Seriously. I’m going to be discussing, among other things, the end of the movie. Which I don’t ordinarily do, but it relates squarely to the film’s major weakness. You’re warned.
The people applauded at the end.
I should mention that first. At the packed Thursday screening I attended, the audience applauded. They didn’t applaud any Marvel films. They didn’t applaud “X-Men: Days of Future Past.” But they applauded BvS because…well, I guess because they had never seen anything quite like it. They believed that they had seen a true rarity in superhero films: a genuine epic.
This was a story of gods and men.
Which is its strength and its problem.
Let’s face it: Superman has always been something of a god. Going all the way back to the first film, as Marlon Brando intoned, “And so I have given them you. My only son.” He was a Christ substitute and the concept of him being a god on Earth could easily have been raised by the citizens of Metropolis. But they didn’t, because Chris Reeve was so human, so affable, so perfectly Smallville cornbread, that not only would it have seemed preposterous to raise him to that level, but his Clark would doubtless have considered it sacrilegious.
But in BvS, that’s entirely what the film is about, with all the pluses and minuses that having a godlike being walking around amongst us would undoubtedly entail. And that is ultimately the problem with the film.
No, the acting isn’t the issue. Ben Affleck, defying the haters, is brilliant as Bruce Wayne and formidable as Batman. His personal enmity toward Superman is understandable as he witnesses first hand the destruction that Supes inflicts on Metropolis in general and his own employees in specific. And Gal Gadot…my God, what a great Wonder Woman. Whether she is quietly informing Bruce that he’s never met a woman like her, or actually SMILING as she faces off against Doomsday–SMILING–Godot is a terrific 21st Century inheritor of the role from Lynda Carter.
As for Henry Cavill…well, there’s the problem.
It’s not that he’s a bad actor. He’s not. He even actually has a scene where he gets to act like a human being and climb into a bathtub with Amy Adams’s Lois Lane. He seems to enjoy that. Who wouldn’t? I’m happily married with four children, but I’d climb into a bathtub with a naked Amy Adams if given the opportunity. So would you, so don’t judge.
The problem is that since Superman is a god, he can’t be human. And as a movie goer, there’s a simple truism which is that your personal involvement with a character is determined by his humanity. Ninety percent of the time that Cavill is on screen, he’s in Superman mode, even when he’s Clark. As Superman he never cracks a smile, never cracks a joke, never cracks his facade. Even when a building explodes around him, killing everyone but him, he is just left standing there looking bummed out. He doesn’t try to find out if anyone survived, he doesn’t do anything. He just stands there, like God observing just how idiotic mortals can be.
The plot doesn’t serve him, or anyone, especially well. He is blamed for the deaths of people in a desert city for no reason. When Lex Luthor kidnaps his mother, Martha, he can’t find her for no reason (even though he can find Lois Lane anywhere at the drop of a hat.) Lex Luthor wants to kill Superman for no reason other than that he’s nuts. He’s like a demented Twitter-head on acid. For no reason. Maybe he hates Superman because Superman is God and being a scientist, he doesn’t believe in God and so must drag Superman down to mortal levels.
And Batman wants to get rid of Superman because he likewise perceives him as a God who has the potential to destroy humanity. Because, well, that’s what God does. Why do you think they call earthquakes, hurricanes, floods, etc., acts of God? Let’s face it, if God Himself descended from on high, Batman would probably want a piece of him. It’s only when he discovers he actually has common ground with Superman that he stops trying to kill him. But that’s okay because, as anyone who watched the trailers know–which is everyone reading this–Lex has Doomsday lined up to pick up where Batman left off.
Man, I am so sick of trailers ruining films. In this instance, every major story beat is in the trailers. They literally tell us everything except the last ten minutes, and anyone who was reading comic books twenty years ago KNOWS what the ending is. Superman vs. Doomsday. You know how it ends.
Yes, that’s right. Doomsday kills Superman.
And that’s the culmination of the problem:
I didn’t care.
If Chris Reeves’ Superman had died in “Superman II,” I’d have been devastated (although then we’d have been spared the sequels, so that would’ve been a benefit.) Hëll, if Brandon Routh’s Superman had been killed in “Superman Returns,” I’d have been upset.
But when Cavill’s Superman died, I felt absolutely nothing. Indifferent. I wondered if they’d bring him back in future films as they did in the comics and realized that if they didn’t, I’d be fine with that. It would make the JLA films better because let’s face it, if Superman is on your side, you don’t really need anybody else (that’s why he was often off on some space mission in the old days, because otherwise he could’ve solved the JLA’s problem by page six.)
I didn’t care that Superman died because he was so utterly devoid of humanity that his fate was of no consequence to me. Because in the real world, we don’t care about gods. In the Marvel cinema universe, Thor is not a god. We know this because Odin says, “We are not gods,” so that’s pretty much that. So we care about Thor. We care about Jesus because he was human. We care about Hercules because he’s half human. But Cavill’s Superman is treated like a god and acts like a god, helping where and when he sees fit, but largely outside of humanity, as if life is some great party to which he is not invited. He doesn’t get us, he doesn’t understand us, he doesn’t see where his place in humanity is supposed to be. How am I supposed to care about someone who is so detached from the race among which he was raised?
Ultimately what it comes down to is that Marvel has set the tone and style for superhero films. The characters are consistently human (even when they’re raccoons.) The films are replete with humor. (There are exactly two jokes in BvS and they’re both in the trailers.) There is a sense of absurdity that you’re dealing with people in costumes, but the stakes are real enough that you gloss over that, as opposed to BvS where Gotham manages to clear out an entire section because the heroes are going to have a grudge match.
