Posted in: Movies | Tagged: batman v superman, dc, entertainment, film, Warner Bros

The Superhero Dojo: 6 Things That Are Almost Putting Us Off Going To See Batman V Superman Already

By Parker McCombe

Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice is a pinnacle moment in film history. The two biggest superhero icons sharing the celluloid, on opposite sides of the poster. It's a dream come true for comic book fans and even non-comic book fans. Both characters have had the most cultural impact of any comics character and are the quintessential Super Heroes, loved far beyond their roots in the panels of Action and Detective Comics. Let's not, for even a second, think that it isn't going to make a gazillion dollars without breaking a sweat, but for us, the people who care so deeply about these characters, it's difficult not to admit that there's a tiny voice in the back of our head saying, "Don't go and see it. Do you want your heart broken again? You do remember X-Men: The Last Stand don't you? You're an old soul now, this could break you."

Why the ominous fear in the back of our minds? Surely no one can mess up the natural awesomeness of a film with both Batman and Superman in it, can they? Let's look at the reasons why we're not all queuing up at theatres right now. First off, there's all that…

1. Past Experience

As comic book fans we've learnt the cruel and inevitable truth that film studios don't understand us. It took Marvel Comics themselves to crawl into the driving seat of that truck and it's still been a bumpy ride once or twice. The men with all the money in the movie business don't read comics, nor do that have a real idea of what we want in our comic book movies. In fact, if we're honest here, the money men don't know, and probably will never know, what makes any movie-going audience tick. The big problem is, they think they do. "Why is there depth in this story? Isn't it for kids? The people who watch these films are children and idiots, just put in more explosions for the trailer." I'm paraphrasing of course, but the proof is the Green Lantern. Time and time again we have had to sit through awful films that studios have treated like action blockbusters with no heart or brains because anything creative has been siphoned off or it's been produced and filmed by a bunch of 'yes men' budgeting for CGI and a big name star. It's their money and if they want a big name on the poster, they'll get one. We all, as movie-goers live under this assumption because it's been proved to us so many times in the past.

Hence the Kevin Smith-deafening public outcry when the word of the day was…

2. Batfleck

"Did the producers even watch Daredevil??" we said. "What about Gigli??" we screamed. "My grandmother would make a better Batman!" we cried. "He's not my Bruce Wayne," we repeated incessantly while sticking pins in tiny, hurriedly prepared Ben Affleck dolls.

The fact is that Affleck is a reasonably good actor, and, while we are all 98% sure he was playing himself in Mallrats, he'll probably make a good Bruce and a passable Bats.

No, that anger we had, it came from fear; fear that some guy with a chequebook was making reckless decisions about our most beloved paragon, the superhero who's just a normal human being like us, the one without the powers The most realistic one. The one we just had three gritty and grounded movies about. This guy is going to freakin' ruin everything because greed.

Why else would that guy suddenly have it open and signed for eleven more films…

3. DC Shared Movie Universe

Wow, now those are some pretty bold words to bandy about.

Of course we all want to see shared universes on screen, crossovers are to us Comic Book lovers what compliments are to Kanye West, we already have them in our head but we want you to lay them out there as much as possible anyway. If Thor somehow crossed over with God, we'd all be going to church to collect as many variant Bible covers we could find. Look at Marvel's shared universe; Ant-Man could be a film about a man looking after actual ants and we'd all go and see it as long as Tony Stark gets mentioned. Guardians Of The Galaxy is pretty tenuously linked to the current movie universe with a bunch of characters we barely know and we still threw ourselves at it like it was the last lifeboat on the Titanic.

Yes, we desperately want to see a shared DC Cinematic Universe brought to us by Warner Brothers.

The thing is though, Marvel has spent a long time building that universe. Now every film feels like it's must-see, not just the big crossover event movies like The Avengers. And even with Avengers, can you imagine they kicked in with that after the first Iron Man? We'd all be like "What the damn hell is going on, seriously, Loki is the villain?" "How do they even know about Thor?" "And who even cares about this Coulson guy, anyway?"

It's almost as if Warner Bros. have jumped in half-way through a story, thinking "Who cares about building the story? If they all watch this they'll have to go see all the other movies."

I'll tell you right now Warner, I have limited time and pennies, you have a hell of a lot of work to do before a Cyborg movie if you're going to convince me to part with my money for tickets and overpriced popcorn the day that thing drops.

So, yes, this movie is the second film in a line of movies in which the only real solid info we have to go on is a supposed memo detailing they'd all be 'dark' and 'gritty' with 'no jokes.'

And all the alarm bells on all of the infinite earths ring out as we have a mass crisis about…

4. The Tone

Batman is supposed to be dark, but even the Christopher Nolan trilogy had brilliant moments of humour. Meanwhile, over on Man Of Steel, Superman, a being powered by the light of sun who stands for all that is good, barely had time to crack a smile, what with all the pointlessly losing his adopted father to hide his powers and then using said powers out in the open, carelessly, to help turn practically an entire city to rubble by using his fists like they would fall off if they weren't used punch something every two seconds.

