Amph "If You Seek His Monument, Look Around You" - The Man of Steel and Announced Sequel Thread

Well, having seen the film again today, it did get better for reasons I don't want to get into here.

However, one puzzle did stay with me that I'm trying to work out. It comes down to this: the court that acquitted OJ has nothing on the Kryptonian justice system as portrayed

Mainly, why the hell is Lara not manacled right next to Zod and friends when they're zapped into the Phantom Zone for three hundred cycles as punishment for the equivalent of high treason? Lara has just been an accomplice in the theft and loss of the Codex, something portrayed as integral to Krypton's civilisation, something that Zod is genetically committed to defend to the point where he spends thirty years or more searching the galaxy tirelessly for it. (Of course, Zod also tries to blow up the ship that's carrying the Codex, but let's leave that aside...)

Anyway, it's Lara herself who pushes the button to launch Kal-El into space, and thus the Codex -- right after Zod himself tells her that if she launches she is dooming Krypton's future. Faora and friends don't get the benefit of "I was just following orders" in their defence on the rebellion, so one would not have expected Lara to get that defence to apply to the crime of theft of the Codex. The evidence seems pretty strong that Zod's version of events would be believed: Jor-El certainly steals the Codex, and Zod is arrested in the aftermath of Jor-El's death. The house droids would be able to be interrogated, one presumes successfully since Zod overrides Jor-El's AI presence inside a scout ship. And if the Council can find Zod's ship at Jor-El's location, I'm not sure how they could miss the launch and departure to hyperspace of the ship. And what about the apparent "heresy" of having a kid via good old horizontal jogging rather than in a petri dish? Zod's shouting at Lara right up to his freezing that he's going to find Lara's son right there next to a council member. Assuming Zod represents the societal or legal norms of his race, he was aghast when Jor-El revealed he and Lara had conceived naturally, so you have to wonder why there were no repercussions for that act from the Council.

So what gives? Jor-El obviously paid for his theft with his death. And it seems to me from the initial conversation that the Council also knows that Jor-El the planet is about to blow up; it isn't the same scene as Donner's S-1 where the Council rejects Jor-El's conclusions. And that Council, despite knowing what's coming, is still bloodyminded enough to put Zod et. al. into the Phantom Zone thus condemning them to literal eternity (as far as anyone knows) in a black hole, even though Krypton itself is doomed. But the same Council is not bloodyminded enough to do anything to Lara for her part in the theft of the Codex. I don't get the discrepancy there, unless there's some deleted scene or other conclusion that makes the logic clear.

The one missing line that would have taken care of it would be a single cue from a Council member caving in to Jor-El's request and giving him permission to take the Codex and order the launch, even if that permission is given a second or two before Zod and friends crash the party. Had that happened, Jor-El's entire sequence of actions becomes legal and Lara is not guilty of any crime. But that line doesn't happen in the film.

Anyone want to kick this one around a bit?

 

So will Batman be Robin Blake or Bruce Wayne?

 

Nobody knows yet. Here's hoping the MoS series doesn't follow the TDK trilogy too closely and we get a Batman that is Bruce Wayne, as it should be. And if it does follow Nolan's TDK, well, Bruce can always come back after he's done banging his criminal gf and decides to look into the alien demigod who got into his ****.

Dude, it's called a plothole.

 

I loved TDK trilogy up to the last half of TDKR.

 

Hell, look at him when he realizes that Martha is in danger. He flies in at super speed, takes Zod away and heads into town and causes even more destruction.

Zod's crimes were greater because it involved murder which the Ruling Council takes issue with. It has been in place for a long time, that criminals should be rehabilitated rather than executed and it is usually the worst sort of crimes that is punishable. Lara is all the remains of the House of El and thus she gets off lightly.

It'll be Bruce Wayne, because it's been said for the last year that the Batman film series will be rebooted. Nolan and Robinov both said that the Batman film series will be rebooted, and Gordon-Levitt has said that he doesn't believe he'll be Batman in a future film series.

