This first part will be spoiler-free for those who may not have seen it yet, I will warn you when I’m about to talk spoilers.
I know one more review probably won’t change anyone’s opinion on this, but I’m writing one anyway because Jesus Christ this movie is terrible, those who have me on Facebook (who, let’s be honest are the only people likely to read this) may have already seen my status. I did not like Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice. Zack “Oh my fucking god who keeps hiring this man?” Snyder, has had the better part of three years to work on this, during which, he must’ve been aware of the polarising reception to his previous outing, Man of Steel, and no, the fact that he didn’t personally write the screenplay for that or this, is not an excuse, the decision to keep the not one, but two writers from Man of Steel, was, ultimately, his call as Director. Therefore, Snyder bears the responsibility for the incoherent mess that comprised the script he was directing.
With the benefit of three years to finish this film, the end result, perfectly encapsulates everything that is wrong with the state of DC Comics movies. First of all, it seems the only superhero Warner Bros sort of know how to do is Batman, so when Man of Steel rolls around, “ooh, let’s make it all gritty and grim like Batman. When that doesn’t work, because of course it fucking doesn’t, because Superman is not Batman and what works for one will not work for the other, what’s his response? “Oh, I know, I’ll put Batman in the next one!” It was bad enough before when he was trying to make a “grim and gritty” Superman, when that didn’t work, rather than address what may not have worked, he elected to crowbar in as many things as possible to make it work the next time. They say that insanity is doing the same thing over again and expecting different results, well then I cite this latest atrocity as grounds to have Zack Snyder fucking sectioned!
Batman v, Superman stubbornly doubles down on everything that didn’t work about Man of Steel, and jettisons any of the levity or light-heartedness that might have made it work, in favour of an unrelentingly grim, and insufferably self-serious clusterfuck masquerading as a superhero crossover, cramming in as many cameos as possible with all the subtlety and tact one would expect of a sledgehammer. There is a scene, *spoiler alert* in which Wonder Woman, in possession of a hard drive full of hacked security footage, actually plays videos of the eventual cast of the justice league using their powers (or in the case of Cyborg, being turned into a Cyborg) one by one. That is not foreshadowing, and it is certainly not world-building, in fact to call it an in-movie trailer would be too kind. What this is, is a fucking PowerPoint presentation on what movies we’ll be getting in the coming years, that Zack Snyder seemed to honestly think would be a good idea for a scene!
You’ll notice I haven’t mentioned much about the story yet, that’s because there honestly isn’t much to tell. The entire narrative is a complete and utter mess, I don’t even think I could identify a protagonist in this movie, it’s not Superman, because he’s honestly not really in it that much, it’s not Batman because he’s almost completely reactionary and being positioned as an antagonist but doesn’t even manage that because the closest thing to an antagonist is Lex Luthor, played by a lanky twelve-year-old in his dad’s work clothes. Whoever keeps telling those in charge in Hollywood that Jesse Eisenberg is A) a full-grown man, and B) an actor, needs to stop lying to people, as he is clearly neither of those things. The only thing I’ve seen him in wherein his performance did not feel incredibly forced is The Social Network, in which he was playing an unlikeable obnoxious teenager, and thus, required little to no acting. (I think this is where I’m going to start talking spoilers by the way) Almost everything about his take on Lex Luthor is bad, gone is the proud, charismatic and cunning CEO steadfast in his convictions against the idea of humanity relying on an alien saviour. To be replaced with something that more closely resembles a mild teenage version of The Joker than it does Lex Luthor, only without the funny. (At one point in this film, he fills a jar with his own urine and places it on a senator’s desk in reference to an earlier conversation. All of this is played out completely straight-faced and seriously without a hint of self-awareness. I wish I was making that up.)
But I could forgive the liberal take on the character if even after watching the film I had some idea what his motivation was, as it seems to change from scene to scene. In the beginning, his motivation is the closest it gets to Luthor-esque. He wants to create a deterrent against Superman so that the world will not be at his mercy. To be fair. that sounds like exactly the kind of thing Lex Luthor would do, later in the film though, he completely loses sight of that in favour of some weird obsession with religious iconography.
He stops caring about the deterrent soon enough and starts talking about gods and demons with jarringly tangential links to Superman. After that he starts utilizing alien technology, then he gets all grandiose about “God bending to (his) will” when he threatens Martha Kent’s life in an attempt to get Superman to kill Batman. By the end of the film, he’s screaming “They’re coming!” it’s not made clear who he’s talking about. I can’t help but think a few important scenes must’ve been cut (which is alarming when you consider what they left in.) and a lot of context is either lost in the edit or flat-out missing.
Speaking of things that lack context, Batman’s main justification for deciding what he’s going to do, is that he has bad dreams about a potential future (which is essentially, the game Injustice: Gods Among Us coming to pass.) which, as motivations go, is lazy, contrived, and just flat out dumb. Especially when he was actually given quite a strong opening, which saw him running through the streets of Metropolis during the events of the battle in Man of Steel trying to save as many people as he can. Then he catches a glimpse of Superman forcing Zod backwards through a building, this is apparently what leads him to mistrust Superman. Which, depressingly, is just about the best-written part of this film.
Oh and Batman kills people in this by the way, like, a lot of people, so, that pathological fear of death and one rule against killing that he upholds above all else and is a huge and pivotal part of his character? “Screw that, let’s just show him shooting people between working out and hitting a monster truck tire with a sledgehammer bro!” I swear I’m fully expecting a deleted scene wherein Batman goes to Hooters and eats a ton of chicken wings, because “Dude, he’s so fuckin’ MANLY!” Also, he brands criminals now, BRANDS them! With a red-hot Batterang I think, because yeah who doesn’t remember Batman having a fetish for leaving scars?
You’re probably expecting me to round on Ben Affleck next, but I’m actually not going to, Ben Affleck was fine, in his defence, there is no actor in the world that could’ve made this god-awful script any better, I’m confident Ben Affleck could play Batman well, but not in a movie as terribly written as this one.
Also, the plot relies so heavily on convenience that you’d think everyone was a fucking clairvoyant. In preparation for the big match-up, Batman has made a pure Kryptonite spear, he stabs it into the ground inside a random building and leaves it there, later in the fight, he gets thrown into that very building by Superman, and pulls it out. No! there is no possible way he could’ve known the fight would end up going there! That is among the laziest writing ever, and it’s not even the laziest there is in this film.
Anyone want to guess the reason Batman eventually stops wanting to kill Superman and decides to trust him? If you don’t know already you won’t guess it, not because it’s clever or anything, quite the opposite in fact. The thing that stops Batman in his tracks when he has Superman dead to rights, is finding out that Superman also has a mother named Martha. At this point I forgot I was in a public cinema and shouted “WHAT!?” This was the stupidest, most contrived ceasefire I have ever witnessed in fiction. And it amounts to nothing because there’s another big-bad yet to fight in Doomsday, who in this movie is just Zod’s corpse given the Tyrant treatment from Resident Evil with alien tech, but that’s fine Doomsday is Doomsday.
The rest is explosions, Wonder Woman shows up for some screen-time and then a serious down-ending the film has not earned and I can’t take seriously.
In summary, this, unrelentingly dour, boring, over-long-yet-still-horribly-rushed self-aggrandising incomprehensible clusterfuck is the worst film featuring Batman or Superman I've ever been compelled to endure, and I'm counting Batman & Robin, AND Superman Returns.
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