Kevin Costner hit the junket circuit this past week to promote his self-financed western epic Horizon and revealed his thoughts on Jonathan’s Kent’s death in Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel.
For a refresh, in one of the movie’s pivotal moments, a teenaged Clark Kent (Henry Cavill) lets his adoptive Earth father Jonathan Kent (Kevin Costner) die in a tornado to keep Clark’s unrevealed superpowers a family secret, acting on Jonathan’s wishes. It was argued by many online that as a powerful Kryptonian, Clark could have easily saved him.
Costner humorously reflected on his role as a ‘normal” character in a superhero movie.
“It’s just my luck to be in a superhero movie and be the only person that’s normal,” Costner said in an interview with Reelblend. “I was like, ‘Really? I can’t fly? And I can’t put my first through the wall? Maybe I should have read this thing closer. I’m a farmer?’ So I looked at that and I said, ‘Ok, I can be that.’”
Costner explained the motivation behind Jonathan’s fateful decision.
“I thought it was rooted in doubt,” Costner added. “But there was no doubt that he puts his hand up and says, ‘Stay there’ to his son.”
Earlier this year, director Zack Snyder addressed decision and defended the divisive scene, explaining the underlying rationale behind Clark’s decision.
“The conversation is exactly what he says to Lois…I let my father die to protect the idea that my father was trying to protect,” Snyder said. “The idea that I wasn’t ready to be outed to the world because I wasn’t Superman. I’m just a teenager that could’ve made a mess of it. I have the power to do it, but have I ever used my powers in this way?”
“I trusted that his vision for what I could be was bigger than him,” Snyder added. “This little incident in Kansas was not the thing that was going to expose me to the world.”
