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The quintessential American superhero — the one who forged the genre — returns to the multiplex this weekend: Superman. The latest big-screen iteration, called Man of Steel, explores the birth of the character (played as an adult by British actor Henry Cavill), delving into why he came to Earth, into his inner conflicts growing up, and into how he resolves them.

And more than perhaps any other big-screen version of the story, Man of Steel lingers on the wrenching death throes of Superman's homeworld — the distant planet Krypton, where his natural father (Russell Crowe) and mother work desperately not just to save their son, but to save their species.

"I have a reverence for that mythology," says director Zack Snyder, who admits to being "a slight dork" about such things. "And I really wanted to treat the experience of seeing Superman born [with care]. ... And that ancient technology ... I find fun to think about. ... Within that world, it was fun to see Jor-El putting his son into the basket and [metaphorically] sending him down the river."

Snyder joined NPR's Linda Wertheimer to talk casting choices, cutting the film down to size, and why this version of the character doesn't wear his shorts on the outside.

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There's no single reason for the decline of bees, suggests More Than Honey director Markus Imhoof, whose family has kept the honey-producing apians for generations. The filmmaker hails from the Swiss Alps, where flowers, fruit, honey and bees exist in synchrony, with only low-tech human intervention. Even there, however, diseases and parasites are devastating hives.

Things are worse in China, where Mao's war on birds shattered the natural order, and in the U.S., where industrial-scale beekeeping and the indiscriminate use of pesticides has fueled the phenomenon known as "colony collapse."

The film's first stop is California, which produces as much as 90 percent of the world's almonds. The trees require the ministrations of untold numbers of bees, whose hives are trucked to the orchards by the hundreds on huge flatbeds, by companies whose insects also pollinate other crops throughout the country. The stresses of travel kill bees, sometimes by the millions. Fungicides and varroa mites also undermine colony health.

Imhoof's visit to China is brief, probably because bad news about its food supply is not encouraged by that nation's censors. Then it's off to Australia, the only continent whose bees have not been infested by the varroa mite. There, bee researchers (including the director's daughter) are working on a disease-resistant breed. The last stop is Arizona, where one honey harvester believes that the hardier Africanized (aka "killer") bee is American agriculture's great yellow-and-black hope.

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Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan issued a strong warning to the protesters camped out at Taksim Square in Istanbul.

He said that within 24 hours, the situation at the square would be resolved. As The New York Times reports, the tough talk was tempered with an olive branch of sorts: Erdogan hinted that a referendum could decide whether a mall would be built in place of a park next to the square.

As we've reported, a small peaceful protest against the redevelopment kicked off the largest anti-government protests in recent memory.

The Times adds:

"'We have not responded to punches with punches. From now on security forces will respond differently,' Mr. Erdogan said on Wednesday. 'This issue will be over in 24 hours.'

"Mr. Erdogan reiterated and sharpened that warning in a speech on Thursday morning.

"'Using a Molotov cocktail is a crime, burning and destroying is a crime, destroying public order is a crime,' he said in his televised statement, in reference to protesters who set barriers around Gezi Park to block police interference. 'These cannot be called a struggle for freedom, struggle for rights.'"

NPR correspondent Joseph Shapiro and his daughter Eva spent the weekend at the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards. Eva, 15, won the "Best in Grade" award, one of two for ninth-grade writers, for a short story. She takes writing classes with Writopia Lab in Washington, D.C.

Excerpts Of Award-Winning Teen Writing

Bad Candy, by Janay Alexandrea Crane (Walkerton, Ind.)

Habibi, by Samantha West (Boise, Idaho)

Grandpanomics, by Anthony Desantis (Greenville, S.C.)