Man of Steel (2013) – Dir: Zack Snyder (300, Watchmen, Sucker Punch)

It's a little unsettling to begin by watching a woman give birth. We all knew well in advance of this film’s release, that Russell Crowe was going to take up Marlon Brando’s role as Jor-El. Russell rocks the shiznit. However, as good a job as the makers did on this film, a lot of the story moments were similar enough to the original, to feel unnecessary.

On the up-side, Russell is cool, if a little melodramatic. Jor-El’s wife Faora (Antje Traue) is an exotic beauty, but gives a forgettable performance. The appearance of Zod (Michael Shannon) is mighty and villainous. This picture of Zod is painted with a bit more depth, some honest motivation behind his violent behaviour.

Zod’s character – his cute twitches and exciting presence draws us into this fun (albeit CGI lavished) prologue. The codex-chase sub-plot is fun to watch. Unfortunately it adds a story element to Supey’s life that doesn’t play out very well – the chance to protect/regenerate his people. The concept just gets in the way of the main story. All of the technology (not ground-breaking FX) looks cool – high tech with an electro-sparked fluid granite theme.

The prologue is more fun than the original and Zod is almost more real. "Bred for war" is a nice touch, an extra complexity which creates more of a challenge for Kal-El (Henry Cavill.) Zod is not a cartoon.

The best sequence in the film is Superman as a bearded wandering bum. His memory flashbacks are special. Young Kal-El is sweet. Not bad for a kid actor - child actors playing the young versions of main characters, can often be the weakness in this kind of film. But all the young Kal-Els were believable enough. The last scene with Clark’s father is heart-breaking.

His mother (Diane Lane) and father (Kevin Costner) are amazing. Enter Miss Lane (Amy Adams – The Fighter, Julie and Julia.) She is pretty charming. Lois Lane could be her most interesting character so far. She is ambitious, fragile yet staunch, callous even, and passionate – as per usual in this type of movie, she adapts easily to fantastic world-changing realities.

The holo of Kal-El's father is one of the few good story pieces. IT is used nicely in escape and battle. But neither is mind-blowing.

The makers did everything they could to keep this film from feeling cartoonish. However, there was so much energy spent on making it exciting, they seem to have forgotten to include an interesting plot.

The symbol of the house of El is a powerful element – and finds some nice punchlines (which were in the trailer.) This Superman movie is fun, but with all that build-up achieves no real emotional/intellectual pay-off.

The struggle with Zod drags on and seems to be the guts of the story – is two men fighting. This is not particularly deep, complex, or interesting.

This is what they think a story is supposed to be: Flashbacks, plus origin story, introduce two strong characters at odds with each other and a love interest, the two characters fight, plus satisfying conclusion to fight, plus a few cheesy Armageddon-ish plot devices (stolen from every other comic book movie – except the Burton ones.)

They are telling us that Superman is supposed to inspire hope, not helplessness. I think that's a good message. The film itself is an exciting romp, but not quite as effective as the classics.

3.5 stars