Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (Post-release)

DuneMuadDib said:

I feel it's rather telling that in a film titled Batman v Superman it turns out that Wonder Woman was the most enjoyable part.

Jesse's Lex was exactly as bad as I expected, though in a different way. I read a review that nailed part of the issue, he seems to think he's in an Aaron Sorkin film. His scheme was decent in a comic book sort of fashion. It'd have been nice it they'd touched even slightly on how he deduced Clark and Bruce's identities or what his interest in the metahumans was. The latter just stank of trying to fast track the team-up without actually building to it (much like the hall of Spider-villian gadgets in ASM2). The cameos were a waste of time, and having Flash show up in what might have been a dream with his vague wording doesn't help. I'm also uncomfortable with Flash advocating killing someone.

Speaking of which, Snyder has a fundamental misunderstanding of both Superman and Batman. Batman straight up killed people. At least in the Dark Knight trilogy they have the occasional "it's a wonder no one was killed" line to give him a pass on smashing cars with the Tumbler. There's no wiggle room here, people clearly die. Also, he repeatedly used guns. Not against doors or robots, but against humans. Repeatedly.

Then you have Superman, knowing full well that Batman is a vanilla human, throwing him through buildings under the assumption that the armor can save him. Superman wasn't fighting with the intent to kill, but Batman is alive only thanks to comic book physics. They were both fighting to kill, even if Superman wouldn't admit it. But hey, they at least learned their lesson when it came to the big fight. Every five minutes they remind us the area is abandoned so their won't be casualties. Kind of hollow after Batman's killed three dozen people, but it's something.

Did the budget go down for this one, since they set the last hour of fighting at night to mask the dodgy CGI?

I lost count, did Lois have to be rescued three times in this movie? That's a higher number than the last film, right? Full-on damsel mode/love interest with just a tiny bit of doing her job to keep her from being one-dimensional. Martha Kent somehow topped Aunt May as the superfluous surrogate mom, which is impressive. But she had to be in there so Superman and Batman could hug it out over having mothers with the same name.

Speaking of useless parents: of the two options for a dead father to give Clark a pep talk to keep heroing they chose the one who had previously told him repeatedly to hide his powers and let people die? Was Kevin Costner just cheaper?

The whole thing was about a half hour too long, and completely joyless. I somehow enjoyed it both more and less than MoS, which just says how unbelievably uneven I find MoS.

Some good stuff: WW rocked, Batfleck was fine (if you like Frank Miller's take on the character at any rate). WW's theme was the only piece of music that wasn't banal, which makes sense.

Wonder Woman's too far into production to really be impacted by this piece of poo, but hopefully they take a step back and reassess everything else. Get Zack Snyder away from these films, please!

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Batman is treated like Iron Man whenever he's subjected to an obscene amount of acceleration/deceleration, they just assume the armour stops all G-forces.

I'm slightly partial to Snyder's Batman, he's the cynical disillusioned Batman who discovered that after 20-years of punching crooks in the face and terrifying them of every bump at night, he has essentially made zero progress. Ditto for Wonder Woman who probably saw more death in her life than the mortician's guild's full membership in its entire existence. It's ironic that in this universe Superman is the closest equivalent of a bright young idealist who. It we be very nice if Snyder's Justice film is a little bit brighter and more colourful ...

As for the dodgy CGI there is the moment where Superman is talking with Lois and then flies off and it's all done offscreen with a big air pump to show the air displacement, I'm not sure if this is a callback to the early days where practical effects were just too convoluted to film it or they were just being cheap and saved a CGI sequence ...

I agree that Lois Lane is a molecule short of two dimensions, she didn't even get a wardrobe change, she was in a blouse and vest in the last as well ...

Overall it was a huge improvement over MoS, but Snyder is writing or characterisation, I don't have a problem if they want to keep him on board as director, but leave the plotting and writing to people who know their jobs.

I think the biggest problem is that Snyder doesn't understand how death works in a narrative, it's not about the death-toll or the act of killing, it's how you frame it within the story and how it affects the characters. In MoS they never made a reference to the carnage and in the end scene it was business as usual. My take on this is simple oversight, Snyder wanted some major destruction porn, yet never stood still by the fact that it made Superman look like a dick ... This is addressed in BvS a few times and I suspect with a large amount of 20/20 hindsight and a lot of help from everyone who pointed out this problematic plot point.

alienscollection.com said:

Well... This guy clearly wasn't a fan - nsfw:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OTKDtoBR-2M

And I kind of agree with some of these plot holes/lingering questions:

http://birthmoviesdeath.com/2016/03/24/10-questions-batman-v-superman-left-me-asking

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The critic is right and yet for some really weird reason I can't quite explain I came out telling myself this movie is terrible by most definitions, but somehow it has just enough redeeming features compared to Man of Steel that I kinda enjoyed it.

