Grasping at Greatness: A Look at Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice

Wow. Two weeks since I’ve seen the movie. So much for deadlines.

I thought this was going to be easy. I thought I was going to be able to see the movie, hate it, write something pithy and moderately hilarious, and call it a day. However, after watching Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice, I noticed something odd. This flick left me feeling despondent, which is proving to make this an absolute beast to write about. After reading the reviews from both fans and critics, I was expecting a pretty bad movie. Not “slam the head of your cock with a hammer” bad, but certainly something less than spectacular.

The closest I will come to Google Image searching that phrase.

The odd thing is, there are glimpses of the makings of a really strong movie here. At times, Batman v Superman flirts with greatness and introduces some really interesting ideas about our preconceived notions of power, humanity’s place among gods, and the kinds of ways these ideas could affect the psyche of the world at large. Unfortunately, the film leaves these questions mostly unanswered in favor of poorly written dialogue, nonsensical coincidences, convoluted evil plots, and some of the most unearned character moments in recent comic book cinematic history.

The good thing about taking time to write this is that I’ve had a lot time to think. Ruminating for the better part of two weeks has truly allowed me to separate the trivial logic problems of the film (how does Lex know for certain that Batman has the means to kill Superman) from the critical structural problems (why are there so many fucking visions, dream sequences, and Flashbacks (ha! Pat on the back for that one)). The biggest problem I keep coming back to is that BvS: DoJ (even that acronym is fucking ridiculous) has no idea what kind of movie it wants it be. It is simultaneously trying to be a Batman Origin Story, a Man of Steel follow-up, a Justice League prelude, and (as the title would suggest) a massive superhero, smack-down/team-up movie.

So fuck it. If they don’t have to make up their minds, why should I? Buckle up kids. Much like the film itself, this article is going to be a long, tedious, mostly unfunny journey through the stories that are contained within Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice.

Spoilers ahead.

Man of Steel 2: Mopeman Returns

And here I thought that Superman couldn’t get any more boring as a character. The Superman aspect of DoJ is by far the weakest piece of the movie. Much like our appendix, Superman’s arc probably served some use at some point during the film’s evolution, but now it’s just kinda vestigial and will probably end up leading to sepsis and eventual death.

Pictured: Superman's influence on the film

In a turn of events nobody could have predicted, Superman’s story begins with him saving Lois Lane from being an idiot (shocking!). Apparently, it’s the only thing she’s really good at in this universe. Lois gets herself kidnapped by a warlord, which Kal-El proceeds to throw through a fucking wall because rational reactions to things.

Guess he didn't learn anything about overkill from Man of Steel.

From that moment on, we have no idea what is going through Superman’s mind. We see how Batman reacts to him, how the general public reacts to him, how Holly Hunter, Lex Luthor, Lois Lane all react to him. Hell, even Neil Degrasse Tyson give an impassioned speech about how insignificant we are next to the proof of other life in the universe. From the time the opening credits roll to the minute the film is over, Superman is used as a nothing more than a prop, doing whatever the script requires of him.

Just a monkey banging cymbals up there.

I guess we shouldn’t be too surprised. Look at his role models! We got Ghost Dad, who pretty much tells him to not bother with heroics, because saving one person is essentially killing someone else (further cementing Pa Kent as the most horrific villain in any DC movie thus far), and Earth Mom whose advice is “Do whatever you want, I don’t give a shit,” which stands as the most unrealistic portrayal of a mother in the history of ever.

"Magneto ain't got nothin' on me."

I wish there was more to write about Superman. I wish I could tell you how the character grew and redeemed himself from Man of Steel or how the character learned nothing and pissed me off even more. Sadly, he is just a nothing character, which makes it really hard for me to feel anything when he dies later.

What? I said spoilers.

Hello darkness my old... Wait, that was Watchmen.

