My answer to "how to fix the superman problem"

This was originally posted in the waypoint forums May earlier this year.

I love superman and hopefully I always will. I don't really see his power level as a problem it just forces the writer to be clever about it, also the boy scout aspect of the character turns some people off I believe. I know as a child I was all about the "cool" characters like venom and wolverine and not really caring for the squeaky clean heroes.

Admittedly the reason I started liking superman was his power level. I remember reading the death of superman trade paperback and seeing the double page spread of doomsday and superman trading blows with the windows of the skyscraper blowing out from the concussion. I remember thinking that was so cool, I had a similar thing happen with iron man.

Anyway as I read more and more I gained more appreciation for the character and his strength both physically and morally. Superman has to be stronger morally or he will be like most kryptonians who come to earth and just try to do as they please. One small slip and he becomes injustice superman. Some of my favorite superman panels or moments come when he does something fairly normal.

I remember a couple of years ago he was stopping some crime and this kids bicycle wheel got all bent and messed up superman said hey later on I'll come by and help you fix that. So superman stops by later with some tools and just spends some time with this kid fixing the bike not using any powers just being a cool guy. I love these moments when he does something without the powers like the all star superman suicide talk. We need more of this superman and less of the injustice superman although I do enjoy that take as well.

I'm gunna say something crazy and say that I loved man of steel. That movie showed Clark making some mistakes like destroying that dudes truck sure he deserved it but he really messed that dudes life up. I do have one problem with pa Kent saying that maybe he should have let those kids drown, I just don't feel like he would say that. Other than that I loved Costner's Jonathan Kent, some people said his death was pointless but I saw it as Clark seeing how he could have prevented this and serves as an example of how he could help people. Also the guilt over letting his father die.

I also really liked how they portrayed Krypton it was not a perfect society by any means what with the no natural birth and forced careers. General Zod was fantastic everything he did from his point of view was justified, he was literally born to protect the planet and his people. After the hope of turning earth into new Krypton is lost and he's sitting there with the ash telling Clark that he took everything from him. I felt a little bad for him, yes he's going to kill everyone on the planet but this was his purpose.

So before I saw this movie I heard about superman killing and I of course jumped to the "oh no" what have they done conclusion. After seeing the movie I turned completely around, Zod forced superman's hand to cause him pain and anguish. Superman was forced to take a life and on top of that Zod was the last of his people. It's getting me a little choked up just thinking about it, the cry of pain after what he was forced to do, also Lois seeing all this was perfect as well. Also I just want to address the "he could have found another way" argument. While I do think he could have eventually how many more people would have died, Zod was not going to stop he said so himself.

Anyways if you read all of this thank you, I love Superman and will gladly talk more about it.