Batman V Superman - Missed Opportunities all around. (My Review)

***WARNING…This will be FILLED with SPOILERS.  I’m going to go into what I liked and didn’t.  It’s going to be filled with plot points and the ending…so you are warned***

Ok…I’ve waited till I’ve seen the movie twice.  One on a small screen (Don’t ask) and one on the big screen.  So this is coming off two complete viewings. 

My first reaction was “This movie SUCKS”.  On a second viewing…I’m going to say…it doesn’t suck…but this could have been so much more.

Let me say first…I come from a comic geek background.  Most of you know I wear a Green Lantern ring regularly.  I have always been a DC fanboy and like everyone else…I’ve waited for this movie for a LONG time. I’ve read many interpretations of the Batman Vs Superman fight and seeing it on the big screen has always been a childhood dream. 

So why am I unhappy?

Because I think the suits at Warner Bros. have screwed this up.  In an effort to catch Marvel…it’s obvious this movie was rushed.  I think it started simply enough.  It was just going to be the sequel to Man of Steel.  Then we started hearing rumblings of Batman in it.  Then we heard Wonder Woman.  Then the casting of Cyborg, Flash (TOTAL miscast…I’ll get there) and Aquaman.  Coincidentally (not really) they started bloating this movie after Avengers became a MAJOR success.  It then started making Zach Snyder and others start thinking how DC can get into the game of creating a cinematic universe.

This is where they went wrong. 

I think in their haste to play catchup…what we have in this film is that Batman V Superman is literally trying to be FOUR movies in one.  In some ways I think they started making a straight Man of Steel sequel involving congress, Lex Luthor, holding Supes accountable for his actions, rescuing Lois etc.  Then someone said “What if we make a Dark Knight Returns for the big screen”?  If you’ve not read comics…Dark Knight Returns is a mini series put out in 1986 which saw an older Batman come out of retirement to make a go of cleaning up Gotham and the final act of it consists of Superman being sent to take him down which results in a MAJOR fight between the two that had been building over years.  Then it seems someone thought they want to make a Justice League movie…so they should add Wonder Woman….so why not have her show up and we can just have snippets of other leaguers.   Finally then someone said “WHY DON’T WE MAKE THAT DEATH OF SUPERMAN MOVIE WE TRIED TO DO IN THE 90’S?” and like a top heavy game of Jenga…the weight comes crashing down. 

Now in some ways…that’s not an impossible task.  If executed properly a bloated movie CAN work.  It requires great writing and better editing.  It requires knowing who your characters are and choosing the snippets that show the audience the most in the shortest time.  It can be done.  However, this movie didn’t do that.  In fact this movie FAILS spectacularly at it.  Starting with the writing by David Goyer (a true comic book film HACK who for some reason KEEPS getting work.) we see a film that has NO sense of characterization.  The point of the Justice League is that it’s a TEAM.  A team made up of individuals with different personalities and types.  What Goyer did with this (and with Man of Steel) was make Superman into a brooding loner with daddy issues who tries to do good.  In this film we’re introduced to Batman who is a brooding loner with daddy (and Mommy) issues who tries to do good.  With Wonder Woman we got a brooding good looking loner with…well we have NO idea HER motivation at all.   The writing WAS bad…no doubt there.  However what also was bad was the directing/editing.  Starting with the directing/tone.  I think Zach Snyder needs to stay as far away from this franchise as possible.  Simply put…his visual style lends itself to Gotham/Batman and NOT the Man of Steel.  The main issues I had with MOS were his choices on tone, palette and style.  Superman isn’t supposed to be dark, brooding, insecure or gritty…he’s the boy scout.  The optimist.  The yin to Batman’s yang, which is WHERE the conflict with them almost ALWAYS comes from.  By making Superman into this brooding, apathetic mess…they take the grandeur out of the character.  I understand in today’s society how writing Superman convincingly can be hard.  There’s a major ‘cheese factor’ line you have to navigate…but it CAN be done.  Snyder (working with Goyer) have made a Superman who is obtuse…alien and not at all human which is a defining part.  It’s almost like they asked DC if they could make another Batman movie (after the Nolan trilogy), and DC was like “We want to let it rest…but you can do Superman if you want” and they decided to try putting Bruce Wayne into Clark Kent’s pajamas.  It just doesn’t work.  Overall…the directing on these two films is tonally wrong from a foundation standpoint.

The reason I bring up editing is that in this movie especially…David Brenner just dropped the ball.  Now I researched him and I have enjoyed other movies he has worked on…so I suspect he did the best with what he had.  However…the whole movie is edited poorly.  There’s a scene about an hour in where Clark isn’t at his desk and Perry White comes out looking for him.  He asks someone about Clark’s whereabouts and they say they don’t know and he quips about maybe he’s flying back to Kansas.  Now here…an editor would probably SHOW where Clark is…since the question was asked…but nope.  They cut to Lois Lane in Washington…THEN to Bruce Wayne…THEN to Lex Luthor…THEN back to Bruce.  We don’t see Clark for like 10 minutes.  It’s BAD editing and lacks REAL flow.

