Man of Steel: A Symbol of Hope

I am a huge Zack Snyder fanboy, and I love most of his films, Watchmen (Director's Cut) and BvS (Ultimate Edition) being my favorites. I liked Man of Steel, but I had a few criticisms: the atrocious color grade, Superman destroying a big rig because the owner was a jerk (and nobody heard it??), Pa Kent's laughable death sequence, and the overdone Smallville fight sequence that detracts from the final fight because by the time you get to it, you're exhausted. All of these things are fixed in this edit, and then some. I loved the Hanz Zimmer Superman theme being used more often, as I felt it was very underused in the original.

If I had to pick something I didn't like it would be the deletion of the "trying to find where I hang my cape" drone scene. I didn't mind that scene so much (with the exception of the cringy "he's really hot" line), but I understand why you cut it and I can't say I particularly missed it.

This version is fantastic. It will be replacing my current copy.

I really liked this fanedit, which is surprising given my feelings towards the theatrical release. I decided to give this version a chance only because I have grown to trust TM2YC's touch and skill.
First and foremost, the color grading is wonderful. MoS felt really grim and sour, partly because of the greenish tint. Here things feel a lot better.
Second, I think the narrative is excellent. The cutting choices make a lot of sense, help trim excruciatingly long scenes, and depict Superman as a more likable character, that actually cares about humanity.
So I recommend you give ASoH a chance, even if you didn't like MoS.

I'm a huge Superman fan, and have watched the vanilla MoS around 10 times. I enjoyed it for the most part, but there were some issues i had. I will say that TM2YC fixed all of those issues and then some. The color alone is worth the watch, but the pacing and music really was a true fix.

The only small issue i had was the removal of some of my favorite action shots, but oh well. Thanks for the hard work, it is by far my favorite of all the MoS edits.

Thank you!

Once again TM2YC has donde it, this edit is fantastic, while retaining its original story somehow he has taken the dark tone out of it giving this edit such a fantastic inspirational story. The color grading is spectacular, this is how the movie should have looked. The new placement of musical cues is greatly inspirational, we get a real sense of the Man of Steel soundtrack this way, it really works. Thanks for this edit, it is my favorite of all the MoS edits, fantastic work.

Firstly, I have to echo others' praise of the color grading TM2YC has done for this edit. It really helps the film to feel less dour, and helped me to notice some things I'd never noticed before (like Superman's black suit while falling into the pile of skulls at the end of the talk between him and Zod). Very well done. One unfortunate side effect is that it helps highlight some dodgy CGI that the muted theatrical grading helped to hide, but it's worth the tradeoff (and that doesn't happen often).

Now, onto the edit itself: it's great.

Don't expect the wheel to be reinvented as far as structure goes, mind you - it's very much the same film. But TM2YC's subtle touch manages to highlight what works well while mitigating some of the fundamental missteps. Superman is more of a hero, there's less frustratingly expository dialogue, and thank God the "he's kinda hot" bit was cut completely.

The fight sequences are something I thought were handled very well, and I suspect account for a large percentage of the time cut from the film. Every time I watch Man of Steel, I get bored about 1/3 of the way through every fight. In "A Symbol of Hope," I was engaged through all of them, even the Smallville fight and Superman vs. Zod. While there's still an excessive amount of death and destruction, it's mostly caused by the villains, with TM2YC doing his best to show Superman save as many people as he can (though he wasn't given much to work with on that front).

My favorite part about this, though, has got to be Pa Kent's death. Every single MoS edit should just swipe that scene wholesale from "A Symbol of Hope" - I mean, with TM2YC's permission, of course. But it's just so perfectly done that I can't imagine a better way to handle the scene. It doesn't feel edited in any way, and it plays up Clark's internal conflict exactly the way the original scene was intended to, but without shooting itself in the foot in the process like the theatrical cut.

The rest of the nips and tucks are well-chosen and very well executed. The expansion of the hero's theme works well except in the "kiss" scene - unlike others have mentioned, I quite liked it during the Krypton sequence, except for a slight technical issue I'll mention in the next paragraph. The rest of the music replacements - when I noticed them, and I'm certain I didn't notice them all - worked seamlessly. The "first flight" sequence is wonderful and exhilarating, as it should be, and again doesn't feel edited even though I know it definitely was. I also especially liked the "quiet" during Jor-El's "in time, they will join you in the sun" speech.

On a technical level, there was exactly one cut that bugged me in the moment, and I know it was an audio transition issue, but I can't for the life of me remember what/where it was, so it clearly didn't have much of an effect on my enjoyment of the edit. And like I said, it was only one cut - everything else was, as usual, perfect. As for the issue mentioned earlier during the Krypton sequence, it was during Jor-El's flight after stealing the Codex: when he notices his bird-lizard's wound, he speaks reassuringly to it - the music replacement/sound FX rebuilding here has mixed Jor-El's lines too low so they're nearly inaudible. I should note that I'm watching this through a 2.1 soundbar, so this may be less of an issue in a 5.1 setup with a discrete center channel.

I still wish the oil rig scene was gone, but other than that, it's extremely close to perfect. This is definitely replacing the official version in my DCEU canon.