Superman: Collateral Damage – Detail Diatribe

One of my favorite scenes from a comic is when a little boy asks Superman, “Are you ever afraid of the bullets?” and Superman's reply is, “Only the ones that miss.”

A thing I really like about Superman and Lois is when a small kid thanks him after the car accident and says "cool costume." and then Superman responds with "Thanks! My mom made it for me." Which is peak Superman.

The older I get, the more I can appreciate Superman's "simplicity" in just continuing to believe in good, no matter what. When you're a teenager, you go like "Pffsht, he's just a boring good guy with no flaws" But the older you get, the more you realize: still believing, wholeheartedly, in the good of humanity, despite being an adult, takes willpower and courage and brings flaws/disadvantages of its own. And that's what I love about Superman, because he grew up and found a way to still believe in goodness despite all the insight you gain as your life goes on.

There was a Superman game based on the 2006 film Superman Returns that, while not being very good, had some interesting ideas like for example Superman does NOT have a health bar, and instead a meter that tracks how much damage Metropolis takes. Too much of the city wrecked is Game Over. As well as encouraging the player to watch how powerful the abilities such as the eyes lazers are to avoid charring the city.

My first thought when they started talking about deriving stakes from saving people was "oh yeah! Superman isn't the ultimate soldier, he's the ultimate firefighter!" It's easy to see him as a soldier because of his combat prowess, and strength and laser vision, but as character he's much more a firefighter.

12:08 just realised. That's why Spiderman is so popular, he's the friendly neighbourhood Spiderman, he doesn't just hit bad guys, he stops bad guys because he can stop a guy with a gun better than someone else and he helps out around the community. One my fav strips from Spiderman comics is one where he sits up late at night helping a kid with his math homework

Another thing I love about Superman and Lois is that Clark is constantly zipping out to save people, like in the middle of a scene he'll hear an avalanche across the world and have to go deal with it, then come back and continue the conversation. Every episode we're reminded that this is what he does , and it's just a fact of life for Lois and his sons.

One thing I want to mention about the part of "superheroes saving people" segment of the video is the movie, The Batman where at the finale he chooses to dive into the water and personally lead everyone out of the flooding building. The entire movie he was almost ignoring the other people to go after Riddler and Falcone, and only at the end does he realize it's the people he needs to be saving so he makes the conscious decision to go after them and do that instead.

This reminds me of why The Incredibles manages to be so compelling in it’s first act. The fact that Bob wants to help out everyone he can, but is not allowed to legally. I love how even in a mundane setting of an insurance company he’s doing everything he can to help out and what ultimately what leads to him losing his job is how he wants to save a man being mugged. And there is also that great scene of Bob and Frozone trying to save innocents trapped in a burning building, but their powers are not tailored to fighting fire. It leads to an interesting scene, especially when contrasted to immediately prior, where they mock the monologuing super-villains.

Red and Blue make an excellent point here: ordinary citizens have kind of disappeared from a lot of Superhero media in favor of focusing on the heroes themselves. This is a major issue with the Marvel Cinematic Universe: named non-heroes are usually powerful because they are members of secret organizations moving chess pieces that heroes have to counter. Other more ordinary humans who aren’t part of some hidden Kaball don’t exist on screen for more than a minute. My favorite superhero movie moment from the last 20 (!) years was from the Tobey Maguire Spider-Man when Spidey uses his webs and his own body to stop a train from driving off a rail into the bay. And then he passes out. The people inside the train pull him into the carriage and crowd-surf him into the center of their little group, all these hands carrying him and laying him down. They all marvel at how this young kid saved them. And he did it by putting himself in harms way but also by using his quick thinking and his skills to maximum effect, not by overpowering the runaway train. There’s such pathos in that scene and these nameless ordinary citizens really raise the stakes when the train is about to go over. But then they provide a counterpoint to that act of heroism. They respond with ordinary tenderness and kindness. Superman stories can use this foil to great effect but when they don’t, they lose power. Heroes are only heroes when they have someone to save.

We’ve been shown “evil edgy Superman” stories so many times that at this point it would actually be counterculture to play a play Superman story again

6:03 Another Superman-alike I like is All Might from Hero Academia. His most famous accomplishment that's still brought up by fellow heroes was the time that he single handedly saved a thousand people because he was the quickest first responder on the scene when the disaster struck. This is still mentioned despite people knowing that he gets into punch ups with supervillains. His protege Deku regularly gets into punch ups with enemies which leave him crippled in the middle of the fight. His experienced hero teacher ,Eraserhead, notices this and is unimpressed by his reckless disregard of his own well-being and tells him that if an exploding punchout is his only hero strategy then he doesn't have what it takes become a pro hero, much less reach the savior All Might.

Also, the thing about Man of Steel being almost good: him wrecking Metropolis could have worked better had they done something similar to what you all mentioned Invincible did. Have Superman try desperately to move the fight out of the city, but Zod, sensing this weakness, continually drags the fight back into it and tries to cause as much damage as possible.

Kind of in the vein of the waitress and Captain America scenes getting cut in the first Avengers, there’s a similar scene in Endgame that got cut. It was supposed to introduce Smart Hulk by showing him rescuing a bunch of people from a high-rise building and then directing the fire crews to where they could more effectively fight the fire. Much cooler than how he was actually introduced imo

There was one thing in the Justice Lords that you should have mentioned. This wasn't a crazed evil Superman. He was still kind to Lois, in a henpecked husband sort of way. She was under house arrest, but they still had dinner while she told him how horrible he was. That and the Batman argument really set the tone that this wasn't just a crazed Injustice style mad God. This was our Superman, which made it all the more terrifying

The best Superman writing isn't where he's scared of being too strong, the best Superman writing has him be scared he's not strong enough.

One of my favorite comics is the one where joker sneaks into the daily planet and tries to kill clark kent with a hammer. It shows how clark thinks in superspeed about how deep in thought he was to not notice joker sneaking in, but much funnier is how the hammer is slowly creeping to his head and all he's thinking about is "what would getting hit in the head with a giant mallet even look like? It would definitely kill a regular guy right? Could I move at the last second to barely dodge it or would that be too suspicious?" I like to imagine he juggles around in his head at super speed the best possibilities to save people

The best sidekick for Superman, is Raven. We had a little taste of it in the second Justice League Dark movie, and I want more. Not only do I love the trope of big softy dad with moody daughter, but they also complement each other. They both in essence, represent hope and care. Superman in that he unabashedly cares, and Raven in that she’s struggled to be cared for. And goddamn it, I just want Raven to have a father figure and to feel safe.

The thing about Lois Lane is that a lot of the time she doesn't just stumble into trouble. Lois gets into dangerous situations by doing her job . She's investigating a criminal conspiracy, and interviewing a corrupt politician, or trapped in a fire while talking to a witness. Lois isn't a typical "damsel in distress", she's a strong female character without having to be manly or violent.

There's another moment from Superman and Lois that I love and think captures the character perfectly. In that same first scene that Blue mentioned when he saves that car, some kid just says, "Hey! Nice suit." And Superman just says, "Thanks! My mom made it." That's just perfect, boy scout, down-to-Earth Clark Kent. He's not telling kids to eat their vegetables. He's not trying to make a larger statement. He's just being the humble farm boy from Kansas who happens to also be Superman. 😊