Zack Snyder: Man of Steel Carnage is "Mythological"

[StewShearerOld]

Zack Snyder: Man of Steel Carnage is "Mythological"

Man of Steel director Zack Snyder says he was trying to emulate "ancient mythology."

A prevailing view among many viewers coming out of Man of Steel was that the filmmakers <a href=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/escape-to-the-movies/7521-Man-of-Steel>botched the job. Whereas they were hoping for a Superman that was a joyful symbol of hope, director Zack Snyder and company delivered a film that arguably somber and undeniably violent. In the opinions of some, in fact, it was a bit too violent. Many questioned how Superman, a guy who generally excels at flawlessly saving the day, could even begin to be a part of the rampant destruction exhibited in the film's final conflict.

As Man of Steel nears its opening in Japan, Snyder made himself available to offer some insight into his intentions with the final battle. "I wanted the movie to have a mythological feeling," Snyder said. "In ancient mythology, mass deaths are used to symbolize disasters. In other countries like Greece and Japan, myths were recounted through the generations, partly to answer unanswerable questions about death and violence. In America, we don't have that legacy of ancient mythology. Superman ... is probably the closest we get. It's a way of recounting the myth."

Snyder <a href=http://www.amazon.com/Supergods-Vigilantes-Miraculous-Mutants-Smallville/dp/0812981383/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1377884488&sr=1-1&keywords=super+gods>isn't the first to express the idea that characters like Superman are the modern day equivalent of ancient mythology. That being the case, we're wondering if the mythology shtick is really the best way to explain the film's devotion to blowing things up. It's not like there aren't other feasible ideas like Clark still being inexperienced with his powers or the baddies just being too powerful to fight in an unrestrained manner. Those arguably sound a bit better than an explanation that basically amounts to "I wanted it mythic so people had to die."

Source: <a href=http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/man-steels-death-toll-is-617666>The Hollywood Reporter


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[josemlopes]

I honestly dont see why all the rage, with such powers its obvious that there is a lot of shit that is going to get wrecked and the excuse that Superman could have convinced Zod to take the fight somewhere else doesnt really work since Zod wanted to kill people, not just fight and win against Superman.

I get it that it can be a bit annoying to see a story be shown differently (didnt like much the last Spiderman movie because of that with Peter Parker being such a different character from what he is usually depicted as even though as Spiderman the jokes did work well) but for such fan rage it really is unnecessary, just be midly disapointed and move on like my dad did (Superman fan) and like I did with Spiderman.

 

[Agayek]

As Man of Steel nears its opening in Japan, Snyder made himself available to offer some incite into his intentions with the final battle.

I think you meant "insight".

OT: I don't buy it. It sounds an awful lot like Snyder's just trying to cover his ass after making assumptions and fundamentally misunderstanding Superman as a character. The whole "but ancient myths had lots of people die!" thing feels way too much like a deflection, especially since most ancient myths didn't. There's actually comparatively few ancient myths with large death tolls of innocents. There's some, certainly, but it's far from the norm.

I think Snyder just wanted to blow shit up in order to make the movie more exciting. And it probably wasn't helped any by Nolan and Goyer. Neither of those two has ever shown any understanding of the concepts Superman embodies and they probably thought it would be a good idea.

 

[Vivi22]

I honestly dont see why all the rage, with such powers its obvious that there is a lot of shit that is going to get wrecked and the excuse that Superman could have convinced Zod to take the fight somewhere else doesnt really work since Zod wanted to kill people, not just fight and win against Superman.

Have to agree with you. Though I want to mention as well that I saw it a second time in theatres after these sorts of complaints started becoming prominent, and on a second viewing, one of the funny things I noticed is that almost none of the collateral damage is caused by Superman throwing the villains through buildings and such. The majority, if not all, is directly the result of actions taken by the other Kryptonians. Only possible exception being the crashing of the ship Zod stole from him, but I can't remember now how many buildings it actually took out, if any.

