Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice

[AJTaliesen]

I
Lex Jr.: They cast Jesse specifically to appeal to the "young" and "hip" demographic. With Ben (old) and Cavill (receding hairline) we have a film anchored by two mature characters. So they wanted a popular young actor. Jesse has youth appeal and is a box office draw.

I believe you're right in that this was their reasoning, and lots of executives still believe this sort of thing, in spite of zero evidence ever.

But if you're ever in one of those meetings and someone says "We need a young guy so this movie will appeal to 20 somethings" ...just go ahead and scoot your chair subtly away from that guy. He's not smart. His future is bleak, and if you're too close to him, you may get associated with his oncoming string of horrifying failures.

It's the kind of thing that old people who think of kids as some kind of alien species have been doing for decades and no kid has ever asked for. Kids dont have a problem with adult heroes and never have. Yet for decades yellow-tie execs have been trying gimmicks like Superboy, scrappy doo, Indiana Jones has gray hair...bet have Shia follow him around!

An origin story is one thing...young and old alike can find it interesting to see where their heroes came from, but the idea that people under 30 wont watch movies with main characters over 40 is absurd and not based on any example that ever actually happened.


Seriously...apply it to any demo: When was the last time any of you walked away from a movie that you thought might have been good, but didn't want to see because it had no main characters within 5 years of your age? Meanwhile...imagine some of the great classics and just how much they would've been ruined if anyone that dumb had been involved with them. Give Rick a smart aleck teenage busboy in Casablanca...Make Michael Corleone a leather jacket wearing 16 year old in Godfather "They shot my dad!"...honestly I almost threw up a little on my keyboard while typing that.

At some point, these idiots need to let go of the terrible theory that has never been true. Yes sometimes people like movies about their demo...when the movie is about their demo. If its a movie ABOUT high school kids, then yeah...a couple young actors is a good idea. But for an action movie? Anyone care that Bruce Willis wasn't 19 in Die Hard? I think I was just starting high school at the time and I distinctly remember not giving a damn that he was almost my Dads age. The movie was still cool.



bah.../end rant.

 

[Dreddful]

I am getting kind of a Kevin Smith story "put a giant spider in the movie" vibe. I wonder if the studio, who has ultimate say so on the film, made this demand to have Doomsday in it.

 

[Brent M]

That video touched on so many great things I agree with.

This is what i've been saying all along when I heard about how many faces were expected to be in this film. It's too much, too soon. I know DC is trying to "catch up" but I don't see why they feel they need to try and get a team-up film along the same lines of where the Avengers are at now. There's NO NEED for any comic property to rush! DC has GREAT characters and they should give their property some time to grow and coexist before Justice League.

Marvel, whether you love them or not and not making this a love/hate between DC/Marvel (For the record I love characters from both), Marvel did their due diligence to make sure solo films were made to develop the team chemistry that we see now. Had there been no Thor or Captain America (etc) film, I would not care much for either. But now that I have had a chance to see each character have some time spent on their own and get a feel for knowing them, seeing them as a team just feels a lot more amazing than simply throwing these characters together right off the bat (no pun intended) without knowing anything prior to their cinematic character development.

At least ESPECIALLY with the trinity of Wonder Woman, Superman, and Batman.... they are each very important roles and should have had their own independent story to show before their eventual bringing together. I'm not saying re-tell the Bruce Wayne child experiences for Batman, but just make a great DCU entry for Batman and then have the conflict between Superman and him as a separate film. Get the WW film made and released... THEN you got the nice rich setup of characters to come together and do the team thing.

You can bring in secondary characters into someone else's film, but doing this with heavy-hitters as a side-part to a film just makes it weaker in my opinion.

I would LOVE to see this team up, just not right now. I REALLY want to see a Wonder Woman film before I see the trinity come together. I would be okay with it being a Superman Batman vs. film and standalone like that if it had to be that way. We all have seen lots of Batman stories. If they have to do it this way, then just leave it as Batman/Superman. They're 2 big characters. I really don't believe there is enough screen time to fit both Bats and Wonder Woman into the picture in their introduction to the new DC Cinematic Universe.

I didn't even touch on Doomsday. Why ALSO bring in such a heavy-hitter baddie so early on?! Too much to absorb.

And as a side note.. cripes DC... WHY can't the TV shows coexist with the film universe?! People already LOVE what they've done with Flash and Arrow.

