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Spoilers Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice - Grading & Discussion

Grade the movie...


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I saw it this morning, and while it's not quite up to the level of the first Avengers, or The Winter Soldier, I still enjoyed it. I give it a sold A-.
I actually really enjoyed the overall story, and thought that it flowed together a lot better than people make it sound. The beginning does jump around quite a bit as they set up all of the characters and storylines, but I thought once things got moving the rest of it flowed together pretty well and came together into a cohesive whole. At first my biggest problem was that the Knightmare scene did feel a little random, but since this is the biggest set up for Justice League I was going to wait to see if it was addressed there. Now that I've thought about it more I'm actually not as bothered by it. The end bit with The Flash still feels a little random, but I realize now that in this story alone, it really does a lot to show Batman's mind set and his fears about what Superman is.
Ben Affleck was amazing as Batman. I thought they did a really good job of bringing in a lot of the different aspects of the character, his resourcefulness, his strategist and his investigating. He does kill a lot of people, but I've honestly never been that bothered by Batman killing. He's already such a dark, violent character that him killing people doesn't really feel like that big of a step away from what he's usually like. I also think it's worth keeping in mind that this movie sees him in an incredibly dark place. With the way they end his arc, I could easily see him stepping away from killing.
I really liked what they did with Superman here, it feels like a more realistic take on the character. I can see the appeal of the big blue boy scout version of the character, but it's always felt a little unrealistic to me. I think in the Marvel style of movie that character could work, but it would just wouldn't fit in this world. The reaction to Superman, which is what makes up a big part of his arc also felt very realistic to me.
Wonder Woman was awesome here. We also got a nice bit of set up, and hints as to what her movie will be about.
Jessie Eisenber's Lex Luthor was a bit odd, and not really how I see the character. He did a great job, and it worked as a character in general, but it just wasn't didn't feel like Lex Luthor. I've never really seen him as a crazy character, just as someone who did bad things for what he saw as good reasons. I saw someone mention up thread the theory that Esienberg's character was the original Lex's son, and I actually did have the same thought briefly during his conversation with Lois on the rooftop. His last scene also presented a very exciting possible explanation for his behavior. I'm really looking forward to that being followed up on.
The rest of the supporting cast also did a great job. Amy Adams especially got some good stuff as Lois.
I loved the scene setting up Cyborg, Flash and Aquaman. I'm a huge fan of Eureka, so I got a big kick out of seeing Joe Morton as Cyborg's father.
The action scenes were great. I especially loved the warehouse fight that was released online. I'm a huge fan of the Arkham games, and it almost felt like a movie version of one of their fight sequences. The big BvS fight was also really cool and the big Trinity vs Doomsday fight was amazing. One of my favorite things about the Avengers movies was the scenes were we saw the heroes using their abilities together, and I thought they did all of that stuff incredibly well here. I love that it took each of them using their abilities to finally kill Doomsday.
I wasn't at all bothered by Superman's death. I thought it was a good conclusion to his story through the movie, and it was also pretty clearly a set up for JL. His death here served a similar purpose to Coulson's death in Avengers. I might have misinterpreted it, but the impression I got from Bruce and Diana's conversation at the end was that with Superman now gone, they wanted to bring together the other metahumans to help protect the world in his place. It is also very clearly set up in the last shot that he'll be back sooner than later. I really hope he doesn't come back right away at the beginning of JL though. I'm hoping that they we get to see Darkseid set up a bit as big massive threat that they need Superman to defeat before he shows back up. His return really needs to feel like a event, and I think a great way to do that would be for the rest of the League to be at the verge of being defeated before he shows up to save them.
Like a lot of you I never realized that both Batman and Superman's mothers were named Martha. I loved the scene when they find that our, and that that was what brought them together.
 
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^
It's a shame that they'd just kill off Jimmy like that.

Yeah, it sucks. to me, this quote made it worse:

“We just did it as this little aside because we had been tracking where we thought the movies were gonna go,” Snyder tells EW, “and we don’t have room for Jimmy Olsen in our big pantheon of characters, but we can have fun with him, right?”

Yeah, Snyder, killing off characters is super fun, especially well known ones that are usually a decently big part of the Superman mythos. Also, "we don't have room for Jimmy Olsen" is BS, but whatever. Its just Snyder being Snyder at this point, I shouldn't be surprised.
 
