Batman V Superman

Batutta

Batutta

Major Contributor
Surprised there was no discussion on this yet. I thought the movie was an ill conceived mess through and through. First off, the whole premise, that Batman wants to kill Superman, is a bad one. Batman has always had an implicit rule against killing. He brings criminals to justice, he's not an executioner. They could have easily done a story where they work against each other, and fight, or have Batman want to imprison Superman somehow and bring him to justice for the destruction of Metropolis, but to kill goes against everything the character has stood for. It's fine to have him wrestle with his ideals. Nolan did that for three movies. But to cross the line to this degree is a betrayal of the character. Same with Superman. Superman always believes in hope and the goodness of people. Here, they compromise that too, all so they can make this bad premise work. Ok, so let's say we accept their premise. They don't even execute their own premise well. SPOILERS. The way Batman gives up his bloodlust for Superman is pat, lazy and unbelievable in the context they've built up. The whole dream sequence in the middle is pointless, dumb and further erodes the values of the main characters. And why, for the love of God, do we have to see Batman's origin for the hundredth time. Affleck is a decent Batman and Bruce Wayne. I wasn't bowled over by him but he didn't suck either. Gal Gadot has a certain charisma, and I buy her in the action moments, but that's almost all she has. I actually liked Eisenberg's performance...but it was all wrong for the character of Lex Luthor, although wether he was playing the original Lex, or his son I was unclear about. There is about 15 minutes of the movie where the heroes team up to fight an enemy where you can glimpse the movie that could have been, but they don't earn the moment at all. Just a mess. A terrible mess.
 
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I didn't hate it the way that most critics did. Generally, I thought that it worked as a "comic book" movie. The storyline and themes worked on the level of a comic book, and I liked the action and the visual style of the film. However, it was just way too long. The story content was a lot shallower than what we saw in the Chris Nolan Batman movies, but it could have worked as vehicle for the action. But there was really only about 90-100 minutes of good material that they dragged out to 151 minutes.

I had the same issues with MAN OF STEEL, in which I felt I watched over 45 minutes of Superman being punched / thrown through buildings.

But at least with with BATMAN VS SUPERMAN, it wasn't all Superman, whom I find to be an exceedingly dull character. Most impressively, I actually surprisingly enjoyed Affleck's Batman. I didn't really have an issue with Batman's vendetta against Superman, as Superman's fight against Zod at the end of MAN OF STEEL really would have resulted in tens of thousands of deaths and billions of dollars of damage.
 
agcohn said:
I didn't really have an issue with Batman's vendetta against Superman, as Superman's fight against Zod at the end of MAN OF STEEL really would have resulted in tens of thousands of deaths and billions of dollars of damage.
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I don't take issue with the vendetta, it's what he plans to do about it, which is to kill Superman. It's against the nature of his character, and is the cause of every backwards contortion of plot and motivation this story has to contrive to create the central showdown. There were better ways to make this showdown happen that doesn't compromise both characters to the point where what we admire about them as characters is extinguished.
 
Batutta said:
Surprised there was no discussion on this yet.
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I haven't seen it, so can't discuss. Sorry. I'm pretty burned out on comic book movies. I mean, really, when is enough, enough? When they quit making money. Yes, I get that, which is why I'm not adding my money to the pot. And we've gone full circle. :shocked:
 
I put the blame on Zack Snyder who is absolutely great with FX and visuals, but he is a terrible director.

BvS feels like 5 different film plots all mixed together, each one fighting for attention, and the end result is a very uneven mess.
 
I think the BVS is ok for me,well, for comic fan is, he uses many references from comics and other story and I am very excited to see the beginning of Justice League :)
 
I think the whole idea is silly. They are just milking film after film after film and will continue as long as it profits.
 
i walked out. not out of some pious reason, I was just bored.
 
The next version of this: Captain America: Civil war

There has been a lot of this stuff lately.

My take is that it actually speaks of the current political divide (read Republican vs. Democrat) in America during this election year, and how it has created a completely polarized climate.
 
I don't think this film has any middle ground. From the opinions I've been reading from people it seems like they either love it or hate it, that's what's so wonderful about art, it's really all subjective. I don't think no one ever agrees on a movie 100%. But I liked it. Of course there were issues with it, but it wasn't enough to not make me enjoy it. I really didn't like Man Of Steel, so I went in with my expectations very low, so that might explained why I enjoyed it so much.

And that dream sequence you mentioned was one of the biggest things that bothered me, then I researched it a bit and found out it wasn't actually a dream, then it made me like the movie even more. And I think Affleck was very good as Batman. Now if only he could direct the Justice League movie then everything would be all good.
 
I think part of the problem with a lot of the dislike for some of these movies, is that these are characters that have been around for decades and we grew up with and "know" their stories and now these re-boots and re-imaginings of the characters is different and when you "change history", people don't like that. On some of the characters they're getting too far away from the source material.

