MAN OF STEEL - Grading & Discussion

Discussion in 'Science Fiction & Fantasy' started by Agent Richard07, Jun 11, 2013.

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Grade the movie...

  1. A+

    10.9%
  2. A

    20.8%
  3. A-

    18.1%
  4. B+

    9.8%
  5. B

    11.3%
  6. B-

    4.2%
  7. C+

    4.9%
  8. C

    4.9%
  9. C-

    3.8%
  10. D+

    3.4%
  11. D

    3.8%
  12. D-

    2.6%
  13. F

    1.5%
  1. Lapis Exilis

    Lapis Exilis Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    There's so much wrong from a tornado point of view in that scene:

    1) When you live in tornado country you know when the conditions are right for a tornado and you're not out driving on the highway so the 35 cars full of people are wrong right off. People tend to stick very close to home when there's a tornado watch on. On top of that, unless there's a football game that afternoon or church that morning, you don't find that many cars trailing each other on a minor highway between small towns in Kansas.

    2) When you live in tornado country, you know that if you are in a car and a tornado is coming, you don't huddle under an overpass, you hit the nearest ditch and get down. Because of the way highways are built in that area, there are generally generous ditches on either side of the highway. If there's no ditch, then you find whatever divot in the earth you can - but you couldn't have Clark watching in anguish if he's head down in a ditch.

    The scene is contrived from start to finish to create the circumstances of Jonathon's death. It's clumsy for sure.
     
  2. Gojira

    Gojira Commodore Commodore

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    I would try and save my dog!! My little buddy is a great friend so it makes Jonathan's actions very plausible.
     
  3. RAMA

    RAMA Admiral Admiral

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    Ah this doesnt really hold water....during the tornadoes in the last few weeks, people in "tornado country" routinely did the WRONG things, including hitting the highways instead of taking deep cover. This is not really much of a criticism.
     
  4. Bad Bishop

    Bad Bishop Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    I liked the scene where Clark visits a church before turning himself over to the military. I'm not sure this suggests that Clark was raised Christian by the Kents; the religious faith of superheroes seems to be a largely unexplored subject. It's too bad, unfortunately, that the scene had the reverend offering some really banal advice. "A leap of faith" is something that Clark could have heard from a Starbucks employee. What a cop-out. Couldn't screenwriter David Goyer come up with something a little better? I could be wrong, but "a leap of faith" doesn't sound to me like it's right out of the Gospels.
     
  5. jadcox@mindspring.com

    jadcox@mindspring.com Commodore Commodore

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    I liked the movie A LOT, and almost loved it. I adored all the Easter Eggs, especially the nods to Smallville, which I didn't expect. A little humor would have gone a long, long way though.

    A few flaws are just plain bugging me, though.

    [SPOILER="I HATED the tornado scene. Hated it. There were just too many ways to avoid that problem without revealing the secret. I can't believe that Superman, in any incarnation, would allow his dad, or anyone, to die when he could stop it. In Donner's film the heart attack had resonance, because it was the one thing he COULDN'T stop, and made him that much more dedicated to stopping the things he could. This just struck me as lazy writing."

    Also, the Zod climax would have been more powerful if we had seen Superman reluctant to kill before.

    Also, to me, it kinda showed that Superman could have ended the fight at pretty much any time. Wouldn't it have been stronger if Superman was constantly having to choose to save the people of Metropolis and let Zod go temporarily?

    And by the way, what WAS Jor El's plan for the codex? To have Superman gradually gain trust, and then bring forth more Kryptonians? I get, metaphorically, that he is now the father of all Kryptonians. But from a story point of view, how was Jor El's plan different than Zod's, save for the terraforming?

    Loved the rest, though. (Although while I liked Jenny, I miss Jimmy. And Krypto.)