One little thing that bothered me.

We had a Batman movie with...
...the KGBeast...
...and we never saw him in costume. :)
 
^ Good catch.
Yeah, Snyder, killing off characters is super fun, especially well known ones that are usually a decently big part of the Superman mythos. Also, "we don't have room for Jimmy Olsen" is BS, but whatever. Its just Snyder being Snyder at this point, I shouldn't be surprised.
Good read. I see that he considered Bryan Cranston for Lex Luthor. He was a big favorite with a lot of people around here as well, most likely because of Breaking Bad. I never thought he'd be a good choice though. I'm sure he could do a good Luthor but at the time he was a little too "flavor of the month".
 
Well, Mark Kermode (who wanted to like it) just described it as lumpen, stodgy and incoherent.

And Eisenberg was incredibly irritating...
 
Cool. I never even thought about whether or not he was a comics character.

Oh, yeah. :)

"The Ten Nights of the Beast" by Jim Starlin, Jim Aparo, and Mike DeCarlo -- the same team that killed Jason Todd in "Death in the Family" -- is one of the classic Batman stories of the 1980s. The KGB sends their best assassin, Anatoli Kynazev, the KGBeast, to Gotham City to murder ten people key to the Star Wars program, climaxing with Ronald Reagan. Batman has to work against the clock, and he faces a foe who is basically unstoppable. The story ends with Batman walling up the Beast and leaving him to die.
 
B- here.

I thought Batfleck just wasn't very good, that his anger got to the point that he needed to kill Superman made no sense. The mention of "Martha" somehow breaking his homicidal rage was non-sense.

But, I thought they hit a home run with Gadot as Wonder Woman. So did my wife who is a long time fan of the character. The movie had some fun things in it. There just wasn't enough to overcome Batfleck and his disjointed story.
 
At the end of the movie, there was a subdued and solemn atmosphere in the cinema. People did not stay to see if there was something during the credits. Once the film ended, they left en masse.

After enduring the last series with Doctor Who, I am fatigued by the story element used at the end of this move and wish to see it shown the door.

I am confused by the ending for another reason. Was I watching one event, or two? (I do not know how to do spoilers, so I am attempting to be as vague as I can.)
 
Oh, yeah. :)

"The Ten Nights of the Beast" by Jim Starlin, Jim Aparo, and Mike DeCarlo -- the same team that killed Jason Todd in "Death in the Family" -- is one of the classic Batman stories of the 1980s. The KGB sends their best assassin, Anatoli Kynazev, the KGBeast, to Gotham City to murder ten people key to the Star Wars program, climaxing with Ronald Reagan. Batman has to work against the clock, and he faces a foe who is basically unstoppable. The story ends with Batman walling up the Beast and leaving him to die.

I've heard of KGBeast, and I'd heard about that ending, but I've never read that story. I never knew KGBeast's real name either. What issues made up the KGBeast story? I might have to see if I can find it on Comixology.
Didn't he also just pop up on one of the Berlanti shows or Gotham?
 
A number of critics have attacked BvS because, in their minds, superheroes like Batman and Superman should be able to talk things out and not try to kill each other. I want to see these arguments again in May when the Avengers turn against one another.

Well, the Avengers have been fighting each other pretty often for two movies already, though it's never been to the death. But it makes sense given their personalities. Marvel characters have always been prone to melodrama and conflict. But I still believe that Batman and Superman, as normally portrayed, would quickly realize they're on the same side. Superman is predisposed to see the best in everyone, and Batman is the World's Greatest Detective and could pretty easily suss out that Superman isn't evil. So putting them intractably at loggerheads pretty much requires changing them into different characters who are a lot more unreasonable than their normal selves.


Their mothers having identical names - how did I miss that this whole time? jeez. I totally bought it as the thing that flips Batman to Superman's side, though.

I noticed it years ago, but frankly it seems kind of lame. I dunno, maybe I'll change my mind when I eventually see the movie, but having two characters intractably determined to destroy each other throughout the movie and then having them become friends just because of the coincidence that their mothers have the same name? That sounds pretty stupid. If Snyder can actually pull that off in a way that doesn't feel stupid, then he must be a much better director than I'd give him credit for at this point.