I saw BvS and I didn't love it or hate. I was actually kind of middle of the road on it. Man of Steel wasn't exactly on my top ten list… Now, Batman Begins and The Dark Knight, I loved. The Dark Knight Rises, I could have done without.
 
I don't know, even in a vacuum I wouldn't think it was a very well put together story. Actually, I might even think it was worse. Our knowledge of the characters and their histories is the only thing that keeps it from being incomprehensible.
 
I was entertained. Affleck was the best Batman ever, when compared to the character as in the comics -- and also seems very much like a grown-up version of the young Bruce Wayne in "Gotham." I didn't come out of it needing to see it again, but I didn't feel like I wasted my time. The music when Wonder Woman joined the fight was great.

Of course, this is viewing it after months of hearing how awful it was.
 
I saw it on opening night and it blew me away. Batman and Superman were on point. Wonder Woman had the audience on fire. I left the theater happy and wanting more.
 
SPOILER ALERT.

I had a big problem with the many glaring plot holes. Perhaps the most stupendous: why did the occupants of Wayne Tower think it was smart to wait for a phone call from the playboy boss before evacuating the building, even though there was an apocalyptic invasion happening literally right outside the window - I mean, was it just business as usual until they got that phone call? Were they living in vacuum, or some kind of scriptwriters purgatory before that scene threw them into the plot?

It also was not very well established that Metropolis and Gotham city are literally on opposite sides of the harbour. It wasn't until about 85% through the film when Luthor literally points across the bay that there is any indication to the audience that they are right next to each other. Up until that point I'd thought Clark Kent's Batman vendetta was akin to chasing news articles about a vigilante in New York while working for a local newspaper in LA. It's kind of important to make those kind of distinctions when it's later going to become a key plot point while you're trying to bludgeon together two pop-culture mythologies in any somewhat coherent way. Comic book buffs might know these things, but 99.99 percent of your audience are not die-hard comic fans.

Regarding the "dream sequence" already mentioned, I've since read that it is part of the greater mythology from the Comics. Ok, that's cool, but why not explain it? If 95% of the audience walked out not knowing what the heck that whole scene was about, then it probably wasn't executed very well. Most people thought Bruce just had a bad dream which was not really in any way related to the plot of the film. To not address it in any way at all feels like I've paid money to watch a 2 1/2 hour long trailer for a new franchise - which is essentially what this movie is.

On the upside, I thought Ben Affleck's Batman was really good - despite the overwhelming legacy he had to overcome, and the writers' terrible decision to redesign him as a murderous psycho. I'd gladly go and see a solo Batman film featuring Affleck.
 
If you're in a building, and the city is being destroyed by aliens with powers, I doubt the safest thing to do is go out of the building and walk on the street while the fight is going on. That's why they stayed.

It should have been established before Lex Luther pointed out that Gatham is across the bay by how fast Clark Kent went to Gatham; not a Superman, to do his investigation. The writer doesn't have to tell us anything verbally we can see for ourselves. Non comic book fans wont know but the dream sequence is a scene with reference to the future if Superman did rule the world.
 
Quality said:
If you're in a building, and the city is being destroyed by aliens with powers, I doubt the safest thing to do is go out of the building and walk on the street while the fight is going on. That's why they stayed.
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If it was safer in the building, then why would Bruce tell them to evacuate? Besides, your logic goes against pretty much all real world advice; If you're in a building, and the city is being destroyed by aliens, a terrorist attack, an earthquake, or any other event which could easily take down the building, then the safest thing to do is get out of the building!

Clark Kent appearing/disappearing quickly is a long running joke in Superman. Just because he is not wearing his Superman outfit does not mean he hasn't traveled somewhere in the blink of an eye. Besides, 100 years of film language has taught us to understand that time passes even when it is not shown to us. Without first knowing how far apart the cities are, our understanding of film tells us that some travel has probably occurred but nothing significant happened during the journey so we don't need to see it.
 
Hmmmm - Superman was there in seconds top save his girlfriend from falling off a building and yet his mother could get kidnapped so easy?
I watched the extended edition - the shot at the end when Lex is up to his waist in water on the ship and there's some strange looking dude holding some cubes who then disappears?! As with the dream sequence, it probably made sense to avid fans but to someone who just wanted to see a film that made sense - that just left me scratching my head!
 
I saw it, didn't like it. I just didn't like the premise that everyone is mad at superman because things get destroyed and people get hurt when he saved the world. It's the same premise as the avengers civil war. Imo it's an ideology where you equate what the bad guy is doing with what the good guy is doing and ignore the reasons WHY then say it's the same thing, which of course it is not.
i would not have been mad at super man would not have been mad at the avengers is be mad at the bad guys so the story just didn't work for me.
now if super man had made s mistake and like killed Alfred or something and batman just couldn't let it go it would have been more believable for me.
 
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