Is BvS worth seeing in a movie theater? Not sure there is any point in telling you that because chances are you’ve already seen it. If you ARE going to see it, then yes, see it in a theater. It’s big, it’s splashy, it’s insanely overblown, and your TV set is simply not large enough to contain it. But be prepared to see that the script does not serve one of its titular characters well, because as much as Luthor may declare that we’re going to see a battle of light vs. dark, day vs. night, we don’t really. At their core, Batman and Superman behave in identical fashion. They are both grim and gritty, both creatures of darkness. The only difference is that one of them cares too much and the other doesn’t seem to care enough.
PAD
• 
I remember telling people that my major problem with Man of Steel was “Too much Krypton, not enough Clark Kent.” And I do feel that’s the major issue here, as well. They’re downplaying Clark Kent, and Clark Kent IS Superman’s humanity. You can make Superman as unflappable as you care to, because later you’re going to see Clark spilling coffee on himself.
I cared about Superman in this film because I care about Superman, period. His death held no punch for me because I read “Death of Superman” and I KNOW he’s coming back (they announced months ago that he’d be in the Justice League film, and there was the heartbeat from his casket).
I thought Luthor did actually explain why he hates Superman. He hinted that he’d been abused by his father, and as such he’d come to the conclusion that God (who didn’t save him) couldn’t be both all powerful and completely good. He sees people acting as if Superman is a god, and it spurs that childhood anger in him. He sees Superman as either inherently weak or a moral fraud, and in either case he can’t stand him. Darkseid (who I assume is coming) probably makes a lot more sense to him.
Darkseid is definitely on the way. It’s all over that dream sequence Bruce Wayne has, which was clearly sent to him by someone. I didn’t recognize sho amidst all the digitized Kirby Krackle. Anyone see it better.
In the dream, we see a giant Omega carved into the ground, it looks like a firepit is in the background, and the flying humanoid insect creatures that show up in the fight there are clearly parademons once you get a good look at their faces.
I think it was Flash
I got the impression there was more to Luthor’s hate based on his flubbed speech at the library, where he started going off about how knowledge no longer equaled power because of metahumans. He had all the power, both in money and in scientific endeavor, but with Superman around suddenly his power was challenged.
I’m not sure I completely agree with you about the portrayal of Superman / Clark. I got the sense that he was written as if he was doubting not just his role as hero, but the lessons taught by his father. He’s questioning he whole belief system but he came off, as you said aptly, looking bummed out.
I watched the movie with my wife, who hasn’t read the Death / Return of Superman story. And for her and people like her, I felt the score of the movie could have given a better sense of hope. Specifically, the music could have faded or been completely eliminated to give more emphasis on the heartbeat. To me, it seemed to blend into the score. If it was missed, then the floating dirt was the only clue and glimmer of hope. It could have given the movie a slightly brighter ending in a mostly dark movie.
I too would jump into a bathtub with a naked Amy Adams.
You’re not wrong in what you say, Peter, but frankly, the whole god-man analysis is unimportant–not in the sense that your review is not insightful and well-written as usual, but in the sense that Terrio, Goyer, Snyder and co. fail to make me care about ANY of these characters, and it’s not because of the dichotomy between men and gods. It’s simply because the writing and directing is poor. The story is poorly and boringly structured (especially the first hour and 17 minutes), the dream sequence with the boom tube is not resolved in this film, which means it’s setup for the next ones (compare this with how Marvel explained the Infinity Stones in “Age of Ultron” in a way that was not only clear, but integrated with the plot of that movie), and of course, the tone of the film one-trick dark, desaturated, cynical bleakness of Snyder’s pony.
Even putting aside the plot holes–nay, plot caverns, like how Batman supposedly lures Doomsday to a Gotham port because he says it’s deserted, as if he doesn’t know that the battle might be dragged elsewhere, in part because Doomsday can fly), the movie, like Man of Steel, is just so joyless, it might as well be diagnosed as anhedonic. The whole thing just seems be a big two hour set up for a big brawl, for which Zach Snyder could reasonably called the Michael Bay of Superhero Films.
For the first feature film to feature the “Trinity”, and the first feature film appearance of Wonder Woman, it was a huge let down, and a huge waste.
Huge let down, huge waste? You’re too kind. I walked out. I got fed up with how they were screwing the characters into the ground. Batman tortures? Kills? Superman kills? And don’t mention MAN OF STEEL. There’s a difference between a nearly unstoppable Kryptonian psycho who can’t realistically be dealt with any other way and a North African warlord with a popgun. So he had a gun to Lois’ head. Supes could have stopped him various non-lethal ways without putting him through two heavy stone walls. But, if it is now OK for the boy scout to kill just ’cause, they’ve lost me. There were many other things, such as Luthor not knowing if he was supposed to be the Joker (honestly? Worst Luthor I can remember) or that the world seemed ready, practically eager, to pin the blame on Supes for a village full of locals … who were all SHOT. Or do they think he shoots bullets from his eyes? Or ignoring that truck full of bad guys equipped with an anti tank weapon so he can stop Batman who is himself trying to stop them? Painful, just painful. Not so much plot holes as thin bits of lace-like fabric surrounding empty air. Oh, yeah, was Caine not available? Because the new Alfred was about as believable as a manservant/butler as I am as a ballerina. Perry White telling Kent to lay off the bat because no one is interested??? Since day one in the comics he’s been the stuff of myths and legends. Of course people would be interested. Come on! The new entrance to his Bat lair? After I picked my jaw off the floor (I couldn’t believe they’d done that) I just laughed at how ridiculous it was. Or maybe it makes sense … if they don’t have Google Earth or other surveillance satellites in that universe. Just occurred, blaming Supes for the damage in MAN OF STEEL makes as much sense as blaming the military for the damage done to Pearl Harbor in WW II. If they weren’t there and so on.
