How to Fix Man of Steel (Part 2)

A better story arc for Lois Lane
Man of Steel's Lois Lane may be one of the most boring Lois Lane in Superman's history. She played very little role in the film and in some scenes, I believe, she is forcibly put into them to give her more screen time. There was no reason for her to be taken captive into Zod's ship and no reason for her to be on board the military plane during the mission to crash Superman's baby ship into Zod's ship, especially when she had already told the general and Supes; how to already carry out the plan. She just met Clark within 24 hours and their kissing scene and relationship felt way too rushed. I am particularly disappointed with the way Superman first met Lois Lane. In the past, it has always been an iconic moment of how Superman first meets Lois Lane. Much of the time, this happens when Superman is doing a big heroic save. In the original movie, his heroic save at the Daily Planet is not only his first public appearance to the world but also his first meeting with Lois Lane as Superman. In Superman Returns, it was the airplane save that reintroduces Superman to the world and to Lois Lane. If anything, let it be iconic! I don't see how the first meeting of Clark and Lois, with her being injured and Clark had to cauterize her wound is any epic or remotely interesting.

 "Hey, I just met you... Here's my number, so- Screw it! Kiss me already!"

Lois and Clark's relationship felt more rushed than the Smallville's version.

Being an iconic and important character in Superman's comic book history, Lois Lane deserves a way better story arc than what she has in Man of Steel. She felt more like a side character in Man of Steel than actually being part of the main line up of characters. In previous incarnation, I always felt she is particularly useful in introducing Clark around the Daily Planet and in their line of news reporting, and maybe even more interesting would be to have a bit of rivalry between them. Even a love triangle between Lois Lane, Clark Kent and Superman would be an interesting story to tell. It almost worked in the Smallville TV series and in the movie, Superman 4. However, that only works if you have Lois Lane not realizing that Supes and Clark are one and the same. And this would work only if you have Clark disguised and working in the Daily Planet early on in the movie. So, what can you do with Lois Lane in Man of Steel before Clark begins to work in the Daily Planet? I guess only her reporting skills can be of good use for her and for the audience to find out more about Superman's background and powers. I guess the only part I did like with Man of Steel's Lois Lane was when she does her digging to look out for her mystery man. "How, do you find someone who has
spent a lifetime covering his tracks... For some he was a guardian angel... For others a cypher, a ghost who never quite fit in."

A reporter with no military training on a mission that's potentially suicidal. That's real smart, Lois.

Superman's First Public Appearance

Superman's First Public appearance is a key moment in Superman's Year One story. Once again, in most incarnation of Superman's origin story. Once you dealt with Clark discovering who he is and what's his purpose here on Earth, all eyes are now turned to how he's going to step out and present himself to the world. In the past, we've got him saving Lois Lane from plummeting down to her doom and stopped a helicopter from crashing to the crowd below, and all eyes, camera and media are on him as he makes the heroic save. In Superman Returns, he is reintroduced to the world when he rescued an airplane from crashing, and got a lot of spotlight when he brought it down in a stadium full of people, and the Smallville TV series finale, he finally stepped out into the world and pushed back an entire planet from bringing certain doom to the world. In Man of Steel however, he lacklusterly showed up to surrender.

In the original movie, he got to the chopper.

 In Returns, he rescued an airliner.

In Smallville, he saves the Air Force One and pushed an entire planet away.

In Man of Steel, he... surrenders...

What can you do instead? Give Superman his big heroic save! Ram up the scale and make it even more epic than the one seen in Superman Returns! If you want to continue down the theme used in Man of Steel of whether the world is ready for a super-powered alien like him. Have the public reaction to his save a mixed bag. After all, this is something that the world have never seen before. Realistically, some would react with fear of the discovery of the likes like him and some would be cheering for a hero. Have the military then try to contain him in fear that he will act "against America's interest", and make Superman realized that maybe his adopted dad is right all along, the world isn't ready for him. You can then have Lois Lane interviewing him and publishing an article to try to put the public's fear at rest ("Why the world needs Superman" article, anyone?) and have her to continue rooting for him and supporting him even when the world is very much against him. This makes more sense in building up a good relationship between them and make this conversation a whole lot more sense:

 

 

 Superman: Thank you.
Lois Lane: For what?
Superman: For believing in me.
Lois Lane: Didn't make much difference in the end.
Superman: It did to me.

