"Man of Steel" has 99 problems, but he just solved one.
April 24, 2015 3:57 PM   Subscribe

 
Jeez, it looks like a freakin' comic book or something.
posted by Atom Eyes at 4:01 PM on April 24, 2015 [9 favorites]


That's jaw dropping. Can we just have the whole movie like that?
posted by graymouser at 4:10 PM on April 24, 2015 [6 favorites]


The 'new' colors and the juxtaposition with the original Superman makes the recent movie look and feel like an '80s production at times. Which I like.
posted by shortfuse at 4:13 PM on April 24, 2015


What if Superman knew how to use the subjunctive case?
posted by HeroZero at 4:13 PM on April 24, 2015 [12 favorites]


What if Zach Snyder knew how to make me care about a movie?
posted by adamrice at 4:17 PM on April 24, 2015 [21 favorites]


But I want my movies about magical flying aliens who fight for truth, justice and the American way to be gritty and realistic!

Seriously though, this looks cool. I never saw this Superman movie because the last one was so turgid and the ridiculous superboy plotline just about ruined the few really cool things (bullets bounding off his eyes, airplane rescue scene). Then this one came out and the concensus seemed to be that it was pretty forgetable. Oh well, a Superman movie wouldn't have to be very good for me to really love it, it'd just have to fun and not frequently stupid.
posted by skewed at 4:18 PM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]


I have an idea for an Elseworlds Man of Steel: What if Superman hadn't been raised by a sociopathic Kevin Costner who made him feel guilty for saving a bus load of kids?

Maybe that Superman wouldn't've let his father sacrifice himself for a fucking dog instead of saving them both. Easily. Because he's Superman. And maybe that Superman wouldn't have leveled Metropolis. Or twisted the bad guy's head off. That Superman would deserve to be in color.
posted by malthusan at 4:32 PM on April 24, 2015 [21 favorites]


.... it would still be the Man of Steel we all love?
posted by Mezentian at 4:34 PM on April 24, 2015


Or twisted the bad guy's head off.

At least let people have more than a sliver of an origin movie in which he won't kill before your mindbending twist ending of hay guess wut we made our bad guy so bad that Superman has to violate his principles -- um, we did remember to tell you about those, right? -- and kill him all dead anyway!
posted by George_Spiggott at 4:39 PM on April 24, 2015




One of my move favorite epiphanies in recent years was when I realized that Zach Snyder and Julie Taymor are not simply both godawful directors, but essentially the same godawful director.
posted by Navelgazer at 4:44 PM on April 24, 2015 [3 favorites]


I realized that Zach Snyder and Julie Taymor are not simply both godawful directors, but essentially the same godawful director.

So we should expect a broadway superhero musical from Snyder?
I really can't see that.
posted by Mezentian at 4:47 PM on April 24, 2015 [2 favorites]


What if Superman knew how to use the subjunctive case?

What if Superman knew what "begs the question" means?

Ha ha, it's a trick question, in Kryptonian, "begs the question" means "asks the question!" I know, crazy, huh?!
posted by GenjiandProust at 4:53 PM on April 24, 2015 [10 favorites]


Hey, what if every movie since directors realized they could use digital color correction as cruise control for cool... didn't? And used actual skill to give their movie the tone they want instead of cheap shortcuts?
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 5:01 PM on April 24, 2015 [5 favorites]


So we should expect a broadway superhero musical from Snyder?
I really can't see that.


It sounds amazing. Live-action speed ramping! Giant Dr. Manhattan as an elaborate dancing prop! Nite-Owl falling to his knees and singing his heart out after Rorschach's death!
posted by jason_steakums at 5:03 PM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]


It strikes me this needs more teal and orange.
posted by Mezentian at 5:03 PM on April 24, 2015 [5 favorites]


At least the next Superman movie isn't yet another goddamn origin story. Enough! We get it!

