some way a rehash of “Superman II”, but that wasn’t an entirely bad thing. It’s just that Superman has a pretty extensive list of super villains they could have pulled out of the vault instead of choosing the one villain that was created just for the movies.

I’m not saying they should have chose another villain for this movie. I’m just saying they had the option, and I hope they explore that option in the sequels to come. I don’t want them to just rehash old ideas from the Christopher Reeve days. Zod was a good choice. He definitely gave Superman a run for his money which was another improvement of the movie. It had action, and I mean a real knock through buildings and leave Metropolis in ruins kind of slugfest. Superman had to pull out all of the stops to fight Zod and all of his followers. There was no holding back. He had to use his fists and pull no punches. It was the kind of fight I wanted to see in this kind of movie. Now, some people say the fight scenes were too drawn out. I disagree. For this fight to truly be epic, it had to be fought all over Metropolis, across Smallville, and even into outer space. The only part, in my opinion, that was weak was the part where Zod attempted to kill civilians at the end of their fight. It didn’t have that feel that Zod may actually succeed and kill those who Superman swore to protect. It just confirmed that Superman would have no choice but to kill him, something I didn’t think they would let Superman do. It was too anti-climatic. Other than that, I rather enjoyed the action at the end of the movie.

This is how Superman should have been. If they would have taken this approach back in the Christopher Reeve days, I might have actually became a fan. I know special effects were limited back then, but they could have still made the movies more action-packed. That’s why if I watch any Superman movie from that time period, it’s “Superman II”. “Man of Steel” took some of what made that movie successful and improved it tenfold. It wasn’t sappy. It had a huge amount of action, and it may have established the second most successful franchise in DC in recent years.

That’s not to say that the movie was perfect. It definitely had its flaws, but they were from a writing aspect and not because I’m not a Superman fan. As a writer, I tend to notice things in movies that some people miss. For instance, I can tell when they rushed a movie out. It feels like they were more concerned with getting it out to the public rather than making it the best possible movie they can. I also notice things like plot holes and character development.

My first gripe was with Russell Crowe’s character, Jor-El. I think they put too much focus on his character. It felt like they thought the movie just couldn’t survive without help from Jor-El. I like the fact that they did develop who his character was, but he had way too much freedom as some kind of holographic persona of his former self later in the movie. My other gripe about him was that he was supposed to be a scientist, yet he fought like a hardened soldier. I’m not saying a scientist can’t fight, but Zod was supposed to have been bred for combat. He should have wiped the floor with Jor-El. I understand this is Russell Crowe, and he’s usually an action star. The movie wasn’t supposed to be about him, though. He was supposed to play more of a background character, a tool to show who Superman really was. All I can say is that they must have paid him a ton of money just to be a bit part and then realized that was a huge financial mistake, so they wrote more parts for him further in the movie.

My next gripe was the backstory. Overall, it was kind of weak. I’ve heard that some people had complained that the original movie focused too much on Clark Kent’s beginnings, but I disagree. It gave you a true insight on how he became the man in the blue and red suit. They did cover some things about his past in the movie, but left you with a real lot of holes in his backstory. They probably could have left out the entire backstory all together and it wouldn’t have made that much of a difference. Now, some people (especially people who knows his origins) thinks it’s boring sitting through his past to get to the parts they want to see where he’s beating the crap out of the bad guys, but I think it is an essential part of explaining why he does what he does especially to those who have never seen Superman before (they do exist). I would have gladly sat through another backstory to get a better feel for this interpretation of Superman like I did with “The Amazing Spider-Man”.

Speaking of backstory, I think Kevin Costner got the short end of the stick in this affair. He is a great actor and could have brought such depth to the character of Clark’s adopted father, Jonathan Kent. Instead, he was reduced to a very small part of the movie. It also didn’t seem to me like he really taught Clark much about being the hero he would become. All he taught him was to hide his power, almost like he should have been ashamed of who he was because he wasn’t human. This was supposed to be an attempt to make Jonathan Kent a more real character, but it just made him forgettable. “The Amazing Spider-Man” suffered the same problems with Uncle Ben. They really didn’t develop any real relationship between Clark and Jonathan. The closest they came to a connection was when Jonathan told Clark how he arrived in their lives. The worse part came when he was killed by a tornado. I had no emotional connection to Jonathan at all, and it didn’t seem like Clark did either. The final message he left Clark didn’t help things. He made Clark watch and not interfere as the tornado swept him away. His last message was hide who you are. He should have been proud of his adopted son’s gifts. Oh, the tornado death was also a little over the top unlike the heart attack he had in the original movie.

I think that was a huge problem with most of the movie. There were no real character connections with a lot of the cast in the movie. Most of the focus was on Superman, Jor-El, Zod, Faora, Colonel Nathan Hardy, and a little bit on Lois Lane which may not be an entirely bad thing. I just think they could have done a little more character development for Lois Lane, Perry White, and Martha Kent. I didn’t really feel any connection for these characters in the movie. They could have been killed off, and I wouldn’t have noticed. I think the relationships these characters have, especially with Clark Kent, help develop what Superman fights for, and it was a lost opportunity in this movie. I hope they do more character development for these characters in future sequels.

Probably the worst is Perry White. His character was totally unnecessary in this movie except maybe to establish where Lois Lane worked and where Clark Kent will work in the future. During the scenes where he and his co-workers were trying to escape the devastation, I felt no empathy for him at all. I felt like the scenes were totally pointless because I wasn’t properly introduced to him. Like I said before, he could have been killed, and I wouldn’t haven’t even taken notice. It’s a shame, tool Laurence Fishburne is another outstanding actor that was crapped upon in this movie. I only hope he will come back to the role in the sequels, so I can see how he will portray this version of Perry White. I want to see more of his character in future movies.

Like I said, this movie definitely had it's flaws, but overall, I really enjoyed this it which is hard for me to say since I’m a Marvel fan. It’s the first movie since Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy that has really shown any kind of real competition for the ever growing collection of Marvel movies out there. Is it my favorite movie? No, I don’t think a Superman movie will ever be my favorite. Did I like this movie? Yes, I really liked the new direction they took with this version. Would I see it again? Yes, I definitely could see myself watching this again especially after hearing about all of the easter eggs that were apparently placed around the film (like Wayne Tech appearing on the satellite that Zod ripped apart). Would I buy it? One of my friends might be surprised, but yes, I will definitely have to buy this movie. I hope the sequels can only build on the success that this movie has established. I also hope they work on the flaws that this film had, or I might not be as lenient on the next one. Anyways, I give it 4 out of 5 stars despite its flaws. I definitely think it is going in the right suggestion, and I suggest this movie for anyone who hasn’t seen it yet. For the Superman fans out there, I suggest watching it a minimum of three times. Anyways, this has been a review by Krimson, and this is Krimson signing off.

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4 out of 5 stars