Well said, man. :thumbsup

 

[Brent M]

Lex Jr.: They cast Jesse specifically to appeal to the "young" and "hip" demographic. With Ben (old) and Cavill (receding hairline) we have a film anchored by two mature characters. So they wanted a popular young actor. Jesse has youth appeal and is a box office draw.

I'm not trying to say this in an argumentative way, but he has box office draw? I've only seen him in a couple movies(Social Network and Zombieland) and those weren't exactly Avatar-like performers at the B.O. I can't imagine anyone would go to a movie for the sole purpose of watching him, but maybe I'm not in touch with who young people like these days. If he's considered "young and hip" I'm glad I am old and out of touch.

 

[seelsa73]

I don't find him grating or annoying in the least (but then it's the same way with Jar Jar for me, to take from that what you will). He's an excellent actor in the right role...I'll wait til I see the movie to pass judgement on that.

 

[dascoyne]

I'm not trying to say this in an argumentative way, but he has box office draw? I've only seen him in a couple movies(Social Network and Zombieland) and those weren't exactly Avatar-like performers at the B.O. I can't imagine anyone would go to a movie for the sole purpose of watching him, but maybe I'm not in touch with who young people like these days. If he's considered "young and hip" I'm glad I am old and out of touch.

I'm only guessing that's how he's perceived by some execs. I'm old, too. But I can imagine a table of execs basically thinking. "We need a successful young actor who can play a genius." ... "Didn't JE play Mark Zuckerberg? He's been in some films that made money and he's not washed up yet. There are not a lot of actors you can say that about." "Sounds great. Have our people call his people. And someone call Zach that we have our Lex Luthor."

 

[Zombie_61]

the tone of the film is very confusing.
i was expecting more of the serious man of steel.
seeing Batman opposite a cgi monster is a strange look

That was honestly the first thing I've seen in the BvS trailers that I didn't like. We have a movie with Superman and Batman and Lex Luthor and Wonder Woman and Aquaman, and now they're throwing in a CG turd monster??? Although I liked The Avengers I still think Marvel was in too big a hurry to get it made; I would like to have seen at least one more Captain America movie set in the 1940s, and a good Hulk movie. And now more than ever I'm getting the feeling that DC is doing the same thing just to get their Justice League movie made--it's too much too soon.

 

[CelticWarrior]

 

[teragon]

Not digging the trailer much, but I don't think the mediocre quality of it will mirror the quality of the movie though.
I've got a few thoughts regarding some of the comments I've read here since the trailer got out :

What batman is holding isn't technically a gun, but a grenade launcher, a FN40GL-S to be precise, we've seen it on display at comic-con, next to special bat-grenades that goes with it. Wether he's gonna use live 40mm grenades I don't know, but the primary use is to launch his own bat-grenades I suppose. So no batman doesn't randomly carry an assault rifle.

Eisenberg isn't a big box-office draw, the dude doesn't even like playing in block busters usually. Studios execs might be greedy, but they have people doing their research about that kind of things, and apart from Social Network, Eisenberg has never even been really an actor that attracts young people. The guy is 40 years old (even if he looks younger) and he's really weird in real life from all his public appearances. It's not like he has a huge fan base of 18-25 years old. I really think they could have chosen someone more likeable and more fitting to attract young people if that was the main goal they had when casting Lex Luthor. Him being associated with Social Network most likely is one of the reasons he got cast though.

And while I can't say if DC's approach will work or not, I don't think that they have to follow Marvel's way of establishing characters in solo films before. Yes, it works, we've seen it, but maybe it's not the only way to make it work, so I'll wait and see. I will say that so far I'm liking very much what Marvel offers with a few exceptions, but I starting to dislike how they ignore some of the things that happened in solo films in their Avengers film, most notably in AoU. Felt too disconnected from WS and IM3 mostly. But this isn't the thread for AoS.

Lastly, we actually know where Bruce was when Zod rampaged Metropolis, he was there, as Bruce Wayne, near one of his towers apparently, trying to save people. Why he didn't suit up and give a hand as Batman, I don't know though. I don't think he's retired, from Clark's ambush-interview it seems Batman is active, pretty brutal but really sticks to the shadows.

I hope the guys who made the trailer heard what the people said and the next trailer will be better.

 

[Laspector]

I think the whole Eisenberg thing is the studio's attempt/hope for another Ledger lightning bolt to hit.......I don't see it happening.