Why are you saying Superman killed the guy when:
-The next scene he appears in he says that “I didn’t kill those men”. And Lois doesn’t counter with “you killed that guy”?
-The Senators aren’t all over him about that like with those other people.
-Lex doesn’t use it to his advantage.
-Martha says he’s not a killer.
-Superman saves Lex from Doomsday after he tries to kill Lois.
One could easily argue he punched through the walls and just carried the guy.
“-The next scene he appears in he says that “I didn’t kill those men”. And Lois doesn’t counter with “you killed that guy”?”
He was referring to the guys outside in the compound who were shot, not the one inside.
“-Superman saves Lex from Doomsday after he tries to kill Lois.”
That would imply consistency. In DARK KNIGHT, The Batman blasts cars out of the way (were there people inside? Did he care?), drives through a building, then drops his bike and risks injury/death to avoid harming the Joker???
“One could easily argue he punched through the walls and just carried the guy.”
Even if I bought that, which I don’t, the sudden acceleration G forces alone would have probably done him in. Remember Gwen Stacy’s broken neck in the SPIDER-MAN comics? The G forces involved were a lot less than those going from zero to supersonic+ in a small fraction of a second.
It wasn’t a coincidence this movie was release Eastern weekend. In addition to what you said other minor complaints I had were the use of out of focus cameras. I prefer when a director keeps things strategically out of frame or blocked things with objects to create suspense. Like Spielberg did the first time we see E.T. In this movie the sequence with the police officer entering the building and encountering Batman gave me a headache. Everything out of focus until the final reveal. I also felt Batman’s change of heart was too abrupt at the end of the fight.
This was a weird mix of Miller’s Dark knight Return with Superman’s Doomsday and the first meeting of the world finest. It was hard to turn of my brain from thinking each of this stories had very different versions of both Superman and Batman or happen at very different stages of their careers. Specially since there are so many “Easter eggs” or foreshadowing that rely on the viewer knowing DC comic history.
I was not bored but at the end I did not care.
I agree: Too much Kal-El, not enough Clark. We should see Superman struggling with the public perception of him. We get that brief scene with his mother, but all we hear is her advice, not his quandary. As much as I did actually like the film, this is probably the major flaw (plus a few plot holes I won’t go into here).
And her advice was not great either. Between Jonathan’s message that the world is not ready for Superman, that the world is going to fear him so he should let his father or anybody die in front of his eyes on Man of Steel and Martha’s message that he doesn’t own the world anything in this movie it is no wonder why Clark is all depress all the time. The big surprise is that he actually saves people some times.
I was one of the people who applauded at the end. Yes, this is a flawed movie, but it still kept me engaged. It’s the most ambitious superhero movie I’ve ever seen, and it was probably for that reason that I applauded. Yes, it bit off more than it could chew, but I think I appreciated the fact that it tried to do something different.
In a very strange way, I actually felt better about this film than Star Wars VII. While it was fun to be reminded of what makes Star Wars great, I couldn’t help feeling that I had already seen that movie before, and it was called A New Hope. Now, Force Awakens is better than Batman v Superman, but I appreciated BvS more. Maybe it’s because I like what the movie was trying to be, but just fell short of. In any sense, it could have been much, much worse. But the real tragedy is it had the potential to be sublimely magnificent.
I also felt better about Batman v Superman when I came out of it than I did about The Force Awakens. TFA is, for better or worse, an insubstantial nostalgia-fest. BvS tries to ask questions about power and its limitations.
I forgot to mention I did not like the score. Superman’s theme is two soft piano notes holding the second note for 15 seconds and then a third note held even longer and repeat. And Batman’s theme seem to be just a very loud TAN TAN TAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN and repeat.
Oh! My! God! They start with the most tired trope in comics (one that’s been done to death starting with Human Torch vs. Sub-Mariner in the 40s) and end it with . . . Superman dying, even though there’s no shock in that because, everyone knows he’s going to get better.
Yeah, pretty much.
PAD
Kryptonian trance? Revived and/or brainwashed by Darkseid? Time will tell.
The one thing that no movie Superman has gotten right since Christopher Reeve is he’s SuperMAN. He is the kind of man I’d hope to be, I’d hope my son is.
Word of mouth does not seem to have been kind – 37% drop from Friday to Sunday.
Huh. This was supposed to be a stand-alone comment. sorry.
From the trailers, from the reviews (including yours), I have concluded that what the filmmakers have really done is produce a movie about Alan Moore’s Marvelman/Miracleman…not any Superman by any set of creators since 1938.
I was thinking that he’s just apeing Doctor Manhattan again and again.
I’m not surprised that people applauded at the conclusion. I was happy it was finally over, too.
While the credits were rolling, a member of the clean-up crew let us know that there was no additional scene to wait for, and that we could leave. I asked, “You mean there’s absolutely nothing in this two and a half hours worth seeing?”
And I don’t care how many people claim to have heard a heartbeat at the end, I can tell you with confidence what you heard was this lump of excrement hitting the ground.
