As a Superman Fan, would I be happy watching the Snyder Justice League?

[Amadeus Arkham]

But how can Superman be like Jesus? I don't get how it works.

He’s always been more of a Moses-like figure to me, if anything.

[MadFacedKid]

Honestly think you guys are being a bit dramatic. It’s not like the character in his own comics hasn’t been treated as the guy who saves the day when no one else can.

In terms of Lois she’d constantly be going to visit his memorial everyday.

Batman has a line in the JL movie where he says without a Superman there is no us, and I think that highlights his importance to not just fighting the antagonist but to the forming of this universes Justice League.

If anything I’d argue J’onn comes off worse cause this guy legit was going to let the whole world be wiped and turned into a conquered world until the epilogue. Where he suggest he’s finally ready to help after the 2 invasions that he simply watched take place he said 3 times is when the green machine comes out to help the world.. Superman was on ice, Martian Manhunter’s excuse is beyond me.

[MadFacedKid]

spoilers:

Honestly the end where he’s enslaved 1.) Is a dream sequence 2.) Obviously took place using a tragedy he experienced coupled with the ALE I’d take that any day of the week over Injustice Superman, or Lord Superman from the Beyond Universe

end of spoilers

[Revolutionary_Jack]

But how can Superman be like Jesus? I don't get how it works.

The (shallow) thinking is that Superman is the source of good and a role model. Jesus is also a source of good and a role model, therefore both are the same. That's what we call a logical fallacy. Where people mistake the social status of characters in a wider culture as the actual value of the characters. I mean in USA, Washington and Lincoln are also seen as a source of good and role models but it would be ridiculous and offensive to think of them as Jesus. In the first case you have a lifelong slaveowner, a man who however you cut it cannot simply qualify as a good person based on his actions during his life. Lincoln is a better person certainly but he was also flawed and it took a while before he came to do the decent things he did, and he followed a pragmatic course until he could act morally.

In comics and movies, Superman=Jesus is basically a way of going "Superman=Good Guy" and nothing deeper than that.

If you do want to scratch the surface and find an actual parallel between Jesus and various Superman stories, there actually is one. In the Gospel of Matthew, you have the Three Temptations of Jesus by Satan, and the third temptation was Satan taking Jesus to the top of the Mountain and showing him all the "kingdoms of the earth" and inviting him to take over the world and use his powers to rule the world. Jesus refused and chose the life of a humble missionary instead, deciding that ruling over humanity was not what he wanted to do.

In the case of Superman you have a guy with immense powers who can conquer the world over a weekend should he choose to do so at any time and yet he uses those powers to help kittens down a tree. That's the paradox and main issue writers and others have explored with him over the decades. The problem is that over the last few decades, you have this fascination with alternate universes where Superman becomes dictator whereas nobody is into Jesus fanfiction where he decides to take over all the "kingdoms of the earth". People agree that Jesus is a pretty cool and complex figure because he didn't make that choice.

In the case of Zack Snyder you have a guy who thinks Superman can be Jesus if he still succumbed to Temptation #3. Someone who has his wires crossed bigtime. He keeps decking his movies with "Evil Superman" imagery but on the surface still has Superman being presented as some moral do-gooder. That literally makes no sense, Jesus would not be who he is if he had given in to any of the temptations.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

spoilers:

Honestly the end where he’s enslaved 1.) Is a dream sequence 2.) Obviously took place using a tragedy he experienced coupled with the ALE I’d take that any day of the week over Injustice Superman, or Lord Superman from the Beyond Universe

end of spoilers

In Final Crisis, Superman didn't "give in". That's the whole point of Darkseid's big speech to Superman about whether he would still resist when everything else in the universe had given in to Anti-Life.

If Superman gives in to Anti-Life, and Superman alone and nobody else in the League that implies a major moral weakness in the character however you cut it.

[MadFacedKid]

In Final Crisis, Superman didn't "give in". That's the whole point of Darkseid's big speech to Superman about whether he would still resist when everything else in the universe had given in to Anti-Life.

If Superman gives in to Anti-Life, and Superman alone and nobody else in the League that implies a major moral weakness in the character however you cut it.

1.) It was a dream sequence. Those things aren’t reliable to suggest where the movie is going. Just where it might go. We don’t really no the context of Superman being enslaved by Darkseid

2.) It was obviously though which hints by the death of Lois that it was done when he was at his weakest. At a breaking point. Reason it worked to begin with. Which I admit is an assumption given we don’t have much context.

