On March 25, DC Fanboys finally had their shot at the spotlight with the film, "Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice." After Marvel seemingly had a superhero monopoly with audiences around the country, it was time for not the movie America needed, but the movie America deserved. The shear amount of hype around this film was to a new level. Fans patiently waited and excitedly discussed in their mom’s basements, Reddit forums, and conventions the upcoming release of the film. When the day finally arrived, the anticipated masterpiece was anything but, leaving fans more sore than Batman’s back in "The Dark Knight Rises." Although many viewers left the theaters satisfied and maybe even quite confused as to why the movie suffered through the horrific reviews it received, I’m here to tell you why it (mostly) deserved those reviews and what was so bad about the film from the eyes of an obscenely knowledgeable comic book nerd. He goes by the alias Chance Eiting and without further ado, I'll let him take the reins.
Batman and Superman, possibly the two most iconic modern-day fictional characters, were brought to the big screen to face off against one another. This should not only be a film of epic proportions, but a two-and-a-half-hour period where you don’t care that your girlfriend wants to make out with you while watching. However, with my expectations being quite high going into this movie, I can truthfully say I was disappointed when I walked out. Not because it was an awful movie, but because it was titled “Batman v Superman.” It was literally the launching point for Warner Bros. and DC comics to cash in on this continuous superhero movie craze. Between the overall lazy script writing, lack of cohesive story, and shoehorned plot devices, the actual five-minute scene where the two Goliaths fight was not enough to carry this movie. Now, as a fair warning, the rest of this review contains more detailed reasoning and hence contains spoilers, so if you have not seen the movie yet I am warning you now, spoilers are below.
To come right out of the floodgates, what was up with Eisenberg’s Lex Luthor? Sure, he was not nearly as horrendous as everyone else has been saying -- he did as good as a job as the script allowed -- but how am I supposed to take someone seriously if they are forcefully putting Jolly Ranchers into other grown men’s mouths? This is supposed to be the diabolical enemy of Superman, the most powerful being on the planet, not some twitchy lunatic. He could have been used much better if just a few scenes were either tweaked or even taken out (for example, the end scene where he is in his jail cell and snot is profusely running down his face. Don’t tell me you didn’t notice that). Another big issue, Doomsday, was not only spoiled in the trailer of this movie but was also completely unnecessary. Not only did he look like a shaved grey gorilla with a bad case of acne, but his character, in general, was not at all needed. This is a movie titled “Batman v Superman,” so I want to see the Man of Steel and the Caped Crusader, not some grotesque beast raised miraculously from a corpse, blood droplets and what appeared to be cat urine in the haul of an alien ship. This leads to my next point: the film had a forced plot that had way too many unnecessary subplots. One, for example (besides Doomsday, which I’ve already touched on), would be what I like to call The Ridiculous Adventure of Louis Lane. I mean, at first it seemed she blended into the main story, but like the rest of this movie, as things unraveled it became convoluted and choppy. At one point she threw a Kryptonite spear into a pool of water, realized (not sure how) that this monster could be killed by said Kryptonite, then dove under to try and grab it, but instead gets trapped under falling debris, once again needing to be saved.
Don’t get me wrong -- this movie was not a complete disaster. I was at the least entertained throughout the majority of the movie; I mean a tear of joy did come to me when I witnessed Batman and Superman go head to head (thank you, Frank Miller). With the financial backing behind this movie, the efforts of the entire studio to start a superhero franchise, and with two bigger than life characters, this movie should have been better than average. How easy would it have been to be a little more creative and focus more on a cohesive story? Instead of worrying about setting up this whole superhero universe by solely marketing future movies within this movie (which it seems most superhero movies are now doing), just make a great movie with a few subtle references. That way, you don’t get critics and audience members alike complaining about a movie that has been dreamt about since the original Christopher Reeve and Michael Keaton movies. Just thank Affleck for his great performance as the caped crusader (not including the lack of explanation for why he was brutally murdering henchmen/criminals), otherwise this movie would have been even less than stellar.
In conclusion, not only was this movie a subpar big budget film, but it was an overall let down from how good this movie should have been. If you do go see this movie, I recommend that you get a large soda and a butt load of snacks to mind numbingly munch on during this two-and-a-half-hour stint, where you essentially wait for only a five-minute fight between the two protagonists, while sitting through what seemed like one long Justice League trailer.
