MOSAIC has tackled a number of peripheral issues relating to the controversial tornado scene in Man of Steel. We’ve talked a little about the incorrect assumptions about available powers, unknown limits and vulnerabilities, distinguished this scene from the bus rescue, and more (with much more to come in the complete analysis), but I just wanted to touch on an aspect that layers throughout that analysis and goes to some of our gut instinctual biases rather than engaging our intellect, imagination, and empathy.
Essentially, it has to do with our intuition about age.
Part of the gut reaction to Jonathan Kent as the man of action while Clark stands by… comes from seeing a man in the prime of his life staying in place, while a man nearing his sixties is performing a rescue. To make things a little more concrete, Costner was born in 1955, Cavill in 1983. At the time of filming (August 2011 in Illinois) they’d be around the ages of 56 and 28 respectively. Hair and makeup did a great job, but there’s still that dissonance. We want the adult Clark to rebel, to take initiative, to demonstrate the capability that is so plainly visible in his strength and youth… meanwhile the older man, approaching his 60s, seems like the better candidate to run to presumed safety.
Within the timeline of the film, we know Jonathan is 46 and Clark is about 17 in this scene, on the cusp of becoming an adult. Both actors were dealing with a decade plus gap. Costner was 56 playing 46 and Cavill was 28 playing 17. Incidentally, Dylan Sprayberry was 13 when filming and is 17 today.
So why did they use Cavill instead of trying to age-up Sprayberry or use another actor?
I’m speculating, but I think the filmmakers felt that this was a critical moment of continuity for Cavill; showing his Clark experienced this moment which carried forwards, through, and until becoming Superman. With another actor, Cavill is denied a moment to work with Costner and the audience perhaps separates this seminal event with the contemporaneous Superman. Maybe. I know that for myself, I don’t quite think of Reeve as the one who witnessed his father’s heart-attack, but instead that was something left behind on the farm or in a cave by someone else.
Inserting a fourth (fifth, if you count Kal-El on Krypton) Clark into the mix may introduce additional risk of confusion or alienation. Continuing to use Sprayberry might mitigate the confusion but might fail to show how close Clark was to manhood (something highly significant that we’ll definitely analyze in depth in the future) and ready to set out on his own.
So trying to de-age Cavill was a calculated risk with sensible reasons. Even if it challenged audiences to consider how old these characters were supposed to be. That choice wasn’t entirely without precedent in the story of Superman: Tom Welling was 24 playing 14 and Jeff East was 21 playing 17. It tends to be something expected and requires some suspension of disbelief from the audience.
In retrospect, aging-up Sprayberry and suggesting that Clark developed a little slower than everyone else might have been better; However, we’ll never know.
Of course, age 46 and 17 may perhaps still not be intuitive; so to illustrate, let’s consider some actors who fit these demographics right now in June 2015. Jonathan Kent was a healthy active fifth-generation farmer. Consider these other men who, today, are about Jonathan Kent’s age in that scene:
Daniel Craig, Hugh Jackman, Gerard Butler, Will Smith, Eric Bana, Timothy Olyphant, Josh Brolin, Aaron Eckhard, and Terry Crews.
Would any of these men seem out of place as men of action? As having the authority to command their 17-year-old teenager? To be respected and listened to by that 17-year-old?
Although it’s a little harder to find 17 year olds who’ve distinguished themselves, consider the following teens who, today, are about Clark Kent’s age in that scene:
Dylan Sprayberry, Asa Butterfield, Chandler Riggs, Jaden Smith, Max Burkholder, Rico Rodriguez, and Tye Sheridan.
If you match up the men, age 46, with a teen around the age of 17, the dynamics of the tornado scene are more intuitive. Jonathan Kent’s protectiveness of his teenaged son is easier to grasp. Remember, that just prior, Clark expresses his frustration with being “safe”… meaning that for the past 4 years, nearly a quarter of his entire life and the time Jonathan has spent with his son… was with the powers suppressed, safe, and unseen. Jonathan had spent the last 1,500 consecutive days with just his son Clark and not his abilities.
Just as we, the audience, struggle to overcome our intuitions and assumptions based on what we see… for Jonathan, when he looks at Clark, he doesn’t see an alien filled with powers or abilities… he sees his teenaged son who still needs protection and guidance.
Of course, that imagery isn’t necessary for us to imagine or empathize with that attitude. It simply makes that empathy a little easier and more intuitive. Certainly we all have had, know, or been that parent who can only see their child- no matter how grown-up, independent, or powerful- as their little boy or girl to be protected. In that sense, no matter how mature Cavill’s Clark looked, Costner’s Jonathan would and could still see the same baby he cradled, boy he took fishing, teen he had long talks with, etc. I don’t think stretching our empathy (challenging it) rather than manipulating it (with a younger actor) is necessarily a bad thing.
It’s a little bit ridiculous to believe that Jonathan performed a careful dispassionate utilitarian calculation in the face of a sudden emergency. Instead, he went with his gut which reasonably sought to protect a son three decades his junior. Jonathan didn’t do some heartless calculation, but even if he did, he be missing gross amounts of data and figures critics routinely assume as immutable facts known to the characters. How would Jonathan know that Clark would be safe against one of the most incredible and destructive forces of nature? A tornado contains 6 times the energy density of a hurricane and even average or typical tornadoes pack the power of 300 gallons of jet fuel, much less a tornado ranked 4 or 5 on the Enhanced Fujita scale (throwing cars through the air).
