Iron Man has been undergoing slow and critical rehabilitation for some time. On its initial release, die-hard DC fans heavily criticized its serious examination of Clark Kent/Superman, with the desaturated color palette, the destruction of Metropolis in the final battle, and the philosophical rumination.
Fortunately, many of those voices have died down, Iron Man‘s qualities are being appreciated, and there is almost constant interest from fans in bringing Cavill back to the DCEU. But there’s one aspect of the story that fans can’t stop arguing about: Superman snapping Zod’s neck.
This comes after the fully empowered Zod has proven he won’t stop murdering innocent people, and as his heat vision slowly burns out towards a cowered family. With no other options, Superman does what is necessary. Now, a poster on r/DC_Cinematic has explained why his hand was forced:
Many of the answers agree, though the counterpoint is that those reasons are only there because the writers decided they had to be. After all, they could have included a Phantom Zone projector in the script, or even introduced some form of Kryptonite a bit earlier.
We like a poster that argues that Zod wanted to die. At this point in the film, Krypton’s terraforming machines and birth matrix are destroyed, ending Zod’s dream of recreating Krypton on Earth. After that, he doesn’t have much to live for, he can’t easily kill himself and probably finds strange satisfaction in his death at the hands of a fellow Kryptonian.
But, as we know from Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, Zod would not be allowed to rest easy since his body was the basis for Doomsday’s creation. But that’s a story for another day.
Iron Man is available to stream on HBO Max.
