Man Of Steel: Remastered

I LOVE this edit!!! I hated this movie originally but I've started to come around to it thanks to Agent 9. The color correction is the first thing you'll notice, there is actually color now! The movie is paced better, avoids questionable Superman behavior (Wrecking that big rig) and Pa Kent's suicide via tornado. This is the fanedit that got me into fanedits. I can't find any faults in this.

Impressive work all around. The color grading and rescoring were very successful to me in lightening the tone of the film and bringing back some old feels. It was overall very well executed. I'll start with visuals and visual editing. The color work was very impressive. I think the interior when he is surrendering is a touch blue but that's a minor niggle. All the exterior shots looks significantly better and the suit looked wonderful. I like the cuts, I don't feel like we lost anything. The flashback use was great and sets up the end well. I thought the placement of the flashback when he is surrounded against the fence could have been elsewhere, though. Where it was it sort of slowed the momentum going on and we went from flashback to pseudodream. If it had been placed before he surrenders I think it would have had a nice thematic echo with him eating his pride for the good of humans. The colors were really good. All of the cuts to the finale made the focus go to the characters with Zod disregarding human life. Definitely much better than thinking about random people probably dying during a climax. The opening credits were awesome, I really think they captured the tone of the edit. For the audio, this was the centerpiece of the edit to me. For a minute, I felt a little disconnect with the very modern look of the film and the music but it quickly hooked me. I really enjoyed it throughout and the music was edited to the screen action superbly. Some musical highlights: The music swells on "beyond your reach!", when Zod is taking off for Phantom Zone, when Zod first comes to Earth and Clark is looking up at the sky, when Lois gives the 'I told you so' look while Perry gives the 'you were right' look when Zod speaks to the world, the way it matched up with the tanks loading before Superman surrenders (great time for flashback IMO), the soaring music as Clark takes Lois's hand, "I don't care what you tell him" from the Colonel, over the sweeping shot as Zod turns to first speak to Superman, Superman rejecting Zod's plan, the timing of the main theme with his takeoff to return to Earth, when Superman attacks Zod from the side, the way the music comes down as she says "you're weak, son of El," great drums when Superman stares down military troops, then the quick hit of the theme when the Colonel says they're not enemies, the somber come down after the neck break. It only really didn't work for me when it sounded too upbeat in the immediate run-up to the neck break and the main theme was maybe used once or twice too often.

I thoroughly enjoyed this, great work!

OK, this is a long one...

As I've said in another review, Man of Steel is not a good movie. By this I mean, it's a great example of poor filmmaking. It suffers from poor directing, poor editing, poor blocking, occasional cartoony effects, odd costume and set design choices (e.g., the giant black condoms that send the baddies to the Phantom Zone; the Nike sneakers swish in the middle of the "S" symbol) and a meandering plot (for which I blame the editing -- the script may've been far more clear). (OK, fanboys, relax, that doesn't mean you can't enjoy the original, but that doesn't in any way change the facts of the problem tech aspects of the original.)

So, let's talk about the edit:
The editor's cut a great deal of fat from the start of the movie, where we meet Jor-El and the world of Krypton. The editor gives the opening far better pacing than the original MoS. He removed the most, er condomy, shots from the capture-of-the-bad-guys scene and deleted Jor-El's silly action-hero moments. However, the big error here is that everything from the death of Jor-El to the explosion of Krypton can be cut -- that's about 10 more minutes fat. Everything in that 10 mins -- about how Zod and his minions survived -- is explained by Zod himself later in the film. As such, it's repetitive and makes the opening, treated as a teaser, a bit weaker than it could've been.

Back to the original MoS: Filmmaking 101: Flashbacks should directly reflect what is happening on screen in the NOW. In MoS, none of the flashbacks connect to present day, and while I've not seen the MoS script, I would bet this problem came out of editing. The Fan Editor has resolved this issue with great skill and aplomb by peppering flashbacks throughout the film and *always* making certain they clearly connect to what's happening "today."

In the original MoS, numerous scenes simply made no sense, this includes the death of Jon Kent (which, again, likely made sense on paper, but due to Snyder's blocking, makes it clear that Clark could've saved dad and the dog before those final moments when Clark would've revealed himself to a town that ended up knowing about his powers anyway). Here, the death of Pa Kent, it is implied, just happened w/the passage of time. A brilliant solution.

That natural death of Pa Kent actually makes more sense since his choosing to die by tornado added nothing to the growth of Clark or to the plot in the original.

However, cutting has its downside. In the original, Lois is attacked when she boards a Kryptonian ship stuck deep in some ice. This same defense mechanism is seen later by the terraforming machine fighting Superman. With the former defense scene cut, the latter one comes out of nowhere during the climax.

Similarly, the original movie has several scenes highlighting Clark's lack of a moral compass, all of those scenes -- save for Pa Kent's advice to "maybe" let some kids die in order for young Clark to keep his secret -- set up Clark's decision to kill Zod. With all of those scenes gone, it no longer makes sense to have Superman kill Zod. This was a sore point for classic Superman fans (of which I am one), yet I felt the original MoS set this up clearly (albeit clumsily). This edit does not set it up at all, and Clark's regret for having committed murder just doesn't sell it.

Fact is, the editor changed the coloring, making it less somber, changed the score, making it more upbeat and exhilarating, and changed the film's entire tone. To then keep the grisly murder of Zod just didn't make sense.