Simplify the plot

I actually love it that the film showed us more of Krypton and more of its background is told in Man of Steel compared to the Richard Donner's film. But there's just too much detail for this fan boy to follow and too many figure of speech for me to comprehend. I don't get what it means for the Codex as being the hope and future of Krypton. I didn't get it as to why Jor-El wanted that to survive with Clark.. not with.. IN CLARK! What's with the whole establishment of artificial population control and Kryptonian's birth being in a pod and having their role in society predetermine? How does that factors in to Clark being different, being born of a natural birth and his attributes not predetermined by the Codex. The Codex, if i understood it correctly, is something like a registry of sorts, that plays out more like a genetic store which help creates those Kryptonian babies and somehow it will also work out which role they'll play in the society. Did a bit of researching, it's also known as the Growth Codex or Registry of Citizens Codex. So, how is that Krypton's hope and future? Why does Jor-El wanted the survival of the Codex by putting it in Clark's living cells? Why even tell Clark much later about it, explaining him that he first wanted Clark to know what it means to be human first, that one day he'll be the bridge between two worlds. Blah.. Blah.. Blah.. Say what?! I don't know how all these factor into the main storyline, and even if  it does... say, you wanted the purpose of the Codex to give Zod a reason to go after Superman in order to get his hands on it. Well, Superman is already a stumbling block to Zod's plan to establish a New Krypton which will result in the destruction of planet Earth, that's a good enough reason to have Zod squash Superman. So, just KISS (Keep It Simple and Stupid). If they want to build a background for the fans to enjoy, why not use the ones established in the comics? Fans would enjoy a little tease here and there, than to try to crack their heads to understand what's going on.

Really Bring Hope
When you hear Clark tell Lois, "It's not an S. In my world, it stands for Hope," and Jor-El telling Clark that, "You will give the people an ideal to strive towards. They will race behind you, they will stumble, they will fall. But in time, they will join you in the sun. In time, you will help them accomplish wonders" as well as "You can save her. You can save them all." You have to ask yourself in what way is Clark a beacon of hope, an ideal to strive for or even a saviour to the world, when he had nothing to show for providing hope, only saved a handful of people when he had allowed thousands to die and what sort of an ideal example of a violent person who brutally punches villains before finally snapping Zod's neck. It all sounds good in words and lines but our Man of Steel failed in keeping them. If I could change things differently in Man Of Steel, let him does a big save as his first public reveal to the world but let the world react negatively to his actions, and prefers to be left alone and doesn't require any help. Superman respects their decision and leaves. When Zod and his army come to bring certain doom to the planet and the military failed at stopping him, when all hope seems lost, Supes comes to the rescue.

Have Superman do the smart thing to save the civilians before engaging Zod. Much of the fight in Man of Steel had him causing so much destruction and lives at the expense of bringing down the baddies. I would think he would be smart and take the fight to some place else or at least make some effort to save people during the destruction. Superman 2 had him trying to rescue people while at the same time trying to deal with Zod and his henchmen. In the movie itself, the villains realising that harming the civilians could be a potential weakness for Superman and exploit it. This would force Superman to bring the fight to someplace else where there would be no collateral damage or casualties. And it would save the movie from a lot of haters bickering over the destruction caused and lives cost in the film. I understand that if you take the fight to a desert or to the ocean, the fight scenes would be boring. If that's the case, have the fight in Metropolis but have the civilians flee from the place as would a potential bombing or a terrorist attack were to occur there. In Man Of Steel, I didn't understand why the civilians have not evacuated at the sight of Zod's ship hovering over the city, especially when you already got a televised warning from Zod before hand and I had no idea why people are still seen hanging around during Superman and Zod one on one fight. One can argue that the people evacuated off screen but on my second viewing, yes, we were shown that civilians in the middle of a road traffic when Supes n Zod were brawling.