3.) It probably wouldn’t even happen. It’s a dystopian future. It rarely happens in comic books when we see into the future at these dystopian futures. There often times prevented.

When did Superman lose Lois in final crisis? Regardless again I’d still take this over Injustice or Lord Superman

[Revolutionary_Jack]

1.) It was a dream sequence. Those things aren’t reliable to suggest where the movie is going. Just where it might go. We don’t really no the context of Superman being enslaved by Darkseid

Zack Snyder's post-release interviews repeat multiple times that he did want to show and portray the world where Superman succumbed to Anti-Life and became Darkseid's new Steppenwolf.

Sure now that the followups are canceled you can say it's just a "dream sequence" but the movies are quite obvious about building up to this.

It was obviously though which hints by the death of Lois that it was done when he was at his weakest. At a breaking point. Reason it worked to begin with.

The psychological justification doesn't matter. You can create a realistic reason for any character to do anything, the question as always is "should you though?" If you want to establish Darkseid as so powerful and such a destroyer of hope and so on, you can have other heroes brainwashed as minions, heck you can have Batman be the brainwashee as he was in "Apokolips War" home video.

But if you do it with Superman who is established as
A) overall series protagonist,
B) someone who already went through multiple story-arcs where people feared he'd go evil only to prove his goodness,
then it doesn't work.

It's basically a yo-yo of a mess.

Regardless again I’d still take this over Injustice or Lord Superman

In the case of Injustice at least Superman didn't join and sign up with the person who murdered the woman he loved. He didn't decide to spread Joker venom across the skies, whereas here Darkseid kills Lois and then Superman becomes enslaved to the being who killed the love of his life. Injustice Superman is a totalitarian who believes ruling the world will help him defend it against alien threats and evil criminals and who in fact does defend and protect the world against Kalibak and Brainiac.

[SiegePerilous02]

1.) It was a dream sequence. Those things aren’t reliable to suggest where the movie is going. Just where it might go. We don’t really no the context of Superman being enslaved by Darkseid

2.) It was obviously though which hints by the death of Lois that it was done when he was at his weakest. At a breaking point. Reason it worked to begin with. Which I admit is an assumption given we don’t have much context.

3.) It probably wouldn’t even happen. It’s a dystopian future. It rarely happens in comic books when we see into the future at these dystopian futures. There often times prevented.

When did Superman lose Lois in final crisis? Regardless again I’d still take this over Injustice or Lord Superman

If it's prevented, and if it's anything like the five film proposal, it won't be due to anything he does. Hal says "I heard the Kryptonian's will is unbreakable" in Snyder's notes, which is the funniest thing ever going off the movies so far.

Him being brought low and easily corruptible after losing Lois is less than ideal. It's overdone, makes him look weak and overly dependent on her as a character, and she gets an even shittier end of the stick because she has to get fridged (or knocked up by Batman) to get it to happen

[Ra-El]

1.) It was a dream sequence. Those things aren’t reliable to suggest where the movie is going. Just where it might go. We don’t really no the context of Superman being enslaved by Darkseid

2.) It was obviously though which hints by the death of Lois that it was done when he was at his weakest. At a breaking point. Reason it worked to begin with. Which I admit is an assumption given we don’t have much context.

3.) It probably wouldn’t even happen. It’s a dystopian future. It rarely happens in comic books when we see into the future at these dystopian futures. There often times prevented.

When did Superman lose Lois in final crisis? Regardless again I’d still take this over Injustice or Lord Superman

Every single character in Batman's Knightmare team lost everything and everyone they loved, and none of them fell to the Anti-Life, Joker whole speech was about how everyone Batman loves dies. Superman was the only weak minded enough to be enslaved. If Superman is so fragile that removing Lois from his life makes him turn evil he should be killed, someone that weak can have so much power.

[Gaius]

In the case of Injustice at least Superman didn't join and sign up with the person who murdered the woman he loved. He didn't decide to spread Joker venom across the skies, whereas here Darkseid kills Lois and then Superman becomes enslaved to the being who killed the love of his life. Injustice Superman is a totalitarian who believes ruling the world will help him defend it against alien threats and evil criminals and who in fact does defend and protect the world against Kalibak and Brainiac.

Yeah, Injustice is cliched nonsense but on a conceptual level that's a Superman that retains his own agency/independence even if the games/comics try to pin some of his more worse actions on other characters.