 

[Ukomba]

When Superman has a higher human casualty body count in 1 movie than Vegeta in all of DBZ, you have an issue.

 

[Deathlyphil]

I honestly dont see why all the rage, with such powers its obvious that there is a lot of shit that is going to get wrecked and the excuse that Superman could have convinced Zod to take the fight somewhere else doesnt really work since Zod wanted to kill people, not just fight and win against Superman.

Have to agree with you. Though I want to mention as well that I saw it a second time in theatres after these sorts of complaints started becoming prominent, and on a second viewing, one of the funny things I noticed is that almost none of the collateral damage is caused by Superman throwing the villains through buildings and such. The majority, if not all, is directly the result of actions taken by the other Kryptonians. Only possible exception being the crashing of the ship Zod stole from him, but I can't remember now how many buildings it actually took out, if any.

I agree with you both. I'm not really tied to any of the previous Superman lore, and I really enjoyed this film both times I saw it at the cinema. As for the final fight, you had a trained and seasoned warlord who didn't care about collateral, since they were all going to die anyway, versus a young and very inexperienced fighter just learning the full extend of his powers. I don't even have a problem with how the fight ended, because there wasn't any other way it could have.

 

[Vivi22]

It sounds an awful lot like Snyder's just trying to cover his ass after making assumptions and fundamentally misunderstanding Superman as a character.

Honestly, I think the biggest problem I have with most people's criticism of this film is that people hated Superman Returns because he doesn't really get to punch anyone. Now people complained about this movie because, to put it as simply as possible, it's not Superman Returns.

Does anyone actually blame him for not making the same mistakes the last movie made with its audience? I think the real problem here is that most people's biggest experience with Superman is from the Richard Donner films and Christopher Reeves being Superman. If people could just get over their hard on for those movies they might not have had as much of a problem with Man of Steel.

 

[MCerberus]

Is it just me or does every superman-like character have more personality and heroism than Supes right now? God Among us was filled with angst-rage Supes, and we can compare recent addition and goo-based superhero Zac from League. It's like how the best thing about Batman isn't Batman.

 

[Kmadden2004]

My bullish!t alarm just up and died from an aneurism while I read that quote from Snyder.

 

[Moth_Monk]

When Superman has a higher human casualty body count in 1 movie than Vegeta in all of DBZ, you have an issue.

That's only because DBZ is a kid's cartoon so of course the characters won't be killing each other for real. See: 90s Spiderman cartoon or 80s Transformers for other examples of that.

 

[Covarr]

Honestly, I think the biggest problem I have with most people's criticism of this film is that people hated Superman Returns because he doesn't really get to punch anyone. Now people complained about this movie because, to put it as simply as possible, it's not Superman Returns.

Nah, Superman Returns had far bigger problems than Supes not being violent enough. Among other things, the movie absolutely couldn't make up its mind about its tone, or even what it was. Was it a reboot, a sequel, or a remake? It had elements of all three, preventing it from having its own real identity.

Man of Steel movie had some pretty serious issues, itself, but I don't think excessive violence was one of them. Rather, it had an issue with sloppy and careless violence, with Superman doing some pretty serious damage to things that aren't people, without regard to the indirect harm that will inflict on the nearby civilians. On top of that, the whole origin story aspect showed a fundamental misunderstanding of the Superman character (and of character development in general). He spent far too much of the film emotionally weak, and never completely got over it.

I understand what the goal was. Nolan/Goyer (I don't think Snyder was heavily involved with the writing) were aware that Superman is overpowered, and attempted to come up with a conflict would still be difficult for him without relying on overused tropes like kryptonite or "even more powerful villain from nowhere". But the solution they came up with was not a good one, and frankly not true to the character or to the general tone of the comics. A far better obstacle for Superman to overcome, in my opinion, would be using the threat of accidental property/people damage to interfere with his ability to make full use of his abilities. "I can't keep up because I'd have to destroy these buildings and might accidentally hurt someone". This was a frequent plot device in the '90s cartoon, and it worked far better than anything in this movie.

