Maybe they should have included a post-credits scene in which Superman is seen helping to clean-up and rebuild the city with his super speed.
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Nostalgia. That’s all it is.
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They weren’t ready.
I love that movie. I think if they had a younger actor playing Clark in the tornado scene people might understand it better.
For me the important part was Jonathan sacrificing himself for a lower life form, because all life is important. In the context of the film, we dont know what he’s capable of and neither does he.
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I love the movie
Faora Ul, amirite?
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I mean, I can’t answer for the critics, I’m just little ol’ me 
Personally, I wasn’t a fan, but that’s just me. That being said, I’ve definitely noticed a gap between critic and audience reviews, a massive one. What critics like if so far removed from what audiences like, I wouldn’t overthink why they like or dislike anything lol.
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@Zombedy, I loved Faora. I’d really like to see her escape the Phantom Zone in another flick and be the main villain in whatever movie that would be.
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Man of Steel is one of the most utterly boring movies I’ve ever watched. The fight scenes get old after about fifteen minutes and from that point on you’re left with nothing. I found the acting unconvincing, the story dull and hackneyed, and the filmmaking itself sloppy.
But I guess I’m just a nostalgic snob.
Critics usually have pretty bad taste in movies. I don’t know why anyone even listens to them. From Man of Steel back then, to Alita Battle Angel today, critics just love to trash the best movies.
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@Vroom, I was hoping she would show up as one of Darkseid’s Furies. Then we get Wondy vs Faora!
Sometimes I feel movie critics just judge these movies against what they expect from “the Superhero genre”. Like they have a different set of rules for the genre, they are supposed to be “light-hearted” and kind of “cheesy” and that gets doubled for Superman as they’re familiar with the character from the Reeve era and the assumption is “that’s what the inside of a comic book looks like”.
I feel MoS gets trashed because it transcends expectations, it gets judged against the standards of original Superman movie instead of as a film on it’s own merits, or even against the comic books. It was very clearly inspired by the John Byrne run.
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@BatJamags if those are your complaints you must REALLY hate the original Superman movie. It doesnt even have fight scenes, he does have a really cool “cat rescue” scene though.
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Oh no, the original has things other than fight scenes. My point was that Man of Steel is pretty much nothing but.
@Zombedy, I read somewhere, sometime, that John Byrne was influenced by the 1978 Superman: The Movie when he changed the Superman story in the comic books.
It was clear to me that Man of Steel was in turn influenced by John Byrne’s work.
So it would be natural to compare the first against the last, in a series of events.
It is a matter of preferences on which stage of this development a person likes best. Those of us that were born before the 1978 Superman movie, probably lean towards that version of Superman as being better, and more like the comics of that time, at least in the characterization of Superman.
Man of Steel changes the characterization of Superman to a great extent, compared with the 1978 movie. That might be hard to take if you were a fan of that earlier version of Superman. Some will hate the changes, some, like me, do not hate the movie for all the changes, but probably would have been better able to enjoy the movie if I had not for having a different standard in mind for what a Superman should be like, and be like. Still, as I have said, I did not hate Man of Steel, I just prefer an earlier version of Superman.
MACJR
@BatJamags, I could tell by your criticisms of Man of Steel that you were fond of the original film, I’m just ribbing ya. My point is all your criticisms are found tenfold in the original Donner film with exception of action, which doesnt exist at all. Superman debuted where? ACTION comics. For me, MoS was way over due, it was everything I ever wanted from a Superman movie. Again, I’m comparing both films to Superman in comics.
@MACJR That’s a fair point about the development cycle and influences. John Byrne definitely said the film influenced his take on the character, but from my understanding it was mostly aesthetics like designing Metropolis after New York and character appearances. I dont remember Byrne ever making Superman reverse time to save Lois (and only Lois), racist caricatures telling superman “that’s one hot outfit!” and no slapstick buffoonery like “bad vibrations?”
Those are my problems with the film, it all feels like low hanging fruit geared at an audience who doesnt read comic books. In the 70s, the Bill Maher perception of comics was almost universal amongst adults, so of course it’s a big corny joke fest that doesnt reflect the comics at the time.
I may be wrong, but dont you dislike superhero movies in general and basically enjoy when they’re kind of cheesy ones like Justice League and Superman the movie. Not to insult or anything, tastes are tastes, but I think you’re right about the age difference in fans. I’m a post-crisis DC fan and the first comics I read were the “Death in the Family” run, do I think that’s why I have a “hold the camp, please” view on comics and movies based on them.
I also find “Aliens” and “Blade Runner” to be better movies than any Star Wars film
Aliens and Blade Runner are better than most movies in general.
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@Zombedy, I never claimed the first Superman movie was perfect. 
I just say it is the best version I have seen, for me. There are several things I would have changed if I had any creative control of the movies development.
And you are very wrong about my preferring camp. But I am very much against the extremes of darkness that have infested comics since the late 80s, but most from the 1990s, onward. You were raised in a comic culture that has already gone corrupt, in my view, so this is how you think things should be, and this is what has formed you into what you are now, at least in part.
No, I am not a bit fan of camp. It seems rather cheesy to me, as well. However, I would rather read and watch camp that much of the vial stuff DC produced today.
That is how I honestly feel.
I also see a lot of good ideas and stories still being developed by DC, so it is not all darkness and dread, just too much so in general.
I am not a Star Wars fan either. I have seen most of the movies, but that last one was so corny that I stopped watching it only a few minutes in.
I very much enjoyed Aliens. That was a kick ass movie.
MACJR
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A few more thoughts about what you said, Zombedy.
Blade Runner was a good movie as well, but it has a rather gloomy view of what the future would be. Sadly, it has come too close to that reality, if you ask me. No, things are not that gloomy today, but we do seem to be getting ever closer to a future that was imagined back then.
And the corny humor in Superman: The Movie, I can agree that it was somewhat corny, but it got a lot of chuckles in the theaters back then.
As for what you call “racist caricatures”, those were stereotyped 2D characters, not a racist commentary. There really were people who acted, talked, and thought that way back then. It was not a commentary stating that all black people think, talk, and act that way. If that had really been the meaning of that scene, then I would protest that scene as much as you do. There were white criminals that were also heavily stereotyped in that movie.
Racism is a real problem, even still today though. I see it all the time, but not nearly as much as my Texan gal friend (she lives in Texas while I live in Washington State). She is black, I am white, so I am aware, more than the average white person, just how bad racism is still a problem today. Being white, I will never know the full impact of being black is, but loving black person does open your eyes quite a bit about such things.
MACJR
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I’ll say that I don’t think one’s age has anything to do with appreciating Superman: The Movie over Man of Steel. STM came out years before I was born, and while I love MOS, I absolutely adore STM over it.
Citizen Kane came out decades and decades before I was born, and I adore it too. Quality entertainment knows no age boundaries.
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@macjr, does she live in southeast Texas, because we have some pretty backwards towns down there that put a really bad name on Texan.