That reminds me, isn't it time to reboot Spider-Man again? It's been at least 3 years since the last reboot.
posted by Justinian at 5:03 PM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]


malthusan: “That Superman would deserve to be in color.”
Hear hear! I've decided that this movie is about an alien who was raised by human parents on Earth, and fights a bunch of dudes from his home planet who want to conquer Earth, but it obviously wasn't about Superman, despite the title and the costume.
posted by ob1quixote at 5:05 PM on April 24, 2015


Oh my god Tales of the Black Freighter as Pirates of Penzance style interludes!
posted by jason_steakums at 5:05 PM on April 24, 2015 [15 favorites]


That reminds me, isn't it time to reboot Spider-Man again? It's been at least 3 years since the last reboot.

It is. And this time he's off to High School.
If you were S-ing I am joking: nope.
posted by Mezentian at 5:06 PM on April 24, 2015 [2 favorites]


No. No. No.
posted by Justinian at 5:08 PM on April 24, 2015


Oh my god Tales of the Black Freighter as Pirates of Penzance style interludes!

You, sir, are a genius.
I very much want to see that right now.
posted by Mezentian at 5:10 PM on April 24, 2015


It strikes me this needs more teal and orange.

I'm pretty sick of Wes Anderson, but would certainly give his Superman a shot.
posted by lumpenprole at 5:23 PM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]


That reminds me, isn't it time to reboot Spider-Man again?

Moore's Law suggests that the time between reboots halves every two years. Alan Moore's Law suggests that the quality of films based on his work gets twice as bad every film. Zach Snyder reportedly sees this as a challenge.
posted by GenjiandProust at 5:31 PM on April 24, 2015 [12 favorites]


Coming this summer, Vivid Pictures' first mainstream release:

Alan Moore's Lost Girls, a film by Zack Snyder and Axel Braun.
posted by Mezentian at 5:43 PM on April 24, 2015 [4 favorites]


Love this. The Matrix and Oh Brother were great groundbreaking movies with their use of color correction but they were fifteen years ago and by now I'm so damn sick of colorless films. Sometimes it gets so bad that I have to watch a Powell and Pressberger Technicolor film as an antidote for my eyes.
posted by octothorpe at 5:57 PM on April 24, 2015 [4 favorites]


Or, there's Speed Racer. :)
posted by Mezentian at 6:03 PM on April 24, 2015 [3 favorites]


Of course superhero movies are in color, pfft.

They're in two actually. Orange and teal.
posted by JHarris at 6:15 PM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]


Speaking of orange and teal, somebody really ought to smack the color correction knob out of the hand of whoever is responsible for the chromatic insult that is "The Listener."

It's like Teal and Orange are the main characters of the show.
posted by darkstar at 6:23 PM on April 24, 2015


The confident "look what we've discovered" narration combined with the mention of Dark Knight gave me the strange sensation of watching a conspiracy-theory video.

So anyway the color grader failed, according to the color grader grader
posted by sylvanshine at 6:30 PM on April 24, 2015


Wait, what did you see by Julie Taynor that made you think she was identical to Zach Snyder!?
posted by Ian A.T. at 6:33 PM on April 24, 2015


Was it The Tempest?
Man, that film was awful.
posted by Mezentian at 6:36 PM on April 24, 2015


What if we didn't spend all our time treating an space creature of unimaginable power and unknowable motivation as some sort of wish-fulfillment fantasy, rather than the greatest threat humanity has faced to its continued existence since the atom bomb.
posted by Alexander J. Luthor at 6:50 PM on April 24, 2015 [14 favorites]


This guy has it right.
Vote him for President of the USA.
He'll put some colour back into the White House: purple and green.
posted by Mezentian at 6:52 PM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]


What if we didn't spend all our time treating an space creature of unimaginable power and unknowable motivation as some sort of wish-fulfillment fantasy, rather than the greatest threat humanity has faced to its continued existence since the atom bomb

Nice try Lex.