 "Let's save the day and not destroy the city."- said no Superhero ever

Reduce The Action

I felt the entire action scenes were too long and too dragged out. Especially when you thought it was all over after they got rid of the world engine, we were treated with a long showdown between Zod and Supes. Beginning with the Battle of Smallville, when Superman comes flying to Zod in full speed, grabbing his collar and repeatedly punching him in his face, while dragging him on the ground, into some buildings and finally into the Gas station, I was like all "YEA! WHOA! That's for messing with Superman!", but when we finally get him facing a final showdown with Zod... it was getting too tiring. I didn't feel the threat of having Zod finally mastering his senses, and ripping off his armor (he looks way better with his armor on). When he and Supes flying around, punching each other into buildings, it begins to feel like the face off between Neo and Smith in Matrix Revolutions. You just know, no matter how many punches they throw at each other, neither one of them is going to be remotely injured. So it really got boring after awhile and back to its resounding flat note of "meh". Trimming it down or pacing them out well would help a lot for the audience to take a breather.

Two superpowered men fighting...

It's Matrix Revolution all over again...

If Zack Synder kept his trademark slowmo, we could have seen Supes pull a punch like this.

Kill Zod?
I definitely am not the one who would advocate Superman killing Zod. Superman DOES not kill. Yes, he sometimes does so in previous incarnation.. rarely and it is never looked upon well on him. Some have argues that he had no choice, but I disagree. He could have easily burst into the speed of sound carrying Zod with him to space and deals with him there. He resorted to something like that in the animated movie, Superman: Doomsday, when he couldn't hold back Doomsday from killing civilians, with his last might, he brought him out to space and brought him down like a meteor impacting Earth. Now, I don't expect Supes to kill Zod that way, but I prefer him alive and somehow, one or another, lock him back into the Phantom Zone.

But.... if you must make Superman kill, at least build up to that moment. Have Zod tease Superman that he must break his "no-kill" rule before Superman realize he had no choice. Although, I still think that's not a good idea because if there's a hero that had been place in a position that should have resorted to killing, it would be Batman, because that's the whole scheme of Joker to Batman in the Dark Knight. It was Batman's no-kill rule that Joker wanted Batman to break and when the Joker thought he'd won when Batman tossed him down to his doom, he laughed with victory before realizing he got roped around his foot and pulled back up by Batman. Batman won by not killing. So, when you think Superman had a bad day and had no choice but to deal a bad hand, well.. I think Batman could laugh at him.

 Batman: I have one rule!

Joker: And that's the rule you're gonna have to break.

Superman: I did it! I broke the rule!

Brighten up the colour palette
Ever since the first publicity still photo was revealed, I was really unhappy with the dark and mute colours for Superman. More so when it comes to the stills from the film, the publicity shots for magazine and posters were actually not too bad. I understand this is Zack Synder's trademark. He does this to all of his comic book film. But Superman should stand proud with his red, blue and yellow. I didn't like the turquoise blue they used for Superman Returns. I felt that the animated series nailed his colour shades perfectly. In Man of Steel however, they've darken the blue so much that it's almost black, they muted the yellow so much it comes off looking looking like lighter shade of grey and the red is probably the only one surviving the filter. Even Superman and Lois' skin looks pale in most scenes. I actually love one particular fan edit/fan art where the fan not only brighten up the colours, but he also put back his red underwear, give him his curl and corrected the shield. That would have been the perfect Superman to me.

I still very much prefer the original look. It takes a Superman to wear his underwear on the outside.

Look how amazing Lois is before having the blood sucked out of her...

(you can compare these two photos)

Give Superman back his charm

If there's one thing I miss from Christopher Reeve's Superman is his charm. Man of Steel's Superman takes himself too seriously. He broods a lot! I think the only scene when things start to lighten up a bit is when he crashes the drone in front of the general and talk to him about convincing Washington about accepting him, and I believe the only light hearted moment would be the fan girl's line; "I think he's kinda hot." Facepalm...

I miss it when Superman could still smile and smirk, he gives friendly waves and is a perfect gentleman. He had so much confidence then. For goodness sake, give Superman back his heart and leave the brooding and emo-ing to Batman.

Dum.. dum.. dum...
Dum.. dee dee dee Dum...

I believe that's the lyrics to John William's Superman score.