I enjoyed the Knightmare sequence, but don't get how Bruce's paranoid fears of Superman are a premonition to Darkseid.
Flash's time travel appearance...was that real or another dream sequence? Added nothing other than an unnecessary cameo.
The meta human sequence was just poorly conceived. I don't think .mov files are a good way to introduce them. Very lazy.
Why did Lex give his mercenaries his experimental bullets to use? And why would anyone think Superman turned up and shot everyone?
There's a lot of things in there I didn't think we're handled well, or were unnecessary. Fortunately I found more to appreciate in the film than I found to dislike. So overall I enjoyed it. Better than MOS, but I so want a Solo Bat-fleck movie soon!

It was a wash for me. I enjoyed some scenes, but overall it just did not satisfy. Have no urge to see it a second time, I will say Eisenberg was better than I was expecting.

In between raising eyebrows and scratching my head I had this feeling the Snyder was really trying to improve on the problems we had in MoS, he even openly references them. I went into the cinema with a sense that this would be a worse failure than MoS and somehow, despite being terrible it showed progress. Even after all the bad acting, all the nonsense they threw at the screen in the hope it would work it had this weird vibe that made it work on some level ...

It's happened to me before to a lesser degree with some Dr Who episodes where things don't mesh at all, but it works, same for some things in Age of Ultron, Ultron feels like he was kept completely separate from the rest of production and the two were joined in post, and the disjoint is glaring, yet it works, it's not great, but again the vibe carries me through the film.

MoS and BvS remind me of film school or low budget first movies. You see progress and then your realize they are the world's most expensive film school projects and Snyder is trying to learn on the job ...

I want the blu-ray, I want a track with a slightly drunk Alfred commenting on this film.

Oh, Zack... you did the one thing I did not want you to do. You had Wonder Woman's first live action theatrical film appearance... and you effed it up.

On Slashfilm.com, Zack explained Wonder Woman's inclusion into the film.

Zack Snyder said:

I am and have been obsessed with the trinity and have wanted to see the trinity, that being Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman, in a single moment. That’s a thing that I was really interested in trying to get in this movie, not that I didn’t have enough to deal with already — but I thought that would be a cool scene.

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On paper I was ready to say 'They wasted Wonder Woman' and leave it at that, but than I read Devin Faraci's post regarding the film's plot holes. Specifically his last point "Why didn’t Wonder Woman kill Doomsday?"

Devin Faraci said:

In a moment of heroic self-sacrifice Superman picks up the spear (of destiny. Yay, another ****ty ****** allusion for a character who isn’t Christlike) and flies it right into the heart of Doomsday. Weakened, Superman is impaled on Doomsday’s spike, and he pulls himself further up the spike in order to drive the spear into the beast’s heart. Both die.

But they didn’t have to, at least not as presented in the film. Wonder Woman could have done it, or at least given it a shot. We saw that she could take a full blast from Doomsday and get up smiling, so why not let the person who will not be automatically weakened by proximity to the weapon give it a try? Instead she stands around watching, her lasso fairly ineffectual on Doomsday who manages to still impale Superman.

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The film actually had the means to justify giving Wonder Woman a crucial role in this battle... and they don't use it! And before you say anything, look!



This universe's Amazons use Spears!

And I know what you're thinking. "Jeyl, if Wonder Woman did that Superman wouldn't have died. The film clearly needed Superman to die." To which I respond "Than what was the point of having Wonder Woman in the film?" To which I bonk myself on the head upon realizing that Zack answered that question already.

Zack Snyder said:

I am and have been obsessed with the trinity

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She's not in this movie because she has a role to play. She's here because Zack wanted to indulge himself. They had the perfect opportunity to showcase her unique abilities when compared to Superman and Batman, they blew it.

Jeyl said:

Oh, Zack... you did the one thing I did not want you to do. You had Wonder Woman's first live action theatrical film appearance... and you effed it up.

And I know what you're thinking. "Jeyl, if Wonder Woman did that Superman wouldn't have died. The film clearly needed Superman to die." To which I respond "Than what was the point of having Wonder Woman in the film?" To which I bonk myself on the head upon realizing that Zack answered that question already.

