It's been a strange journey for me. It was one of my most anticipated films for a variety of reasons, but when I watched it the first time I was mildly disappointment. I still liked it, but something felt off...maybe my expectations. I knew I needed to see it again so I did about four days later, and I liked it a lot more the second time. I saw it again yesterday about a month later, and I liked it even more than I did the second time.

Thought most of the character choices were on point. The Superman specific stuff works better and better on every viewing. Brosnahan might be the best Lois we've ever gotten. She's not a damsel in distress or getting into situations that Superman has to get her out of.

it's not perfect, but Supes speech to Lex about what it is to be human is outstanding.

That and the interview scene are my favourite parts of the movie.

My only issues are the pacing feels a little off (the film felt like it was ready for the final act when there were still 52 minutes to go) and I didn't particularly care for Hawkgirl (specifically the stupid screeching), despite usually liking Isabela Merced.

Overall, this is a lovely modernized take on the Silver Age comics.

Finally saw this tonight and agree with all of this. I liked it, didn't love it. But it made me forget about the awful Snyder films, so there's that. I'd give this a generous 7/10.

I'm on my 4th viewing and the colors on this thing just pop on my G8.

I know the tubers are trying to build some controversy with this early digital release, but this film will find new life on streaming/home video format. That's guaranteed.

Yeah, it looked spectacular on my LG C2. Solid audio too. The bass isn't as deep as I'd like, but Christopher Boyes made another wonderful mix nonetheless.
Totally agree. Between digital rentals and digital sales, this should make a tidy profit. This is the new VHS/DVD market, not streaming subscriptions.

I was on a business trip and yesterday had some time on my hand and looked for a theater that was still playing Superman. I ended up making it a double feature with Fantastic Four.


I'm not quite sure what to make of the movie. I liked the idea that they didn't start with an origin story, but I didn't like how they introduced the characters. It just felt like I missed part of the story, which was probably deliberate by Gunn, but didn't work for me. The first and second row of characters I liked, but I hated the comic book side kicks, only comic book readers know. They just stole screentime. The relationship between Lois and Clars/Superman didn't work for me either. She wants to dump him, but doesn't because he says "I love you" and that wouldn't have been the right moment, but after he saves the day she loves him too.

The action set pieces were the best thing. They all looked fantastic and you could actually follow them, although the showdown with Ultraman went on too long. What I hated was everybodies reaction while the rift was expanding. It wasn't a wave just step to the side and you're safe for the moment anyway and what I hate in all disaster movies. If people are fleeing a city I'm pretty sure they also use the wrong side of the road and don't follow the rules of traffic.

In my opinion Man of Steel is the better movie, but this is probably a better franchise starter, since it succesfully puts Superman in a world with other characters outside of the typical Superman characters.

I've been reading DC Finest Catwoman, and while I know the Bat books in the early 90s were all sort of tying together in various ways (this was during the Knightfall storyline), the Jo Duffy/Jim Balent series will just completely change the status quo from issue to issue without explanation. I actually don't mind it as much as I hate when media explains "I know x from my days doing y" and Protagonist: "An x? What's that?" Sidekick: "I can't believe it! I read papers, but an x was only a theory. It's when you [do whatever] to a y, and then add in a z."

It lets the audience fill in the blanks on their own and use context clues to work it out. Catwoman knows the nameless computer hacker because she has a background in the criminal underworld. She got this personal assistant because it looks like she traded up her digs after her crappy apartment blew up. She knows about experimental technology because she's a master thief and presumably does her research. But each time you are just sort of thrown into what's going on.

Ok, I finally watched it (bought it digitally since we couldn't make it to the theater earlier and my kids really wanted to see it).

I liked the In Medias Res aspect of it, but then that's how I was kind of thrown into superhero comics as a kid: all these colorful heroes I knew nothing about, and little footnotes here and there that if you wanted to catch up on what they were doing track down issue 10 of superduperman, but otherwise you could just ride along and know that there's a bigger universe than what you're seeing. I always loved that about superhero comics.

Loved that they went out of their way to show Superman cares about saving lives. Some probably found it too over the top but I loved it.

Loved that Lex is just purely evil and his motivation is basically jealousy, and he owns up to it, along with the undercurrent of "we need to take care of ourselves" which isn't exactly wrong.

If you're going to give time to other superheroes at the expense of Superman's supporting cast (who other than Lois and Jimmy are again pretty much just there), I'd kinda rather you have a fuller superhero team. I mean I get why you focus on just a few but man Hawkgirl seemed borderline useless (at least they seemingly will touch on her murder of a foreign leader) with no convictions. Mr. Terrific filled in the "scientist who serves as deus ex machina" role so I have no problem with the way they elevated him. Guy was perfect, including the whole "you only bring up the Green Lantern Corps when there's something you don't want to do." Also had no idea until Peacemaker that Sean Gunn was Maxwell Lord, I must have missed that in that news snippet. But them being the premiere superhero team (seemingly) in this universe is... something.