Well, this is all wishful thinking. Man of Steel may not be the definitive and perfect Superman movie I've longed for but it still have its moments. The visual effects were great, some of the action were enjoyable, Krypton scenes were beautiful, Henry Cavill, Amy Adams, Michael Shannon and Russel Crowe felt perfect for their roles, Superman's flight scenes were brilliant and Hans Zimmer score was epic! I guess I'll just have to embrace with what we've got. It'll be a long time before a Superman reboot were to ever happen and I don't think the red underwear will ever come back. Let's hope Man of Steel 2 will be the definitive Superman movie we all been waiting for.

Oh wait... the follow up movie to this is going to be...

(Click on the photo below to watch How Man of Steel Should Have Ended)

After Earth (2013)

Do not misunderstand me, danger is very real but fear is a choice."- General Cypher Raige

Directed by M. Night Shyamalan, After Earth takes place in the future when Earth is no long habitable and the human race had to colonize another planet to survive. They settled on new planet is known as Nova Prime, but just when their survival is secured, monsters from the planet start to pose a threat. These monsters, known as Ursa, although blind, can only detect the humans through smelling "fear". General Cypher Raige (Will Smith) became the first human who has ever put aside his fear to the extend that the Ursa are blinded to him, a process known as "Ghosting". General Cypher Raige, although well respected in his military ranks and skills, has never been a father to his son, Kitai Raige (Jaden Smith). Realizing this and at the encouragement of his wife, he decides to invite his son on to his last voyage before retirement. When their ship crashed landed on a now evolved Earth, Kitai had to not only survive the harsh environment and dangerous jungle predators in order to save himself and his dying father, but to face an Ursa that has now broken free from the ship.

 From Independence Day Hero to Zero Charisma.

I guess fighting aliens in his career just sucked the life out of him

SPOILERS AHEAD
I actually had very little interest in this film. The trailers failed to impress me and you've got director Shyamalan attached to it. He's a good writer... not the best, but he is simply bad in his directing. The concept and the story of this film is actually quite interesting, it may have the potential to be a good or above average film but what failed the movie in the end is the directing and the acting, and the CG effects. The entire movie played out like a flat note. Put it simply, it's a resounding "meh". The film suffers from being too philosophical. Before we get to the actual story, we had to be expose to its exposition of how people had to leave Earth, face monsters in Nova Prime and the key to fight these monsters is to ghost...which is a process that...blah blah blah blah. I find that this whole background and beginning long winded exposition of the story is just to set up the character development and arc for Kitai (and for us, audience to relate) that he had to overcome his fear in order to achieve victory. From the start, we know Kitai had a major weakness in his fears and had a bad relationship with his dad, from this you pretty much can guess that he's going to ultimately overcome his fears and patch up his relationship with his dad. After all, you even got a final boss who only smell fear. You can tell Jaden is going to successfully overcome his fear and defeat the beast. The whole story can be predicted from the start of the film. Is the journey from start to finish any interesting? Well...

What's the matter with you, son?

There were tense moments here and there. The scene that got my attention where Jaden gets poisoned by some form of mutated leech and develop signs of dangerous looking allergies which he had to then inject a very user-unfriendly antidote. The scene when he lacked the technical readouts of the warm spots for him to take refuge and was close to being frozen to death before being rescued under the wings of an eagle, came off as a surprise to me. The rest failed to get my curiosity or my attention. I would also probably choose the scene when Kitai's father gets sucked out through the gaping hole at the back of the ship during the whole crash landing sequence, but that only felt like a tense moment when I first watch the movie's trailer on big screen. After seeing the trailer several times, when the movie actually plays out the scene, the whole sequence felt diluted and uninteresting. Even the scene with him facing the CGI monkeys felt like they pose no real threats. When Kitai finally comes face to face with the Ursa, I already expected him to Ghost and just beat the crap out of the blind monsters, which he did...to no surprise. The Ursa sadly, doesn't even look or feel remotely frightening. I don't know what happened to the Hollywood's design team, but they are more successful at creating iconic and memorable monsters from puppets and costumes than they do with CGI. A matter of fact, a lot of CGI monsters and aliens nowadays begin to look like a generic grey/ black mess.

