Man of Steel Review

General Overview

The Creators

"Writer" and

Producer

Director

Screenplay

Critical Overview

• Rotten Tomatoes: 56% (53% from 47 top critics)
• "Man of Steel provides exhilarating action and spectacle to overcome its detours into generic blockbuster territory."
• Metacritic: 55/100 (Mixed reviews)
• Audience Ratings: 75-81/100

The look of shame

The Movie Critics On....

The Actors

The Fanboys/Creators

Brian Michael Bendis

• Generally praised but with mixed criticism
• "Even when she’s being swept off her feet by a tall, dark dreamboat in tights, Adams never looks like she’s having much fun."--Ann Hornaday WASHING POST

• Generally praised
• Peter Travers of ROLLING STONE praised Cavil for taking the role and making it his own.
• Other reviewers criticized him for not living up to Christopher Reeve's performance (or at least resembling it).
• "Cavill is particularly good here, lending the compassionate moral center of Superman a wry specificity that keeps it from seeming bland."--Glen Weldon NPR

"Amy Adams' savvy, matter-of-fact Lois Lane is given more to do than many Loises before her."--Glen Weldon NPR

• Most praised actor of the movie.
• David Pepose of NEWSARAMA called Crowe's performance the best in the movie.
• Richard Roper referred to Crowe's performance as pretentious.

• Praised all the actors
• Criticized the stylistic choices such as the color pallet and shaky camera work
• Referred to the last half of the movie as a "mistake"
• “The reason there is no after credits teaser at the end of Man of steel is because Superman accidentally destroyed it in the fight scene"

• Mostly favorable reviews with the biggest critique being he's not Terence Stamp
• "Shannon, an actor of almost supernatural intensity, plays him with a rage and empathy worthy of Shakespeare's Richard III. When he's on screen, MAN OF STEEL earns its air of gravitas." Rafer Guzman NEWSDAY
• Lisa Kenedy of the DENVER POST praised Shannon's intensity.
• "Zod isn't as amusingly effete and sadistic in MAN OF STEEL as he was in SUPERMAN II, but he's not without humor, sometimes inadvertent. Shannon, an expert in projecting self-defeating macho rage, makes Zod less of a straightforward evildoer than a tragically misguided antihero." Matt Zoller Seitz ROGEREBERT.COM

• Costner and Lane are generally praised for their roles, as well.
• Ann Hornaday referred to their performances as "beautiful."
• Costner tends to get more generous reviews, but that is mostly due to his much larger role in the movie.

This about sums up his performance

Critics On....

The Fanboys/Creators

The Narrative

Max Landis

• "But for the first hour or so, when it lays out Superman’s origins on Krypton and his rite of passage toward realizing and growing into his identity, Man of Steel is sober and superb — the rare action movie where each spectacular event helps define the character. Whereas films like Clash of the Titans and Immortals (in which Cavill played Theseus) turned classic myths into comic books, Man of Steel, like Nolan’s Batman films, strives to elevate comic-book heroes into the figures with the heft, depth and burdens of Greek gods.”--Richard Collins
• Rafer Guzman of NEWSDAY praises Snyder for handling the early narrative so sensitively

• Many reviewers felt the chemistry between Adams and Cavil was much like the romance of their characters--forced.
• "There are flirtatious moments between her and Clark, but they're few and far between, and I'm not convinced that the apocalyptic events surrounding the couple are the only reason for this."--Matt Zoller Seitz

• Calls it a beautiful movie.... but...
• "At the end of Superman all I'm seeing is fire and death, and that confuses the living shit out of me. Because Everybody's going to these movies and [they're] making so much money...That isn't a Superhero to me."

"Clark's enormous shoulders confirm that he's a regular at the Wolverine Gym, but they had better be broad, because this guy's got a lot to carry. And it isn't just the oil rig that goes up in flames or the school bus that runs off a bridge (although, check and check). This Clark Kent has to bear the weight of everything this heavy, humorless, throat-clearing movie is desperate for him to symbolize." --Wesley Morris GRANTLAND

Christopher Orr of THE ATLANTIC blasts "The Dark Knight-ification" of this movie.

JOYLESS--HUMORLESS

The Fanboys/Creators

Mark Waid

Critics On...

The Cultural Perspective

• "With the exception of the first-flight beat–the smile Superman gets when he first takes to the air–it’s utterly joyless. From start to finish. Utterly. Joyless. And I just have no interest in relentless and joyless from a guy who can fly."
• "As Superman’s having his final one-on-one battle with Zod, show me that he’s going out of his way to save people from getting caught in the middle. SHOW ME that trying to simultaneously protect humans and beat Zod is achingly, achingly costing Superman the fight. Build to that moment of the hard choice…show me, without doubt, that Superman has no other out and do a better job of convincing me that it’s a hard decision to make, and maybe I’ll give it to you."

“Belatedly arriving in Metropolis, the movie stages the umpteenth replay of 9/11 with a happy-ending chaser and never adequately addresses the superhero dilemma of saving a few people while the evil enemy kills millions.”

--Richard Corliss TIME

"We've seen a lot of cities wrecked in the name of blockbuster entertainment (every week this summer will bring at least one world-ending movie). Michael Bay's third Transformers movie brazenly evoked 9/11, and one action movie after another has done the same. This one ranks among the most shameless. By the time Laurence Fishburne, playing the Daily Planet's editor, Perry White, is covered in dust and helping to dig out an employee trapped beneath rubble as skyscrapers collapse around them, the movie has turned the iconography of terror attacks into pornographic exploitation."

--Wesley Morris GRANTLAND

"But Man of Steel has another master to serve: the Mammon of the summer blockbuster and all of the rote mayhem that entails. When Man of Steel gets dumb and predictable, it does so faster than a speeding bullet. The showdown between the benevolent, blue-suited alien who goes by Kal-El and his Krypton nemesis, General Zod (Michael Shannon), goes on for an eternity and gets stuffed with the kind of detailed nonsense that weighs down lesser movies of this ilk. One building crumbles, then another. One climax leads to another, then another. It’s as if Man of Steel suddenly remembered an obligation to compete with the Transformers and Avengers franchises."--Chris Vognar DALLS NEWS

My Thoughts...

• For the most part, the critics are right to have such mixed reviews.
• Baggage
• The reverse Zak Snyder and pretend Christopher Nolan
• Works better as an opening chapter.