Anybody else trying to reconcile how Batman’s parents died is 1981 and at the time of the film Bruce has been fighting crime for 20 years? So when did the movie take place?
So the whole BvS fight could’ve been avoided if Clark had said at the outset, “My mother’s name is Martha”?
There really are no words to describe how violated I feel by this film. Well, there probably some but not on a family safe website.
With great characters, comes great responsibility. DC Cinematic Universe You failed. DC TV Universe, wash the pain away with the Supergirl-Flash crossover tonight.
Cinema Sins “Everything wrong with BvS” will 2 and 1/2 hours long.
–Edwin
Edwin, the movie takes place now. The Wayne’s were killed in ’81, Batboy trained until ’96 and he fought crime until 2016.
There’s a lot of problems with the story but this is not one of them.
Actually, that dovetails very nicely with Frank Miller’s Batman: Year One, where Bruce returns to Gotham and assumes the mantle of the bat in his twenty-fifth year.
Oh, yeah, Bruce’s parents’ death. Bad guy doesn’t hesitate to kill father, mother, yet lets the kid live who got a good look at his face??? If the audience sees it clearly, so does Bruce. Made no sense. Would have taken all of two seconds and it isn’t like one heard cops closing in.
I can actually see that. Someone who wouldn’t hesitate to gun down adults might have a thing against killing kids. Stupid that he apparently didn’t wear a mask or something (ain’t seen the movie, ain’t gonna) but not killing Bruce works. It’s like prison… rapists and murderers supposedly give child molesters a really hard time, because they prey on kids instead of adults like the rest of ’em.
I think when Moxxon was mastermind behind the Wayne death Chill was ordered to leave Bruce alive to confirm the story (random killing).
It is hard to rationalize Chill leaving Bruce alive. It basically signs his death warrant. How does he even get out of town? Batman’s origin in many ways doesn’t age well. Much of this is due to changes to the backstory over time. In 1939, the Waynes were a wealthy family but not the Gotham royalty they are today. Maybe I’ve watched a lot of LAW & ORDER but the murder of a family that prominent doesn’t go unsolved if the police or the DA want to keep their jobs. A child eye witness is not the best but he’s enough to capture the shooter within a few days.
“-The next scene he appears in he says that “I didn’t kill those men”. And Lois doesn’t counter with “you killed that guy”?”
He was referring to the guys outside in the compound who were shot, not the one inside.
“-Superman saves Lex from Doomsday after he tries to kill Lois.”
That would imply consistency. In DARK KNIGHT, The Batman blasts cars out of the way (were there people inside? Did he care?), drives through a building, then drops his bike and risks injury/death to avoid harming the Joker???
“One could easily argue he punched through the walls and just carried the guy.”
Even if I bought that, which I don’t, the sudden acceleration G forces alone would have probably done him in. Remember Gwen Stacy’s broken neck in the SPIDER-MAN comics? The G forces involved were a lot less than those going from zero to supersonic+ in a small fraction of a second.
Apologies for the duplicate (and misplaced) post. Odd posting problem.
As for Bruce being still alive, in earlier versions I got the feeling the killer’s face was either masked or in the shadows to the point where Bruce couldn’t have identified him so no real need to kill him. Not so in the movie where we plainly see the guy’s features.
Just to further add to your points, the problem with ‘Man of Steel’ and ‘BvS’ Superman is that his entire character is based on him being the other, so outside and above and beyond humanity that he is essentially, as you said, a God. He is an alien and is decidedly not human.
…which is, I think, a drastically incorrect interpretation of Superman.
I posit that Superman is NOT above and beyond humanity. Superman is NOT a God and Superman is NOT an alien.
Not only is Superman human, but he is the most human. Superman is a pure distillation of the best that humanity has to offer, and a patent refusal to understand that he is an alien in biological terms only harms the character and the ideal.
I have’ t seen the film yet but it sounds like it reflects what has happened to all of our fictional characters and the way they are portrayed. The heroes are amoral and flawed and the villains are maniacal psychos. I haven’t read any comics since the mid 90’s and do not know how the New 52 are portrayed. I grew up on the silver age comics and as corny as they are, at least you always knew Superman and Batman had high moral principals. Superman in particular had that small town clean living Judaeo/Christian vibe to him. Both the Christopher Reeves version and the Smallville program did a good job of showing us that. Man of Steel did away with that and I did not enjoy it so much. Movies are being reduced to long CGI scenes of destruction with no real story points to speak of.
On the other hand, the Supergirl series portrays Kara as being very human under her goddess facade. She cares about people, she cares about her city, and she even cares about her boss. We’ve seen her cry, we’ve seen her laugh, we’ve seen her sick, and we’ve seen her burned out. If Superman had been written this way, it sounds like the show would have been better.
Indeed. It seemed almost appropriate that last weekend’s debut of the Zack Snyder DC Cinematic Murderverse, we were (genuinely) treated to the Supergirl/Flash crossover episode of the former’s series. Someone needs to chain Snyder to a chair to watch that episode over and over again to see how it’s done.
–Daryl
Earlier today I saw a tweet which seemed spot out: Superman is not the story of a messiah, but of an immigrant. Snyder & WB seem to have forgotten that (along with anything resembling a bright color).
Just (finally) watched the animated version of The Dark Knight Returns. Been so long since i read it, i’m not sure how close it was.
But i suspect that the Batman/Superman throwdown was better than BvS…
I just watched these last night myself. Other than the odd decision to eliminate Bruce’s inner monologue/narration, I thought it was an almost perfect adaptation..
