Controversial Superman Opinions

[SiegePerilous02]

the difference between superman and the rest is that superman pays for every mistake he makes, while the rest get away with it.
batman creates plans to kill his friends = nothing happens it's batman, how cool.
ww attacks her friends = nothing happens, shows the power of women.
but with superman everything that is not smiling and letting others humiliate him,is wrong.

Um, she's been paying almost non-stop for the Max Lord crap when she doesn't need to. Even in a meta sense because she can't escape him and he's invading her movies.

[Agent Z]

Um, she's been paying almost non-stop for the Max Lord crap when she doesn't need to. Even in a meta sense because she can't escape him and he's invading her movies.

Also, if you get past the Trinity/Big Seven, a number of heroes do pay for their mistakes, sometimes disproportionately.

Green Arrow got exiled from Star City and had everyone turn their back on him for killing Prometheus.

Zatanna got the crap kicked out of her for her role in the League's mindwipes.

Jason Todd was killed for disobeying Batman.

There was a time when John Stewart blowing up a planet was all he was known for.

Hell, even Hal Jordan had a difficult time earning back people's trust because of what he did as Parallax even after it was revealed he was possessed.

[Agent Z]

the difference between superman and the rest is that superman pays for every mistake he makes, while the rest get away with it.
batman creates plans to kill his friends = nothing happens it's batman, how cool.
ww attacks her friends = nothing happens, shows the power of women.
but with superman everything that is not smiling and letting others humiliate him,is wrong.

What mistakes has Superman made that he's paying for?

[Gaius]

Also, if you get past the Trinity/Big Seven, a number of heroes do pay for their mistakes, sometimes disproportionately.

Green Arrow got exiled from Star City and had everyone turn their back on him for killing Prometheus.

Zatanna got the crap kicked out of her for her role in the League's mindwipes.

Jason Todd was killed for disobeying Batman.

There was a time when John Stewart blowing up a planet was all he was known for.

Hell, even Hal Jordan had a difficult time earning back people's trust because of what he did as Parallax even after it was revealed he was possessed.

Or even going across the pond and how Hank Pym will never live down hitting Janet.

[Jim Kelly]

I'm not up on all the latest comics. My knowledge is like Sam Beckett's swiss cheese memory. But does anything really stick with the characters? Some fans seem to think they know exactly what's true for Character X, without any doubt--but how can they? Nothing is certain, is it?

[Quinlan58]

Batman v Superman had a much better take on the Death of Superman than the 90's comic book did (despite otherwise being a bad movie).

[NaVi]

What mistakes has Superman made that he's paying for?

I don't mean the comic, if not the real world. if superman gets to attack his friends or create plans to kill them, everyone would say that he is a violent and dark. but with ww and batman nothing happens. Imagine Superman looking for deadly and extremely painful radiation to humans, guarding and weaponizing it, using it against Batman and his family, who you think would be called Superman.

[NaVi]

superman killed zod in another universe, and continues to pay for it 30 years later, even in the movies. the difference between superman and ww, is that the ww story was an important event, the superman story does not even remember the writer, they only talk about superman kills.

[Ascended]

I'm not up on all the latest comics. My knowledge is like Sam Beckett's swiss cheese memory. But does anything really stick with the characters? Some fans seem to think they know exactly what's true for Character X, without any doubt--but how can they? Nothing is certain, is it?

That's just literary analysis. It's not a perfect science, and with comics it's even less so due to the longevity of publication, different creators putting their voice to the characters, and the ebb and flow of culture.

The downfall of literary analysis is that it locks a character into a particular shape, in a way that simply isn't true for real people. Perhaps you might never drive over the speed limit, and everyone who knows you knows that you drive like a little old lady. Literary analysis would tell us it's out of your character to speed. But what if a unusual circumstance comes along? What if your late to a very important interview, or your wife is giving birth across town? You'd probably drive fast. But in literary analysis, a lot of people would say you're acting against type, without taking the additional circumstances into consideration.