I can forgive them rushing Justice League.  The day of comics driving content is over.  I know now that these movies and TV shows will dictate how my comics move forward…but what I am having a hard time swallowing is BAD filmmaking.  I think it starts right at the beginning…this script is SLOPPY. 

Literally by trying to cram SO much into this movie…they leave MAJOR plot holes.  I’ll try to recall a few of them below:

1: Lois Lane.  She went from being a strong independent and incredibly self-sufficient journalist…to Maid Marion of Robin Hood Prince of Thieves.  She became a plot device…and one that is MAJORLY misused.  Why would Perry White get her a chopper just on her word?  Why would she not be called in front of congress when the stuff came down about Africa?  WHY IN THE WORLD DID SHE GET RID OF THE SPEAR?!?!?!  She served no PURPOSE in the last battle than to be rescued and to cry.  It was a waste.

2: Wonder Woman.  Her WHOLE motivation in this movie is getting her hands on a photo.  One in which she’s seen and it’s from 1917.  Ok.  She doesn’t want people to know she’s old…ok.  SO then why is she working so hard to get a file from Luthor…when at the end of the day…Bruce was making a COPY of the file.  He wasn’t DESTROYING the server…he was COPYING it.  Luthor STILL has it. Her taking it from Bruce served NO purpose.   It was ridiculous.  Granted her and Affleck have MAJOR chemistry and I liked her overall…but man this struck out to me as a bad hole.

3: The Flash.  OK…I’m a MAJOR Flash fan.  I’m upset that they’re not using the one from the TV show cause he’s INCREDIBLE and a PERFECT Barry Allen.  This one is a hipster wannabe.  Ezra Miller is COMPLETELY miscast here.  It’s awful.  I can get around that…but oye.  Still Flash can travel in time…and I guess that’s ok…but HOW did he insert himself into a dream?  Bruce was DREAMING when Barry showed up (and I loved it overall…especially cause it kinds harkened back to Crisis on Infinite Earths when Barry did something similar)….that isn’t a power that Barry has EVER had.  Now maybe they’ll show him using Metron’s chair to do this (yes…apokolips is in here too.  Even MORE stuff to cram in)…but by not showing us now it comes off as just a stupid device.

4: THE BIGGEST hole/contrivance of all.  Martha.  Let me get this straight…Batman feels he must take Superman down for how he answers to no one.  He’s a menace and an alien and people DIE when he’s around.  `I can sort of understand that as they showed his motivation in act one with how he reacted to the loss of Waynetech’s tower in MOS.  Yet when he has Superman on the ropes and is going to finish him (by killing him…which is SO Batman…right?  I’ll get there…) he stops when Clark says they’re going to kill Martha.  This makes Bruce stop, and ask what he means because (as they showed us 80 times in the film) Bruce’s mother was ALSO named Martha (something I did notice as a kid but just thought that Kane and Finger got lazy).  When Lois (who shows up for NO reason at all other than to deliver this news and be a damsel in distress) tells him it’s Clark’s mother, Batman learns the error of his ways and they’re all Super Friends.  It’s the worst reason to end the fight EVER.  There were literally 5 other ways to probably do the same thing without the contrivance of a shared name between two women.  Bruce could have been in danger of dying and Clark saves him, or saves a small child from death who looks like the little girl Bruce saved, or any number of other devices.  By using this reasoning to stop…it makes Bruce look petty and ridiculous.  Five minutes later when Doomsday (YES…they also have Doomsday…we’ll get there) shows up…they’re now quipping with each other and high fiving like old buddies.  It’s stupid. 

5: BATMAN DOESN’T KILL!!!  Yet in this movie he commits vehicular homicide like 300 times.  His ‘no killing’ rule is part of the character’s DNA.  Same with his ‘No Guns’ rule…it plays to his psychosis.  Yet in the ‘future dream’ we see…he’s actually SHOOTING people.  I don’t see how there’d ever be a world where Batman would pick up a gun…because of how his parents were killed…he can’t do it.  Snyder doesn’t get it.

I think my biggest issue with the movie from a foundational story perspective is that (especially with seeing a preview for Civil War before the movie) this movie didn’t EARN the right to have these two fight.  In the Marvel universe…it took five movies before they even had a team up…and we’ve seen Cap and Iron Man work together…so now when they’re about to fight…we as an audience feel like we have some ‘skin in this game’.  We have a ‘relationship’ with the characters that makes us predisposed to care about the outcome of this fight.  In BVS however, we’ve got a new Batman we barely know (though he is WITHOUT a doubt the STAR of this film) and a Superman few really like.  We’re not really at the point of caring about these two being different…and by rushing it, they short change the real philosophical differences the characters have which could serve a conflict between them so much better in a later movie which adds to the movie’s bloat…since they now have to concoct a reason for these two to fight having never met each other.  They should have waited at least until after Justice League 2…it would have given a natural progression and given us as an audience time to like them.

