For the life of me, I’ve never been able to comprehend the appeal of the Man of Steel.
Seriously, what is it that you people love so much about any part of this character?
Let’s go over a few things about this fellow… First off, he really can’t be killed. Sure, there’s the whole Kryptonite thing but we all know that’s total bullshit. You can’t even find it on this planet and even when you can get it, he can sense it’s near. That would be like me, Scott Spinelli, saying my only weaknesses are bullets fired from guns, but I know when and where they’ll be coming from at all times.
Second, his alter-ego is ridiculous. Granted, in all of these stories about superheroes, the capacity that the citizens of these various towns have for ignorance on the part of the identity of their local hero is astonishing. They’ll root out the bad guy instantly, but no one can figure out how to simply follow the fucking Batmobile back to Wayne Manor. Still, that aside, at least a lot of these guys have the decency not to rub it in our faces.
Spiderman, Batman, the various X-men… at least a lot of them wear either masks or other things that cover their identity. Not Clark Kent. The sonofabitch has the audacity to simply put on glasses and no one says a word. Need I remind you, he works at a newspaper… The same newspaper, apparently, where the investigatory journalism was hard-hitting enough to UNCOVER SUPER-FUCKING-MAN… but can’t ID the exact same guy in glasses and a button down. Stunning, truly.
Now, I know what you’re saying… Scott, it’s just a comic book hero. Of course he can’t be defeated and so what if we all know who he really is!?
To the first part of that, I say, fair point. None of these guys ever lose, I get that*. However, at least with the other ones there’s a chance they might. There’s at least that point where they’re a little bit beaten up, weakened. That seems to rarely ever happen with Superman (and when it does, it’s such an obvious forced script point on the part of the writers that it doesn’t even feel true in the context of a movie where the plot centers on an alien from another planet who wears tights and a cape and saves the earth from destruction).
This all is brought about because I recently caught the most recent Superman movie on HBO. In it, there’s a fight scene between Superman and whoever the bad guys are in this movie. Basically, it’s just 10-15 minutes of these people completely and irreparably destroying a small town in Kansas with little to no remorse. Superman throws one guy through a building, another guy tosses a U-Haul van at a flying plane, another one takes Superman and flings him into the local IHOP (where, again, they destroy everything without concern). And, after all of these things, they each just dust themselves off and get right back to it.
Watching, I got the sense that if neither party got bored, they could’ve kept fighting for hours like that. Just roaming the great plains of the United States, fighting/ruining everything the people of these small towns took lives to build and accomplishing nothing in their eternal struggle.
And why, you may ask, does it go for so long? Well, besides the fact that none of them have any weakness, it’s that Superman, apparently, doesn’t really like to kill people. I mean… come on.
If that right there isn’t enough to turn you off from him, I don’t know what is.
Apparently, they’re making a Batman and Superman movie that’s hitting theaters in a few years. Honestly, I feel bad for the scriptwriters because no matter what, there’s no way to make a bad guy/group of villians that can even remotely threaten those two together. Batman on his own has knocked off some pretty tough foes… how do you think he’ll fare when he has an indestructible flying alien on his side?
Exactly.
Fuck Superman.
*In fairness, I always root for the Joker to toss Batman’s ass of the building in Dark Knight Returns, but that’s neither here nor there.
scott spinelli 