Batman Origins: What Knightmares Are Made Of

You know what’s worse than watching an origin story? Watching the same origin story for the rest of eternity. I gave The Amazing Spider-Man so much guff for retelling the radioactive spider bite story a mere 10 years after Sam Rami’s Spider-man hit screens. After this, I believe I owe Sony an apology, because at least we haven’t had to watch it four-goddamn-times. We have now seen Batman’s origin in Tim Burton’s ’89 Batman, Joel Schumacher’s ’95 Batman Forever, Chris Nolan’s ’05 Batman Begins and Zack Snyder’s What Currently Passes as a Batman Movie here in good ol’ 2016. What’s even more frustrating is that the only reason this scene exists in the already bloated movie is to establish that Batman’s mom’s name is Martha, which leads to the most unwarranted, uninspired moment of the film, but I’ll get to that in a minute.

Oh look, another hidden display case for the batsuit.
Never seen that before.

After his origin (which ends up being a dream sequence with unnecessary voice-over narration that is never used again in the film), we cut to the end of Man of Steel to see the destructive final battle from the point-of-view of Bruce Wayne. Of all of the missteps this movie takes, this is a sequence that actually works. You have Bruce Wayne charging through the wreckage of Metropolis with no gadgets, no suit, and no plan. He just knows that he needs to help however he can. It is singlehandedly the most Batman thing in the movie. Unfortunately, it’s also the only Batman thing in the movie as Bruce Wayne then becomes a sociopathic murderbot with only one directive: kill the Superman by branding and murdering a bunch of dudes.

He's about to kill that little girl and eat her still-beating heart.

I’ve heard a lot of arguments for and against Batman torturing and killing bad guys. I personally don’t care one way or another. What does bother me is that in this movie, Batman has no real motivation for doing so. The movie plays it like Batman needs to cross these lines in order to prevent a dirty bomb from going off in Gotham City, which leads him to investigating Lex Luthor by slowly killing his way up the pecking order. As far as motivations go, this is an okay one. We have an older Batman working against the clock to save Gotham; shit is going to get sloppy. I understand it. That is until *TWIST* Wayne is only investigating Luthor to try and steal the kryptonite out from under him in order to kill The Man of Tomorrow. In essence, Batman is killing a bunch of dudes so that he can, in turn, kill Superman, who he sees as a threat for… killing a bunch of dudes…? 

"It's only okay if I do it! You're an alien, so it's wrong!" - Donald Trump

I know that people are already crafting their arguments about how The Caped Crusader is worried about home-planet security and how unchecked power should be viewed as an absolute threat. However, no matter how passionate and well-acted the speeches are that Batfleck gives, it never comes across that he has anything but total eradication on his mind. At one point, Alfred pleads with Bruce to choose diplomacy over violence, to which Bruce replies “What was that? I couldn’t hear you over the sound of me sharpening my goddamn kryptonite spear.”

In case we thought a kryptonite bullet to the back of the head was too humane.

This isn’t Batman. Batman is the world’s greatest detective, valuing logic and reason above all else. Killing isn’t necessarily outside of his wheel house, but I don’t want to live in a world where Batman kills before he absolutely has to. He never even took a minute to make sure that Superman is the one that he should be after. He never asked Superman out for coffee, or asked him to curb his neck-snapping habits. He went straight to the murdering. Batman’s not a hero in this movie. He’s a thug with nicer toys.

This picture gets more unsettling the longer you look at it.

Batman v Superman: Best Friend, Bitter Enemy

But what about the main event? The whole reason we are here? It’s an exciting premise, to finally witness the event we have been promised for three years. God vs. Man; Day vs. Night; the greatest gladiator match in history, as Luthor says.

Only, it’s kind of not.

Not even for a second.

