'Man Of Steel' Writer David S. Goyer Defends Superman Killing Zod

David S. Goyer, prolific writer of superhero movies such as the Blade movies (including the third one), the Dark Knight movies (including the third one) and David Hasselhoff's Nick Fury: Agent of SHIELD TV movie, spoke about the controversy surrounding his most recent work, Man of Steel, at the BAFTA/BFI Screenwriter's Lecture last night. Spoilers for the movie ahead, if you were lucky enough to dodge that bullet.

Goyer's Man of Steel, directed by Zack Snyder, stirred up indignation in many corners of fandom earlier this year (including this corner) thanks to an ending in which Superman took the life of the villain General Zod (and also thanks to the movie's wholesale rejection of the idea that Superman is a paragon of heroic virtue, of course).

Speaking at the lecture, Goyer acknowledged that he expected the scene to be controversial."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."

"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.

"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."

"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."

Goyer's next superhero movie is Batman vs. Superman (title pending), due for release summer 2015. It remains to be seen just what will be "inside the narrative" of the upcoming team-up and/or deathmatch starring Ben Affleck and Henry Cavill.

[Source: Digital Spy]