CG is so bad, this looks a lot like Diego from Ice Age

Will Smith, along with his son, Jaden Smith are actually good actors. Will Smith has his signature charisma and charm, and Jaden Smith is slowly molded after his dad. What I don't understand here is that, this film completely suck out all their charisma. Will Smith constantly looked stone cold and a real joy killer. Jaden played well of his character who had to deal with fear and guilt from his past, as well as a boy who had a broken relationship with his father. However, I still don't get the whole fearlessness expression that they both acted out or the director directed out. What's with the stone cold and joy killer look? I would think when you got no fear, you would show 100% confidence, smirk, taunt the monster Ursa, say with Schwarzenegger's accent, "You are one ugly mother-" you know. You would go all Samuel L Jackson or Will Smith in Independence Day. But no, apparently having no fear means you just go expressionless like Kristen Stewart. I think the only good scene where acting is actually involved would be the scene when Kitai confronts his dad on the communication link, pouring out his heart, his anger and his tears to his father, just before he leaped over the falls and activated his flight suit.

Apparently, the key to maintain self-control is to do an imaginary marriage proposal, a good advice from Alex "Hitch" Hitchens

I got a friend who commented that his chameleon suit is kinda cool. Well, honestly, all the tech in the film is just uninteresting. There's nothing desirable about them at all. It's nowhere close to other fictional tech, such as Batman's suit, gadgets and batmobile or the Iron Man suit or a even the Mandalorian armor (Star Wars reference). The futuristic Swiss army knife..sword as well, I think a lightsaber is a lot more convenient and a lot cooler. Design wise, this movie had nothing to offer. After all, it's not the real showcase. But it should be, because if you ever make a film that takes place so far into the future and space travel is involved, you can't escape from the artist's drawing board. I think a little more design creativity should have been put in.

Don't you think they ought to design a rubber handgrip for this thing?

Honestly, it's a bad film. The story is too philosophical and predictable, there's zero charisma and charm from Jaden and Will Smith characters which is wasted acting potential from these two fine actors, the CG is uninteresting and some parts were even terrible and the whole movie played out like a flat note from start to finish. The only thing I can appreciate from this movie is the concept that could have potentially work in the hands of another director. I would give this movie a 3 out of 10 Oxygen Capsules.

Use your clicking Kung Fu to fight with Jackie Chan-trained Jaden below to view the trailer on YouTube

Despicable Me (2010)

Dr Nefario: Here's the new weapon you ordered.

[Shoots minion with the fart gun]

Gru: No, no, no. I said DART gun.

 Dr Nefario: Oh yes. Cause I was wondering... under what circumstances would we use this?

CO-CO-BANANA!

Since I've written my review on Despicable Me 2 and an article of the potential third sequel of the franchise, thought I just complete it by reviewing on the first Despicable Me. Unless you can find a way to brainwash me from ever remembering anything of Despicable Me 2, the following review is written post-viewing of Despicable Me 2.

Where's Lucy?

When the Pyramid of Gaza had been stolen by a new villain Vector (Jason Segel) which made the other villains look... lame. Super-villain Gru (Steve Carell) had to conjure up a plan to steal the moon which will beat the Pyramid theft. But when his key device for his moon stealing plan, the shrink ray, gets stolen by Vector, Gru had to adopt three little girls; Margo (Miranda Cosgrove), Edith (Dana Gaier) and Agnes (Elsie Kate Fisher) for his mission to steal back the shrink ray. Events in his life begins to take a different turn when the three girls turned his life upside down and made him realize there's more to life than just being a villain. With his help from an army of minions and an old hearing impaired doctor, will Gru be able to pull off the greatest heist in history?

If you didn't realize, Vector is trying to camoflauge the pyramid to the background of the sky...

Good computer animated films are rising and gaining credibility to be good family oriented movies that can be enjoyed by both children and adults alike. Despicable Me is one of those films. It has a good story with character development that is similar to the story of Dr Seuss' "The Grinch that stole Christmas" and another animated film Megamind,a super-villain turned good. A little cliche but it still is a good story to tell. But the real showcase of the movie are the many hilarious moments involving the yellow Minions and the parody of the stereotypical comic book and Hollywood's supervillains. I enjoyed the movie a lot. I was very much engaged to the story and to the characters and I had a good laugh at the wonderful minion moments.

Gru's Q, you can tell he's evil by his goggles.