People are fluid in their behavior, capable of a wide range of things based on their surroundings and motivations, even things that seem contradictory. Writing doesn't get the same kind of flexibility; if Batman is known to never kill, then he simply doesn't kill and anything that goes against that will be considered out of character, regardless of the context.

That said, you *can* look at these characters, find common traits across their history, and build a reliable, honest list of what's "true" for them. It requires a good amount of twisting, interpretation, and accounting for shifts in eras/culture, but you can at least get a basic idea of who these characters are and what's typical of their personalities. And then you take that basic framework and pull in other details that pop up regularly and/or fit the larger list to round things out.

That's actually how I came to realize that Clark doesn't have a no kill code. Or rather, that he doesn't truly follow it. It doesn't happen a lot, but almost every version of the character across eras and formats have taken a life (if not several). And a lot of y'all push back against that idea, and once upon a time I did too (everyone *knows* Superman never kills, right?), but when we take the time to look at what is actually on the page, and set our preconceived notions aside, we find that Clark has taken more lives than most of his League peers.

And that's one of the beauties of analysis; we can find that what we thought was bad writing or a bad story is actually rooted in established character behavior, and that can shed a whole new light on things. Like, if Clark claims he never kills but history tells us otherwise, then we get to see a new facet of Clark's personality and a taste of his hypocrisy, and if he's a hypocrite in this, then perhaps he is in other things as well, and that can lead us to uncovering nuance and depths in his character we never would've seen otherwise.

[Gaius]

superman killed zod in another universe, and continues to pay for it 30 years later, even in the movies. the difference between superman and ww, is that the ww story was an important event, the superman story does not even remember the writer, they only talk about superman kills.

If people are talking about Superman killing Zod, I'd say even the majority of comics will be talking about MoS not Superman #22. Superman long moved on from him killing Zod from that issue. Yeah, all comic fans got something they want expunged from their favorite character's record, Superman's nothing special.

Hal Jordan - Parallax (even post the space bug retcon) and the Arisia relationship

John Stewart - Blowing up a planet because he was an idiot

Wonder Woman - Killing Max Lord to make Superman and Batman look morally superior

Kyle Rayner - Kickstarted "Women in Refrigerator" trope.

Barbara Gordon - Even a lot of Oracle fans aren't exactly happy TKJ is how they got that version of Barbara

Cassandra Cain - One Year Later heel turn

Zatanna - Mind wiping

[NaVi]

and none of them are seen by readers as a murderer or a US dog.

[NaVi]

superman has worked with the US, Batman has worked with the US, ww has worked with the US, but the government dog is superman.
superman has killed, ww has killed, batman has killed, but the only one seen as a potential psychopath is superman. superman, ww, green lanter, they are just as strong, but the only one bored for being strong is superman.
the reader always judges superman more strongly.

[Yoda]

superman has worked with the US, Batman has worked with the US, ww has worked with the US, but the government dog is superman.
superman has killed, ww has killed, batman has killed, but the only one seen as a potential psychopath is superman. superman, ww, green lanter, they are just as strong, but the only one bored for being strong is superman.
the reader always judges superman more strongly.

The issue is the source of the characterization. The issues with Superman as government stooge was popularized in Dark Knight Returns - one of the most popular comic stories in existence and the "psychopath" side of it stems mainly from Injustice (and DCEU would have likely cemented it) I think which doesn't have the reach of DKR's but is still more popular than monthly comics. Monthly comics don't set public perception at all.

[DochaDocha]

The issue is the source of the characterization. The issues with Superman as government stooge was popularized in Dark Knight Returns - one of the most popular comic stories in existence and the "psychopath" side of it stems mainly from Injustice (and DCEU would have likely cemented it) I think which doesn't have the reach of DKR's but is still more popular than monthly comics. Monthly comics don't set public perception at all.

I'd probably argue that Injustice probably had more direct reach among modern audiences by sheer volume of sales, but DKR probably set the tone for so many stories that followed, including stuff like the DCEU, that few stories will match DKR's lasting legacy. It's like the Genghis Khan of comic books as far as having stories that drew inspiration from it.

[marhawkman]

There was a time when John Stewart blowing up a planet was all he was known for.

This was also more-or-less an accident.