She's not in this movie because she has a role to play. She's here because Zack wanted to indulge himself. They had the perfect opportunity to showcase her unique abilities when compared to Superman and Batman, they blew it.

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BvS feels a lot like one of those high-end model kits with photo-etch and brass parts. It's as if they assembled 3/4ths of it and then when it came to finish it, they got tired, threw everything in a box, squirted in all their leftover glue, gave the box a good shake and that was good enough.

In the actual titular fight, Batman sets up sonic weapons and some guns to slow down Superman. And when the fight actually starts he activates them in sequence and watches on doing absolutely nothing and then it's just a brawl ... and the film feels like a string of them, so many missed opportunities, so many moments that could have been an awesome payoff ...

How hard would it be to have an awesome finish. Have Superman bring in the spear and fails to stab him as Doomsday is getting too strong to pierce with kryptonite alone, have Doomsday start to beat Supes into a pulp, worse than Shaolin Soccer, and then set it up that Batman uses the last gas cartridge to weaken Doomsday from the inside while Lois gets the spear to Wonder Woman who grants her a fan-squealing "thank you sister" and then as Doomsday is about to do to Superman what a giant mutant fly does to naughty children, she stabs him and Supes gives it the last fatal shove before dying ... You put that in BvS and I jump on my seat and I buy twenty tickets to see it again and again ...

I still dont understand how people can walk away from this dumpster fire of a movie and actually like it. You know what I liked? That Miles Bennet Dyson was cast as Cyborgs dad. And thats obvious because of T2. That was the only moment in the entire movie where I was like "Haha oh man cool!" There were so many plot holes, how lex deduced who superman AND batman were with little evidence, the way doomsday was concocted, how Superman didnt clean up any of the world engine parts, there are so many things to discuss. And yes, of course, why didnt he toss the spear to WW and have her do it? Why? Cause that would make too much sense. This is a damn senseless movie. They were him hawing around about Superman being a hero, or if he actually was good, and they give him a funeral that would rival a Kennedy. Its asinine.

Rotwang said:

Batman is treated like Iron Man whenever he's subjected to an obscene amount of acceleration/deceleration, they just assume the armour stops all G-forces.

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Yes, from a film making/audience suspension of disbelief standpoint you're correct. The difference is that the people throwing Iron Man through buildings are admitting they're trying to kill him, which Superman denies despite the obvious intent in the action.

annanake said:

WW also has the same powers as the Highlander she pulled a sword shield and rope completely out of her ass .then replaced them when done .
the more I remember of the move the less sense anything makes !

Wally sent his checks back to bruce Wayne from the beginning with notes about stopping superman ?
Did he know Wayne was bats ???
How ?
If not how did that help anything ????

Then lex knows darksied is coming ????
How ???
Nobody thought Lex leaving the Superman hearing was at all strange ? He had no excuse . he was there and he left right before the bomb went off . superman saw him( along with everyone outside )but could say nothing just like he could not mention lex having his mother kidnapped until he lost to Batman and was going to die ?

That has always been a pet peeve of mine in movies . the drama action what have you depending on a character not just opening there damn mouth up and explaining something .

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The sword was on scabbard on her back and her lasso on her hip, she didn't pulled them out of thin air. She got there with her shield too, and probably dropped it at one point.

Wally didn't send anything, he never got the checks. It was Lex messing with Bruce all along to rail him up, he says so himself in his speech to Lois. He wrote "you let your family die" on the newspaper etc. and Lex did know Bruce is Batman, but we don't know how he figured it out. Although he's tracking all meta humans he can, and has pretty detailed files, not a stretch that his research guys did a bit on Batman too. Superman he figured it out because he was sloppy when it comes to Lois. Luthor says it in the movie too, every time she's in danger he shows up to save, and he kissed her several time too, not so discretely.

Lex most likely knew about Doomsday thanks to the kryptonian ship but that's my take on it. And he never set a foot in the court room, he was in the hallway and sent his assistant to it, but he went off after that. With that said it is strange how the military just let him toy around the ship and Zod's body without supervision though.

WW wasn't just standing around watching it, her lasso was keeping Doomsday in place for Superman to get there with the spear while Batman weakened the beast with his K grenade. Most people liked Wonder Woman and are excited to see her movie, I call that a success. One of the good element of the film.