    By the way, in the flashback where Clark is playing with the blanket cape, who is he pretending to be?
    ][/SPOILER]
     
  6. jadcox@mindspring.com

    jadcox@mindspring.com Commodore Commodore

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    I HATED the tornado scene. Hated it. There were just too many ways to avoid that problem without revealing the secret. I can't believe that Superman, in any incarnation, would allow his dad, or anyone, to die when he could stop it. In Donner's film the heart attack had resonance, because it was the one thing he COULDN'T stop, and made him that much more dedicated to stopping the things he could. This just struck me as lazy writing."

    Also, the Zod climax would have been more powerful if we had seen Superman reluctant to kill before.

    Also, to me, it kinda showed that Superman could have ended the fight at pretty much any time. Wouldn't it have been stronger if Superman was constantly having to choose to save the people of Metropolis and let Zod go temporarily?

    And by the way, what WAS Jor El's plan for the codex? To have Superman gradually gain trust, and then bring forth more Kryptonians? I get, metaphorically, that he is now the father of all Kryptonians. But from a story point of view, how was Jor El's plan different than Zod's, save for the terraforming?

    Loved the rest, though. (Although while I liked Jenny, I miss Jimmy. And Krypto.)

    By the way, in the flashback where Clark is playing with the blanket cape, who is he pretending to be?
     
  7. davejames

    davejames Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Yeah, a whole bunch of them hit the road because an idiotic TV weatherman's told them to drive away, and they got trapped in their cars. And I was also surprised to read that the vast majority of people in that area have no kind of underground shelter or bunker at all.

    Yeah I liked that as well. It's something you don't usually see in a superhero movie, and yet it totally made sense given his upbringing.
     
  8. Samurai8472

    Samurai8472 Vice Admiral Admiral

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    There was quite a few "Superman for all seasons" inspirations in the movie

    The tornado
    Jor-el's dialogue
    Talking with the priest


    [​IMG]
     
  9. davejames

    davejames Vice Admiral Admiral

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    I'm still totally baffled by the "no humor" criticism. There might not have been any Avengers-style wisecracks, but there were still plenty of small, humorous moments throughout.

    -the trucker trying to punch Clark, and then seeing his truck torn apart
    -Lois's line about everything going downhill after the first kiss
    -"Well here, it's an S" and Superman describing the items in Hamilton's pocket
    -Jor-El calmly helping a frazzled Lois shoot Zod's men
    -Superman telling Lois "You might want to step back... a little bit more"
    -the reverend's huge gulp when Clark tells him who he is
    -Martha's "nice suit" line
    -the infamous "I think he's kinda hot" line
    -the double meaning of "Welcome to the Planet" and "Glad to be here" at the end....
     
  10. Nerys Myk

    Nerys Myk A Spock and a smile Premium Member

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    All those got big laughs at the showing I saw. Though I think I was the first person to get the last one.
     
  11. Bad Bishop

    Bad Bishop Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    IHOP received some pretty good exposure (and damage) in the film. Do they have some sort of "Man of Steel" menu item right now? :)
     
  12. sojourner

    sojourner Admiral In Memoriam

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    I thought the funniest bit was Jor-El's "crossing guard" direction of Lois in the spacecraft.
     
  13. Samurai8472

    Samurai8472 Vice Admiral Admiral

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    "This construction site has gone 80 days without an accident"


    "Superman crashes into sign"
     
  14. davejames

    davejames Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Ha, yeah it was a bit weird seeing Superman and Zod standing in the middle of an IHOP at one point.

    Although I guess it could be considered a Superman tradition now, considering the blatant product placement of Coke, Marlboro, and Cheerios in the Donner films.
     
  15. Lapis Exilis

    Lapis Exilis Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    You may not think so, but I'm guessing you've never lived in a rural area of Tornado Alley. I have. I've been through numerous tornadoes out in the country. The incident you're referring to was people in Oklahoma City following the poorly considered advice of a weatherman in the face of an F5 tornado. It was a somewhat atypical situation.
     
