https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eWT JIBGNId0 Why do so many

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For me it's because I misread the commentary and characterization that went along with that speech.

It's not really representative of Superman at all. But it is how Bill sees people entirely in terms of their relationship with power.

His interpretation of Superman is reductive and dismissive of Clark Kent and any humanity that's inherent in Superman. He sees this as only a mask and that's the same mistake he makes with Beatrix.

There is a mask at work but he doesn't realize that the vulnerability and humanity are real and not just a put-on. And his inability to understand such a thing is part of his downfall.

But he says it with such convincing authority that it also represents his own true greatest power. Which is why he's called the Snake Charmer.

Anyway, post Supermans

>>89577045
It also kind of fundamentally misses the point that Clark Kent is Superman's opposite for utilitarian reasons. Kent's a coward because he needs to run off before Superman shows up. Kent's weak and unsure of himself because he wants to remain as far removed from Superman's power and confidence as possible.

Bill's whole monologue is basically an unsupported, unprovable theory.

>>89577538
When Bill is talking about Clark Kent he's not talking about how Superman acts around his family or loved ones, he's talking about how Superman acts when he's pretending to be Clark Kent in public. Cowardly Clark Kent is about as far from the real Superman as Playboy Bruce Wayne is from the real Bruce Wayne. It's a mask he uses to fool people, but why did he choose that particular mask?

Probably because most modern Superman fans are more familiar with the post-crisis Superman who is Clark Kent from Kansas first, and Kal-El of Krypton second.

>>89577841
Superman can hear a butterfly's heartbeat on the other side of the planet, There are no utilitarian reasons for him to pretend to be a cowardly human.

>>89577045

Honest question, in these Byrne stories the villains were escaped phantom zone prisoners right? Why didn't Supes just drop them right back in the zone?

I still disagree with his killing these guys, even if the zone wasn't an option... find some isolated uninhabited planet and drop each of 'em off on one. put them in an earth prison if they were powerless? (i'm assuming gold-k?) there were options, and i think Byrne was feeling the 90s.

>>89577538
>>89577841
>>89577933

You guys do know that the whole "Clark Kent is who Superman is" was a relatively modern interpretation, right?

Before 86' Superman was Superman first and foremost. Clark Kent was just a mask. Even Lana Lang, who grew up with Clark in Smallville, was in love with Superman, because that's who he was.

>>89577045
well its objectively wrong, innit? for decades we could see Superman's thoughts, and he never thought like that

>>89577993
He's Clark Kent because he doesn't want to be Superman all the time, right? He wants to have normal interactions with normal people as a normal person. The less like Superman Clark Kent is, the easier it withstands scrutiny. The less like yourself you look when wearing a disguise, the better that disguise is.

>>89578116
>>89577933

Clark Kent is who Superman is was relatively modern interpretation, but it's been around for nearly half his history now. We start seeing a shift in a Bronze Age with there being a Smallville!Clark who isn't Superman or Metropolis!Clark and is closer to who he is when he's around people who are in on his secret. Even Superman: The Movie puts forth the Smallville!Clark idea. Bryne, L&C, the DCAU, etc just further expand on that idea.

And even so, the way Bill talks about Superman still misses out on the fact that Superman's humanity is as real as his power. It's not something he fakes. He may be Superman, but he is still a man first and foremost.

The cowardly Clark Kent is a disguise but being human is not. That's where Bill fails. He thinks of Beatrix as being one thing or the other and that at least one of them is an act as opposed to her being both and the act being that either is actually completely separate from the other.

Is the real Moses Egyptian or Hebrew?

>>89577538
That's the fucking point. That's how people like Bill see Superman, it's not what Superman really is.

>>89579057
Not really. The modern interpretation is 31 years old, while the classic one is 50 years old.

>>89578116
>Expecting post crisis fags to know about the real Superman.

>>89579057
What Bills misses out is that Superman wants to be one of us because he loves us, not because he wants to make a critique of the human race. That's the point Bill is missing because he's a power hungry egomaniac and can only think on those terms.

Think about this: Bill is a professional killer. The movie is about one of his assassins that wanted to be out of the game and have a normal life. Near the end of the movie, he does this monologue where he says that, because Superman is better than humanity, he wouldn't have a reason to be Clark kent. The only explanation a guy like him can come up with is that Superman is mocking up humanity acting like a wealking, because that's how he sees us. That scene is supposed to show us that Bill can't understand why an extraordinary guy like Superman would want to have a normal life by choice. It says more about Bill than Superman. It's exactly a Lex Luthor mindset.

>>89578043
It was the 80s, and 80s was about reinventing superheroes as dark and gritty.

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>>89577538
this

>>89577045
Because it perpetuates a complete misunderstanding of Superman.

Even if people like >>89577538 who say Bill was supposed to be portrayed as being wrong are correct, nothing in the text of the movie makes it clear that he is wrong.

Also it was in a Tarantino movie, which are all terrible.

>>89579683
He's not at fault if people is stupid. What >>89579533 is right. Is a statement about what an egomaniac Bill is. Not really about Superman.

If Lex Luthor said the same thing in a Superman comic would you say the same about it?

>>89579614

Comic writers can't into science.

>>89579522
>implying there's a "real" Superman

Not a chance with a character that's been running this long.

>>89577045
Because Bill was quoting a book written in the '70s, and which was based on the Pre-Crisis incarnation of Superman. It does not apply to the modern, post-Crisis Superman that most of us here grew up with.

>>89577045
Because people take is as a totally cool factual speech instead of a view into Bill's problems.

>>89583718
It didn't apply to pre-Crisis Superman either. Clark Kent was meant to be bumbling because it made him look less like Superman, but it was in no way a mockery of humanity as Bill wanted to see it. Superman is fundamentally a super man, not an alien (which post-crisis actually often emphasizes the alien aspect quite harder to make him troubled), he still wanted to hold down a job and have friends and coworkers and a love life. Bill's speech is about Bill and about Beatrix, it's not really about Superman at all.