Devils don't come from hell beneath us, they come from the sky
posted by Justinian at 6:59 PM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]


Is anybody else totally stoked for Jesse Eisenberg's Lex Luthor? I mean, the rest of the movie may be completely Synderfied but I'm still stoked for Lex Luthor.
posted by Justinian at 7:05 PM on April 24, 2015


I'm not.
posted by Alexander J. Luthor at 7:06 PM on April 24, 2015 [8 favorites]


that's because you're dead inside
posted by Justinian at 7:08 PM on April 24, 2015


Huh, member for a year and a half. Your time has finally arrived.
posted by Justinian at 7:09 PM on April 24, 2015 [2 favorites]


What if Superman knew how to use the subjunctive case?

Ahem. The subjunctive is a mood, not a case.

Grammar Pedant...awayyyyyy!
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 7:11 PM on April 24, 2015 [9 favorites]


I'm still waiting for Mr. Luthor to interact with Mallory Archer in some thread.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 7:17 PM on April 24, 2015


Wait, what did you see by Julie Taynor that made you think she was identical to Zach Snyder!?

A number of things, unfortunately, but I guess Titus Andromicus is the most obvious example, but the legitimate visual inventiveness, plus complete inability to actually tell a story, plus unbearably pretentious excess, minuthe slightest bit of self-reflection, made me realize just how crazy similar they actually are. I bet if we knew nothing of what they're next projects were going to be, you could switch the credits on them and nobody would be the wiser.
posted by Navelgazer at 7:22 PM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]


What if every comic book movie didn't have to destroy large sections of cities?
posted by Thorzdad at 7:23 PM on April 24, 2015 [5 favorites]


What if Wong Kar Wai directed Man of Steel?
posted by gucci mane at 7:50 PM on April 24, 2015 [5 favorites]


Malory is a lovely woman, and it is odd that we've never encountered one another in one of these discussions. I have nothing but the best things to say about her, and on the rare occasions when we see each other in person, we always have a marvelous time.


Malory, if you are reading this thread, milles bisous, and Lana (my Lana, not the other one) says hi.
posted by Alexander J. Luthor at 8:22 PM on April 24, 2015 [2 favorites]


If we're going all crazy speculation: What if Ang Lee directed The Incredible Hulk?
posted by Mezentian at 8:24 PM on April 24, 2015 [4 favorites]


Don't make it Ang Lee. You wouldn't like The Hulk if it was Ang Lee.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 8:36 PM on April 24, 2015 [32 favorites]


The color correction was an interesting visual.

But, do you know what Superman movie I would really like to see?

The one a director decides to make.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 8:55 PM on April 24, 2015 [2 favorites]


The one a director decides to make.

*slow clap*

What if every comic book movie didn't have to destroy large sections of cities?

What if they do destroy large sections of, say, New York and the rebuilding process becomes part of a TV series set in the same universe. Is that okay?
posted by crossoverman at 9:03 PM on April 24, 2015 [5 favorites]


In other DC news, they've released the first image of Jared Leto's Joker from Suicide Squad and dang, I think it's a little harsh to sentence a kid to the Suicide Squad for shoplifting from Hot Topic.
posted by jason_steakums at 9:03 PM on April 24, 2015 [7 favorites]


I was going to get all snarky about how fabulously well letting directors bring Supes to the screen, but then I found out the actor who played Baby Kal-El in the '70s version died at the age of fourteen after inhaling solvents.
posted by Mezentian at 9:07 PM on April 24, 2015


What if they do destroy large sections of, say, New York and the rebuilding process becomes part of a TV series set in the same universe. Is that okay?

Every time one of these guys punches someone through a building our margins go up three percent!
posted by Justinian at 9:46 PM on April 24, 2015 [5 favorites]


So, if I liked the dark and desaturated look of Man of Steel then I'm the asshole? The guys behind this video are dumb.
posted by dogwalker at 10:03 PM on April 24, 2015 [1 favorite]


I have loved comic and science fiction movies. Except Joel Schmuckmaker. His crimes are unforgivable. I am not alone in this. Zack Snyder however managed to make the DC Movies as bereft of interest for me as J.J. 'Lens flare' Abrams has the Star Trek films. Snyder is a good, maybe even great, cinematographer. He knows how to use the CGI process with film in a manner I wish most directors could do half as well. He should never be let near a script or a director's chair (except maybe for music videos). Taymor can at least get decent performances from her actors. Snyder's casts always seem to be mildly sedated. His channeling of Frank Miller's id worked for 300. But could someone please get his hands the hell away from superheroes.
posted by Ignorantsavage at 10:15 PM on April 24, 2015 [3 favorites]


At this stage of the DC cinematic universe, NuJoker has pretty much sapped any interest I had in Suicide Squad, so that leaves Aquaman (which still had a greyed out, colourless poster) and Shazam!

