Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice – Film Analysis of the Week

With the Justice League movie only two days away, it seems appropriate to revisit the most polarising comic book film of all time, and take a look at exactly what Justice League shouldn’t be in order to be successful.

I have written about this film quite a lot, and my actual review of the movie ended with me giving the film a full rating. My opinion, over time, has greatly changed. I think the reason I praised Batman v Superman so much, initially, was the fact that Batman and Superman were on the big screen together for the first time, and I was caught up in the spectacle of the moment. Ironically, that’s what this movie should have been. It should have been a film people would be talking about for decades. Unfortunately, it doesn’t deserve to be.

Last year, I wrote an article that considered the comic book movie in general, and I closed it off with a rather extensive list of the things wrong with Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. I would strongly recommend reading it, even if you skip the main article, because reading it after so long, it made me laugh a little. You can read it here.

Alright, let’s get into it. It’s fair to put a spoiler warning here.

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, which was coming off of three years of intense anticipation upon its release, has a ‘plot’ that is far too complicated to be made into a synopsis. It involves Superman going under trial because some people thought he killed civilians in Africa (which, by the way, is never even explained in the theatrical cut). Batman, who was in Metropolis during the Michael Bay fantasy known as the last act of Man of Steel, has taken it upon himself to take down Superman, who he justifiably sees as a threat to humanity, given the fact that this version of Superman really doesn’t seem to care about people at all. Meanwhile, Lex Luthor is toying around with the Kryptonian remains from Man of Steel and has some dire plans for Superman. Also, Wonder Woman’s in the movie. And Lois Lane is trying to track down a bullet that leads to Lexcorp. This summary is already a mess.

There are some good things about the movie, and the positives mostly are limited to the performances. Ben Affleck, Henry Cavill, Amy Adams, Gal Gadot, Jeremy Irons and Diane Lane are all good. Affleck in particular stands out, as my personal favourite Batman so far.

However, Superman in this movie is completely baffling. It’s as if the writers and Zack Snyder said ‘let’s take what makes Superman Superman… And forget all about those things’. There is a montage in this film of Superman saving people (including the weird shot above) and he looks miserable doing it. It looks like saving people is not something he wants to do, but is something he is being forced to do. Even when, in the middle of the film, a courtroom blows up, Superman not only ignores the wounded around him, but he just flies away without helping them. This isn’t Superman. This is a version of the character that is caught up in the ‘everything has to be dark and gritty’ movement, which does work when done well, such as with Riverdale. However, when this, quite frankly, stupid desire to drain the hope and energy out of everything affects the wrong things, like the very character of Superman, it’s just wrong. Marvel gets a lot of criticism for not being ‘dark enough’, but the difference between Marvel and DC is that Marvel don’t sacrifice the core traits of their characters just to be ‘edgy’. Captain America isn’t a moping war veteran who has given up on life. Spider-Man isn’t an emo teenager who hates himself and everything around him.

Furthermore, especially in Man of Steel, Superman doesn’t seem to care all that much about civilians he might be putting in danger. Yes, he does kill Zod in order to save a family (one of the best Superman moments in the DCEU), but that comes after voluntarily wrecking half of Metropolis. The DCEU has, at least so far, failed the character of Superman so badly that only a miracle can save him going forward.

Lois Lane plays no role in this film other than being plain stupid. Nothing highlights this more than when she dumps Batman’s kryptonite spear into a body of water for no reason whatsoever other than creating a moment of tension at the very end of the movie.

Of course, the only performance I didn’t call good is Jesse Eisenberg’s crackhead psychopath that was billed as ‘Lex Luthor’. I don’t know what anyone involved in the production of this movie was thinking, first in casting Eisenberg at all for the role, and then allowing him to essentially play the same characters he did in The Social Network and Now You See Me. Eisenberg is a talented actor, but even if he wasn’t miscast in this film, his performance is dreadful. This may not be his fault, given the material, but if it isn’t his fault, then it is somebody. It is rather nice that both Superman and Lex Luthor were done so wrong in the same movie.

As good as Ben Affleck is as Batman, there is no denying that there is one aspect of the character that this movie blatantly ignores. What I am referring to, obviously, is the entirely unexplained murdering. They seriously must have just thought ‘let’s think of what’s central to these characters, and ignore them’.

Enough about the characters. Let’s really examine this movie.