P.S. Thanks

P.P.S. Maybe someone could just make a live action movie based on the '90s cartoon. That'd probably be pretty good, now that I think of it. Even let Tim Daly reprise the role.

 

[Agayek]

Honestly, I think the biggest problem I have with most people's criticism of this film is that people hated Superman Returns because he doesn't really get to punch anyone. Now people complained about this movie because, to put it as simply as possible, it's not Superman Returns.

Does anyone actually blame him for not making the same mistakes the last movie made with its audience? I think the real problem here is that most people's biggest experience with Superman is from the Richard Donner films and Christopher Reeves being Superman. If people could just get over their hard on for those movies they might not have had as much of a problem with Man of Steel.

Having never watched a Superman movie other than Man of Steel in my life, I can confidently say that that's not my issue with MoS. In addition, any umbrage I feel toward the fighting isn't so much because of the fighting itself as it is because of the secondary effects of my real issue.

Which is that Man of Steel doesn't actually have Superman in it; it has a fairly normal guy with absurd powers. The movie is a deconstruction of what being a superhero means and a cynical perspective on what it means to be different. In and of itself, that's not necessarily a bad thing, but it's not Superman.

At the end of the day, Superman can be summarized by two characteristics: 1) Optimism and 2) "A Good Man". Neither of those qualities had much presence in Man of Steel, in the fighting or out, and it really detracts from the movie as a whole.

Honestly, most of the blame can probably be laid at the feet of Goyer and Nolan in my opinion, because Snyder's past work at least gives the sense that he understands and makes use of those ideas. Nolan's heavy-handed "emotions are teh devil" approach to storytelling and Goyer's inability to write characters that aren't various shades of angry at the world (or so it appears at least) meant the movie was crippled from the getgo. I had just hoped Snyder would have had enough pull to override them more than he apparently did.

 

[Smooth Operator]

Well this confirms what I've been thinking watching the movie "director hasn't got a clue".
I'll give them the top CG award tho in this, those guys really did a fantastic job, everybody else appeared to aim at local cable TV show quality, hell if they just aped Smallville shit would turn out better.

 

[Daaaah Whoosh]

If Zach Snyder wanted to make a movie about mythology, he could have made another 300. As such, it would seem as though his idea of Superman did not coincide with the majority, and for that reason I do hope he remembers to think of his audience for Man of Steel 2.

 

[cerebus23]

Same way the dark knight rises did not have batman in it, nolan and crew are good at giving nods while they piss all over the characters they are supposed to be making movies about.

tdk was mostly the joker, tdkr was mostly bane, or emo bruce.

comic batman had a pathological need to fight crime, nolans batman fights crime for all of about a year or two at most, gets his knee blown out. Then sits on his ass for years.

i think we can get over that nolan is the end all be all, he may be good begins and tdk were good to great films, but he really does not grasp or really care about the characters he is using.

I hope aflack gets a go at directing if not writing the scripts soon, if rumors are to be believed. he is a guy that is into comics, gets the characters and has chops when it comes to writing and directing. i would be far more excited if nolan just called it quits and went on to do w/e and give our new batman a shot at making these characters come to life on the big screen.

 

[Baresark]

That is frankly... idiotic. Don't get me wrong. I don't find the level of carnage present in Man of Steel to be a problem with the movie. I think confusing the fully developed Superman character with the not perfect, insecure, Superboy character is stupid. He couldn't save everyone because it was literally the first time he even found out his Powers went as far as they did. Also, Superman's history is littered with events that cost many lives. It is part of the reason that he is who he is, because each one of those deaths he takes personally because he has the expectation of being able to save everyone. He faces threats only he is capable of overcoming, lots of people died when he fought Doomsday, both heroes and normal people. That is just one of many violent clashes that he has had. I think this is a stupid excuse to call the movie inaccurate or wrong in some way.

