In a way, you can hardly blame the filmmakers for giving people what they want. Each vignette serves only as an occasion for action, then ends. The idea of the future Superman working a fishing trawler or waiting tables, like Bill Bixby in the old Hulk series, is intriguing … but the filmmakers aren’t interested in depicting Clark enjoying manual labor or bonding with his fellow workers. Early scenes include glimpses of Clark Kent (Henry Cavill), not yet Superman, drifting anonymously from one odd blue-collar job to another, occasionally leaping into action when a disaster threatens lives, or a bullying trucker needs to be mysteriously punished by the inexplicable destruction of his rig. Who’d have thought that at nearly 50 Russell Crowe would be saving Lois Lane, not to mention the world, in a Superman movie?Ĭharacters are given almost no chance to breathe. Not only does Jor-El speak with Clark (as in past iterations) long after his own death, he also gets action scenes (both in life and posthumously), saves Amy Adams’ Lois Lane and masterminds his son’s ultimate attack plan.
There are three separate Kryptonian expeditions to Earth - one of which has nothing to do with Kal-El or General Zod. Not to mention all the gizmos and effects that don’t get special names.
Somehow the filmmakers have turned one of the simplest superhero origin stories into an overstuffed tale involving a Codex, a World Engine, a Genesis Chamber and a Phantom Drive (which I think gets converted to a warp engine, or vice versa, or possibly both). There’s too much plot, too many sci-fi conceits, too much technobabble, and almost certainly too many holes. (I say this as a lifelong lover of comic books and superhero movies, who put The Avengers on my 2012 top 10 list.) From a dragon-riding Russell Crowe as Superman’s father Jor-El battling the forces of Michael Shannon’s General Zod on Krypton, to a numbing finale so catastrophic that a sequel (or, mirabile dictu, a Justice League movie) would be hard-pressed to outdo it without destroying the planet, the film bludgeons the audience with scarcely any respite.
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