A few other nitpicks: like nobody can track the Hammer of whoever when he flies back to base? He beats the crap out of Superman, showing that a foreign power seemingly has a superpowered being stronger than Superman and nobody cares? The whole "magic equation is going to completely close this rift" thing seemed a little too convenient too but I get why they did that. Once again, Superman turns himself in because he thinks that's the best option, but this time for his dog (and it's not even his dog)? (admittedly, Krypto was precious). Nothing besides plot armor prevented Lex from just killing Krypto anyway, if he was even still alive.

Overall though, hopefully people enjoyed it, lots of human moments for Supes and he's a bit of a dork even outside of Clark Kent, and this is the kind of dorky and caring yet superpowered Superman I enjoy.

I thought about no one tracking the Hammer, as well. But I chalk it up to that level of metahuman being difficult to track generally, less of an interest because the Hammer only seems to defend Boravia, and Luthor feeding false information to the US or other intel networks

See the more I think about it, the more stupid I think the US was in this (maybe not too far off base from reality but still...)

You think maybe Superman was sent here to takeover the world. You have no weapons (at least not shown) that can subdue him. Your one hope is that this privately owned security force can keep America safe. What the hell were you going to do if Superman didn't turn himself in? Why the hell would he turn himself in?
But he turns himself in. Now you have this privately owned security company who is aligned with you (for now) that has potentially the strongest metahuman alive. You also have a foreign country that you at least think has a metahuman that is also stronger than Superman. These two entities have strong ties with... each other. But yeah let Luthor have his way, in private, with Superman, do experiments on him, whatever.

I found the government's lack of oversight in regards to private contractors to be extremely realistic, to be honest haha. Rick Flagg at least seems to be pretty ambivalent towards Superman "He seems like a good guy, but yeah he has potential to be a threat, but not at the moment" kind of thinking

I did think it's funny that they never once show or even pretend to consult POTUS, and the audience is probably like "yeah, I get why."

She doesn't want to dump him, she's scared. Not just because any intelligent person considering the seriousness of their relationship is scared, but especially because this is SUPERMAN, who is an alien.

His optimism, trust and hope in humanity helps, but then she meets his parents under adverse circumstances and gets to really see his human side and understand who he actually is. And she realizes not only will he move heaven and earth for her (or anyone, but especially her), but if ever there's someone deserving of trust and hope and love, it's him.

And that doesn't make her love him, it allows her to acknowledge to herself that she already does, but is also now willing to think there might be a future. And for however long there is a future, she wants to spend it with him.

He's been active for three years, and there have definitely been other emergencies. Clearly Metropolis has exceptional evacuation plans, and - in a divergence from reality - the citizens actually seem to listen to such advice!

Right - he's not "evil," he's jealous, arrogant and a (human) supremacist.

Superman's been around for 3y. One of the many contentions of the DC universe(s) is that Superman be the 'first' or pre-eminent superhero. It's reasonable to extrapolate that the rest are only relatively-recently emerging, and certainly not teaming up that often. Equally, Superman's focus on trust and kindness is a rarity, so the conceit of a Justice League that essentially comes together because it's the right thing to do needs a Superman to coalesce around, inspire and be a rallying leader (and a Batman to fund it); currently, the Justice Gang seems to be a ragtag group of employees (of Max Lord), in it as much for the role as the rightness.

But, as we see, this is starting to change. Metamorpho is inspired to Do The Right Thing, as well as reach out to a team; Mr. Terrific is won over by superman (and Lois); Guy steps up to step in for Superman. All we need is Batman to step out of the shadows and Wonder Woman to reach the world of men, and the Justice League-proper will come to the fore.

The Gang are not - to my eyes - the "premiere" team, but the only one!

^ I won’t quote for length but a thumbs up for ntnon’s last couple of posts. I wholeheartedly agree.

This is one of the very few movies I’ve seen in quite awhile that had me thinking about it for several days afterward and has me eagerly anticipating revisiting it again.

She might be scared, but she actually talks to Daily Planet Barbie about wanting to end the relationship with her boyfriend.

I'm sure this has been discussed in here already, but I just watched this. Lex and his employees gleefully calling out commands for Ultra was so bad it almost took me out of the movie. Every time it happened, it was beyond eye rolling. There are a million other ways they could have shown Lex to be more intelligent.