I sat through the movie feeling basically nothing beyond "Batman looks cool, Diana looks cool". I hate the laziness of just writing words on a screen for exposition "The world's first interaction with Superman"..."18 months later", I can't stand when movies do this honestly. We did NOT need to see the Waynes die, or see Bruce fall in that bat hole again, everyone knows his origin, or at least don't care. Lois' involvement in the desert was unneeded, proprietary "experimental military tech" in the hands of shadowy mercs plot is so stupid, and exists just to give Lois something to do. No one would go to the trouble of creating a new round like that, they would just use guns and ammo from some rival country, or honestly just US military issue ammo, there's no way of knowing who fired it.

Using the Africa situation to turn public opinion on Superman was completely brainless and convoluted, they should have just highlighted the anniversary of the Black Zero event, add in Wallace's vandalism, and sprinkle in the idea that other metahumans have been reported across the globe, leading to fears of copy cats or escalation. I felt that Lois should have been tied in with the Senator a bit, with an exclusive seat in the hearing that she barely misses due to increased traffic around the site. This gives Clark another personal motivation for being angry at himself as well as Lex. Something in the vein of "that could have been you in that courtroom Lois, and because of Superman dozens of families are missing their loved ones tonight".

Too much news footage, and ham fisted TDKR imagery. The nuke, the sniper rifle, those things felt like they were only included because they were in that book.

I get that it was the point of the movie, but Batman and Superman shouldn't have fought as much IMO. I think that Synder took too much from TDKR Batman and made Bruce irrational, and honestly pretty dumb at some points. I felt that Batman wouldn't focus on murdering Superman, but more likely just going to great lengths to show him fear, to paint the image of what it felt like to be in Metropolis that day, utterly helpless and powerless. Instead we got the weird "Martha" scene, and another "why are you here" moment from Lois. Without Lois there they could have had Clark gasp "Martha. He has my mother, Martha." which would snap Bruce out of it, leading him to realize that Superman has a human mother, and is more like him than he believe. Bruce may be vengeful about the damage from the Black Zero event, but he should also understand that in a world populated by "gods" that the best weapon is to have one on your team.

The "metahuman" folders were so so shoehorned in there, and it's laughable that Lex is the one to name and design logos for these heroes. His performance aside, I felt like Lex's storyline could have been trimmed by easily 40%. He should have already owned the Kryptonian ship, already been working on Doomsday, we didn't need to see him making business deals to get the rights to those things. He seems like he lucked into things half the time.

Wonder Woman was great, if underused, and weirdly plopped into random parts of the movie. I have no complaints about her, and I'm even more excited to see her solo movie now.

I don't know, I so wanted WB to succeed here, but I think this one will get filed away in my brain next to MoS. Hopefully Suicide Squad surprises us and can give their movie universe a boost while they restructure things (and relieve Snyder of some of his duties)

I loved it. I can see some criticism, in particular with Luthor, but I am not particularly attached to the Superman universe. This felt like the closest we will get to a Kingdom Come film, and I really enjoyed it.

I wanted to respectfully counter a few arguments here.

harrisonp said:

"The world's first interaction with Superman"..."18 months later", I can't stand when movies do this honestly.

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A movie sort of does need to tell you when significant time passes.

harrisonp said:

We did NOT need to see the Waynes die, or see Bruce fall in that bat hole again, everyone knows his origin, or at least don't care.

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I disagree. Firstly, I saw it at the Alamo, and before the film, they played a bunch of early Batman and Superman content, from the serials to foreign knockoff films to Animated Series toy commercials, as well as a collection of every time we have seen the Waynes killed on screen. Firstly, I loved the pearls being broken by the kickback of the gun. I am not a huge Snyder fan, but he excels at visuals. He was a commercial director. The dream-like Bruce being raised by bats was also a really unique choice. Regardless of the visuals, we needed to see the Waynes die for the use of the name "Martha" to have impact.

harrisonp said:

Too much news footage, and ham fisted TDKR imagery. The nuke, the sniper rifle, those things felt like they were only included because they were in that book.

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I didn't think it was too much news footage, particularly considering how much has been used in other superhero movies. I thought the sniper rifle thing was fantastic. I loved looking at that shot and not realizing Batman was there for a few seconds.

harrisonp said:

I get that it was the point of the movie, but Batman and Superman shouldn't have fought as much IMO.

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They fought once.

harrisonp said:

The "metahuman" folders were so so shoehorned in there, and it's laughable that Lex is the one to name and design logos for these heroes.

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I thought it was a really clever way to introduce Wonder Woman and to involve Bruce with what will become the Justice League. We also don't know that Luthor designed the logos. I mean, Wonder Woman's is basically on her attire.