On this same point, while the fan editor removed a great deal of the wanton destruction (e.g., it's one thing for Zod to throw Superman into a building, but when the hero is doing it, it's clearly just a gratuitous choice by the filmmakers), he could -- and should -- have removed far more of it to fit the new tone and style he created in the first hour.

The editor's removal of the destruction of Metropolis thus mitigated the movie's ultra-violent tone. As such, much of the climax no longer works -- yet he kept it in tact. I would recommend the fan editor do 1 of 2 things here: 1. Either end the film with the evil Kryptonians being sent back to the Phantom Zone, thus implying that Zod went with them. Or 2. Re-edit it so that the fight with Zod occurs WHILE the payload that opens the PZ is being distributed. That way, with some clever editing -- and perhaps 1 or 2 new effects -- one of Superman's punches can depict Zod being punched into the PZ entrance when said payload does its job.

Re: the Score: Zimmer's score was virtually the only good thing about MoS, although his score most assuredly lacked a crescendo -- an absolute necessity in a superhero film (Elfman's Spider-Man theme had the same issue). The new opening credits sequence, with the John Williams score, is quite wonderful, and the big Superman scenes throughout the film pack a much bigger punch with Williams' score. The problem in using the old Superman score is that on Krypton and throughout the film, we get the same cues over and over again. The editor did his best to switch it up, but there just wasn't enough to draw from. It does get frustrating, but one cannot deny that it most definitely gives the film a more exciting tone and feel (along with the color correcting and improved pacing). I'd suggest he dig through the John Williams library and see if he can find some cues from his other film scores which have a similar tone and style to his Superman work (much like the villain marches is S:TM and Star Wars are similar, I'm sure there are other lesser-known Williams scores that also bear a resemblance to his Superman style). It would be much better than re-using a cue for the 5th or 6th time.

Overall, this was a very well-done edit. It absolutely improved upon the original, clearing up story, plot, and character problems. The new look works nicely, and it now looks like a film made by pros, rather than a big-budget film made by film students. The editing is definitely leaps and bounds above the jerky original.

I hope to see a version 2.0 of this cut to fix the problems mentioned above. But I highly recommend checking this out if you did not enjoy the original.

Unfortunately, I really didn't enjoy this edit. I quite enjoyed the original version but admit I saw it a year or so ago so I will try and be as fair as I can with this review.

Negatives first,

The soundtrack was a mismatch. It just didn't fit in my opinion. It was nice to hear the classic theme songs and that but it just didn't keep with the pacing of the action and the emotion of the scenes throughout the movie.

The intro credits were too long and incredibly dated. Its understandable to want to reclaim that nostalgia and authenticity of the older films but again, it just didn't suit. I had realised I was messing around on my phone during the opening credits and that's not what you want really when trying to hold a viewers attention.

The first act felt rushed and incomplete. I felt like Clark becoming superman was literally thrown in our face too fast without any character development at all. Because of this rush, it removed a lot of other characters impacts during the film too. Clark learning to control his powers and even his adopted father dying were cut which heavily impacted my emotions when first viewing the film.

The positives,

I thought the colour correction was good. From a technical point of view I was very impressed. Although it never truly bothered me personally but I heard this was an issue for many.

The visual quality was very good. Both in editing and resolution.

End thoughts,

I have only recently got into watching fan edits, and maybe naive in saying this but I believe it will probably be better to only watch fan edits that you actually had strong issues with before hand. As I remember enjoying the original, I suppose this version felt inferior to me. I would advise anyone to watch for themselves. An opinion is only an opinion :)

Thanks to the editor anyway

Well, an AMAZING achievement with some stand-out points - but ends up a little flat and dare I say a bit... boring.
This is mainly to do with Williams' score. Apart from the iconic theme, the rest of the music is rather bland. It doesn't match the frenetic action on screen - this is the problem of taking a 30-year-old action theme and matching to today's action. It's just way too slow.
It also felt like a lot of music was just on repeat throughout a scene, particularly the action sequences.
Also, because replacing the score necessitated rebuilding the soundscape, in many places the soundscape is just a tad too empty.
The edit ended up being very action lite as a result of the shuffling of the scenes. Now I kinda liked it (and it was very reminiscent of Superman 1), but it made me understand why they didn't go this route in MOS.

Regards editing: I thought the church scene (or something else showing his internal conflict) was necessary before he just appears in front of the tanks. The jump from Lois arrested to "Where is Lois" is way too abrupt. The church scene isn't brilliant, but it's not as bad as everyone makes it out to be either.

Now the positive:
The editing is first class here! Edits are technically brilliant. Flawless. Story-wise they work too.
The cut-down Krypton opening is brilliant.
New credits are great, if a little long. (By the way, Kevin Spacey was listed in your credits, but wasn't in the film)
The colour grading is flawless.
The THEME - oh hearing the Superman theme was PERFECT!
Audio-work is AMAZING. What a huge undertaking!

Summary:
Because of the 70's action muzak and 70's style framing (Act 1 seems to drag on forever) I found myself a bit bored on occasion .
The rescoring, in total, detracted more than it added. I feel annoyed at not scoring it 100% because of the huge undertaking - I think it deserves 18/10 for audio editing because of it. But it wasn't perfect and led to some scenes feeling a bit empty, which was weird.
Perhaps a hybrid of Superman theme with Zimmer's score?
Be that as it may, I recommend this edit to everyone: for some it replace their copy of MOS, for others, like me, it is simply a master-class in fanediting. Applause A9.