Artistically, the design of the world is rather simple, but very effective. Minions look adorable and clearly stole the hearts of the audience around the world that we got a Minion Fever going during the release of the sequel. Some of the gadgets, Gru's lab, bombs and rockets and flying vehicle looks very much like exaggerated evil villainy designs. Vector's home, gadgets and vehicle on the other hand, looks very much like they are made by Apple... but ironically, Vector's look reminded me a lot like Bill Gates. The character and look of Dr Nefario reminded me of Pierce Brosnan James Bond's Q, just a lot more evil looking, perhaps even coming off as a mad scientist look and I love it when they made fun with his age and his hearing impairment... they came off really smart. I still love the line that Dr Nefario delivers when he realize he misheard the instruction to build the Dart gun and ended up inventing the Fart gun, "Oh yes, I was wondering... under what circumstances would we use this?" He's just so old...

Comparison?

There were so many hilarious Minions moments. I think I enjoyed all the Minions moments. They're just so cute...and evil (considering that they love weapons and evil schemes). The one moment that really stood out was when Minion Mark, Tim and Phil had a trip to the mall to buy a new toy unicorn. I love their disguises and costumes as a dad, a mum and a baby. I love it when they went their separate ways to explore the mall. I'm sold! Other moments was watching Kevin the Minion living his life being tiny after being shrunk by the shrink ray and also the moment  when you realize that one Minion had a freaking huge crown when they all decide to contribute to financing the building of the rocket. I also like Jerry the Minion going, "Say Whaat?!" after being accused by Edith for conjuring up the plan to mess up the house. Wait... Did I just mention all the Minions by name? Oh gosh.. I'm turning into a Despicable geek.

Tiny Kevin or Giant Dave? 

Overall, it's a really good animated film. I love the creativeness in the parody of your stereotype super villain, love the character designs, particularly their originality in their invention of the Minions that just took the world by storm since the film's release. They may be cute, adorable and all, but ultimately it's only as good as the story takes them. Not as brilliant as Pixar's Toy Story but this one certainly has heart and good character development. I would give this an 8 out of 10 fluffy unicorns. They're so fluffy... I'm going to DIE!

We'll probably won't be visiting this franchise again until the release of Minions in December 2014. For more despicable reviews, you can check out my review for Despicable Me 2 and my article on Despicable Me 3 by clicking the first two photos below. Thanks for reading, fellow Minion.

 Yes, that's a freaking crown...

Yes, that's a Kitchen Hand mixer at the left...

Yes, this blog is powered by all 10,400 minions...

White House Down (2013)

"Whatever happened to the pen being mightier than the sword?"- Head of Presidential Security detail, Martin Walker

A Buddy cop film?

From the disaster loving director and filmmaker, Roland Emmerich, that brought you 2012, The Day after Tomorrow, Godzilla and Independence Day, comes an action film like one other (Olympus Has Fallen). White House Down tells of a story of a struggling father, U.S Capitol Police Officer John Cale (Channing Tatum) who tries to patch his relationship with his America-loving, patriotic daughter Emily Cale (Joey King), by taking her to the White House for his job application into the secret service, giving her chance to take a tour inside the Presidential residence. Things begin to go awry during their time there when a group of paramilitary terrorist decides to seize the White House and go after the U.S President James Sawyer (Jamie Foxx). When help failed to come from the outside, Officer John Cale has to not only spring into action to save his daughter but to team up with the U.S President to stop the terrorist plans from succeeding.

 Roland Emmerich has destroyed the White House so many times in his disaster films,

that it's about time he made a film solely on the destruction of the White House.

...Spoilers from here on out...

Apart from the much Americana theme and American patriotism, this film has plenty of action and entertaining moments. A less serious film compared to Olympus Has Fallen which had a similar plot, and certainly has a much higher budget. Roland Emmerich is known for causing destruction and mayhem in his films. Well, he certainly had fun blowing up, demolishing and destroying much of the White House in this film. It was certainly good entertainment threat. There were even few good surprises that caught me off guard. When I think this sort of story you only can have gun fights or hand to hand combat, I had no idea you can even put in a car chase scene on the lawn of the White House. And just when you think all the explosion and destruction will be concentrated on the White House, BOOM! there goes the Air Force One in the sky. John Cale even surprised me and made me laugh when he decides to light up the Presidential bedroom on fire to get the enemy's attention.

"Detective John McClane?"

He's busy in Russia. What can I do for you, President L Jackson?

