Man of Steel: Just How Important is Lois Lane?

One of the major criticisms that has emerged from fan forums and reviews of Zack Snyder's Man of Steel is a notion that Lois Lane isn't treated well enough. Certainly, we can relate to that concern; we named Amy Adams and Lois Lane as separate items on our 25 Reasons We're Excited About Man of Steel. But ultimately, how important is Lois Lane? Certainly she's more than "just" the love interest, but what should we have expected from this character going in? First of all, it's worth noting that Superman is one of only two A-list superhero characters who have spent a number of years married--and in the main continuity, too! Batman and Catwoman were married for years on Earth-2, but those weren't "the" Batman and Catwoman. The other is Spider-Man and, due to the cyclical nature of comics and the fact that whatever change isn't illusory is temporary, neither of the two are married now. Those relationships have an impact, though, and they have cultural cache. Most casual fans can tell you the name of Spider-Man's true love, and you'd be hard-pressed to find anyone who can't identify Lois Lane. But move past those characters and--well, it's a steep drop-off. One supposes that right now, with the success of the Iron Man franchise, Pepper Potts would come in around #3, but it's really not even remotely close.

Mary Jane, too, has something that Lois, in my opinion, does not; she is, in many ways, Peter's tether to the "real world" outside of being a superhero. Like Linda Park was with Wally West, ultimately Peter's compass always points toward Mary Jane, and so he can't go too far off-course. One could argue that Lois is Superman's soulmate, but she isn't his conscience or his soul. That goes to Jonathan and Martha Kent. What she is, then (and this has been explored in writings not just about Man of Steel, but going back for years...and was explicity spelled out by J.M. DeMatteis in Superman: Where is Thy Sting?), is Superman's hero. Clark Kent aspires to BE Lois Lane--to be confident, smart, strong and human--as much as regular people aspire to be Superman. And that's essential, especially in the world of Man of Steel or the New 52 when Superman has lost one or both parents.

But how was she actually treated in Man of Steel? Better than I expected going in, that's for sure. After having heard a number of times that Lois got the short shrift in the film, I was pleasantly surprised by how smart and capable she was, and what a complete arc she had. The romance may have seemed a bit forced to some, but he was her salvation a number of times and she was the first person smart enough to really figure him out. During the heightened energy of the battle with Zod, it's not surprising that two people like that would reach out to each other; how the relationship is handled in the future is, of course, a whole other thing. I could have done, honestly, without that third act thing where she couldn't figure out how to make the Command Key work. Like the ticking bomb in the third act of The Dark Knight Rises, it felt like it was there just to artificially inflate stakes that were already high--and the fact that Emil Hamilton managed to fix it so quickly and easily (even if it's realistic--after all, he's a scientist who's been examining this tech as long as it's been known to exist and she was an English major) took a little wind out of Lois's "I can do everything" sails. Of course, there's another thing to consider: while some elements of the audience felt she was miscast, I loved Amy Adams's portrayal--and so did DC, from the sound of it. DC Comics co-publisher Dan DiDio said "I thought this was the best interpretation of Lois Lane in any film or series," and Dan Jurgens--no stranger to the character of Lois Lane, having written Superman for a decade and having penned the wedding issue in question--loved the way she was handled in the film. "More than anything, I loved what they did with Lois," Jurgens told us. "We'd always ask, 'If she's so smart and such a good reporter, wouldn't she know Clark and Superman were the same?' They got around all of that by having her work through that right from the start, which elevates her as a reporter." How important is Lois Lane? Almost immeasurably. But how much weight do the complaints against the film hold? As it pertains to Lois, not a lot.