 

[Bigdaddy]

I liked both trailers, the "Knightmare" trailer had a Red Son feel to it. (My favorite Superman Comic run...by far!) The full trailer had a lot of great looking shots and made this more than Batman fighting Superman ( we all know who wins that fight!) I'm a huge fan of the CR movies and I'm glad they aren't trying to make a "copy" of that style, it's been done and done right. I could go either way on Jesse as Lex, but I'll give him a shot at it.
Doomsday: He looks pretty generic, but so did the comic version (my least favorite Superman comic run ). I think the main reason he looks CGI is because he is CGI. I thought he was rendered as well as the Hulk in Avengers (A craptastic movie IMO). Though I was not that hot-to-trot for MOS I warmed up to most of it, so this is one of the few films I'll actually see at the theater in 2016 (as well as CW, because Captain America is Kick-Ass!)

 

[dascoyne]

Jesse: "How do you want me to play Lex Luthor?"
DC/WB: "We're DC. Our heroes are stoic and our villains are bombastic. Just ham it up as much as you can. That's all Hackman, Spacey, Leger and Nicholson did so you should be good to go. If you chew enough scenery you might even get an Oscar nomination."

 

[seelsa73]

Doomsday: He looks pretty generic, but so did the comic version (my least favorite Superman comic run ). I think the main reason he looks CGI is because he is CGI. I thought he was rendered as well as the Hulk in Avengers (A craptastic movie IMO).

Shut your mouth! [emoji14]

Seriously though, I agree with you about Doomsday. He looks like a combination of any number of movie monsters.

 

[dascoyne]

I liked both trailers, the "Knightmare" trailer had a Red Son feel to it. (My favorite Superman Comic run...by far!) The full trailer had a lot of great looking shots and made this more than Batman fighting Superman ( we all know who wins that fight!) I'm a huge fan of the CR movies and I'm glad they aren't trying to make a "copy" of that style, it's been done and done right. I could go either way on Jesse as Lex, but I'll give him a shot at it.
Doomsday: He looks pretty generic, but so did the comic version (my least favorite Superman comic run ). I think the main reason he looks CGI is because he is CGI. I thought he was rendered as well as the Hulk in Avengers (A craptastic movie IMO). Though I was not that hot-to-trot for MOS I warmed up to most of it, so this is one of the few films I'll actually see at the theater in 2016 (as well as CW, because Captain America is Kick-Ass!)

The Red Son look left me speechless when I first saw it. I'm now sad to think that it's only going to inform the aesthetic of a sequence instead of something more substantial.

The Doomsday story isn't the greatest but he's definitely a landmark villain and ought to be handled as such. It feels like he's just getting the basic movie monster treatment here. And that's a shame.

Even if he looks about as good as the Hulk, with a character of this magnitude we should expect to be surprised. Clearly the reveal in the trailer should have been an "OMFG"-moment, not a "he's good enough"-moment.
Remember, people were impressed by the Hulk, not because of his looks, but by what his character did - e.g. thrashing Loki around. And that's something we never saw before.

 

[dascoyne]

I was just thinking...

If they had made Doomsday look EXACTLY like he does in the comics I would have actually been blown away. As ridiculously excessive as he might seem I think more fans would have been impressed. I know just seeing the comic come to life would have me more excited.

 

[JoeG]

 

[Banner]

Would be cool if this is true... but I don't think Zack Snyder is capable of this much forethought.

 

[Egon Spengler]

What a waste.

Banner, I doubt it because it seems like they are trying to pack as much into this film as possible in an attempt to make it "Epic". Doomsday is far better known than Wraith as far as I'm concerned and they'd probably play it safe and just go with the "Known, it sells" route. Ugh.

Like I said, what a waste ..

 

[Fawbish]

View attachment 562815

Would be cool if this is true... but I don't think Zack Snyder is capable of this much forethought.

That is quite good that actually, something I didnt realise. And also one of the things that stood out to me immediately, is that I dont remember Doomsday having heat vision at any point (though of course Im sure its happened somewhere)

It might also explain why he doesn't quite look like the doomsday we love. Its not that massive a stretch. Wraith is supposed to be intelligent etc - what we saw didnt sound intelligent. Ergo probably still DD. Also Wraith is supposed to be mostly friendly with Superman in Unchained?

 

[robstyle]

Or it IS a Ninja Turtle.

Sometimes simplest answer is most often correct