Our hero John Cale actually feels more like Die Hard's John McClane here compared to Gerald Butler's Mike Banning from Olympus. I mean he even does all his thing in a singlet much like our Die Hard hero. He not only feels like your kind of guy who's in the wrong place and at the wrong time but I do feel that he's got a lot more vulnerability than Olympus' Mike Banning. This is especially so when his daughter's life is at stake (Die Hard 4 anyone?). So his character is a lot more engaging and fun to watch. As for President Sawyer, he is played brilliantly by Jamie Foxx. You can tell he picked up certain characteristics from President Obama, but I found it really fun to watch him fumbling with his presidential habits in a time and crisis like this. President Sawyer and John Cale make a good dynamic duo, their chemistry is fun to watch and actually gave a feel like a good buddy cop movie. (Die Hard 3 anyone?) So, creativity wise... that's a plus point. Just think about it, how cool is that if President Obama had to do something like that. I'm guessing that's probably how they pitched the idea to the studio to green lit this movie.

 I have my peace treaty right here!

I find the story takes some time to build up. Nearly bored me in the beginning. It did introduce a little too many characters for me to follow. I'm guessing that's because there's going to be a lot of people involve when a crisis like that were to occur. But ultimately, they are quickly dealt with and we follow more of our heroes and the baddies in the White House. There's certainly a good character arc and development written for our hero John Cale, but it's a little too cliche and has been done quite a lot of times, as mentioned to my reference above, Die Hard 4. You just know that they purposely set up his bad relationship with his daughter so that they will reconcile in the end after he does his hero business. But what surprises me more was the back story of our villain, the head of presidential security detail, Martin Walker. While the motive of the villain in Olympus Has Fallen has something to do with the conflict between the North and South Korea, this one had a more personal motive and vendetta. So, it got me quite engage to the story as the real villain motive slowly unfolds. I was particularly surprised that even the President proposal of withdrawing the troops from the Middle East plays a small part in the villain's motive. Kudos also to the writer to how the take over scene was written. I thought it was interesting to have the head of president's security detail, Martin Walker to mastermind the whole attack. It always someone within. How he meets his end too, was rather... a little overkill but still WOW!

 Don't worry, honey... we'll be in good terms once I kill all the bad guys, save the President and America.

A little long for the story to build up and a little too many characters to follow, otherwise it's a fun action movie to watch. I enjoyed the performance of Channing Tatum and Jamie Foxx, and the story, although similar to Olympus Has Fallen, is a lot more fun and engaging at times. Entertaining and cool. Then again, Olympus has a much different direction and take, more gritty and serious in tone, a thriller film. White House Down is more of a summer action flick with bits of light heartedness and humor in it. I give a 6.5 out of 10 pairs of President's Jordan Sneakers. Comment below, which did you prefer: Olympus Has Fallen or White House Down?

How to fix Man of Steel (Part 1)

"What are you doing Zod? This is madness."
"What I should done years ago,
these lawmakers with their endless debates had led Krypton to ruin!"

The Man of Steel has polarized fans around the world. Either you absolutely loved it and feel that the film is already perfect and doesn't need any fixing, or you are disappointed with it that you find it really difficult to embrace the new film. I fall on the latter side. I didn't like the film as much as I want to. But after viewing it several times, I learn to accept with what we got and keeping my fingers cross that we'll get a definitive one in the near future. The next Man of Steel sequel would hopefully hit the mark, but it wouldn't retell its origin story and Year One story again which had a lot of potential to make a good story. Ever since I came out from my first viewing of Man of Steel, I have been thinking of how in the world could they fix the movie. I would actually love to see a complete rewrite of the whole story but right now, here are my thoughts... of what little tweaks here and there that I think could make this a better Superman movie. Let's go through this part by part.

 

Move the Krypton Scenes to later
I would begin the movie with the scenes of Clark at the rough seas, working as a fisherman. There's a reason why I skipped the whole of Krypton scene for the beginning. It's not that I didn't like it, I actually loved the Krypton scenes, but I felt it would serve better when it is played out during the conversation between Jor-El's ghost and Clark when he has to explain about Krypton's fate and Clark's origin. Have Jor-El narrate during the scenes. This not only makes Jor-El's exposition less boring but I felt we could relate a lot better to Clark in his journey of discovering his identity, rather than knowing all along where he comes from and who he is before Clark had any clue about it.

