Why not just Superman

There've been hints they were trying to capitalize on Nolan Batman, maybe they thought dark, brooding Christ figure Superman would seem really clever and interesting.

Writers these days seem to think it's too simplistic for a protagonist to simply be a good and upright person, without some complex darkness or narcissism or other personality issues. As you mention, Superman in the comics has been like that for the last few decades.

After the success of the TDK trilogy, Snyder was going for a somewhat grounded/realistic and darker approach to Superman hence this film. If Superman actually existed, there are people that would worship him as a god, there is no doubt about that. That's what he was going for and Superman doesn't become Superman until the end. It was a different approach and it didn't work out for the most part.

They won't go back to that. The next Superman will be black from the hood who is a rapper instead of a reporter.

There are different ways to interpet stories. That story was already told. Zack Snyder was telling the story where Superman is the first alien visitor Earth learns about, and is wanted by surviving members of his planet. It's a sci-fi take, mostly. The Christ figure stuff is an homage to the origins of Superman, where he was like Moses, even down to the basket floating down the river with the infant (just like the spaceship taking him to Earth).

"Why does he have to be dark, or brooding, or a stalker, or mopey, or a self-important demi-God, or a Christ figure...?"

When does Superman go into brooding monologues about meaninglessness and despair? When does the film touch upon the necessary thematic touchstones that characterize a dark film, such as the unsightly and taboo aspects of human nature? At no point does it do this. The film is sombre sure. And it presents a Superman that's more lost than he's ever been portrayed. But "dark?' No. When people complain that Man of Steel is dark and brooding, I have to conclude they've confused it with a completely different film.

I'll give you the religious allegory to a degree, but keep in mind that Superman was conceived as a religious allegory when he was first created. They just shifted from Moses to Jesus.

"Superman is light and airy. He doesn't doubt himself and always knows what the right thing to do is - and does the right thing."

You just gave a perfect description of how not to write a movie. The first thing they teach you in screenwriting course, NEVER NEVER NEVER make your character perfect. It doesn't work. We want someone with flaws, and we want to see them learn from those flaws. Comic Superman worked for a medium based on children's power fantasies created in an idealistic era of mankind, but things change when you're moving to a different medium. The idea of a moral paragon is nothing more than a childish fantasy, and it'll be nothing else when expressed in a visual art form.

"He's aspirational."

Are you saying Superman is obssesed with material success?

"The Salkinds and Reeve understood this. So did the writers of the Reeves show in the 50s. So did the writer of every comic before 1986."

If you have to go as far back as 1986, than that just seems some people are afraid to move on with the times.

I understand the instinct that you wanna make it different, I just don't think you should make it different at the expense of what people like.