I don't see it as cynical and hopelessness to explore these things. To the contrary, I think understanding the why of Superman is important for people like myself who don't understand the appeal of Superman and feel very much on the outside of the insistence that he must be good all the time.
Wanting Superman to be "good" all the time is an unrealistic desire, as it divorces him (a character who consciously places himself in dangerous situations for the purpose of stopping something/one) from any relatable experience and behavior common to humanity. Of course, this kind of conversation in recent years stems from the overreaction to
Man of Steel's Superman killing Zod, when the latter was mere seconds away from incinerating a family (yet in a contradictory position, have no issue with MCU Captain America--sold as the most moral, justice-minded of
all superheroes--deliberately trying to kill the Red Skull, Thanos and in fact, slaughtered innumerable Hydra agents, and others).
As noted in the past, for those familiar with or lived through real world experience and/or read it in more realistic fiction, there were and will be situations where the most brutal and/or lethal action is the only action when there is no time for simply handcuffing someone, standing in their way or negotiating with a dangerous person.
From a creative standpoint, there's no drama if this one character
never finds himself facing this all too common situation--where he conveniently has the luxury and choice to pluck someone up by the collar and float to the local prison. There's not an ounce of dramatic weight in a character always being "that guy". As created, Superman was once a mirror of the feelings of readers--particularly American readers--about crime, terror and other societal problems. He was not shy about being violent or lethal if the situation called for it, but we also know Superman would be severely watered down from that Great Depression warrior of his early years.
Ultimately, the perception of Superman as a Boy Scout is one of the many reasons Batman across all media ultimately surpassed Superman in popularity: he's the more relatable character. Batman was born from the worst kind of violence and knows its a neverending
condition of humanity in one form or another, thus his reactions--his
solutions ring as closer to what a reader / audience member feels and/or would do, rather than a character who lives in and sees the world in glowing, Disney-esque ways that never existed on any large, universal scale.
As a member of a
population of a heroic fiction universe, where the very essence of the genre develops and includes threats beyond the capabilities of regular people to address, having a character act (or writers force him to act) as if the threats will always stop short of challenging his
unsought, but occasionally necessary solutions renders the character as being the equivalent of someone represented on a coin: it may look like the person, but its a nothing more than a symbol--an idol in relief bearing no resemblance to the real person born with real heart & reactions.
