Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel sets out to rebuild Superman from the ground up. Warner Bros. handed the character to David S. Goyer, who developed the story with Christopher Nolan, and the result is a 143-minute origin film that opens not on Krypton but on Earth. Henry Cavill plays Kal-El, the first naturally-born Kryptonian in centuries, sent to Earth as an infant before his homeworld is destroyed.
The reboot arrived after a long road. Development began in 2008, when Warner Bros. took pitches from comic book writers, screenwriters and directors and chose to start the franchise over. A 2009 court ruling let Jerry Siegel’s family recapture the rights to Superman’s origins and Siegel’s copyright. Snyder was hired as director in October 2010, and principal photography began in August 2011 in West Chicago, Illinois, before moving to Vancouver and Plano, Illinois.
Trailer, via Warner Bros..
Krypton, Kansas, and the Codex
The plot turns on a stolen birthright. Krypton is destabilizing from reckless mining of its planetary core, and the Kryptonian Council ignores Jor-El’s warnings. Jor-El steals the Kryptonian genetics codex and infuses it into his newborn son, then he and his wife Lara evacuate Kal-El toward Earth. General Zod kills Jor-El during a coup. The Council stops the insurrection and sends Zod and his followers to the Phantom Zone. Krypton is destroyed.
Kal-El lands in Kansas and is adopted by Jonathan and Martha Kent, who name him Clark. Earth’s yellow sun and his Kryptonian physiology give him superhuman powers, and Jonathan urges him to hide them. He refuses Clark’s help years later and dies in a storm. Clark travels the globe under aliases, helping people quietly, until a Kryptonian scout ship in the Arctic pulls him toward his origins.
A Cast Built Around Cavill
Cavill is the first non-American actor to play Superman. He was previously cast in Superman: Flyby, which was shelved, and was considered for the 2006 film Superman Returns before losing the role to Brandon Routh. Tyler Hoechlin, Matthew Goode, Armie Hammer, Jamie Dornan, Joe Manganiello and Colin O’Donoghue were also considered.
The supporting cast is deep:
- Amy Adams as Lois Lane
- Michael Shannon as General Zod
- Kevin Costner as Jonathan Kent
- Diane Lane as Martha Kent
- Laurence Fishburne as Perry White
- Russell Crowe as Jor-El
Cavill has been direct about what he saw in the part. “There’s a very real story behind the Superman character,” he said, describing a man split across his birth name and his alter ego. He added: “He’s alone and there’s no one like him.”
That must be incredibly scary and lonely, not to know who you are or what you are, and trying to find out what makes sense.
Cavill trained more than two hours a day and ate nearly 5,000 calories a day to build the mass.
What the Origin Costs
The film’s best idea is that Clark’s powers are a burden before they are a gift. Jonathan Kent’s death in the storm is the hinge: Clark could have saved him and was told not to, and the guilt sends him wandering the globe under false names. That is a real story, and Cavill plays it straight.
The problem is what surrounds it. Man of Steel wants to be an origin film and a planetary war at the same time, and the second half spends its energy on Zod’s arrival rather than on the man deciding what he owes the people around him. Lois Lane’s investigation and her decision to track Clark to Smallville after hearing about Jonathan’s sacrifice are the parts that actually build the relationship. They get less room than the spectacle.
This is a confident reboot with a clear lead and a muddled sense of what it is about. Cavill is the reason to watch it, not the scale.
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