I just found this thread, and I'd like to drop my two cents worth in here, since apparently I've set off yet another firestorm on the boards.
Could Superman kill? This is a touchy subject. Many people have differing views on this (just look above), but I’m going to base my response on the TV series and its episodes, and I plan to present my case by asking and answering a few questions (not unlike a court of inquiry).
Did Clark (as either of his public personalities) ever deliberately take a life?
No. Never happened.
Did Clark (as either himself or as Superman) ever threaten anyone’s life?
Yes.
When Luthor came to Clark to find Lois (who was then singing as Wanda Detroit), Clark told Luthor that if Luthor had hurt Lois, Clark would go through him if necessary to defend her. Luthor asked Clark if that was a threat. Clark didn’t deny it, and in fact sounded like he really meant it.
Here’s the dialogue from the DVD (Double Jeopardy, #16).
CK: I don’t know yet what you’ve done to her, but I will find out. And I WILL bring Lois back. If I have to right through you to do it, I will. I promise you.
LL: My, my, that sounds like a threat, Clark.
You would be correct in protesting that Clark didn’t actually kill Luthor. You might also protest that Clark was speaking in hyperbole, making a threatening statement when he had no intention of following through on it.
I don’t see it that way. Clark didn’t use hyperbole in anything else, whether speaking or writing as himself or as Superman. His character wasn’t given to empty threats or hollow speech. If he said something, you could take it to the bank. I believe that, given the proper circumstances, Superman (or Clark, if you prefer) would be capable of killing Lex Luthor to protect Lois.
This is, of course, my opinion, and that doesn’t mean you have to agree with me. You’re free to disagree with me about this fictional character.
Let’s ask one more question, shall we?
Did Clark (or Superman) ever take a life during the course of the show?
Yes, he did. On two occasions during Season Three.
In the episode “Ordinary People,” Superman redirected a flow of liquid nitrogen onto Spencer Spencer, Dr. Pescado, and Nurse Heidi. Admitedly, they were trying to kill him and probably would have killed Lois soon afterward, so one might conceivably claim self-defense, but his actions directly resulted in the deaths of those three people when the ice that held them shattered under gunfire which he allowed to ricochet off his invulnerable body. We can speculate that he believed that he might revive them after all the action was finished, much as he had recently revived Lois, but the circumstances were different. Being chilled by frigid air is not the same as being frozen by liquid nitrogen. They were not simply encased in ice, they were frozen into ice themselves. These folks were people-cicles (and were quite dead) long before the ice was shattered. And Superman did it.
As much as we might wish to ignore this episode, it’s obvious that Superman killed three people. It was not done with malice aforethought, nor was it done deliberately, but it was done.
The second instance was during the episode “It’s A Small World.” Annette Westman (who had just tried to murder Lois) was pushed into a wall by the couch shoved across the room (which was propelled by a tiny Superman) and was drenched by her own shrinking potion. She shrank out of sight and was never seen or heard from again.
Did Superman deliberately kill her? No. But he did directly cause her death. Even if she survived being shrunk so small, she’d be prey for any small insect with a taste for fresh meat. No court (at least, in the episode) ever looked into her actions in shrinking and kidnapping her former classmates or investigated her disappearance, especially Superman’s participation in it. And neither Clark nor Lois ever expressed regret over her death.
I agree that the incidents I’ve mentioned do not represent murder, but I believe that they seriously damage the notion that Superman couldn’t be Superman if he were ever to cause someone’s death. You may, of course, disagree with me. And that’s the beauty of fan fiction. We can write whatever we please, and nobody has to read it or agree with it.
The only other point I'd like to make is that several respondents have tossed the term "murder" around as if it fit anyone who took a life. It does not, no matter what country you're in. Murder is the deliberate taking of a human life, or the taking of a human life during the commission of another felony (such as shooting a guard who tries to stop you from robbing a bank). I hope that, if you post comments about either this story or its predecessor, you will read them. You don't have to agree with my portrayal of the characters, or like what I've written, but I hope that if you do comment, you do it from a position of knowledge instead of presupposition and prejudice.
