2. If You Pick A Theme, Stick With It
For my own personal taste perhaps, there were far too many "themes" trying to develop themselves in
Man Of Steel that it became unclear as to what the theme of the movie was
actually supposed to be. None of them were given the time or respect that they ultimately deserved, and much of the plot involved Superman being told by other characters what Superman was supposed to be. That kind of passiveness just doesn't make for an interesting hero, and the character ultimately suffered because he seemed conflicted for all the
wrong reasons. There's even a scene in the movie where Clark Kent goes to a church and talks briefly to a priest - he's framed behind a stained glass window, and the message (or comparison, if you will) is clearly "this guy is like the Messiah." Later on, though, Kent chooses to kill Zod by snapping his neck in a moment that feels totally at odds with that. For me, the religious theme doesn't gel at all with the Superman character that we got, and it serves only to make the screenplay feel at odds with itself, as if it doesn't quite know where to go or what to say. When you're writing your own screenplay, themes should naturally develop for themselves - in the second draft, you might go back and try to develop those themes so that they stand out and can make more of an impact. But don't do what Goyer seems to have done here, which is to scatter "thematic" sequences throughout the movie that jar horribly with one another. You can tell that the move didn't pay off because, coming out of the movie, it's still unclear as to who or what Superman is supposed to be, or for which ideals he stands for. It's an origin story lacking an origin story.