 

 

Have Jor-El narrate or provide exposition during the Krypton scenes when he explains everything to Clark in the Fortress.

Having the movie begin with Clark at the seas also gives a shroud of mystery around him to the audience. Who is he? Why is he at sea? Is he running away from something? This works well for those who knows nothing about Superman because then, we are introduced to his powers, especially his superstrength and invulnerability when he does his heroic save at the oil rig. As the oil rig explodes and smokes and the helicopter flying away, we hear the pilot asking the men, "Who was that guy?" Then we cut to Clark sinking/semi-floating in the middle of sea and have the title sequence begin with the amazing Hans Zimmer Superman theme playing, and credits rolling. This whole introduction sequence would get the audience excited and pumped for the movie ahead, in the same vein of how Casino Royale's introduction and opening gets us all pumped for our new take on James Bond.

 

Imagine a smoking oil rig and the helicopter fly by. Pilot asking "Who was that guy?"

This is pretty much how I imagined the title sequence would be...

Have the credits roll on from here and Hans Zimmer's amazing Man of Steel theme playing.

Add more depth to Clark-The-Drifter scenes
I always found the scenes with Clark on the fishing ship, moving on to the oil rig save, then working in the bar before he quits and leave, were all together flat and felt the events were moving from one place to another with no real purpose or goal for his character development. His childhood flashbacks, on the other hand, tell a good story that factors heavily into his life. Add more weight to those scenes and how it can still factor into Clark's progression into becoming Superman. First, you got to answer the question why is he drifting from places to places and working odd jobs, then make the audience realize that he is looking for answers or perhaps help the audience understand that he's trying to find his place in society as someone who's not normal or even human. If I could add something to those scenes is that, I would work out a story to help Clark realize that the world is in need of hope and a saviour. All these need to happen before he finds a clue that would lead him to the Fortress of Solitude and meets his ghost space dad, and finally understand his true destiny as a saviour and a hero.

Just drifting along...

Make Jonathan and Martha Kent be real parents
I always love the line that was delivered by Jor-El in the finale of Smallville: "Your powers may be of my blood, but it is your time in Smallville that makes you who you are." Jonathan Kent and Martha Kent are perhaps the most important people to the origin of Superman. More than just raising Clark and helping him with controlling his powers, they are his a moral compass and they play a big role in shaping his character. The only thing I would change from the second childhood flashback is Jonathan Kent's answer to Clark's question of whether he should let the people on the bus die to hide his secret powers. I hated the grim idea that Pa Kent would consider allowing his son to let everyone on the school bus to die when he has the power to actually save them. Have Pa Kent answer Clark, with a solid "No," instead of "maybe" and then continues on with "but there's more at stake here than just our lives and the lives of those around us, Clark." However I still love the line that was borrowed from the original Superman movie and expanded on in this movie: "You were sent here for a reason, son, and even if it takes you the rest of your life, you owe it to yourself to find out what that reason is."

 

I still love the line from the original Superman movie: "You were put here for a reason..."
I'm so glad they used it again in Man of Steel

Have Pa Kent die of a heart attack
I want Jonathan Kent to die. But how should he die? Like in many of his incarnations, he died of a heart attack with Clark Kent having all his powers was still unable to save him. I always found the scene from the original Superman and Smallville TV series very tragic and in someway, very ironic. Clark has all the superhuman abilities to save people from disaster but he was powerless to save his father from a heart condition. The death scene could and should factor heavily into Clark's character development. I mean, Jonathan is after all his only dad left. Actually, I think it worked out rather stupid that he obeys his father's refusal of letting Clark save him from a tornado just so he doesn't expose his secret to the public, when in the end, he exposed himself as Superman anyway. It nullified Jonathan's death scene, and realistically, if that would actually happen to me as Clark, I would rather save my dad first and then deal with the consequences of my disobedience. "Screw you, dad! I'm saving you!"

 

Pa Kent's death due to a heart attack worked out so well in various incarnation.
Why of all things would you want to change that in Man of Steel, Zack?

That's enough for now. I'll continue on with part 2 some other time. Tell me what you think and if you could revisit any part of Man of Steel movie, how else would you have done it. Thanks for reading. =)