[SiegePerilous02]

Injustice vs. Knightmare is a battle nobody is going to win. I'm looking forward to some of the stuff when I watch the Snyder Cut next week, but I continue to have no interest in the Knightmare portions.

Just shit all the way down.

[MadFacedKid]

Every single character in Batman's Knightmare team lost everything and everyone they loved, and none of them fell to the Anti-Life, Joker whole speech was about how everyone Batman loves dies. Superman was the only weak minded enough to be enslaved. If Superman is so fragile that removing Lois from his life makes him turn evil he should be killed, someone that weak can have so much power.

I responded to yours cause it was shorter and I’m eating no disrespect to Revolutionary and Seige.


But the thing is it’s a nightmare sequence with little to no context. It’s hard to be upset about it and take it as something that’s going to happen when we don’t have the context of how it happens and honestly I question it even happening.


We don’t even know how the ALE works exactly in Snyder’s vision for all we know Darkseid has to activate it on you, that’s why it was done to Superman at his close to breaking point and not Mera or Batman or anyone else. Hell Darkseid might have had no interest in using the ALE on anyone of the other heroes deeming them unworthy of it. Or possibly even yet it took most of it or all of it enslave Superman.


Again that’s all theories but it’s just as valid as saying Superman was enslaved to it while others weren’t without the proper context. We don’t know because we’re limited to knowing without the whole picture.

[Ra-El]

I responded to yours cause it was shorter and I’m eating no disrespect to Revolutionary and Seige.


But the thing is it’s a nightmare sequence with little to no context. It’s hard to be upset about it and take it as something that’s going to happen when we don’t have the context of how it happens and honestly I question it even happening.


We don’t even know how the ALE works exactly in Snyder’s vision for all we know Darkseid has to activate it on you, that’s why it was done to Superman at his close to breaking point and not Mera or Batman or anyone else. Hell Darkseid might have had no interest in using the ALE on anyone of the other heroes deeming them unworthy of it. Or possibly even yet it took most of it or all of it enslave Superman.


Again that’s all theories but it’s just as valid as saying Superman was enslaved to it while others weren’t without the proper context. We don’t know because we’re limited to knowing without the whole picture.

Yes, I'm pretty pessimistic about Snyder take on Superman (ironically since I love Man of Steel and it was the thing that get me back into superheroes comics), so it's possible that I'm looking at it from the worst angle, but much of my view on this comes from the leaked storyboars and Snyder own interviews.

[MadFacedKid]

Yes, I'm pretty pessimistic about Snyder take on Superman (ironically since I love Man of Steel and it was the thing that get me back into superheroes comics), so it's possible that I'm looking at it from the worst angle, but much of my view on this comes from the leaked storyboars and Snyder own interviews.

I haven’t really been following any of the leaks as much as any of you might have been so I might be being optimistic. But I’d hope that Snyder with some of the backlash he’s gotten wouldn’t go in such a direction. I’d imagine the end goal would be making a film where that future doesn’t happen.

I honestly think the whole dystopian future thing is a concept used to have stories try to prevent the worst possible outcome and show what they’re fighting for. I see it like one of those things like the Justice Lords where you see these characters change in morals in a way but it’s ok because it’s not our main universes version of the characters.

For the most part I’d understand voicing frustration at the thought of another evil Superman but I wouldn’t really treat what we saw as something that’s concrete and implying Superman for a definite is going to be under Darkseid’s leash.

[Jim Kelly]

In BATMAN V SUPERMAN, the older Flash comes back in time from the nightmare world to warn Bruce. So, the way I see it, the nightmare world happens but then Barry does stuff to make that world not happen. Nightmare is just one possible timeline and probably not the one that would ultimately happen by the end of the Snyderverse.

It was Mario Puzo who put all the religious iconography into the 1978 SUPERMAN script--but then the other script doctors pulled some of that out of the script. It seems to me that Puzo was much more into using iconography from religion and mythology and more heavy handed.

But the mythological elements were already there in the Siegel and Shuster story.

And at the risk of offending some folks--the Jesus story as it was filtered through Greek and Roman culture in the 1st and 2nd century A.D. is highly influenced by all the other philosophies and religions of the period. And making Christ fit into those other beliefs was the way the Church could sell all those nations on the idea of Christianity, with it ultimately becoming the state religion.

So, yeah, Superman resembles Jesus, the Son of God, but he also resembles a lot of those other mythological heroes who predate Jesus and influenced how Jesus was interpreted.

From a Jungian perspective, all heroes are going to be similar because they are all based on the archetype derived from our collective unconscious.