Just keep little kids out. Any child under thirteen who expects to see his heroes Batman and Superman will be at minimum disturbed and possibly traumatized enough to have to leave the theater crying.
This movie defines PG-13.
It’s also yet another example of why Zack Snyder was a great choice of director for Watchmen and such a lousy choice for Superman. I don’t wish anyone any lack of success in their professions, but I do wish Brad Bird was directing this franchise instead.
I couldn’t agree more with what you say about the plot not serving either character well, absolutely spot on. And as for Wonder Woman, well I was 14 when Lynda Carter adorned the outfit that dictated my taste in woman for decades to come and despite that Gal Gadot had me hooked right away.
I do think there were some more fundamental problems with it, too many dreams too many flashbacks and how many times do we need to see the death of Bruce Wayne’s parents? I have seen them die so many times in so many movies and TV shows I’m one step away from being glad their dead. The slide of the gun breaking the pearls was a spectacular concept but that one image as a flashback in the culmination of the “grudge match” would have said it all.
How many times do we need Batman backstory? Seriously anyone who would even think about seeing this film would have already seen multiple Batman movies. I thought the idea behind bringing in a seasoned version of Batman would be to save everyone yet one more re-telling of how he falls into a pit of bats, yet there it is.
I do like the conflicting opinions in the movie as to whether having Superman is a good thing or a bad thing, that is very real. The sheep can’t really tell the difference between the wolf and the sheepdog, the sheep only see that both have teeth. And yes Marvel started that line of thought in a few films.
DC / Warner rushed this and they rushed it to capitalise on the Marvel movies and Avengers success. I’m happy and sad to say Marvel are doing it better. The disappointment is that I loved the 2013 Man of Steel movie and any hopes for this franchise are now more than a little dashed.
For a script that was written by two writers. One an academy award winner and another guy (goyer) who’s written a bunch of comic book scripts while being over-seen by Snyder and with Affleck making changes to the script during filming and the fact that they delayed it an extra year, I’m surprised the movie still sucked…
I have to admit, I was really bored at the end – and yes, strangely, the Superman death had zero effect on me. But I was unable, ever, to emotionally connect with any of it. I think that’s partly the direction (when every moment of every scene is amped up to uber-meaningful-megadramatic, the result is that none of it is), but mainly it was the script.
The plot was fine, don’t get me wrong. Totally serviceable, and the anger worked within it, but the actual scripting itself….gads. I don’t know that there was ever any character interaction that ever seemed anywhere remotely near what any actual human beings would ever say to each other – under those circumstances, or any circumstances. So stiff, unnatural and contrived. As a result, I had no emotional engagement at all.
And as a postscript complaint… reducing Lex Luthor at the end to some kind of super-Renfield was NOT cool.
Well, PAD, after ‘Fantastic Four’, I take your reviews with a grain of salt 😉 but I agree with a lot of what you wrote. Other than Affleck being brilliant, I mean. I thought Batman was nearly as bereft of personality as Superman in this film, being one-note for most of the movie. Certainly the world’s greatest detective should have figured out that Luthor was messing with him. Wonder Woman, also, seemed a non-entity to me. I didn’t care for teenage Luthor/Joker either. I did like Jeremy Irons’ Alfred, though.
After Superman, the character who has received the most damage in these movies has been Jonathan Kent, who in ‘Man of Steel’ argued for letting children die, and in this movie argues that doing good is futile. Good Lord.
Can we please let Greg Berlanti take over the DC movie division?
Oh, and by the way, I’m a guy who didn’t see any of the trailers. I try to avoid trailers of movies I plan to see. I don’t watch previews of next week’s episode on
TV shows either.
To be fair, I don’t think the point Jonathan was trying to make is that “doing good is futile.” I think he was saying that one’s efforts to do good may have unintended consequences, and what’s viewed as good by one person may be viewed as bed by someone else. He was essentially saying “You’re not God, but keep doing your best.” That’s what I took away from it, anyway.
I see where you are coming from, I’m not agreeing or disagreeing. You make some great points. But the bottom line is that this is the Transformers of superhero films: It gave audiences exactly what they wanted. Loud, violent, abrasive, dark, explosive, in your face, apathetic…the list goes on. Everyone in the theater loved it. Does that mean it’s a good movie? of course not. People got what they wanted. Everyone I talked to over the weekend saw it which means a movie like this is going to have to appeal to the lowest common denominator. And can you really blame Warner for not going the Disney route with their films? The Marvel vs DC has been going on for decades and if they had tried to Disney-fy this franchise that would be conceding defeat from the onset. And we all know that isn’t they way the big two do things.
My default comment:
BvS was pretty dámņ good for what it is.
Of course, what it is is Warner Bros. saying “Marvel is eating our lunch and they’ve got nearly a decade’s head start, so please accept this two-and-a-half-hour offering of universe building in lieu of 12 well-crafted interlocking films.”
I spent about the first hour trying not to scream “GET ON WITH IT!” at the screen; Ikea furniture has less set-up time. When it finally GOT to the point of the movie, there were some things I liked, but others… Not so much.
Liked:
1. Visually amazing shots, nobody can deny that
2. Affleck doing his dámņdëšŧ to act the hëll out of that script, I’ll give him that
3. Gail Godot. Ðámņ. Perfectly regal, indeterminate accent adding to her otherworldliness, and as PAD stated, that GRIN in battle… The pre-movie haters be dámņëd, she killed that role.