So, for me, hope lies in the cinema world's second best Conan*.... and The Rock.

I'm... just really not that optimistic. And I like Black Adam as a character.

(*I have never seen the Conan TV series, so I have no idea how bad Ralf Moeller might be, but Momoa seems like an affable character who could bring an interesting Aquaman to life).
posted by Mezentian at 11:09 PM on April 24, 2015


1:22: "Zach Snyder had a beautiful looking movie. So what went wrong?"

Oh, snap!
posted by Gelatin at 7:10 AM on April 25, 2015 [1 favorite]


Don't make it Ang Lee. You wouldn't like The Hulk if it was Ang Lee.

onestly? Because I liked it. Yeah, the last third of the movie is an incoherent mess, but I understand that was the studio insisting on a big showdown rather than anything Lee wanted. Lee's Hulk is a really interesting effort to make the subtext of a comic take center stage -- the Hulk is pretty much about anger management problems, and making Banner and Ross two individuals messed up in different ways by their (quite differently) abusive fathers is a tremendous take on the superhero genre, which often are driven under the surface by issues with parents. (How many superheroes have positive relations with their parents? The most recent Starman may be it -- parents are either absent or horrible. Think of the Tim Burton Batman climax, with two costumed lunatics in a church steeple arguing about who created whom while raining destruction down on the city.)

Anyway, Lee made this tension the center of the film, and the climax should have been Banner and Ross finding some way or ways out of their self-destructive loops (embodied by the Hulk) rather than the weird "battle" at the end. You'll notice that Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon is the same sort of thing being done to the wuxia genre. The Lee Hulk is a tragedy, not a joke.
posted by GenjiandProust at 7:54 AM on April 25, 2015 [2 favorites]


Yeah, the Ang Lee Hulk movie did a lot very well, it's just that the bad parts were really bad. I think if Ang Lee made it for Marvel Studios in the current MCU it would have been excellent, I really don't think the problem was with him.
posted by jason_steakums at 8:33 AM on April 25, 2015 [2 favorites]


What if they do destroy large sections of, say, New York and the rebuilding process becomes part of a TV series set in the same universe. Is that okay?

And if the guy doing the rebuilding had a Vision for His City that he intended to see realized, no matter who he had to kill?

Might be a pretty damn good TV series.
posted by Mooski at 9:10 AM on April 25, 2015 [1 favorite]


From the comments, it looks like they tiresomely exaggerated that "original footage" to make it look a lot worse. Good times.
posted by emptythought at 4:17 PM on April 25, 2015 [3 favorites]


What if they do destroy large sections of, say, New York and the rebuilding process becomes part of a TV series set in the same universe. Is that okay?

Two words:
Damage Control.

From the comments, it looks like they tiresomely exaggerated that "original footage" to make it look a lot worse. Good times.

Damn. I was thinking I didn't realise MoS was *that* washed out.
But, like many, I just didn't want to subject myself to it again to check.
posted by Mezentian at 5:08 PM on April 25, 2015


From the comments, it looks like they tiresomely exaggerated that "original footage" to make it look a lot worse.

This video really is the movie equivalent of a heckler at a standup comedy show.
posted by dogwalker at 7:03 PM on April 25, 2015 [1 favorite]


I'll just stand over here in the very small group of people that liked the movie. I thought it was great. Represent.
posted by chisel at 6:03 PM on April 26, 2015


In fact watching this video made me want to watch the movie again. So there.
posted by chisel at 6:05 PM on April 26, 2015




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