(Does anyone else get a major Harry Hamlin/Kraken Vibe anytime that phrase gets used?)
I'll be honest, I have not liked the Snyder take on the DC Universe. I find it violent in a way that doesn't seem to work, in that some of the heroes, especially Superman, don't seem to notice or care about the victims their Fights Through Cities are causing.
How do you grow up in Smallville and then allow yourself to be a part of having it trashed? There's cornfields in every direction, Super Bro. Use your head smarts.
But in anticipation of today's release I wanted to give the Snyderverse a second chance. So today and tomorrow, I'm going to drop a couple thoughts about cool writerly-ish things I take from MAN OF STEEL and BATMAN vs. SUPERMAN.
Then over the weekend I'm going to finish up on the FREAKS & GEEKS pilot. And next week I'll take on JUSTICE LEAGUE.
++
You know the thing that hits me hardest rewatching MAN OF STEEL, other than Tornado Dog and the 9/11-esque-but-worse destruction of Metropolis?
It's the way that Snyder fights to weave together things that every other interpretation of Superman's origins have kept apart. You look at the original SUPERMAN: structurally it starts with a prologue that's about 30 minutes, because Krypton is a really full story of its own to tell. You really can't just start with Kal rocketing away; you want the audience to know his parents, because their sacrifice and love is in a sense the real rocket ship, baking pathos and empathy into our understanding of Superman's character before we've ever met him.
Then you've got Jonathan and Martha to introduce and develop, who like the Kryptonians are really their own discrete thing. And before you know it it's been 45 minutes and we've yet to get to Metropolis or meet Lois Lane, who is the greatest human character in the DC Universe.
In SUPERMAN the approach to all this is basically a baton-relay. Krypton hands off to the Kents hands off to Metropolis and Lois. And it works just fine. I still think we have yet to find an interpretation of Clark and his story that hits like that one does.
But still, it's all a bit of a shaggy dog. Also, it's been done now.
So what does Snyder do? We still start on Krypton, and it still takes a while. But then Jor-El keeps coming back into the frame. He's the AI in the ship that Clark discovers, explaining his origins, a la the original SUPERMAN. But then he comes back again as an active character helping Lois escape the ship and bringing the fight to Zod. He's a part of the film almost the whole way through, in fact.
Similarly, rather than hand off to Smallville, the film goes right from Krypton to Adult Clark. And that allows Lois to join the action almost immediately. In fact she drives quite a bit of the early action, including hunting down Clark's identity--a crazy bold choice, and yet one that absolutely fits her character. Of course she should discover who he is, and on her schedule not his. She's Lois !%#!%! Lane.
And just like that she and Clark can be a real team the rest of the story, working with his dad to stop Zod.
So where SUPERMAN has these pretty distinct sections that never fully cohere, MAN OF STEEL works really hard to weave all the elements into one story. It's a creative approach to Superman, but classic screenwriting. You don't want loose ends; you want everything to lock in on a common goal.
++
There is one downside to this approach: We really don't get to know Clark. When we meet him he's doing the strong silent savior type. And in those early scenese we get cutaway glimpses of his childhood. But mostly those moments tell the story of his father teaching him to keep his identity a secret (even when it means letting his dad get murdered by a tornado).
I really need a scene in Justice League where Clark describes this moment, and they're all like Wait, What?
So we get a clear sense of the conflict in that for Clark, but beyond that we don't learn too much about who he is. In fact the little vignettes that are offered each nod to a much bigger journey that Young Clark has been on that we have not been privy to. In doing so they tend to create distance between him and us, rather than forging a connection.
The result of all this is when Adult Clark is in scenes where he has to express a desire--as with the priest--or ask questions of his AI Dad, there's a flatness to the scenes, an affectlessness that is strange. If we entered into those moments with a clearer sense of who Clark is or what his life is like beyond Nomad Hero, I think they'd play much stronger.
I'd like to say it was possible to weave the stories together and still build Clark out more. It certainly seems like it should be possible. But there's always tradeoffs, too.
