Continuity mistake: In the balloon, after Luthor says "Due North", Teschmaker's arm swaps from raised to lowered.
Continuity mistake: When Lois is cutting oranges the glass jumps from being on the right side of the table to being on the far left.
Continuity mistake: When Superman is crossing the street and a taxi crashes against him, the passers-by are not continuous between shots. Check the African American girl in a pink dress who appears randomly on every single corner of the streets around.
Continuity mistake: After Lois asks the Paris spokesperson about the bomb he turns around and talks to her. Then it suddenly cuts to a closeup of his face and he's now talking to the journalists that were on the left, without having turned his head or body.
Continuity mistake: At the Eiffel Tower Lois approaches the spokesperson, cut to a wide angle where he is facing left. Then as she arrives there's a close up of him turning around. Then back to the previous wide angle where he is facing left again.
Continuity mistake: Perry White is telling Clark about the terrorists while composing the headlines. Note the cut-out of the word IN under Paris. It swaps from straight to slanted between angles.
Continuity mistake: During the fight in Metropolis, Zod throws a concrete wall which Superman explodes. When debris falls, a taxi stops but a grey car behind keeps moving. In the close-up the grey car is parked several meters behind the yellow one.
Continuity mistake: When the antenna falls, two men close to the pram by a yellow car hide next to a blue car. A shot later they're next to a yellow car, but a shot later they're running towards the blue car again.
Continuity mistake: When Superman rescues the kid in Niagara and holds him in his arms, in the wide shot the kid's waist rests in Superman's arm, but in the immediate close-up he is crouched and now the head rests on the arm.
Continuity mistake: When Ursa says to the Cosmonaut "What kind of creature are you?" her whole body is facing forward. He responds "Just a man" and in the next shot of her, her body has turned left. Then when she goes to grab his patch her body is facing forward again.
Continuity mistake: As Ursa goes to sit at the table in town, she starts to put her elbow on the table. After the cut, she starts to do it again.
Continuity mistake: The kid fell backwards off the ledge and down toward the falls, but the distance shot he's face down rather than face up. It's also easy to see that it's a dummy because the hair color is different, as well as the body structure and limb movements are all wrong for a human.
Continuity mistake: As Zod bends down to pick up the Cosmonaut, the action is repeated in the reflection on the helmet.
Continuity mistake: After the Cosmonaut settles in front of Zod, there is nothing reflected in the visor if the helmet. A second later, after looking at Zod from the human's point of view, Zod and the moon buggy are reflected, even though the Cosmonaut didn't move the helmet.
Continuity mistake: During the Marlboro truck scene, a woman with a violet dress and curly hair is inside her car laughing at the fight. This lady appears in almost every single angle of the flying sewers scene with no continuity at all: sometimes standing, sometimes falling, other times somewhere opposite to where she was before.
Continuity mistake: The hole which Non and Superman go through is square, and smooth inside. A frame later, from a different angle, its side is covered in bulky rocks and it's rounded.
Continuity mistake: Right after Ursa cries "Superman" and is about to throw the sewer lid at him, a man with a white jacket and a big afro runs from right to left and hides behind her. When the angle changes, he is on the very far right side of the street, many meters away, running towards Ursa, repeating all previous movements.
Continuity mistake: When Zod is trying to heat up the truck's gas tank, while Superman tries to cool it the number of cars around changes dramatically, with no order whatsoever.
Continuity mistake: During the big street fight, Ursa grabs a flag pole. It is either in the shadows or lit, depending on the angle.
Continuity mistake: During the street fight, after the sewer lid scene, Zod lands on a car with his legs next to each other. A frame later they're spread apart.
Answer: In the theatrical cut, nobody really knows why the green crystal restored his powers. However if you watch the Richard Donner cut, it is explained that the green crystal is a communication device that helps Superman talks to the residual essence/spirit/ghost of his father Jor-El. Before he died, Jor-El gave the crystal to his son. Jor-El anticipated that Kal-El might give up his powers, and he also anticipated that Zod might eventually escape the Phantom Zone, so Jor-El lets his son absorb the leftover energy of his spirit, thus restoring all his Kryptonian powers.
Matt Van Gogh