first image of Henry Cavill in "Man of Steel"

The first image of Henry Cavill as Superman in Man of Steel (2013) was released today. First, the image, then my thoughts on it.

Let's start with Henry Cavill himself.

His hair distresses me a bit, as there is no trademark spit-curl. I realize, however, that not all incarnations of Superman have had the famous 1950's holdover (Dean Cain's Superman from TV's Lois and Clark, for example), but I prefer my Superman with the curl.

Physically, he looks big enough for the part, with muscles that seem to be the right size for the character. He fills out the costume impressively. I've always been of the mind that Superman should be very large compared to other superheroes (Sorry Dean Cain, you just weren't big enough), and at least in this photo, Henry Cavill looks like he's done the work.

They've obviously decided to go with a "fresh face" this time, picking an actor that doesn't remind us at all of Christopher Reeve's face, which some will say is a good and bad thing. (On a side note, to those that say there is no other Superman besides Christopher Reeve, I say, yes, he was the greatest incarnation of the character that we have ever seen and probably will ever see on the big or small screen. But if we ever want to see another Superman movie made, we're gonna have to accept someone else in the role of the Man of Tomorrow. That said, now we can move on.)

Let's talk about the costume now.

Very muted colors, even more so than in Bryan Singer's Superman Returns (2006). I'm not the biggest fan of that, honestly. I know that the public currently prefers their superheroes to be brooding and dark and edgy, but that isn't Superman. I don't mind the bright red, yellow, and blue outfit seen in the comic books. It represents his optimism for humanity. But that doesn't mean that the Superman movies have to be all saving kittens from trees; they can deal with tough and serious subject matter and feature a lot of action while still maintaining a more-than-average dose of hope. So I say, bring on the bright colors!

The S-shield has been changed more dramatically than any other incarnation in the past, with a much more pointed tip of the "S" at the top. It's alright, though. If you look at some of the early S-shields on Superman throughout the 1930's, there was a lot of variation. And it still looks very much like Superman's symbol, so I'll take it.

From what I can see, the red underwear-on-the-outside is gone, matching the recent change in Superman's look in the comic books. I never had a problem with the red underwear, perhaps because I grew up with it and it just seemed like part of the character.

His costume has a textured look to it, much like Brandon Routh's in Superman Returns, which was to be expected. The public doesn't look too fondly on straight Spandex costumes currently. I'm just glad they didn't put him in armor, which had been a concern of mine.

Stylistically, his boots look very much like they do in the comics and his cape is quite long compared to Christopher Reeve's and Brandon Routh's, which typically went down only to their mid-calf.

His pose is suggestive of more intense action than we saw in Superman Returns, which is probably what they're going for. The image seems very posed, yet Henry Cavill's face is slightly blurred, suggesting that it is either an actually screenshot from the film, or a very poorly shot promo photo.

The overall look is dark and intense, but that could just be this one image and may not be indicative of the entire film's tone. We'll see.

To sum it all up, I'm relieved that they didn't try to dramatically revamp the character's look. And as always, I'm gonna wait until I see the actor (and his costume) in action in the actual film before I make a final decision on the movie.

What are your thoughts?