I would almost rather watch Superman III

Rating: 3/10 (8 April 2016)

Good cast not given little to work with here, they're given *too much* to work with, in this overlong, overly busy, joyless, rather depressing update of Superman.
Henry Cavill is good here, but he is one of those actors who I enjoy in almost anything they're in (I even thought he fared well in that God awful Hellraiser flick he did early in his career) Amy Adams is cute and does well as Lois Lane, and has enough chemistry with Cavill, Michael Shannon is okay as General Zod (but Terence Stamp set the bar high with his performance in Superman II) but the screenplay bounces all over the place, with numerous flashbacks at odd times, and an overall feeling of doom and gloom throughout.
The climactic battles amount to little more than Superman and Zod and company throwing each backward into things endlessly. After a while, it really does look like a repetitive, numbingly violent video game, with no heart or soul.
Here, the colours of Superman's suit are so muted, faded, that it looks grey/ black, like they colours of the suit after Superman ended up in the vat of acid at the end of Superman III, which only adds to the depressing vibe I get from this film.
Christpher Reeve's Superman I and II were fun fantasies. They had a child-like sense of wonder and awe, spectacle, charm, class, all things which this film's quarter of a billion dollars budget cannot buy.