I went with #3 although to be quite frank my actual response was “Get off my lawn you rotten little brat and put Linda Lovelace in there. What the Hell is wrong with kids these days?”
Ya’ know, the one great thing about having such “unrefined” tastes is that there’s so much more out there for guys like me to enjoy.
I’m really not seeing why Man of Steel is supposed to a bad movie.
I’ll give you Super Man Returns though. I wouldn’t go sa far to say it was horrible, just not something I would watch more than once like I would MoS.
Superman Returns. Superman as a deadbeat dad stalking his former girlfriend is not a Superman I want to watch.
Anaamika, for sanity’s sake, can you please make it clear they are both equally to blame for this?
I’m not a fan of the comics (not even when I was a kid) but I don’t get the hate for Man of Steel. It’s exactly what it needed to be, and adult-oriented superhero film. IOW more *The Dark Knight *instead of the silly Marvel stuff. Feel the same way about the trailer for B v S…
Aragorns speech in front of the Gates can stand with Henry V St. Crispins day speech.
And yes, Jackson has had hits and misses- which prolific Director hasn’t? But he’s no Michael Bay.
And I’ll give him a pass on Deadbeat dad, but *not *creepy stalker.
After careful consideration of the facts before me, I had to go with MoS as the better of the two.
I will admit to getting a wee bit tired of the origin story. Just a wee. Other than that, I thought MoS was a bit more connected to reality, weird as that might sound. With all of that super strength and whatnot, you know there must have been some impressive destruction along the way. It was just off camera, so to speak. Insulated. Safe. Now it’s not safe anymore. Supe’s moved from campy to the big leagues.
I voted “Equally bad” -
SR has the worst fucking Lex Luthor ever, and all that kid crap. But I love, love, love the bullet-in-the-eye scene!
MoS has the worst Pa Kent ever (seriously - “Should I have let them die?” “Maybe…” Fuck that noise) and Superman killing someone. But I liked Zod (hated the lead-in, though, Krypton seems like a true dystopia)
No he wasn’t!
He was not aware Lois was pregnant when he left on his space pilgrimage to Krypton, and when he returned not only did he have no reason to believe humans and Kryptonians could produce offspring Lois also LIED saying he was not the father, and the child showed no obvious signs of Kryptonian parentage.
I haven’t seen Superman Returns but it must be truly awful if it can be considered worse than Man of Steel which I couldn’t even finish.
Again, I’m really surprised at this. I get why Superman Returns was disliked and underperformed. But taking it for what it was, namely a huge tribute to the Richard Donner/Chris Reeve franchise, I can accept it. I mean, I’ve only ever watched it once and have no desire to watch it again, but it was no Superman III or IV by any means (those two are MST3K bad!) However SR still wasn’t what people wanted, nor was it a direction that should have ever been taken (restarting a 30-year-old franchise poisoned by two shit sequels!).
But Man of Steel was a thoroughly modern, grown-up film. No cheesy opening credits, a non-linear storyline, no spoon-feeding the audience exposition etc. And the next film, Batman v Superman, finally takes into account the one enormous bit of realism that all superhero movies have totally ignored: Namely that once a truly god-like individual was known to exist the entire world and every society in it could never be the same.
You beat me to it – except I was about to make the exact opposite point.
I can accept MAN OF STEEL on its own terms. Show me a bearded loner trying to figure out where he fits in, following a childhood where saving those kids on that bus led to small-minded people freaking the hell out, and show me how his father chose to die rather than let the world know there’s a young man with the power of a Greek god? Show me he reluctantly goes public only because it’s the only way to foil a threat to all mankind, just like he reluctantly kills when all else fails?
I get where that’s not everybody’s ideal Superman. But like I was just saying, I can put that out of my mind and judge it as an interesting story on its own terms.
I can’t do that with SUPERMAN RETURNS; the whole point is that Brandon Routh is doing an eerily accurate Christopher Reeve impression while parroting Reeve’s famous lines, and that makes me think, naw, that ain’t it; this reminds me of that movie where a more charming actor slept with Lois Lane and then told the President he sure is sorry and he won’t let you down again, before – leaving for five years, I guess? Dude, just shut the hell up about how air travel is statistically the safest form of travel; you don’t get to say that, right as the music comes up, without me comparing you to Reeve – and you don’t want that comparison, because, honestly, what change do you bring other than a comically undersized ‘S’ on your chest?
I don’t get that when I’m watching Henry Cavill casually snapping his handcuffs after amiably chatting with Amy Adams. I don’t get that when he slugs the guy who was threatening Diane Lane, or when he finally wins over Christopher Meloni, or even when he plays immovable object to deal with some loudmouth forcing his attentions on a gal in a bar, which would’ve pinged my radar with Routh, but Cavill gets a pass, because he’s doing his own thing.
I liked Spacey as Luthor. I hated Pa Kent. I think Costner did the best he could with that role, but it was written as poorly as the finale. I liked Crowe better than Brando, and while that imagining of Krypton wasn’t my cup of tea, it wasn’t bad.
Yes! I do hold Superman to higher blame though. He sets himself as higher. He carries a higher moral code. He should have been way more careful. But yes, she should have done something too.
ETA: As a “tribute” to the older films…man, they should have just left that idea on the drawing room table. First of all, if you think those movies were great (which I don’t) then you can’t match up even with a tribute. If you think they were awful (which I also don’t) then you’re just going to hate it.
People like me, who enjoyed the movies, but didn’t think they were the end-all be-all, aren’t going to be impressed anyway. I mean I liked the second Superman, but they still weren’t great movies or anything.
Problem I had was, it wasn’t Spacey as Luthor, it was Spacey as Spacey.
Michael Rosenbaum spoiled me for Luthors made of cheese.
Yeah, the whole “tribute” thing is dorky to the max. I don’t go to the movie to watch “tributes.” Save that for Oscar night skits, bozos.
they’re both pretty bad films, but Man Of Steel is so ham-fisted, so tone-deaf, and so aggressively stupid that it’s easily the worst of the two. It is the Linkin Park of superhero movies, a hyperactive angry entitled teen of a film that’s had five or ten Mountain Dews at the Subway next to the Shoney’s next to the intrusive product placement, an atonal scream of spine-snapping, of Pa Kent jerkishness, Lois Lane uselessness, of leaving out Jimmy Olsen in favor of nameless Daily Planet employees who exist to fill Jimmy Olsen’s spot, of the Giant Penis Rockets Of Krypton, of Russell Crowe’s Ghost fightin’ round the world. It’s a Superman movie made by someone who hates Superman and everything Superman ever did that was entertaining.
I don’t mind Jimmy not being in MoS. He’s 10-15 years younger than Clark (whom I’ve always taken to be several years younger than Lois; he SHOULDN’T b around when Clark is hired, EV n allowing for Clark’s late start.
The young girl was meant to be ‘Jimmy.’ She was called Jenny Olsen in the promotional materials and on IMDB before the movie came out. Fans freaked out and they changed the last name on her name tag to something Polish.
That was Jimmy, though.
Nothing counts unless it’s on the screen, especially if it’s CONTRADICTED by what’s on screen. Says so in the Necromonicon.