In an effort to pit our two heroes against each other, Lex kidnaps Superman’s mom, Martha. Bring me the head of the bat, he says, and your mother shall be returned safely. Let’s go ahead and stop there for a second. Apparently, Lex Luther, the most intelligent man in the world, could not think of a more elaborate plan than that of (deep breath) Green Goblin, Doc Ock, Sandman, Venom, Green Goblin again, and that’s just in the Spider-Man movies. But hey, if it ain’t broke, right? They needed a shortcut from A to B, and since our heroes have as much personality as cardboard cut-outs, I can see how this would be at least passable reason for our boys to throw down.

But he did do better than Electro so... I guess that something?

Except that the entire reason Luthor wants Batty dead is because Batman stole the thing to kill Superman… which both men were going to use to kill Superman… huh… kinda seems like things would have worked out on their own, especially since Batman is already in pure murder-rage mode.

"I will fuck your rotting corpse!"

Superman flies to Gotham to confront Batman, and in a move that genuinely shocked me, asks for Batman’s help. In typical Snyder fashion, Batman responds with something akin to “I’m going to rip off your head and shit down your throat.” 

Stay classy, Wayne.

Superman beings his menacing walk towards the Caped Crusader, activating Wile E. Coyote-esqe traps, which he (naturally) is able to dismantle with ease. Superman, in no immediate danger, again tries to plea with the Dark Knight in order to… no, wait, he throws him through a fucking wall.

"Cause I had the time of my life!"
"Damn it, Clark, we're fighting!"

This entire fight could have been avoided if Batman had just taken a fucking breath and listened to what the Man of Steel had to say. In other words, HE JUST HAD TO BE THE GODDAMN BATMAN. But of course, we all know what happens next. We get about 10 minutes of the laziest, slowest, most apathetic fight in a superhero movie I have ever seen. It’s the equivalent of a superhero slap fight. Each time one of these powerhouses lands it hit, it takes the recipient of that hit about 3 minutes to waddle their way back up onto their feet. It’s like toppling over two obese people and taking bets on which one can get up the fastest. Only less exciting.

The fastest anyone moves in this fight.

Batman hits Superman with kryptonite gas and, since the sun never shines in the Snyder-verse, Superman can never fully recover leading to Batman besting The Last Son of Krypton. Batman is about to plunge the spear into Superman’s heart and fuck the bloody hole, when all of the sudden, Superman says it. The line that shall live in infamy. The line that will make or break the entire movie for you.

“Save Martha.”

Suddenly, Batman and Superman are best friends. They hug it out, get matching lower-back tattoos, and skip off merrily into the sunset holding hands.

"Kiss me, you fool!"

If you look at it from a psychological point of view, the line almost sorta works. In helping Superman save his mom, Batman is retroactively saving his own (who, remember, is also named Martha), which is the source of his dourness (duh). You want to look at it that way, awesome. Good on you. However, there is no redeemable quality in this fight that makes this line work for me. If the filmmakers were able to create a beautifully choreographed, emotional fight scene with real stakes on the line, I could forgive “Save Martha,” or at least look the other way. The problem is that they never do. We don’t care about Batman, we don’t care about Superman, and we don’t care about why they’re fighting. Hell, Snyder couldn’t even do the ONE THING he is good at as a director and make a visually fascinating fight. Everything falls flat. The characters, the movie, the terrible line they decided to use to resolve every issue. Like the rest for the film, this scuffle and this resolution are probably the most insulting things I’ve seen in a superhero movie. Congratulations, Green Lantern, you’re off the hook.

Let's fist-bump it out.

Dawn of the Justice League

But wait, there’s more! As if those three movies were not enough to keep you entertained (they weren’t), DC also decides that hey, why not throw in references and appearances to every other upcoming DCCU film coming down the pipe?

And you know what? Taken by themselves, most of these nods and references actually work. So let’s talk about the minor ones first. Batman’s future-look Knightmare sequence is pretty cool. DC channels Mad Max to create a visceral, dystopian look for a future under the rule of Superman. Granted, apparently every single soldier during the fight against Batman forgets that they are holding an automatic weapon, but that’s just the logic of the movie. I’ll buy it. 