4. I had reservations about Jeremy Irons, as he’s had a habit of gleefully devouring scenery lately, and he doesn’t quite LOOK old enough to have been the family butler since the days of Bruce’s parents, but his snarky charm won me over
The not so much:
1. Someone needs to tell DC/Snyder that “making the films more grounded in reality than Marvel” doesn’t necessarily have to mean “Bleak, joyless, and devoid of humor”. You have a flying alien with eye lasers and an immortal woman with a magic sword and lasso. “Reality” be dámņëd
2. While we were treated to Gail Godot peppered throughout the movie for her big reveal, I would have liked to see more of her as Wonder Woman instead of in the last 20-30 minutes of the film. That said…
3. After all that buildup in the media about the secondary characters, announcing the cast, revealing the photos, even building up Jason Momoa’s Aquaman as a “badass”… and they’re relegated to the equivalent of 30 second easter eggs? I know it’s set-up for the next film, but after all the pre-movie hype, PUT THEM IN THE FINAL ACT, FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!
4. Did nobody tell Jessie Eisenberg that the Joker’s already been cast? I understand he’s not “Lex”, but Lex’s son, and a totally different character, but… Is that a reason to make him a flailing, gibbering nutbar?
All in all, despite some moments where I really, really wanted to feel a lump in my throat, like Batman swearing to protect Martha, all emotion and heart got sucked out of the experience by the utter bleakness so by the end of the film, I was left numbly going “So that’s IT, is it?”
I agree with you 100%, but I had two other complaints — it was too dark (not in tone, but actually dark — God, does it rain ALL the time in Gotham?) and too loud (I had a headache by the end of the film). But you are right. By the end of the film where Superman “died,” I did not care. Bad movie. But for some reason, a lot of people seem to like it.
Just saw it and cumming in as sumone who hated MoS, I was prepared to be let down by this… but I rly liked it thru and thru.
The emotional beats were well hit and stayed true to the characters. Take the opening for example. I had originally thought it to be a simple (and redudant) way to clean the slate and introduce us to our new Batman even though we all know his origin. Instead it plays a key role in turning the tide of the fight. And how beautiful was it that as Batman is about to stab Superman in the heart with a kryptonite spear, it’s Superman who stabs Batman’s heart by uttering a familiar name. At the heart of the matter, it’s a tale of two fûçkëd in the head orphans who have to process their grief in different ways.
I loved the visual of Bruce comforting that little gurl among the rubble, it felt cheesy in the trailer but came off as emotionally real in the actual film and tells you all you need to know about Bruce. He’s been orphaned and he’s never going to let alone relive that pain if he can help it. Likewise the part in the trailer where Ma Kent tells Clark he doesn’t owe humanity a dámņ thing cums off as dickish. But in the film, it works becuz you realize his sacrifice isn’t really for Earth, it’s for the two women in his life that he loves moar than life itself. And having failed his adoptive father once to protect his own self interests, he wasn’t going to make that mistake again.
There were a couple of interesting choices, like having Bruce be an actual lush and womanizer as opposed to just faking it for posterity.
Like MoS before it, this movie plays VERY VERY fast and loose with the secret identities but overall it works for me. I had wondered where they were going with the Lois Clark relationship after MoS without the comedic safety of will she see past the glasses to fall back to. But here it rly works, they have a clearly healthy nurturing relationship. The scene where he steps in the tub fully clothed absolutely killed it for me. Superman isn’t dark and brooding, this is a guy who celebrates and enjoys life. The woman he loves is laying there naked and beautiful in front of him. Hëll yea hes going to get in that fûçkìņg tub with her and have sex. It’s all a part of celebrating life.
Speaking of Lois, while they had to play the usual beats of him saving her several times. I like how it was played that anytime she was facing death she essentially never really worried. She has complete faith in Clark. Shades of Lois in the hands of the giant robot in All-Star Superman.
I know Lex is a heartless bášŧárd but it seemed weird to me that he would so casually kill Mercy. Why introduce a named character, build her up, then kill her off before she has time to shine. Same with the death of Doctor Hamilton in MoS, it annoyed me then and annoyed me nao.
As ironic as it sounds, I was actually very happy that Batman was given so little to do during the Doomsday fight. One of the most annoying things about the Avengers movies is seeing Hawkeye and Black Widow take out an army of Ultrons and Chitauri as easy as Thor or Iron Man. If normals can do everything that supers can, then the powers lose all meaning and sense of scope and wonder. Here Batman knows he’s outmatched and wisely stays outside the fight. This makes Superman’s sacrifice especially relevant as it’s clear only he can do what’s necessary.
Lastly the funeral scene worked for me as well. Normally I find them to be trite, superhero funerals in particular. Here the emotional beat feels earned from his relationship with Lois and Ma Kent. Likewise Batman absolutely would terrorize the šhìŧ out of Lex in prison for killing his bff. This isn’t the moar emotionally grounded Morrison Batman, this is the “Gød-Ðámņ” Batman of Frank Miller. A clearly messed up in the head guy plowing thru one night stands, blowing people away and terrorizing the people he has reason to hate. Though I was surprised he didn’t brand Lex. It came off as him admitting defeat and retreating with his cape between his tail to Lex’s prophecy of the bell alrdy having been rung (cue Darkseid).
But yes overall I loved it. The emotional beats worked. The characters (Bruce in particular) were true to their nature. And the stakes, particularly during the BvS fight felt emotionally real.
Let’s try to get this in the right place:
Word of mouth does not seem to have been kind – 37% drop from Friday to Sunday.
ehhh……..personally I thought the movie was done about as well as could be considering all the hype and unrealistic expectations from the fans. and it seems like the overwhelming majority of bad reviews came from people who wanted this movie to suck, people who had no idea what it was about and people who found one thing to go after and crucify it.