I mean, my mother's name was Nancy, but that didn't make me think any better of Ronald Reagan's presidency. It's just a name.



I'm ready to enter this Universe that by all accounts is going to be a tad darker than the Marvel one we've followed for the last 8 years.

You know, I just now rewatched Age of Ultron, and I found myself thinking, "How can people think this isn't dark?" For one thing, it was literally so dark I had trouble seeing a lot of it. And Joss Whedon has never written anything that didn't have plenty of darkness and pain and cynicism alongside (and usually driving) the comedy and witty banter.

And before that, they set up SHIELD as this Big Damn Hero organization and then wasted little time exposing the whole thing as corrupt to the core and needing to be torn down. Oh, and then there was the bit where Thor's mother was murdered -- and there's no telling what's happened to his father. The MCU has plenty of dark stuff alongside the fun and humor. That's always been Marvel's approach from the beginning of the Marvel Age. The Fantastic Four started out as a rather lighthearted adventure comic with a level of self-referential, fourth-wall-breaking humor rivaling Deadpool today, but it always had the darker threads of Ben Grimm's turmoil at being a freak and Reed Richards's guilt at what his recklessness had done. Spider-Man was always a wisecracker, but he was driven by his guilt at Uncle Ben's death. And so on. Just because a story has fun and humor, that doesn't mean it lacks darkness. After all, real life is a mix of both. So it's a fallacy that fiction has to be one or the other.


...I've honestly never been that bothered by Batman killing. He's already such a dark, violent character that him killing people doesn't really feel like that big of a step away from what he's usually like.

Well, he's only really been a dark, violent character from 1939 to early 1940 and from 1986 to the present, more or less. That's 31 years of "dark, violent loner" versus 46 years as a more upbeat character.

And no matter how aggressive Batman has gotten, the main thing that's defined him since 1940 is that he's fighting against death. The willingness to destroy life is the very thing he's most strongly opposed to, because it was the death of his parents that compelled him to become Batman. This is one thing that I think Gotham got very right in its first season even while it totally screwed up everything else -- it recognized that Bruce was driven, not by revenge or madness, but by profound empathy for the victims of violent crime and a profound, compelling need to protect them in the way he was unable to protect his parents or himself. That's what makes him different from someone like the Punisher, who's just out for revenge. Batman is not fundamentally about violence, but about fear. As a child, he experienced the fear and anguish of being the victim of crime. So he's dedicated himself to making criminals afraid of him, so that innocent people won't have to be afraid of criminals. He doesn't want them dead, he wants them scared out of their wits and passing the word along to other criminals. And he wants to be a symbol of hope to the innocent. It's hard for a lethally violent vigilante to be a source of hope and comfort.

Sure, you can do an alternate version of Batman that's just a vengeful thug wanting to see criminals dead, but I think that loses a great deal of what defines Batman and makes him stand apart from the endless parade of vengeful, deadly action leads in American popular culture.


I also think it's worth keeping in mind that this movie sees him in an incredibly dark place. With the way they end his arc, I could easily see him stepping away from killing.

Maybe, but I've never been a fan of Snyder's notion (expressed in defending the ending of MoS) that someone has to start out being a killer before they can learn not to be.

I really liked what they did with Superman here, it feels like a more realistic take on the character. I can see the appeal of the big blue boy scout version of the character, but it's always felt a little unrealistic to me.

Well, leaving aside the intrinsic unrealism of a humanoid alien who can lift supertankers, levitate, and shoot lasers from his eyes, I'm not sure I'd agree. I mean, someone with that much power would have to take exceptional care to be as compassionate and ethical as possible, because indulging his selfish side or his weaknesses for even a moment could be deadly to the people around him. He'd have no choice but to be in total control of himself at all times.

There's also Elliot S! Maggin's idea from his '70s Superman novels that Superman's keen senses make him vividly aware of all the signs of life in a living being -- electrical fields, heat, blood flow, metabolic activity, respiration, a whole symphony of cellular functions -- and vividly aware of their cessation. So he feels the life and death around him on an intimate level, more profound than any human can grasp. Not just life and death either -- he could sense our emotions, experience every shift in breath and pulse and body heat, hear the cries and despair of the people for miles around him. He couldn't be callous and self-absorbed if he tried -- he's just not physically capable of it. That's why he needs a Fortress of Solitude way up in the Arctic -- it's the only place he can ever be alone. Given all that, I think it's entirely realistic that he'd be more profoundly compassionate and protective of life than most humans.

