I never read the comics, so this is all just how I feel about the movie as a standalone property, with the idea that they expect us to come in with at least some cultural knowledge of who Superman is.

I was really disappointed by the female characters overall. I’m not expecting a Superman movie to center or even really care about female empowerment, but this was bad.

Lois Lane is introduced while professionally berating Clark Kent’s work at work. I am prone to some sarcastic banter, but it seemed like a real jab and not actually funny. I don’t know that I was buying it as playful, and it seemed like they were setting it up to not be playful and like she actually took issue with his work. I understand wanting to keep the relationship a secret, but why is she with him if she thinks he’s actually bad at his job and at being Superman? Then the apartment scene where Clark is making his favorite food for their anniversary. I’m not sure if this is a joke about how men always get it wrong or not, but it made Lois out to seem ungrateful, not that I think she was, it just seemed like that’s how the scene was framed. I think Clark would’ve remembered her favorite, but that’s neither here nor there. Then she again berates his journalism and attacks his journalistic integrity after which she proceeded to essentially combatively interview her boyfriend which I don’t think is peak journalism standards either. Though I understand where she’s coming from with the “you made a decision unilaterally”, there’s no real acknowledgment from her of the fact he was doing good. If my partner tried to singlehandedly stop a war and save innocent lives I would start from a very different place. It makes it seem like she doesn’t support this decision at all even though by the end of the movie it’s shown to be the morally correct decision that other superheroes take up. Then he removes himself from a hostile situation and she does the (imho often male) fallback of acting like she was somehow the slighted party and falls into the “I knew this wouldn’t work” female trope which I hate. Sure, I could see this as the actions of a real person, and they’re allowed a lovers spat, but this makes them seem like just a bad couple. I’m not rooting for them or for her at this point. She then spends the movie relying on a male superhero to do the smart stuff, a male reporter to use his sources and a mostly male supporting cast. She then gets weirdly elitist about punk music, which if you followed the baby metal thing at all you already understand, but is upstaged by Superman’s real understanding of punk. She doesn’t even understand the music she was just lording superiority over him with. I’m sure it’s real punk to ask the president if you can stop innocent civilians from dying. Where was that punk spirit when Superman was actually being punk in the beginning? They randomly go to his childhood home even though it’s dark there and he gets healed by the sun. Maybe he asked to go there, but a weird choice though I understand it was maybe needed for his character development. Then of course at the end she says she loves him. No real character growth from her at all so I’m not sure what changed other than he was in danger so maybe trauma bonding.

Next up we have lex Luther’s girlfriend. What an all around weird character choice. I’ll leave out why they were even together in the first place, but she’s just a bad person. She was in a position of dating lex so obviously not great to start, and then she manipulates the male reporter in a weirdly non explicitly sexual harassment way. It was gross all around. She’s obviously not doing great emotionally and he is stringing her along and using her and she is withholding information about an evil war plan so some guy will hang out with her. Her name in his phone is of course about a physical imperfection which he hyper fixated on. I already saw that Seinfeld episode and it wasn’t funny then. Of course she uses her “vapid self absorbed” selfies from the forced audience perspective as a cover to get information, but it’s not because she’s secretly good, she’s just a conniving woman who turned as soon as she was slighted. Not a trope I like either.

Then there was “confident Latina”. She got to be evil this time. What a win for representation.

Then there was low cut top girl. Her whole job in the movie was to be in a revealing top. Thank god we had that jumping scene at the end. Really helped develop her character.

I have other thoughts about the movie, and I didn’t think it was terrible, but certainly not a cinematic masterpiece. I just wanted to chat about the female representation here because I feel like I’m not seeing a lot of people talk about it without hating on the movie for political reasons. For what it’s worth, apparently Lois lane is pretty close to the comic book version.