  16. The Old Mixer

    The Old Mixer Mih ssim, mih ssim, nam, daed si Xim. Moderator

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    Well...I wanted to like it, I really did. I didn't go in with a lot of preconceived notions...I was prepared for some of the individual choices that purists were making a lot of noise about. And a lot of the things that the film did interested me...though definitely not the action half of the film, which was as mind-numbingly OTT as I'd heard. As a whole package....It feels kind of like Ang Lee's Hulk. A superhero film that's ambitious, that tries to do something different...but just doesn't come together into a greater whole.

    I'd be interested in seeing a sequel to see where it goes from here...but I have doubts about how this film's going to fare...I predict a steep drop next weekend from bad WOM. This is not Joe Sixpack's Superman.

    I think I'll go with a B. Hovering on B-.
     
    Last edited: Jun 15, 2013
  17. Trekker4747

    Trekker4747 Boldly going... Premium Member

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    For what it's worth, though, there have been news stories (one, in fact, that took place in central Kansas conceivably at the time Clark would've been this age as it was in the mid-90s) where people have survived taking shelter in an over/underpass. There's even video of a couple of these incidents one DID include people on a fairly busy highway. So it DOES and HAS happened, the underpass thing I've not too much a problem with. (It IS a wrong idea but people have done it and survived.) But the biggest problem, really, is that it was over a dog. Which people would know better than to risk their lives for and for audience members it can come across as trivial. It would've been more impactful if Jonathon risked himself to save a child or a person rather than a dog. Again, I say this as a dog lover, but if I'm in a situation where I have to get myself to safety and the dog isn't coming, screw him. I'm getting myself safe.

    Everyone likely knows of the infamous video of "Galloping Girdie" of the Tacoma Narrows bridge that was poorly designed without wind guards resulting in it bucking and swaying like a banner in high winds. In that video a car is trapped on the bridge and eventually goes down with the bridge. There was a dog in that car that people tried to save but the dog wouldn't come and eventually the people involved and trying to save it gave up and fled to safety before the bridge collapsed.

    It's sad, but that's what you're supposed to do in disaster situations. Save the human beings FIRST and then, only if you can safely, get the animals. Jonathon died saving a dog and, really, that feels a bit shallow.

    Well, maybe shallow isn't the right word. But it just feels... "pointless". again, maybe that comes from always being taught to worry about human beings before animals but I think the death would have meant more if it was to save a person or a child than a dog and if Jonathon really WAS in a situation where saving him would've meant much more exposure for Clark. Here, Jonathon is pretty much just stand there, holds up his hand and says, "Meh, I've done my time. Let me go."

    I agree the death in SM:TM meant more because it was a natural thing Clark COULDN'T do anything about. Here it could've just been a choice Clark had to make between exposing himself and saving his father but, really, it seems like his father risked himself, essentially, for nothing. If Jonathon risked himself to save a person it'd mean a bit more. But saving a dog doesn't work for me.

    Now, on another front, I'm big on the idea that Superman doesn't kill. And at first I was bothered by the killing of Zod but then I think it kid of worked because we saw the anguish in Superman after he did it. He didn't want to do this but he pretty much had to to save lives, he was pushed to his limit. Now we could argue that Superman always finds another way or even that the people weren't truly trapped, but I think the moment works because of how Superman reacts to it.
     
    Last edited: Jun 15, 2013
  18. P0sitr0nic

    P0sitr0nic Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Saw it this morning and loved it. Pure greatness.
     
  19. Admiral2

    Admiral2 Admiral Admiral

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    Wow. That was boatloads more awesome than I expected it to be.

    I'm not gonna go over this entire thread. I'm pretty sure everything I can praise about it has already been mentioned a thousand times. I'll only mention a couple of quibbles:

    1. The CGI battles weren't as sharp as they could have been. It looked more like Spidey and Doc Ock in SM2 than what was in the Avengers.

    2. The music score was the typical lotsa-beats-and-no-melody Syfy movie of the week crap. John Williams was missed.

    Everything else, the acting, the visuals, Krypton...just awesome.
     
  20. trekkiebaggio

    trekkiebaggio Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Ohhh that's a good comparison.