Friday Night Fights: Wright - Round 5: Special "David Goyer Is An Idiot" Edition!

Bear with me, folks, I have to start this week's round of Friday Night Fights: Wright with a rant.

How many of you here have read David S. Goyer's Digital Spy interview about the controversial Man Of Steel ending? For those of you who answered "yes", how many of you are still slamming your head against your desk?

You too, huh? How can you not be with gems like this:

Goyer, however, stated that the Man of Steel's moral code "exists outside of the narrative and I just don't believe in rules like that".


"We were pretty sure that was going to be controversial," Goyer said. "It's not like we were deluding ourselves, and we weren't just doing it to be cool. We felt, in the case of Zod, we wanted to put the character in an impossible situation and make an impossible choice.

Well, at least he didn't call it a "Kobayashi Maru".

Still, Goyer calling that an "impossible choice" gives the impression that he's never read a single Silver or Bronze Age Superman story in his entire life. Somewhere Cary Bates is reading Goyer's interview and making the jerking motion.

"This is one area, and I've written comic books as well and this is where I disagree with some of my fellow comic book writers - 'Superman doesn't kill'. It's a rule that exists outside of the narrative and I just don't believe in rules like that. I believe when you're writing film or television, you can't rely on a crutch or rule that exists outside of the narrative of the film."

"Outside the narrative of the film"? David, this movie introduced us to Clark Kent's parents, his school, and even his CHURCH. And judging by the art on the stainglass windows shown for that aforementioned church, it's the one with the list of 10 Commandments, one of which SPECIFICALLY STATES "THOU SHALT NOT KILL". I'd say that "no-killing" code is pretty damn self-explanatory.

"So the situation was, Zod says 'I'm not going to stop until you kill me or I kill you.' The reality is no prison on the planet could hold him and in our film Superman can't fly to the moon, and we didn't want to come up with that crutch."

Why can't he fly to the moon in your movie, anyway?

"Also our movie was in a way Superman Begins, he's not really Superman until the end of the film. We wanted him to have had that experience of having taken a life and carry that through onto the next films. Because he's Superman and because people idolise him he will have to hold himself to a higher standard."

So apparently Goyer and Snyder's ethos on killing comes from Family Guy.

And based on that, should police maybe dig up the backyard of the house where teen Dave Goyer lived?

OK, rant over. The reason it's relevant here? It's because writer Kurt Busiek and artists Mark Bagley and Art Thibert provide us, courtesy of Trinity#13, with a stunningly beautiful rebuttal to Goyer's logic that also happens to serve as tonight's fight entry. Synopsis: Superman has to singlehandedly face Owlman, Ultraman, and Superwoman, the latter two being as strong as he is. How will he do?

A lot of writers seem to be split on whether Superman should primarily be a thinker or a brawler. Here, Mr. Busiek effectively shows him doing both at once. But how did Superman get so skilled at that? Explain away, Kal (and Kurt):

But...but...but...Superman not killing is an outside-the-narrative crutch, y'all!


Oh, and did he also mention a "mound of skulls"? How prophetic, Mr. Busiek!

Now that is multitasking!


Tonight's lesson? Not killing your opponents actually makes you a smarter, better hero. And that's one to grow on!


Maybe WB should be consulting Busiek on the MoS sequel instead of Frank Miller. Just sayin'.


Tonight's fight has music to hurt your alternate self by, courtesy of the Greg Kihn Band.

For more nonlethal knuckle sandwiches, click here. And don't forget to vote!