In case you haven't noticed, Man of Steel has started a war of opposing viewpoints on just how successful Zack Snyder's relaunch really was. Certainly it's already winning the box office battle, and has spurred Warner Bros. to get moving on a sequel in short order, but that hasn't kept the critics from pointing out its flaws. One particular bone of contention has been with the film's climactic battle between Superman (Henry Cavill) and General Zod (Michael Shannon), and the actions the hero is forced to take. In case you haven't guessed, there will be spoilers beyond this point, so proceed at your own risk....
In the final battle, Superman is put in a position where he's forced to kill Zod by snapping his neck like a twig. It's a devastating moment, and we see the impact it has on Superman immediately. But at the same time it left many feeling as if we had just seen something wildly out of character, because Superman supposedly never kills. I don't buy that for a second, and others would argue that Superman has killed Zod and other aliens such as Doomsday(I know he can resurrect himself but that changes nothing) in the past, but still it has led to some heated discussions. In the latest episode of the Empire Podcast, Snyder and screenwriter David Goyer talked about that decision, and revealed that none other than Christopher Nolan was initially one of the scene's most vocal detractors...
Goyer: Killing Zod was a big thing and Chris Nolan, originally, said there’s no way you can do this. That was a change - originally Zod got sucked into the Phantom Zone along with the others and I just felt it was unsatisfying and so did Zack. We started questioning - we talked to some of the people at DC Comics and said, “Do you think there is ever a way that Superman would kill someone?” And at first they said “No way, no way,” and we said, “but what if he didn’t have a choice?” Originally Chris didn’t even want to let us try to write it and Zack and I said, “We think we can figure out a way that youll buy it.”
Snyder went on to add that he felt Superman's "no killing" rule had never been fully explained, and that there needed to be a catalyzing moment for him to come up with such a stance...
Snyder: I guess for me - and in the original version of the script he just got zapped into the Phantom Zone David and I had long talks about it and Chris and I talked long about it and it was like, “I really think we should kill Zod and I really think Superman should kill him. And the why of it was, for me, that if it’s truly an origin story, his aversion to killing is unexplained. It’s just in his DNA. I felt like we needed him to do something, just like him putting on the glasses or going to the Daily Planet or any of the other things that you’re sort of seeing for the first time that you realize will then become his thing. I felt like, if we can find a way of making it impossible for him - like Kobayashi Maru, totally no way out - I felt like that could also make you go, “Okay, this is the why of him not killing ever again, right?” He’s basically obliterated his entire people and his culture and he is responsible for it and he’s just like, “How could I kill ever again?”
Although Nolan was against it, Snyder and Goyer did manage to convince him and the folks at DC Comics of their idea...
Goyer: “I came up with this idea of heat vision and these people about to die, and I wrote the scene, gave it to Chris, and he said, 'Okay you've convinced me.' ”
I've seen some people acting as if Nolan's initial reluctance somehow proves that the scene never should have happened, but that doesn't make any sense. He's no more an authority on Superman than anybody else, and if it isn't obvious by now, there are many different camps with their own ideas who the last son of Krypton is. Leaving behind the fact that Golden Age Superman was more than willing to kill, and that more modern versions have killed other powerful beings in the past, what Man of Steel is doing is presenting a character who has yet to figure out who he wants to be. That's kind of the entire point of it, right? So this Superman now has a death on his hands, and part of his continued evolution will be seeing how that affects him, because he's likely to be put in a similar life-or-death situation again very soon.
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