You can split Batman v Superman into two halves, divided by the courtroom scene. The first half of the film is a grounded, character-driven political thriller. The second half appears to have been made after everyone involved turned off their brains, and assumed everyone in the audience would too.

Having said that, however, it isn’t like the first half of the movie doesn’t have problems. The most prominent is the dream Bruce Wayne has, which is followed by a warning about Superman from the future Flash(?). This is the problem with studios wanting to cram as much as they can into a film. There is absolutely no reason this entire sequence is needed in the film. Batman already wants to take Superman down. He doesn’t need further motivation from a Darkseid-themed dream and an Injustice-themed warning.

That, in essence, is Dawn of Justice’s biggest problem. There is simply a lack of focus in the film, which is trying too hard to balance too many elements and set up too many things.

The second half of the film really takes your ability to believe things and flushes it down the toilet. Batman has prepared everything he needs to kill Superman. And so he finds a deserted area in Gotham and just… Waits for him. If you actually put some thought into this, there is no way this would work without Lex Luthor, who Batman magically knew would kidnap Martha Kent and send Superman after him.

Now, why would Lex Luthor send Superman after Batman? I really am not sure. Does he want Superman dead? Because if he does, then it’s really fortunate that Batman was prepared with the kryptonite and not just hanging out at a bar or something. Lex Luthor’s plan and Batman’s plan coincide so perfectly and complement each other so well that they would be impossible without cooperation, which the movie establishes does not exist. So, basically, this movie’s screenplay decided that the best way to have Batman and Superman finally fight would be coincidence and two very stupid plans. Well done, movie. Well done.

Now even though I gave the movie my full rating in my review, one thing that did bother me when I first watched the movie was that the fight between Batman and Superman is inexcusably short. Everything that does happen is great, and is probably the best part of the movie, but for a movie literally calling itself Batman v Superman, dedicating 4% of its run time (the Ultimate Edition) to actually honouring that title is laughable.

And of course, as that fight leads up to its climax, this movie leads up to its crowning moment of stupidity. Who, in the history of the world, would ever say ‘Save (mother’s name)’ instead of ‘Save my mother/mom/mum’? Which one of this film’s two writers thought ‘this is an excellent way to have the two stop fighting, right before Batman is going to impale Superman and murder him’, and who was the other writer that said ‘yes, that is brilliant’? The fact that someone’s mother shares the same name as yours should not stop Batman from finishing his task. If, in this universe, he ever has to confront Ra’s As Ghul who has a similar plan for Gotham City as in Batman Begins, this version of Batman would simply let him do it if he says ‘my mother’s name is Martha’.

Now, did I mention that throughout this movie, Lex Luthor is creating an abysmal-looking Doomsday? Sorry if I didn’t. That’s a part of this movie, because it didn’t already have enough in it. Here’s the thing, though. Lex Luthor creates Doomsday to kill Superman in case Batman doesn’t. But what did he have planned after his plan succeeds? Did he expect Doomsday to just obey his every command? Lex Luthor is supposed to be intelligent. This Lex Luthor is an idiot.

So, Superman goes after Lex Luthor while Batman saves Martha (in this movie’s most commendable scene). And then Doomsday is born and Wonder Woman shows up and we have a clustered mess of a finale in which Superman dies with Doomsday, is buried and is supposedly not dead.

Wonder Woman in this movie is fine. However, the rest of the Justice League in this movie, introduced for the first time on the big screen through an email, is some of the laziest writing anyone will ever see. Someone at LexCorp took the time to design names and logos for all of them too. The movie literally stops itself to have Diana Prince look at an email and some footage of the members of the Justice League.

This movie is honestly tiring to think about.

Look, if you’ve read this far and are a fan of DC, you probably hate me. I’m a DC fan too. However, I’m also a fan of movies, and this just isn’t a good one. Even if you say ‘It’s designed for DC fans’, there is no escaping the fact that this film has a lazy script, one disastrous performance, messy editing, questionable logic and tries too hard to set things up.

Suicide Squad is even worse, but thankfully Wonder Woman is a good film. And I really do hope Justice League is too. As long as it doesn’t make the mistakes this film made, it should be good.

I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again. Justice League should be as poetic as it is awesome. And it shouldn’t need an ‘Ultimate Cut’ to try and justify its plot holes, most of which still aren’t clear.

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice will not be remembered for decades to come. Hopefully, Justice League will be.