To me he either loses geek cred (by believing the speech) or writer cred (by thinking it was credible enough to have narrative impact on its target).

Eh. Didn't like the movie anyway.

I had issues with that speech.

I understand that and I totally agree that it had no place in that movie, nearly ruining a perfectly good scene. But it resonated in that I always thought of the glasses as the disguise.

And while I'm on the subject of Morrison's JLA, I came across this great bit again--probably the best insight into Superman and Batman's motivations:

Superman is trapped inside the "Primoridial Destroyer," and succumbing to overwhelming despair as Batman tries to shout him out of it via the Martian Manhunter's telepathy.

Superman: "All we've ever done is try to save Krypton and Mars, save our parents and loved ones over and over again, but we never will ... we never did."

That's completely what I believe is rattling around in their subconsciousnesses,

Haven't seen Kill Bill 2 yet (missed it in the theatres and I'm too lazy to get a video rental card) but I'm with victor and Frank on this one. That's not QT's POV, that's a villain's POV.

The key one being that it's wronger than wrong?

Oh, wow, I don't agree with that at all.

I haven't actually seen KB I or II. I always *meant* to.

I felt that the only reason the speech was in the movie was for QT to raise his geek flag.

What's so wrong about it? I don't think I agree with the fact that Clark is Superman's critique of the human race, but I can definitely see Clark being the disguise, rather than vice-versa.

Particularly since, in order to be Clark, he has to put on the zero-prescription glasses. The stuff about Clark being Superman's critique, blah, that's just taking stuff too seriously. But the idea that he is Superman more than Clark, I can go with that.

Mainly because he was Clark before he was superman. What, fourteen? fifteen? years of his life was spent as Clark Kent. That's formative, that's identity building. At the end of the day, when he wants comfort or to keep Lois safe or whatever, he goes back to the farm and Smallville. It's where he stashes Kon. He chose to become Superman, to use his powers for good and saving the world, yadda yadda, but I don't think he would ever lose himself in the ideology of Superman. It would destroy him on both ends if he did. He's Clark Kent, the guy who hides superman--not Superman, the hero that hides Clark Kent.

Either way I guess it's a matter of perspective. I think Clark became more of the disguise when he started developing his powers and had to maintain his identity behind his 'glasses'.