A lot of stuff went over people’s heads and others were too busy focusing on trying to find what all was wrong with the film instead of just trying to enjoy it. What it boils down to is there are millions of people who wanted this movie to be tailor made to their exact taste so of course not everybody is going to get what they want.
I thought Snyder did a great job at incorporating so many storylines into one so that it seemed like the ultimate DC Universe. True fans appreciated what he did even if it wasn’t “perfect”. I also thought Cavill was spot on as Superman. People complaining that he should have had Clark slipping on banana peels don’t seem to get what they are trying to do with this franchise.
Since you want to bring up the Christopher Reeves movies….okay. Hey I like them as much as the next person……big part of my childhood. But can you seriously sit there and say watching those movies in 2016 that those movies didn’t have a ton of flaws or were poorly written? Superman flying around the earth to turn back time? Kissing Lois to erase her memory? The whole giving up his powers crap? Throwing the cellophane “S” symbol at Zod? Criminal mastermind Luthor has the same plot in every movie….real estate schemes. And those are the good 2 movies.
Snyder and Cavill did their own take on a modern day Superman with modern day problems. No they don’t show him rescuing a cat from a tree or telling a kid they need to brush their teeth 3 times a day. And BTW Superman IS an alien…..a fact that everybody çráppìņg their pants won’t let go. That’s the entire plot of this movie. They are trying to decide if he’s too dangerous and powerful. And if so, what do they do? What CAN they do? And despite him wanting to help, he doubts whether he should as often as he does or if he should even do it at all.
It is a subtle nod to Kingdom Come where humanity sort of gives up aspiring to achieve greatness because there are super beings everywhere. Which is ultimately Luthor’s problem. If not for Superman’s presence, someone like him would be looked up to as “powerful”. Like I said earlier, a lot of the weight of the story is lost on way too many people who were ready to pick apart Eisenberg’s portrayal or Luthor or to see how bad Affleck would be as Batman or wondering why they have 2 superheroes fighting in the first place or why Batman was ripping off Iron Man’s armor.
One critic tore this movie apart due to how Lois and Martha Kent were made to look weak and needed to be saved as well as bashing them for the lack of backstory on “Jenny” from the Daily Planet and the woman in Bruce’s bed. So in a movie called Batman v Superman, based on a comic book, and introducing 4 other superheroes and some villains, this critic was stuck on the way the background characters weren’t given enough screen time and that’s why in their opinion the movie was just absolutely the worst.
And there were some others like that. Some actually said they wanted the movie to do poorly so that Snyder would be replaced even though they admitted it wasn’t a bad movie. At this point it just seems to be trendy to s— all over it. And I’m sure when Civil War premieres it’s going to be just the greatest thing ever put on film according to these same people. The bottom line is I don’t think anyone else could have done this movie any better. It’s okay if you personally didn’t like it but don’t try to convey that into some final judgement that it’s the worst movie of all time. I think people that were scared off by all the bad reviews will eventually check it out on DVD/Blu Ray and more likely than not end up liking it and wondering what all the negativity was about. Honestly I think a good portion of it was just a smear campaign to hurt sales in advance seeing as how Civil War will be dealing with the exact same issues.
Okay, you went and invoked ‘Kingdom Come’ in your comment, so I get to talk about how I think KC perfectly illustrates the mistake Snyder et al have made with this latest incarnation of Supes.
Take a look at this quote, said by the character Norman McCay to Superman in the aftermath of the grand finale:
“Listen to me, Clark. Of all the things you can do…all your powers…the greatest has always been your instinctive knowledge…of right…and wrong. It was a gift of your own humanity. You never had to question your choices. In any situation…any crisis…you knew what to do. But the minute you made the super more important than the man…the day you decided to turn your back on mankind…that completely cost you your instinct. That took your judgement away. Take it back. If you want redemption, Clark…it lies in the very next decision you make. Make it as a man…and make it right.”
To me, this absolutely nails the essence of Superman, and the flawed being he became within the comic itself. Mark Waid’s story is very much about a Superman who has lost touch with his humanity. And yet, KC’s Superman STILL comes across as more human and caring than Snyder’s, who seems to never have had that connection in the first place.
I imagine KC was a source of inspiration for the film, but once again they only seemed to delve as deeply as a few cool images and vague ideas.
Excellent review, Mr David. I’ve been a big fan of your work for years. I’ve got so many things in my head concerning this movie and while I don’t mind Zack Snyder delivering his own take on the DC universe I felt the execution was so flawed.
The film is of course visually stunning but its more like a bunch of cool looking loosely strung together images than an actual story that connects in any sense of the word. There’s no engaging flow of events. Zack Snyder seems to be more interested in Superman as this stoic monolithic image than as a man. He’s like a stand in for Dr Manhattan in a film more inspired by Snyder’s own Watchmen than the characters he’s using. Things are done because they are “cool” not because they would work well to develop the story.
There was such lazy blatantly convenient script writing throughout. Characters motivations were touched on then not developed enough. B plots were there just to give certain actors things to do that destracted from the main story while others things weren’t given enough time or attention. The film was overstuffed and undercooked.
Superman came off like hypocrite when it came to his issues with Batman and many of the characters became easily gullable morons when the story needed them to be. Superman saving strangers seemed more like a chore or burden than something he was happy to do and even that was only paid lip service. Most of it was done in a montage. It’s like Snyder had no interest in covering the basic thing Superman does that makes him Superman: helping people. He wanted to get right to the angst and alienation. That doesn’t make for a well rounded character in a story like this.