For this level of threat, as far as Jonathan knew, Clark was as in just as much mortal jeopardy as he was. So the father did as you’d expect: prioritize his son’s life over his own. This is self-evident with respect to his own rescue, since Jonathan prefers Clark to live free from persecution, for a time, over his own life. Clark, meanwhile, has reason to trust and obey the man who has lived three times as long and done nothing but love him his entire life.
However, we’ll get into all that soon, for now, the takeaway: while the film does present us with a 28-year-old actor following the wishes of a 56-year-old actor… if we consider what the scene is to meant to convey, we might overcome some of the biases based on perceived ages instead of what the story tells us their ages are and expand the capacity and thoughtfulness of our empathy.
I enjoy How It Should Have Ended. Based on the prominence of Superman (and Batman) at the Super Café, I think their affection for Superman is obvious and I generally take their offerings in the spirit in which I think they were intended: superficial lighthearted jabs at plotting meant to raise an eyebrow and chuckle. HISHE isn’t a serious indictment of or malicious bitterness towards the films (they do take a few more pot-shots at Man of Steel in later clips, but nothing too vitriolic).
I think they tend to humorously raise the questions the general audience might, under the short window of their production schedule (this video was originally published a little over a month after the premiere), but often those questions can be answered by those more invested in the work than general audiences. For example, the issue of the eagles with The Lord of The Rings: The Return of The King.
They’re under time pressure to try to find a more seemingly rational course of action (and ending) while hoping that it’s received as funny. Their aim isn’t to test any film’s staunchest apologists. By the same token, the following isn’t meant to impinge on their intelligence, attack their efforts, or criticize their creation (never meant to do much more than make you chuckle) however it does address the questions raised by How It Should Have Ended.
The video basically raises these questions:
The biggest flaw in raising these questions is assuming too much about what characters know or don’t know. If we don’t make the same assumptions, let’s see how things could have ended!
Why does Lois fall from the C-17 while debris rises upwards around her? Is Lois heavier than a car? Did the filmmakers make a mistake? read more
With more images of Batman’s armor, the question has been raised as to how it might be able to contend with Superman and the idea that it grants Batman increased strength is a reasonable theory. The idea of armor or exo-skeletal strength enhancement is prevalent in real-world R&D and extensible from Kryptonian technology (but perhaps not in the way many assume).
There are many justifications on how Batman might, under contrived circumstances, stand a chance against Superman and increasing Batman’s strength is just part of it. However, this has re-raised the question as to whether Kryptonians in the Battle of Smallville had armor which granted them the abilities seen then. I don’t think so.
The topic has been raised before and it took me a while to crystallize my own thinking about what was actually happening, so my previous efforts tended to be more rebuttals of other theories than affirmative statement of what I think the final theory on powers actually is, but let me take one more crack at it. I’ll start with a quick rebuttal, a short statement of the rules, then a justification and support for what those rules are.
I respectfully request that you clear your mind of preconceptions and assumptions and try to operate under the theories to be set forth. read more
Six mini-myths in under 4 minutes!
Using fighting-game metrics we illustrate the gap in skill and experience between General Zod, Krypton’s military leader, and Superman, who threw a punch for the first time in his life earlier that same day. Detractors place completely unrealistic expectations on a total rookie fighting for his life.
Some have unfairly and harshly judged Superman by unrealistically expecting rescue efforts, attempts at diplomacy, complex strategies, and ploys to bait or lure Zod. The metrics show Superman is barely able to keep up with Zod, much less impossibly think and act well-beyond his body of experience or situation.
read more
Why assume the Kryptonians can terraform anything when the film shows us evidence to the contrary?
Many detractors will propose Mars as a candidate without thinking through what they’re assuming. They clearly intuit that Mars is a better candidate than Jupiter or Pluto because they understand that technology has limitations. It isn’t magic that simply does whatever you wish it to. If Mars is a better candidate than Jupiter or Pluto based on the limitations of technology, why assume that Mars is even a candidate within the limits of an unknown alien technology? To the contrary, the film shows terraforming technology to be quite limited: read more
Jor-El and Jax-Ur both explicitly link Kal-El’s strength to radiation. Jor-El uses the metaphor of drinking to describe the absorption and storage of solar radiation (first in speaking with Lara and then again to Kal-El). One isn’t hydrated only while drinking, but also while relying on one’s stores. However, a better metaphor- which accounts for the Kryptonian Atmospheric weakness- would be a device, like a laptop, with a removable rechargeable battery which can also be plugged-in.
The device can draw from either a charged battery or the plug. read more
In order to understand Kryptonian powers and weaknesses, we determine whether the powers demonstrated in the Battle of Smallville were the product of Kryptonian armor. Contrasting the strength demonstrated in Smallville against the strength of Kryptonians on the Black Zero or back on Krypton, it is evident that the armor does not give super strength.
If Kryptonian armor provided super strength, Jor-El and Zod might have decapitated each other with their strikes to the head, mere doors would not block the guards attempting to stop Lois, and Lois would not have been able to kick Car-Vex off to escape. The Kryptonians on the Black Zero aren’t powered at all. They are downed by Lois firing small-arms fire and Jax-Ur explicitly tells Kal-El his strength is neutralized aboard the ship. read more