 

You can guarantee that it will be Bruce Wayne. One, because Bruce Wayne sells. Two, because Gordon Lovit is like 5 feet tall.

 

It'll be Wayne, because John Blake got killed on his first night out as Batman. (Blake tried to phone him for some ninja guidance, but Bruce was too busy at the café doing absolutely nothing.)

 

FYI: Just found this as a part of an actually unrelated search. This more fully explains how out-of-touch the WB studios were (as well as basically confirming the marketing costs) in their expectations and why we say "the movie underperformed" to those unrealistic expectations, even if it was profitable.

http://variety.com/2013/film/news/w...-priciest-incarnation-of-superman-1200493334/

 

So... Superman is about goodness, unlike Batman?



I wonder how much they think Batfleck is going to make...

 

Well, to be fair, a bunch of the nut-grafs from the writers/producers in that article make me cringe -- but really, this just shows what sort of pressure the WB brass put on everyone and why people look at 650 million globally as anything other than "successful, full stop."

EDIT: For example...

"... You just have to go back to the source material and reboot it a little more modern and gritty for today’s audiences, and you’re going to get a film that if it delivers, will launch a bigger universe than any other superhero movie."

Yes. Dark and gritty works for Batman because... he's BATMAN. And The Avengers outgrossed him while being... not dark and gritty.

 

Are people still being idiotic about the casting of Affleck?

There's a simple solution for the butthurt crowd. 1) Stop making your assessment on old Affleck films. Watch Hollywoodland, The Town, and Argo and be humbled. or 2) Shoot yourself in the face and do us all a favour.

 

Modern and gritty, not dark and gritty -- read the quote again. I grant you Man of Steel came across more elegaic than the Donner Superman, but given it's as much the tragedy of Krypton's fall as it is Superman Begins, I don't see a big problem there, especially since Superman is a symbol of ultimate hope rising out of the destruction of Krypton.

In passing, I got a pleasant thrill when I think I realised the artistic inspiration behind the design of Krypton if not other elements of the show: butterflies.

Take another look at things like the headdresses the Council members wear, the four-winged creatures, the plant-like, even insectoid, design of structures and costumes on the film. Consider that lingering image of the monarch butterfly sitting on a giant chain at almost the end of the film, especially after we saw those images of a dead monarch butterfly on that same chain in the trailers. Hell, Superman's baby rocket impresses as almost like a stylised pupae. Consider the fact a butterfly's beautiful, can fly, and your eye's attracted to them when you see them out of nowhere -- but at the same time it's incredibly vulnerable.

 

Any word on when MoS is out on DVD?

 

"Gritty" Superman:

 

And that's after he punched his pregnant wife to death because he thought she was a nuclear bomb or something oh god that comic was so moronic.

 

You can perhaps close that plothole by assuming for a minute that trials on Krypton are conducted in a similar manner to those on Earth whereby specific defendants charged with specific crimes are dealt with separately and not all together. Following the sentencing of Zod and cronies, the trial and sentencing of Lara might then presumably take place, the results of which are not seen. She may well have been awaiting sentence when Krypton was vaporised.

 

Why would you punch a nuclear bomb in the first place? What would that even accomplish?

 

Because Injustice is a terrible ****ing comic.

 

Yet, for all that, even it managed to avoid terrible 1-panel divorce scenes.

 

It's a tie in to a console video game. Idiocy is the currency for console gamers, so yes. That and the picture the closet racist posted are from something that should be burned and scorned.

 

Suck my ass Ender.

 

I'm sorry, I'm just not that kinda guy. Buy me dinner first, maybe make out for a bit, then we'll see.

 

Both of you can drop it.

 

I like how LeeKenobi assumes you are talking about him. It shows some level of self awareness.

 

Right, let me rephrase that: Discuss the film and post content, not posters, or else.