Lois Lane did certain things not because they made sense but because she needed to be rescued or build to an action sequence. Like you said I just didn’t care about what was going on. So many things didn’t feel like they were fully developed or earned. Two examples being Batman and Superman putting their differences aside or the death of Superman.
Batman’s a 20 year veteran and a great detective but he never suspected that some other party was playing him for a reason with those notes and other things? Affleck was excellent but this was a case of the actor rising above the material. His Batman had more to do and was better developed but there were still problems with what he was given to work with.
I thought using Excalibur to foreshadow things ahead was actually pretty clever but this wasn’t a Superman who had earned so much of the worlds admiration compared to his comic book counterpart. It felt more like a way to get them out of the corner they’d written themselves into with the character and the way the world perceived him by using a quick fix solution. They don’t do as good a job showing why Superman had to make that choice to sacrifice himself. If they’d done that, shown why he HAD to do it when no one else could, as well as make him a relatable character with a fuller range of emotion it might have mattered. X-men 2 pulled off a similar ending far better because Jean Grey was more of a well rounded person and we saw how devastated the people who loved her most were. The King Arthur reference was also handled much better in X2.
The film needed to be more Batman v Superman and less Dawn of Justice. I’m glad DC has kicked off their own film universe but sometimes keeping certain things simple works best.
Hey, unrelated question: I’m just now watching Young Justice and wanted to know if you or any of the writers are fans of Wolf’s Rain? I’ll probably never receive an answer to this, so I’ll also say that I’m fans of both shows.
There must have been some kind of references here, tho. Must have been.
I understand every argument Mr. David is putting up, and I respect his opinion even when I disagree with it.
I’ve been reading comics since 1965. I know the Death of Superman storyline, so I understood what was coming.
I still watered up at the end.
When Superman was standing in the rubble after the bomb went off, I took it as read that he already knew nobody was dead, given his speed and super-senses.
Given how poorly-executed the previous film was, I was surprised at how much I enjoyed this one.
Your mileage varies.
Spoilers.
Here’s another reason why Superman’s murder didn’t have enough impact: We know he’s going to come BACK. At least, anyone who’s even remotely familiar with the comics knows it. Even the average audience member who hasn’t picked up a comic book in his/her life will have probably heard about “that thing where Superman got killed for a while.”
In stark contrast, Han Solo’s death in TFA has an authentic punch to it, since A) Harrison Ford is well over 70 and can’t simply resume the role as if he were 35 again, and B) whatever was left of Solo vaporized with the destruction of Starkiller Base. Even the idea of Solo coming back as a force-ghost is a stretch, as his character wasn’t force-sensitive to begin with.
I still think that scene defines the movie, honestly. When we were first introduced to Han Solo in ANH, he was an amoral smuggler (mostly) looking out for number one. But his final act was one of optimism, reaching out to his son, hoping to bring him back to love and warmth. It just seemed like an appropriate way for the character to bow out. To be frank, I jump over the scene with my remote every time I watch the movie at home. I haven’t done that since Mufasa’s death in LION KING. Murder and mayhem are so commonplace in contemporary sagas like GAME OF THRONES, the audience grows numb to it. Solo’s murder flung me back to my childhood, for better or worse.
Zack Snyder is a filmmaker too much in love of bloodletting to “feel” anything for the meatbags populating his movies. If you want to see a better adaptation of Superman’s fate at Doomsday’s hands, you’re better off with the 2007 straight-to-video cartoon:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=48VQnq5ejTw
Finally saw it yesterday and I needed to watch some Batman:Brave & Bold after.
Fresh complaint. After seeing what these writers think a midwest funeral is like, I’d like to let them know that we have funeral parlors and real cemetaries just like the rest of the country. When they had to drive directly through the middle of a cornfield, my eyes rolled. I’m glad it wasn’t an open casket funeral or we would have seen how Martha dressed Clark in his favorite flannel shirt and bib overalls.
From The AV Club/a>:
I point out that Zootopia has been running since 4 March.
Oops. Moderator/whoever: Please delete my previous, messed-up version of this comment
From The AV Club:
I point out that Zootopia has been running since 4 March.
Good casting, the plot was awesome, Lex was awesome, great fight. good start to form justice league. ending is great too … he will be back.
It makes sense! It all does!
IF, as one friend put it, these bozos are the core of what’s to become the vilainous Injustice League and the coming of the Justice League means the real heroes doing a dimension hop to this grim universe where they’ll kick these pretenders; butts. Hey, I’d pay to see that.
Absolutely agree, Peter. I remember listening to an interview of Richard Donner and Tom Mankiewicz and they said the difficult part about making a superhero movie is on one hand you must take the characters seriously, but not make them unrelatable. They also said Christopher Reeve was such a good actor that he was able to accomplish that duel need. The Marvel movies, especially Iron Man and Captain America, accomplish this very well.
Not to be contrary to the people who like this film, but I was recently struck by the revelation that for me, this movie didn’t have “That moment”, the big one in a movie, that gets you.
Certainly nothing that can compare to that time in 1980, when the phrase “General… Would you care to step outside?” got an audience full of grown adults on their feet and whooping with joy.
The closest I came to such a moment was referenced by Mr. David. When Wonder Woman has been smacked by Doomsday, smiles, and launches herself back into the fight.
There was of course, nothing even close to that from Superman