That was so massively stupid. So Superman is fast as lightning but Lex' commands, the reaction of his goons and the moves of Ultraman are even faster.

What got me is that it's (superficially) similar to the scenes in GotG v.2 - videogame reality.

The point is that Lex is not just smarter and better that Superman, he's also a control freak. He likes barking orders, being in charge and demonstrating his superiority. He has studied Superman, know the 'best' counter-moves to all his fight moves, and has not only memorized them but can recall them instantly - so fast that he needs an entire team to relay those commands to his puppet.

The contention that Superman should be reacting faster than a mere human can is something one has to suspend disbelief over. If the Flash could run that fast, there'd be hundreds of scenarios like that of the opening of The Boys, as well as shockwaves. As mocked as MoS and Snyder's grimness is, and as terrible as Superman Returns was, both had moments where Superman's speed caused significant property damage. But it's best to just wave that away.

Superman and the Flash may be constantly experiencing time at a faster/slower rate and having to PERMANENTLY reign in and slow down, but that would swiftly degenerate into farce and ruin the plot. So the emphasis (especially with Superman) is that he typically just acts and reacts at human speed. Hence his fights broadly happen at a speed the reader or watcher can follow - and therefore Lex as observor can also follow and react to in real time.

I think he was also pre-empting rather than just reacting. Predicting what was coming up and prepping an immediate command-response.

Lex is evil though... he is willing to do anything including killing innocents for the sake of his goals (which are not even altruistic but that doesn't matter much anyway), plus he doesn't value human life other than his own like at all, and that to me is evil. The root of it isn't like doing bad for the sake of doing bad but I still consider that evil.

Also I see that you didn't mention Hawkgirl... I guess part of my "Justice Gang is the premiere/only superhero team" is that I don't want that to be true, but that's personal preference. In a world where Lex Luthor can easily create an Engineer and Ultraman and a bunch of ultra marines or whatever they are, and there are enough super powered bad guys to make up a Suicide Squad or two, I'd hope there are a bunch of like "good" metahumans out there, but I digress.

I could've sworn Lex had some kind of predictive technology (probably based on the psychology of how Superman fights, his tells, etc.) where he was able to correctly predict how the fight was going to progress, which kind of explains why him relaying orders verbally was "fast enough." You could also argue that he's not used to fighting against people that rival his strength, if you want an additional no-prize. But yeah, super speed is a cheat code that needs to be nerfed in order for most fights with the Flash or Superman to be feasible. You also have to have Superman have like "normal" human intelligence for the most part because if he's also a super genius...

The powersets of the "godlike" characters in comic books will always cause issues. The Flash should never be hit by anyone who isn't a speedster, yet it happens all the time. Superman is unstoppable without kryptonite for the same reasons. The Avengers could just send Thor in to solve 99% of their conflicts. Dr. Strange could have cut Thanos in half with a portal. And on and on.

There has to be a limit to what is done with those powers, otherwise stories would be over in an instant. The Boys was mentioned and that's one of the things I like about that show/comic series - there is a sense of dread whenever any of the "evil" superheroes are around, because any one of them could murder who they are talking to in the blink of an eye (and often do).

I think he could rationalize it as utilitarian. Ends justify means, and the 'end' is returning humans to the top of the pile. If there are superheroes, they should work for corporations - ideally Lex/LuthorCorp.

Good! We need more of that attitude in the world at the moment.

Contextually, within and without the film, in the DCU, comics, etc., Hawkgirl is around the same level as Jimmy Olsen - important-ish, relevant, definitely part of the plot, but also second- or third-tier. Green Lanterns are as/more powerful than Superman. Mr Terrific is as brilliant as Batman and Lex. Hawkgirl is a decent and relevant superhero. (Metamorpho is getting there.) And/or, maybe every movie superteam needs a "Hawk-" character who is present and helps, but isn't that important.

*recruited the Engineer. Looks like we may not get an Authority film any time soon, but he didn't make her.

The Suicide Squad is an interesting aside - partly because its grandfathered-in (like - probably - Blue Beetle), but mostly for the same reason connected universes wind up being awkward - because you're right: it demonstrates there must be a large and diverse metahuman community across the US/world. Some/many of whom must have been inspired by Superman (or the proto-Justice Society seen in mural) to step into the light and fight crime - necessarily the Squad ought to have been fighting/caught by other superheroes.

Stepping into the real world, given the (oft-manufactured) criticisms of Superman not being a solo(-enough) film, many more cameos, references or teams would have been out of place, made the plot more muddled and cost more.

At the end of the day, even though it's a cop out, the answer must be "it is a work of fiction."

Oh I could've sworn Luthor took credit for the Engineer's powers. I probably misheard.l