I mean, this is the whole driving idea behind the creation of Superman. Siegel and Shuster were reacting to Nietzsche's idea that an ubermensch would be "beyond good and evil," would cast off conventional morality and compassion as a childish thing. They advanced the notion that a physically and intellectually superior human might be ethically superior as well.


I think in the Marvel style of movie that character could work, but it would just wouldn't fit in this world. The reaction to Superman, which is what makes up a big part of his arc also felt very realistic to me.

That seems backward to me. Marvel has always been defined by its more flawed and human characters, while DC's heroes have tended to be purer archetyes. The thing is, DC has been trying so hard over the past few decades to imitate Marvel that it's basically overshot the mark.


One little thing that bothered me.

We had a Batman movie with...
...the KGBeast...
...and we never saw him in costume. :)

He was a recurring character in the second-season Arrow flashbacks, played by Stargate Atlantis's David Nykl.


I see that he considered Bryan Cranston for Lex Luthor.

That would've been interesting, since he'd previously played Jim Gordon in the Batman: Year One animated movie (opposite a Batman played by Ben MacKenzie, who's now Jim Gordon on Gotham). It would've made him, I believe, the second person to play both Luthor and Gordon, after Lyle Talbot in the 1949-50 movie serials. (Talbot was not only the first actor to play both characters, but the first actor to play either character.)
 
Why are people using spoiler codes when the thread title has that huge spoiler warning in front? :shrug:

I'm sorry to say I had a lot more problems with Batman v Superman than I expected to. I mostly liked it... but I had a lot of big issues. It definitely suffered from the same issue Age of Ultron and Amazing Spider-man 2 had of trying to shoehorn in a bunch of set up for future movies. But there were moments and aspects of it that I completely loved.

THE GOOD:
Cavil. Affleck. Gadot. All did great with their characters.
Batman's costume, Batwing, Batmobile, toys, fight movies... all great.
Foreshadowing Darkseid right down to showing Parademons in a dream sequence. So amazing to see this in a major motion picture. Geeked me right out.
Batman vs Superman. (though directly comparing it to DKR makes it suffer in comparison)
Seeing Bats and Supes and WW working together for the first time. The Lasso of Truth!!!
When everyone else is running screaming away from the collapsing building... Batman runs INTO it. YES.
Chris Pine cameo!

THE BAD:
Jesse Eisenberg. Everything about his performance, his choices, and the character. And the hair.
Batman KILLS PEOPLE. a LOT of people. Those aren't rubber bullets. This is so much worse than any whoopsie-daisy killings in previous Bat-movies. It's everything Batman stands against. Superman was forced to kill one dude.... but Bats mowed down dozens of people here...
All the dream sequences. I imagine they're there to add action to a movie that doesn't have any fighting in the first 90 minutes, but some of them are just bizarre and unnecessary.
The thirty seconds of Holly Hunter stumbling over words staring at the jar of "whiskey". Why did that go on so damn long?
Was it really necessary to show Batman's origin for the umpteenth time... in a Superman movie? And then to turn it into a dream sequence where Lil' Bruce can fly?
You mean to tell me that Batman has operated for TWENTY YEARS and never learned about the existence of all these metas that Lex knew about?
You mean to tell me that all these metas already existed... and did nothing to help in the Kryptonian Invasion?
Krypton AI: It's utterly forbidden for me to create this illegal unstoppable killing machine. Lex: the Kryptonian Council is dead. Krypton AI: okay, I'm going to create this illegal unstoppable killing machine for you! (the AIs in MOS were practically sentient...)
Batman's brilliant decision to LURE DOOMSDAY BACK INTO THE CITY where the spear is away from the UNINHABITED ISLAND HE'S CURRENTLY ON... rather than, say, flying back to the city, getting the spear, then flying back to where Doomsday isn't hurting anyone.
Superman's brilliant decision to use the kryptonite spear himself, rather than swapping places with WW to hold off Superman while she uses the spear which would cause no harm to her.
I still can't believe that they held the BvsS fight until the third act, directly rushing into the Doomsday fight. We didn't get any time to see how Bats and Supes and WW interact with each other. I really wanted BvsS in the second act.
Killing Superman at the end of a movie about everyone hating him felt like a really weird choice when you KNOW he's immediately coming back. The death storyline in the comics was great because it was a long examination of the world's need for Superman... not a world where people hate and fear him.

