There is still so much question surrounding Man of Steel, Warner Bros.' upcoming reboot of the Superman movie franchise. 300 and Sucker Punch director Zack Snyder is helming the film, Immortals star Henry Cavill is playing Superman, and he'll be facing off against Academy Award-nominated actor Michael Shannon (Boardwalk Empire), who plays General Zod.

Aside from two Man of Steel teaser trailers - which admittedly managed to generate some positive attention - the plot details, footage, images, posters - even behind-the-scenes footage - have been scarce. But while we can't offer you any new juicy promo materials, we can offer a nice little tidbit for fans of Richard Donner's 1980 film, Superman II, who worry that Man of Steel is treading a little too close to that classic.

Michael Shannon was sitting down with VH1 for an interview (Watch the video here); however, conversation with host Carrie Keagan wasn't just awkward (codpiece size came up), it managed to also be somewhat revelatory.

When prompted by Keagan to (awkwardly) fit the line "Kneel before Zod!" into a WrestleMania reference, Shannon blurted out what was eventually confirmed to be the news that he doesn't actually say Terrence Stamp's famous line from Superman II in Man of Steel. Cue fanboy reaction.

There will likely be two main schools of thought on this:

  1. "Lame, Zod should say his best line!"
  2. "Good. Some things should remain sacred.

And of course, some will also point out that Smallville already played that game with its own iteration of Zod. How many times can the line get spun?

Again, we know very little about Shannon's portrayal of Zod at this point. What we DO know is that he will be a Kryptonian general who comes to Earth, he will be aided by Faora (Antje Traue), his lieutenant who is a variation on Sarah Douglas' Ursa character from Superman II. Considerable evidence points to this version of Zod and Faora sticking close to some recent comic interpretations, which includes their elite military unit Black Zero - a name that not so concidentally popped up in some recent test commercials for the Man of Steel toy line. Not very much to go on.

Man of Steel Movie Spoilers

Even though there's still more than half a year to go before Man of Steel hits theaters, the reserved nature of the promo campaign is bordering on the line of suspicious. One would think if the film was all the studio had hoped for there would be at least one major set of images or promo footage that would be released to set the Internet abuzz again...

That's not to say that Snyder hasn't crafted a truly re-inventive approach to Superman movie making - in fact, there is still prime opportunity for new Man of Steel footage to blow us all away around the  time the studio's big holiday release, The Hobbit, hits theaters this Christmas.

Man of Steel will be in theaters on June 14, 2013.

The Hobbit will be in theaters on December 14, 2012.

Source: VH1