From a character standpoint.  I’m mostly ok.  I loved Affleck as Batman/Bruce Wayne.  As this was an ensemble picture…we didn’t get to see much of Bruce the playboy…but I think Affleck can pull this off.  Amy Adams did good as Lois…though again she didn’t have as much to work with.  She served more as a plot device/distraction than anything else.  Henry Cavill as Superman has never worked for me.  The character as written is too detached and aloof.  In this ‘sequel’ it gets worse.  It’s just not good.  He does decent work…but I think he misses the fun of being Superman.  Jeremy Irons KILLS it as Alfred in my opinion.  He’s snarky, smart and fun.  Everytime he was on the screen…I wanted more.  Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman was amazing.  She’s still ‘feeling’ out her character…but I loved the nuance of the performance.  The way she’d smile when Doomsday hit her as if to say “now this is a fight…let’s go”.  My major issue was with Jesse Eisenburg as Lex Luthor.  Ok…I get it.  We live in a new day and the billionaire genius would probably be a hipster doofus with a god complex…but there’s still a part of me that wants to see Lex be diabolical, in control, the mastermind.  What we had here was a sniveling brat with a mild touch of Asperger’s and no depth at all.  It’s like the Jon Cryer character from Superman IV suddenly became Lex.  I get that they wanted to do something different…but in this case different could have been closer to the comics.  See in 1985 they changed Lex from the evil mastermind villain into a corporate industrialist with incredible intellect.  His legitimate business made him almost untouchable and gave him resources so that every time Superman and Lex fought…Lex usually didn’t have to pay for his crimes.  Instead of the “Zuckerberg Lex”…what if we got the “Donald Trump Lex”?  Someone who’s shrewd and who’s intellect was his most powerful weapon and he hated Superman because of the fact he's unchecked and rivals Lex for the adoration of the millions of Metropolis citizens.  In some ways…I hope that the father Jesse spoke of isn’t dead.  That he comes back and is the Lex we all want.  Cast Clancy Brown (the voice of Lex from the cartoon) in the role and you’ll win back a ton of trust. 

There were good points.  The bit with the ‘Trinity’ (Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman) standing ready to go toe to toe with Doomsday was AMAZING.  The bits with Parademons, and the allusions to a possible “Injustice: Gods Among Us” (a DC elseworlds video game where Superman went bad after Lois was killed) were not lost on me.  It’s just I found myself so upset at bad choices. 

The film isn’t bad.  It’s just too bloated and the people at the top just don’t have the talent to cut and prune this into something that makes sense.  They tried to shoehorn so much into this.  Even the Apokolips stuff (which is where all the ‘dream sequences’ were pointing to.  In fact we saw Parademons which was AWESOME) seemed out of place.  Frankly going the Darkseid route can be either an awesome spectacle or a TERRIBLE gamble.  Most people don’t GET Darkseid.  It requires a lot of investment into the Jack Kirby ‘Fourth World’ and is pretty cosmic in comparison to the Avengers.  They should hold that off for a sequel…but I think it’s going to be what it is. 

I want to see Ben Affleck’s Batman movie. I think he’s amazing in the role and as he’s writing and directing it…I think it’ll be what we want.  I want to see the dual personas of Batman and his mask Bruce Wayne.  I want Alfred to kick butt.  I want to see what happened to Robin (loved the costume with the Joker writing) and I want to see him fight someone new like Killer Croc, Mad Hatter, or even a new Poison Ivy. 

Finally I want to talk about the final battle with Doomsday.  This was the most pointless plot point of the movie and disappointed me so much.  It served no purpose except for removing Superman from the board.  Worse is now I’ve seen a Death of Superman story and it left me feeling cheated.  This should have been its own film.  Like the comic series of 91…the whole movie could have had this 

creature inching closer to Metropolis and in the last half it’s a knockdown dragout.  In fact…if they 

avoided the Batman V Superman altogether and instead had a Dark Knight of Steel movie…where in the first act you have Bruce investigating Lex Luthor and his machinations with the Kryptonians while Clark is answering for the destruction of Metropolis in MOS…then have them meet and go after Doomsday at the halfway mark and spend the rest of the flick introducing leaguers and having Batman, Wonder Woman and Superman go at this…only to have Supes fall in the last moments of the battle…you’d have a MUCH better movie and a better springboard to a Batman V Superman we’d want to see.  You’d still have a launching point for JLA and you’d have made sense.  What BVS is really at its core…is a missed opportunity. 

If I were rating this movie on a scale of 1 to 5 stars…I’d give it 2.  There’s so many plot holes, contrivances and so much bloat that the story is STRANGLED and takes away from the performances.  I know there’s talk of an extra half hour of footage that will make this into an R-Rated movie on Blu-Ray.  I for one don’t think that adding to the bloat will help.  This shouldn’t be an epic movie.  It’s a super hero movie.  Keep it at 2 hours and cut and prune it so that the pacing doesn’t suffer.  By adding more I think  you’re finally going to weigh this movie down so that the only way to get it is if Aquaman goes to the bottom of the ocean to rescue it.

Thanks for Reading.