Story was way too rushed. They spent time marketing this as a film that would delve into Clark's emotions as an outcast and someone who, despite being an extraordinary being, was held back to being ordinary by a cautious father who was both scared of what the world would do if they knew his son's true capabilities, but was hopeful that whatever Clark was, wherever he came from, he was there to be something important.
Instead, we only get glimpses of what was an excellent yet short lived performances from Costner going over what essentially amounts to bullet points in Clark's past. These scenes are, far and away more interesting than any other in the entire film. And they are, unfortunately, glossed over as flash backs. They are also the most development Clark gets in the entire film. Adult Clark, unlike, say adult Bruce Wayne, goes through no transition character wise.
For a few scenes, with little dialogue, we see what Clark is up to, then, randomly, he stumbles onto hearing the location of some ship, which ends of being the Fortress of Solitude. He, rather flatly, is told of who he really is, where he came from, and is randomly given the suit and cape from his father's ghost, and bam, he's all of sudden flying around in costume. Literally no build up, whatsoever. It's just "Hey, I infiltrated this Kyptonian space craft the military found, found out who I was, and now I'm geared up, ready to accept my destiny".
Zod could have been a great villian, but he's squandered to not enough dialogue scenes exploring his character and is an otherwise forgettable punching bag for Superman. There's a line before the final bang zoom fight scene that Zod states, and it sums up his character beautifully. Unfortunately, prior to that line, he's not given much time to expand on his feelings and justifications.
And while still on Zod, why in God's name would he be banished to the Phantom Zone when A) everyone including the Council knew Krypton was going to blow, which would B) free Zod and his minions upon doing so. Just poor writing there.
Lois Lane wasn't bad, but again, another character who wasn't given enough time and was seemingly thrust into being in love with Superman for the sake of it. The two characters didn't share much pre disaster screen time for this to work properly.
And man, did the action drag on way to long. It was so over the top and ridiculous that, honestly, it took me out of the film. I was not interested in any of these fights, especially because Clark could legitimately hold his own with these genetically created warriors. Faora and Zod both mention they were created for this sole purpose, yet Supes, with zero formal training at all, hangs with and ultimately defeats them.