When Zack Snyder took a chance at storytelling in the DC Films universe, his interpretation needed to be different than the movies that had come before his Man of Steel, specifically the gentle Richard Donner homage that was Bryan Singer’s Superman Returns. As Kevin Smith wisely pointed out, Superman (in the movie) makes it through the entire film without hardly ever throwing a punch. That’s a choice, for sure. So Snyder leaned hard in a different direction, embracing a more mature interpretation of the Man of Steel that tells the classic immigrant story of an alien in Kansas, but asking big philosophical questions about how humanity might react if and when they learned that an alien exists amongst them.
Needless to say, it gets dark and violent. And by the end of Man of Steel, Superman (Henry Cavill) and his adversary, General Zod (Michael Shannon), have battled to the death… leaving a trail of destruction in their wake. This led some to conclude that Snyder was trying to make Superman – normally a beacon of hope – into something more angry. But when posed with that theory following a Man of Steel screening in Pasadena, the director pushed back a bit and clarified:
How do you make a god “relatable”? It’s a complicated question every time any filmmaker takes a stab at Superman as a storytelling device. James Gunn will be the next one to approach this Superman conundrum when he brings his Superman: Legacy to the screen in 2025, part of a first chapter of DC movies that will establish a new universe for Warner Bros.
Though, as Snyder points out, both he and Gunn (and Singer and Donner) are just individuals in a long line of people who will get a chance to share the Superman mythology with fans over generations. As the Man of Steel director said:
As fans at the SnyderCon event pointed out, to them, Snyder’s interpretation of Superman remains their favorite. We included Snyder’s comic-book work on our list of the 30th Best Superhero Movies to date, so start debating if we got it correct. And start thinking about where James Gunn’s Superman: Legacy might fall into those rankings, when it opens in theaters years from now.