My name is Bruce. My world is fire and blood.

The sequence ends with The Flash coming back in time and warning Batman not to trust Superman. Or something, I don’t know. The audio was pretty shitty. Seeing Flash on the big screen is enough to get any nerd excited, and to the critics who say that nobody outside of the inner circle of nerd would understand that cameo, I retort with the same could be said about the Nick Fury/Avengers reference at the end of Iron Man. Not everything is for everyone, get over yourselves.

I'm here to talk about the Justice League Initiative.

The viral video introductions to the rest of the Justice League were okay. Watching Aquaman break the sound barrier underwater was awesome, and seeing Cyborg being created in a Frankenstein-like manner had the same effect as an old Universal Studios monster movie. But the biggest connection to the bigger universe was, obviously, Wonder Woman. Seeing the character in action portrayed by an actress who genuinely looked like the only person having fun during this film was, for lack of a better word, thrilling. Gal Gadot was able to play the hardened Amazonian warrior with a bit of Selena Kyle thrown in the mix. It ended up being a lot of fun to watch the dichotomy and range in her brief yet powerful performance. And seeing the holy trinity on the screen for the first time together made my heart skip a beat (or it might have if it hadn’t been revealed in the trailer).

Spoilers!

Sadly, all of this content belongs in different movies, or at least be moved to another part of the movie. The Flash sequence comes immediately after a Knightmare, what comes immediately after Batman falls asleep trying to jailbreak a phone. The whole scene really slows down what was already becoming a sluggish pace for the movie (who woulda thought that Flash would have slowed down the movie, am I right?). The viral videos come to us immediately after Batman finishes sharpening his goddamn kryptonite spear on the skulls of his fallen enemies, and is on his way to fight Superman. The scene is literally the audience watching Wonder Woman read the email Bruce sent her for about 10 minutes before (what should have been) an epic fight scene. At the risk of evoking the other big comic book property, doesn’t that seem a little better suited for a post-credits scene? At least save it until after the Doomsday fight when it would made Batman’s “I thought she was with you” line make a bit more sense.

Dude, you literally just emailed her. World's greatest detective my ass.

Speaking of Doomsday, this entire sequence felt like it belonged to Justice League: Part I. Imagine how much more impactful Superman’s sacrifice would have been after he had surveyed the bodies of his fallen comrades; if he had no other choice but to pick up the spear and kill himself in order to kill Doomsday. It would have been a great cliffhanger/set-up for Justice League: Part II, and a great culmination of the DCCU up to that point. Instead, we get an unnecessary sacrifice (Wonder Woman seemed to have Doomsday pretty much handled, and the spear could have been handed off to literally anyone else), a waste of a villain, and a waste of what could have been a cinematic game-changer.

As a bonus, we also get a copy-cat villain from eight years ago.

Speed-Round

Since this article is running very long in the teeth (at least from my end; I hope you haven’t died of exhaustion halfway through reading this), here are just snippets of things I couldn’t organically fit into the four subheadings above.

Lex Luthor is not as irritating as I was expecting him to be, but he also didn’t do himself any favors by being Mark Zuckerberg 2.0. I hope he gets raped in prison, causing an impacted bowel, infection and eventual death so we never have to see him again.

The Batmobile just looks terrible. It reminds me of the mousetrap cars we had to make in 8^th grade, only with murder cannons strapped to the front. It’s also amazing how cartoony that entire sequence looked. Nolan used props and toys and managed to make something more realistic looking 10 years ago.

Without a proper fulcrum and lever, this thing probably won't go the required distance for full credit.

Lois Lane is fucking useless. From being held hostage by an African warlord, to being trapped under a pile of rubble and almost drowning, to going up to a known mercenary and asking him “Do I know you?!” it seems like Lois was the kid who should have died from eating too many marbles in kindergarten. I don’t understand how she made it this far in life without sticking a fork in an electrical socket. If her only reason for being is for Superman to save her, please just let her die. Everyone will be so much better off.