If you somehow trusted this and were let down but continue to trust Suicide Squad, I am really confused.

I got a free ticket last night after my friend's wife backed out due to reviews, so I gladly tagged along.

I'm going to try and be really brief in my thoughts so here it goes (some spoilers):

(PREFACE) I have loved Batman and Superman since I was a child and am 38 now.

- I loved Man Of Steel, but this new film managed to suck what heart and soul Superman had and made him pretty plain
- I REALLY REALLY tried to see Bruce Wayne/Batman, but I just kept seeing Ben Affleck. Not a bad acting job, I just couldn't focus on Bruce/Bats completely
- The turning points were so out of the blue (i.e. Woah, your Mom is my Mom's name, too? We should be friends now)
- Wonder Woman was better than I thought she would be; I wanted to see more of her (coming in the WW film obviously)
- The movie was NOT boring, but it wasn't engaging or emotional at all due to the stale job done attempting character development
- Lex Luthor... absolute worst iteration of Lex to-date. Seemed like a pissy, condescending little high and mighty attitude a-hole who was just mad at everything.
- Doomsday's development got a bit cooler as he grew (visually more features as he's seen in the comics), but wasn't something I cared about.
- The visuals were beautiful. The storytelling just didn't hold up well.
- I just didn't care

I really wanted to be wrong and love this film. My expectations were it was going to be a steaming pile of crap, but was better than that, but I don't know how much of a compliment that is.

I don't think it was a very well done film and just left not knowing how to even feel because I just felt nothing. I'm sad about that, too. I love Batman and Superman, but I didn't feel like this was a legit WB film and made as a fun adult-oriented fan film or something to that effect.

Snikt said:

Im sorry, but Im usually cool with opinions not being wrong etc, but if you like this movie, you hate film.


If you liked this movie, get a catscan cause your synapses are broken.

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That's... pretty silly. I'm a filmmaker by trade and went to school for it. I'm allowed to find something enjoyable despite your inference otherwise. I might recommend some level of restraint when choosing words, because broadly insulting people for liking a piece of fiction is a little shallow.

CessnaDriver said:

I've read Batfleck kills people? As in blowing up cars with people in them?

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I've read that a lot as well, and had prior to seeing the film. After seeing it, I didn't see where he outright killed anyone, but put them in a position to die, which... essentially every on screen Batman has.

glunark said:

Is there anything after the credits?

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Just crushing disappointment.

CharlesHouse said:

I've read that a lot as well, and had prior to seeing the film. After seeing it, I didn't see where he outright killed anyone, but put them in a position to die, which... essentially every on screen Batman has.

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Not since '89 when Batman killed Joker has an on screen Batman so overtly killed people, and Batfleck's bodycount is easily the highest. He threw a grenade at guys that we clearly saw blow up next to them. He shot the fuel tank of a flamethrower, which promptly ignited and fried the dude (even setting aside the issue of Batman wielding a gun). There's a marked difference between intentionally causing the death of people (directly or otherwise) and committing actions that could be inferred to cause deaths. Batfleck has the highest on-screen bodycount of any Batman and his intent is more malicious than other versions. He's a killer.

He did kill the guy who was about to kill Martha, that one is true. Although it's straight from TDKR, down to batman using the goon's machine gun and dialogue "I believe you" :


About the passing time writings, it makes me laugh : in TDK Rises (3rd Nolan), we jump without explanation from bruce leaving the pit to bruce in Gotham, and people were either confused or grunting about it. You write it down here to avoid confusion, and people are still grunting about it

DuneMuadDib said:

Not since '89 when Batman killed Joker has an on screen Batman so overtly killed people, and Batfleck's bodycount is easily the highest. He threw a grenade at guys that we clearly saw blow up next to them. He shot the fuel tank of a flamethrower, which promptly ignited and fried the dude (even setting aside the issue of Batman wielding a gun). There's a marked difference between intentionally causing the death of people (directly or otherwise) and committing actions that could be inferred to cause deaths. Batfleck has the highest on-screen bodycount of any Batman and his intent is more malicious than other versions. He's a killer.

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Huh no, a guy threw a grenade at him, which he deflected, then the same guy tried to grab the live grenade again, literally jumping towards it and got blown up. Not Batman's fault.
You make it sound like He's the one bringing the grenade and the gun, he's not.

alienscollection.com said:

Just crushing disappointment.

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I think he means the end credits, not the opening ones