The gladiator match of the century is here. The Bat of Gotham vs The last son of Krypton... is it just another a CGI skiet, skop ‘n donner or is there more to this movie? Let’s dig in...
If you’ve been watching comic book movies over the years, you know what Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice (BvS) means to DC. It’s the first time DC’s best selling and most popular characters interact in a live feature film. BvS is supposed to set up the tone and world of all the other superheroes in the DC world and most importantly, it’s the film that needs to assert the unique selling points of DC from Marvel.
Although DC came first in the comic book world with Superman in 1938, Marvel has done a way better job with Ironman and the later Avenger films to dominate the cinema world. Marvel’s character and brand of films are very big at the moment. Marvel has successfully sold comic book movies as light, funny action films that won’t give the 13-year-olds at the movies any nightmares.
Step in Zack Snyder with Man of Steel and its companion piece BvS and like hip hop kids say: the game gone change and nothing will ever be the same again. This is not your 1980’s Batman from Tim Burton movies, no more. This is not even your Dark Knight Batman of Christopher Nolan’s era.
So the same can be said of Superman. The Christopher Reeve Superman of a bygone era is gone, like Perry White says to Clark Kent “this is no longer 1938" and Superman is no longer just a blue eyed scout boy with powers.
Things have changed and Zack Snyder and his writing team of Chris Terio ( Argo) and David S Goyer ( Batman Begins) are totally committed to treating comic book movies as mythologies of our times: so it means big themes around the meaning of faith, power, religion (God) and democracy.
It also means that we are seeing real world issues treated in fantastical ways with characters who mirror the times they live in, even though their context is not exactly like ours.
Batman suffers from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder - what do you expect from a man who's been fighting crime from the margins for 20 years? He's grizzled, he shoots, he stabs and is one shade away from being the bad guy.
On the other end you have Kal El aka Clark Kent who has just started being a hero; whose idealism and strength is a threat to everyone around him (including the US government and on archrival). How do the strong subject themselves to the weak? Can utimate power be benevolent?
Yes, this is heady stuff and it's all coming from a comic book movie not Charles Dickens or Julius Ceasar. This is merely scraping the top of the iceberg - there are more themes and ideas to be mined from BvS, one can spend days analysing and decoding the movie, which is testament to the writers and the scope of the creators' ambitions.
Yet it’s not just heady stuff here - the action is motivated by story - something the Matrix perfected. There’s lots of cool action and humour but it's not there for action's sake. It either moves the story forward or the action piece becomes significant within the story later.
Snyder clearly took the criticisms of MoS to heart and addresses most of them in this movie whilst building on what he did on MoS beautifully. Like Star Wars; The Empire Strikes Back, Snyder and company up the ante and also give us a deeper perspective to our characters, mining and building on ideas from MoS.
Batman and Superman are established as two sides of the same coin but different in their world views, how the world views them and its impact on their sense of self. Snyder shows off their virtues but also what makes them flawed.
Cavil (who's brilliant) and Affleck (equally brilliant) are supported superbly by Jesse Eseinberg as Lex Luthor Jnr, Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman and Jeremy Irons as Alfred.
I can truly and honestly say that based on BvS alone, the characters, the story, the action and the themes, I am so looking forward to the Justice League movie Part 1 next year. I’m very happy that DC is keeping to its darker tone and mythological take on superheroes rather instead of giving us funny action films in spandex.
Side note: BvS is loosely based on Frank Millers comic book story The Dark Knight Trilogy, with its final chapter currently available at comic book stores (The Dark Knight: The Master Race) whereby Superman
(who's more pro US government and almost dictatorial) faces off with Batman and Green Arrow because superheroes have been outlawed by the state.
Frank Miller's Dark Knight is Zack Snyders favourite comic book and has influenced the tone of the movies and look of Batman in this new DC universe.
Rating ****1/2
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* trash ** if only theres nothing better on tv ***its aight **** Almost perfect *****Classic