Well, since it seems we can respond here, here's what I wanted to say to The Beast before my response was deleted.
The problem with Superman killing in II isn't a moral issue from a superhero standpoint, it's a problem from a killing helpless individuals and giggling about it is horrifying standpoint.
Aside from in-story, symbolic and very practical reasons (can't get rid of the supervillains, after all), there's a very fine line with Superman in particular. With that dude, any sort of indication that he might be anything less than absolute and unimpeachable in his morality, the idea of someone with that much power declaring he's going to do what he thinks is right stops being comforting and inspiring and becomes
absolutely goddamned terrifying. That wasn't really a problem in the Golden Age, the most unsophisticated (if also one of the most fun and inventive) era of superhero comics, but once you add any sort of sense of empathy or regard for consequences into the equation, it stops working.
Also, yes, superhero comics are indeed sliding back into adolescent male power fantasies, and
that's horrible. The comics you mention below were very much born of an attempt to move beyond that sort of mindset, and while I'm fine with comics just about good guys fighting bad guys, the day we lose the Astro Cities, Miraclemen, Stormwatches and New Frontiers of the world is the day I give up on the superhero genre altogether.
There are so many, MANY other reasons for that. It's not like kids aren't familiar with good guys finishing off the bad guy, and not everything needs to operate on action movie standards in terms of how stories are resolved. All this though, reminds me of something I've wanted to recommend to you a couple times. I know you have a vehement hate for anything that could be perceived as 'cliché', and while
I don't think that's something that really works over the long term, it reminded me of something you might enjoy. It's a Steam game, The Stanley Parable, that plays around with the idea of possibility and choice in narrative, and it's a hoot. I suspect you might enjoy it.