THE GOOD AND BAD AT THE SAME TIME:
I geeked out at the Justice League cameos BUT they're so shoehorned in.
It's cool to see Doomsday, and to have him being a product of Kryptonian cloning technology, and to recreate the comic of him and Superman dying together... BUT... reanimating Zod's corpse with Lex's blood is just silly...
The biggest WTF moment for me was Bats getting visited by a time traveller in the middle of his dream. What the hell was that? Who was that? Was that the Flash in red armor? Was it Vibe? Was it someone else? Was that someone time-travelling back from the time of the Darkseid Invasion to send a warning that we'll see in the next movie? That's cool but it was so bizarre and out of left field.
So... how did Lex find out Clark's secret identity? They never mentioned it. Not that it was a huge secret in MOS...
 
I noticed it years ago, but frankly it seems kind of lame. I dunno, maybe I'll change my mind when I eventually see the movie, but having two characters intractably determined to destroy each other throughout the movie and then having them become friends just because of the coincidence that their mothers have the same name? That sounds pretty stupid. If Snyder can actually pull that off in a way that doesn't feel stupid, then he must be a much better director than I'd give him credit for at this point.

I mean, my mother's name was Nancy, but that didn't make me think any better of Ronald Reagan's presidency. It's just a name.

I think you're inferring some things here that you'll possibly interpret differently upon seeing the film.

Suffice it to say, Superman does not approach their end battle with the sole goal of destroying Batman.
 
F here.
Didnt realize this was just a Batman movie with a Superman cameo.
As someone that has always hated Batman, this movie is like a nightmare. This whole Batman can beat anyone and even Superman has always been BS to me. Superman could throw a dam planet at him if he wanted too, punch his ass to the sun, suck all the air out of him, heat vision his brain etc.
I get Superman didnt want to kill him but man that was just weak that Batman can just put on a powered suit, grab some Kryptonite and beat up Superman and just about kill him. Its almost like DC just wants Superman to play second fiddle to Batman. Sorry but to me Batman is just a thug in a mask that uses tricks and can fight good.
People think Superman is boring and vanilla, well to me that is Batman. Too over powered for a dude with no super powers.

Was it just me or did Batman come across as Iron Man, Wonder Woman as Xena and Superman a poor mans version of Captain America?
The cameo of the Flash was bad too, dude does not fit the part and needs a hair cut.

Movie itself felt too long, too much Batman, not enough action, to much Batman back story, Lex was awlful, Superman too depowered, story itself was just bad. Give me Deadpool over this any day.
The writers of Flash and Arrow would of done a better job than the writers of this movie.

What i did like was Wonder Woman and beginning of the movie showing the Zod-Superman fight.
That actually was better than the actual Superman movie.
This Batman movie will make tons of money for DC but for us Superman fans out there, DC just seems to have no idea how to portray him.
 
The biggest WTF moment for me was Bats getting visited by a time traveller in the middle of his dream. What the hell was that? Who was that? Was that the Flash in red armor? Was it Vibe? Was it someone else? Was that someone time-travelling back from the time of the Darkseid Invasion to send a warning that we'll see in the next movie? That's cool but it was so bizarre and out of left field.
Yeah, that was the Flash traveling back through time to contact Bruce. But to be honest if you don't know what Ezra Miller looks like then it'd be pretty difficult to tell. He had a red mask on, but because of the light surrounding him and all that weird armor or whatever he was also wearing, that made it hard to determine who exactly he was supposed to be.

Since I picked up on who he was supposed to be right away, I was more confused about why he was appearing to Bruce in a dream. How can the Flash travel through time and enter a person's dream? It would have made more sense if Bruce had woken up from the Knightmare and then the Flash made his appearance.
 
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