Batman may have first name billing in the title for BATMAN V. SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE but this is by far a MAN OF STEEL sequel because Superman is at the heart of the film.
This is your final chance to stop reading before the SPOILERS start after the image below; and there's a notation below when the spoilers stop to you can scroll down and read more. Please note that not everything is being revealed in order to keep some stuff a surprise for your theater seat.
The movie starts with Bruce Wayne's origin story. Seriously. Again. This takes a few minutes too long and our society is at a point where, like Spider-Man over on the Marvel side, there's no need to tell the origin of Batman anymore. Everyone knows it across all generations. But director Zack Snyder did it anyway and this could have shaved a bit off of the run time.
Speaking of the run time, it felt like a very long 2.5 hours that should have been cut down closer to two hours. This is mainly due to its slow pacing. Throughout the first two Acts, it feels like the pacing starting picking up in spots but then fell off and there was no consistent momentum at any point of the movie. (And there's a 3-hour extended cut of this movie coming for home release, yikes.)
During Bruce's origin tale a moment was shown of Bruce falling into a well (or cave) and there are of course bats. These bats then begin flying around Bruce to float him up to safety, seriously.
But then the pacing actually picks up and we are thrown right into Bruce's perspective from the ground during Superman's battle with General Zod at the end of MAN OF STEEL. This is easily one of the best parts of the entire movie because it has great pacing and Ben Affleck conveys his intensity in a believable way where we actually care about the destruction taking place around the Wayne Building in Metropolis. Sadly, this sequence is cut short when Snyder could have stuck with it for a bit longer showing the effects of the destruction so many critics and fans complained about from MAN OF STEEL. Throughout the rest of this movie, there are a couple of forced mentions of how the heroes are in an abandoned area to imply that any destruction will not have casualties.
The movie fast-forwards 18 months and we have a world where society either loves or hates Superman. Lex Luthor is received as the savior of rebuilding Metropolis but he is up to no good and is playing a long con of pitting Batman against Superman. Lex acquires some Kryponite and Bruce wants it and Batman eventually gets it. During Batman's pursuit of the Kryptonite it really looks like Batman does indeed kill in this movie. During much of Batman's fight sequences opponents are defeated ambiguous enough to be perceived as Batman kills, but let's not dwell on this and let social media and forums debate about it.
Bruce is, of course, then invited to a big party thrown by Lex and he uses this as a means to hack LexCorp but he also runs into Diana Prince (Wonder Woman) and Clark Kent. Alfred is in Bruce's ear guiding him through Lex's place to get to Lex's system mainframe, but at the same time Clark can hear their entire conversation with his super hearing. Unfortunately, when Bruce goes back to his hard drive bug, it's missing and a certain Wonder Woman had already acquired it.
Bruce winds up (conveniently) running into her again at a museum and asks for his property back. She makes a crack at how it isn't his since he was in fact stealing from LexCorp but she gives it back, but at the request of Bruce, she tells him she needed a picture back from Lex.
Meanwhile, Bruce has been having nightmares and he has three of them but all of which have no real meaning toward the actual film itself and all could have been cut out. One takes place in the Wayne mausoleum where there is an Easter Egg cameo that will be left a secret for the comic book readers to love its surprise. A second nightmare is when he is in the future wearing the trench coat you've seen from the trailers with all the hints possible that Darkseid is coming. And the third one which was highly weird and felt awkwardly forced.
Lex sets up Batman to hate Superman more and frames Superman for an explosion. Then, he sets up and forces Superman to fight Batman. The moment every fan has been waiting decades for commences but the majority of the actual Batman and Superman fight was revealed through trailers. No different from when Marvel Studios revealed pretty much all of the Hulkbuster fight in its trailers for AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON.
Batman wins the fight with his crafty uses of Kryptonite but Lois intervenes to save Superman and helps Batman realize Superman needs his help, so they team-up to fight Lex. This makes Lex unhappy and he unleashes Doomsday. Lex's motives to create Doomsday are weak and poorly laid out as him just being a crazy smart insane person who wants Superman and Batman both dead.
Superman and Batman fight Lex's monstrosity but when Wonder Woman shows up she helps the boys battle the monster. She's definitely a badass but a lot of her fight scenes were of the CG variety and most of the Doomsday battle looked more like video game cut scenes than anything else and was honestly a born battle when it should have been fun, entertaining and more of an iconic moment.
Superman helps to turn the tide and the battle is won but not without loss. Here is where we stop recapping the movie because if we dig any deeper into it, then there won't be any surprises left for your seat.
Of course this is a set-up movie to JUSTICE LEAGUE and the expanding DC Extended Universe and there are quick cameos by future Justice League members but those quick teases were really unnecessary.
[SPOILERS end.]
Overall, BATMAN V. SUPERMAN is a movie you have to see at least once regardless of the fact the pacing is very slow. Whether you'll want to go back for a second viewing is unknown because everything in its story is pretty straight forward and easily understandable (albeit still confusing at some points due to storytelling issues) without much mystery as to what is coming next. Because the story is so linear and lacks any thoughtful mystery, there's not much left to talk about except for its big ending. And if you're looking for any laughs there are maybe two that aren't more than a little giggle quietly to yourself. The film takes itself too serious too often to really be seen as being fun and it is borderline too dark for it's own good. Hopefully that won't continue in JUSTICE LEAGUE because the DCEU need at least a little color and a lot less grit.
Affleck is a decent, but not great, Batman. He's no game changer in the role. But then it all feels weird because it feels like this Batman kills and doesn't care about killing; Batman shouldn't kill. Alfred felt like a wasted performance from Jeremy Irons because he's just mostly in a room by himself talking into Batman's ear as his guide during missions. He is less of a butler and more of a crime fighting partner from afar.
Gal Gadot is a strong presence but her role in the film could have been so much more mysterious and she was shoehorned into the big battle when she should have been the one who turned the tide and saved the two heroes. Jesse Eisenberg is not menacing enough and he comes off as a millennial who has missed too many doses of Adderall and is more on the annoying side of being a true villain. A much different spin on Lex Luthor than ever before but that alone may rub fans the wrong way because it's a bit on the side of being too different. More character development for Lex would've helped a lot. And let's not forget about Hans Zimmer's score which is always a stand-out, as per usual, with his work.
As the headline for this review says, this is a MAN OF STEEL sequel above all else. Henry Cavill conveys emotion, heart and strength in every scene he's in. Superman is at the heart of this movie because without his actions in MAN OF STEEL, then nothing in this movie would have ever happened. Even though Batman's name is in the title, this is Superman's movie. When you peel back the extra baggage and just focus on Superman's story it actually feels like it would have been a much better movie than it is with all those extra layers on top of it.
This movie should have just been called BATMAN V. SUPERMAN without any JUSTICE LEAGUE subtitle tease set-up and it still would have been a great set-up movie without all the layers that were forced in and helped to bog down its pacing.
In conclusion, let's rant about the trailers for BATMAN V. SUPERMAN. This movie would've been so much better when it comes to its surprises had there been no Doomsday trailer reveal — that decision should've gotten someone fired — and less shown of the actual Batman and Superman brawl. Plus pretty much all of Wonder Woman's scenes were from the trailers, too. It's time to take a less is more approach when it comes to big iconic characters in movies because too many moments were ruined by putting too much into trailers to entice people who were already going to go and see this movie in the first place. Perhaps with less shown in trailers, this movie could have left a better impression, generally speaking.
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