Knock that shit off! It sets a bad precedent!

Jeremy Irons as Alfred was great. I was afraid he would be a dark and gritty Alfred because the rest of the fucking movie. Instead, Scar was bitchy, hilarious, and brought much needed levity to the ensemble. Using him as the voice of reason and the only one in the film with a conscious was also a nice choice.

The one joke not told by Alfred in the movie was actually pretty funny. After Batman saves the life of Martha (Kent, not Wayne), he tells her “I’m a friend of your son’s.” “I kinda figured,” she replies, “the cape.” It’s a glimmering ray of light of what the movie could have been, and what future movies could be. It is possible to be dark and funny at the same time.

The fight scenes are really poorly done. We have exactly one good fight scene with Batman, and that was revealed in the final trailer. The Knightmare scene is like watching a Power Ranger fight the Putty People, the Doomsday fight is poorly tracked, CGI nonsense, and you already know my thoughts on the main event. Zack Snyder only really does one thing well. He just couldn’t do it in this movie.

I count four guns that nobody thinks to use and a bat about to feed on his next victim.

Why are knives the most powerful weapons in the DCCU? I know I wasn’t going to talk logic HOWEVER Batman’s suit can clearly deflect bullets, but a knife pierces his skin like butter. Superman gets fucking nuked in outer-space, but a spike through his chest is enough to earn him a funeral. I can overlook a lot of problems with this film, but “pointy things trump all others” is where I draw the fucking line.

Final Thoughts

If Warner Bros. had taken one of these storylines and given us a more focused narrative, the movie could have been great. We could have had a truly amazing Batman movie, Superman movie, or Justice League movie. Instead, they made a movie that is trying to be too many things, which only succeeds in being a failure for everyone involved.

I feel like I’ve done a pretty good job in leaving Marvel out of the discussion, but there is one comparison that I feel like I have to draw. I’ve been watching Daredevil on Netflix, and it’s incredible to me how much better of a “versus” story it is. See, these two stories share a lot. You have one vigilante that creeps just up to the edge, and another who thinks that there isn’t an edge; he must only do what is necessary. Both stories are dark, have brutal fight scenes, contain elements of the supernatural, and are part of a bigger shared universe. The only real difference is how they approach the story. Daredevil and Punisher spend an entire episode on the roof of a building arguing the concept and ramifications of morality. After a while, it gets pretty difficult to figure out who the viewer should agree with. The biggest debate Batman has with Superman is whether or not Batty should cut of Supes’ dick and feed it to him before he kills him. That’s not good story telling.

"You'll be eating your dick through a straw by the time I'm done with you!"

So why take the time, right? Why spend two weeks crafting a piece that ultimately amounts to every other bad review that is out there? Why spend over 3700 words taking the piss out of every fanboy/girl that will not concede the fact that this movie is not “ZOMG THE GREATEST COMIC BOOK FILM EVER”?

It’s because I feel like we deserve better.

If this is all you want from a superhero movie, if this is all you care to see your favorite characters do for the rest of their cinematic future, then please, disregard everything that I have said. Go give more money to Warner Bros., see the movie a thousand times, and buy the unrated Blu-Ray with 30 minutes of extra footage.

But I want more. I feel like we deserve to be able to leave every event movie like we just finished watching Star Wars: The Force Awakens (with half-a-stalk and eager to see it again). I want to be excited to buy the movie and listen to the commentary and delve into everything it took to make this film. As it stands, I have seen the movie once. Once was more than enough.

END

As always, thanks for reading, folks. Hey! Want another perspective on Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice? Click here to read an article by Thera Pitts: and individual who genuinely enjoyed the movie. And while we’re at it, do you like movies in general? Of course you do! Click here to read amazing reviews from Chris Kryaninko!

Be kind to each other.

-James