I also think the justification he is going for detracts from the movie itself. It's really annoying that he basically says he wanted it to be like a Greek Mythological level event (aka. 300 with an unstoppable superman as Leonides).

It sounds an awful lot like Snyder's just trying to cover his ass after making assumptions and fundamentally misunderstanding Superman as a character.

Honestly, I think the biggest problem I have with most people's criticism of this film is that people hated Superman Returns because he doesn't really get to punch anyone. Now people complained about this movie because, to put it as simply as possible, it's not Superman Returns.

Does anyone actually blame him for not making the same mistakes the last movie made with its audience? I think the real problem here is that most people's biggest experience with Superman is from the Richard Donner films and Christopher Reeves being Superman. If people could just get over their hard on for those movies they might not have had as much of a problem with Man of Steel.

I agree. All the complaints everyone has are basically covered in Superman Returns. Now they get something new, which is what everyone said they wanted, and the movie "sucks". Too many special effects? I'm sure they would have loved a man on a wire like the Christopher Reeves films.

I would also like to point out that lots of people died in the the original Superman film, but he reversed time (because Superman is the equivalent of God, which doesn't make him relatable at all). This, I feel, is the primary problem with peoples expectations for this movie. They deny the characters one flaw which is that he cannot be everywhere and save everyone.

 

[Ukomba]

When Superman has a higher human casualty body count in 1 movie than Vegeta in all of DBZ, you have an issue.

That's only because DBZ is a kid's cartoon so of course the characters won't be killing each other for real. See: 90s Spiderman cartoon or 80s Transformers for other examples of that.

Ah yes, DBZ, where no one ever dies...

Have you seen DBZ? Every main character has been killed at least once The entire Planet Earth was destroyed twice. When they first arrived on Earth Napa Nuked an entire city. The wishes make it easier to let characters rack up huge body counts and do absurd amounts of collateral damage because they can be wished back.

 

[AzrealMaximillion]

I honestly dont see why all the rage, with such powers its obvious that there is a lot of shit that is going to get wrecked and the excuse that Superman could have convinced Zod to take the fight somewhere else doesnt really work since Zod wanted to kill people, not just fight and win against Superman.

I get it that it can be a bit annoying to see a story be shown differently (didnt like much the last Spiderman movie because of that with Peter Parker being such a different character from what he is usually depicted as even though as Spiderman the jokes did work well) but for such fan rage it really is unnecessary, just be midly disapointed and move on like my dad did (Superman fan) and like I did with Spiderman.

Its was because the violence was careless and sloppy, which isn't Superman's modus operandi. I'm not even a Superman fan but I have to say that the near levelling of Metropolis by the end of Man of Steel was very out of character for Superman. Superman is the greatest boy scout in superhero history only to be rivalled by Captain America, so for him to contribute to a fight that could have (and lets be honest, probably did) killed a lot of people with collateral damage was very much against every other time barring the fight with Doomsday that Superman has fought within a city.

Superman does his best to keep humans out of danger when he fights. That's the one thing that all Superman media besides the Man of Steel kept, no matter how bad a lot of the previous movies were.

I'm not raging like a lot of people are of course, but if the sloppy violence is why some people are raging, then they're more right than most on the issue of why Man of Steel wasn't a good Superman movie. Zack Snyder's love affair with massive careless destruction was a bad fit with the Superman mythos. The massive violence made sense in The Avengers because of the events that were going on. In Man of Steel had the final confrontation simply taken places in the skies of Metropolis with maybe a couple of buildings being damaged, it would've left a better taste in people's mouths.

 

[Stalydan]

So am I the only one here who thinks that Man of Steel was actually pretty good? I do like the film for taking a bit of a more somber approach. I understand people who didn't like it but the majority of people who've seen it apart from me quite like it.