Of course, there is the argument that it's taking the character back to it's original roots. Thing is, that character evolved, and it's true popularity came from that evolution. Of course the sentiment doesn't necessarily fit with today's world, and in turn that makes it difficult to sell to audiences, but it's been done reasonably consistently in both the comics and the DC Animated Universe if writers use Superman the way he should be used, brains before brawn and the character's unyielding goodness being used against him to create interest and peril. But, no, actually writing a well thought out and entertaining movie story around these principles is maybe a little hard, let's just change the entire dynamic of the character instead and make him gritty.

Mark Waid, a man who knows Clark Kent's social security number off by heart, put it best when he said "With the exception of the first-flight beat—the smile Superman gets when he first takes to the air—it's utterly joyless. From start to finish. Utterly. Joyless. And I just have no interest in relentless joyless from a guy who can fly."

Ultimately, Man Of Steel is a pretty decent Sci-fi movie and, conversely it turns out, an absolutely terrible Superman movie.

It wasn't so much a departure of what had been done cinematically with Superman before – it wasn't even a complete rehash – it was like ignoring all of the charm of the actual myth of the character, and instead focusing on all the bits that would lead to the most possible CGI at any given time. No wonder people want to spray over his statue in the trailer for Batman V Superman, Supes, out of every single superhero, is the one who is supposed to inspire hope, not fear. They even made a point of bringing it up in the film itself before completely ignoring the concept. It's fundamental. Fundamental in the way Batman is the character who inspires fear as opposed to hope. That's why the Superman/Batman match up/friendship is intriguing in so many ways. They are polar opposites in many respects along with this main, inspirational one, but both have the need to serve justice without killing. Bruce Wayne is a mortal making sure he can protect mankind against a god if the need arises and sometimes Kal-El is more human in his thoughts and actions than The Bat.

If anything, Batman V Superman is the most character driven crossover you can have in all of comics, if you change the fundamentals of one character, you change the dynamic if the two men entirely. It's a storytelling necessity that Superman's stories, while still deserving of depth, conviction and consequence, need to be lighter and more hopeful in tone because that is part of the essence of what that character is at it's core. Not to mention the fact that stories, dark in nature or not, need humour and charm in the mix to entertain. It's a big worry when any film studio forgets that, especially when we're talking about far-fetched things such as men in masks and capes. If any films need an undercurrent of jokes, self deprecation and knowing winks of Robert Downey Jr-like charm, it's ones like this.

And we aren't the only ones worried about how Warner Bros. are approaching this thing…

5. Hollywood's Lack Of Faith

As recently documented in the Hollywood Reporter, no one, either in the movie industry or perhaps even at Warner Bros. seems to have any faith in these upcoming DC movies past the intellectual property as a draw and success seems mostly hung on the tent-pole of mere character recognition, something that in the past has never went well.

Moreover the studio don't even seem to have a rudder like Marvel's Kevin Feige to bring consistency to the myriad of creative visions on each project, Is it worth us really investing ourselves in something so seemingly hashed together? Especially when they seem so jumpy about how certain projects are going that the vision behind them is constantly in flux.

The lack of confidence in their product is hanging over Dawn Of Justice like a bad smell, compounded by the fact that they've moved the date of it's opening weekend twice, soon after the opening weekend was announced for the second time, it was changed, Warner backing down in fear of Captain America's box office draw when the same weekend was announced as it's opening day.

6. That Date Change

If ten years ago someone had said a Captain America film was odds on to do better in the Box Office than Batman V Superman they would get laughed out the Hall Of Justice, but now that is what's happening. Warner running scared of major opening weekends with two of the most recognizable fictional characters worldwide sets all sorts of panic going off in the back of our heads. They decided themselves that we'd all go and see Civil War, months before it had even started filming, never mind when we were actually presented with the choice.

Surely they realize this would impact our view? Maybe the fact is that they changed it so quickly thinking "Hey, they'll probably not even remember. Better now than later on when we can't hold our poker face and really look stupid for losing our bottle."

Like I said though, we're still all going to go see it and it will make a bundle of cash. It's Batman Versus Superman. But it would be nice to go completely excited, without all these nagging doubts, comfortable that, like the Marvel Cinematic Universe, we'll be judging it in simply either being low or high on the scale of 'great'.

I hope that Zack Snyder and everyone involved gets Batman V Superman right, but I just can't help but fear that, not only will we leave the cinema unentertained, we'll leave broken hearted, knowing it could be long time before we see it done again, properly, as Warner Brothers will take the ticket sales as gleeful encouragement to continue on the same half-assed track and make awful Justice League movies featuring these versions of the characters for years to come.

@ParkerMcCombe is Co-Creator and writer of Samurai City and goes out of his way not to verse people who comment on his work (but always has a plan to defeat them prepared).

Enjoyed this? Please share on social media!

Stay up-to-date and support the site by following Bleeding Cool on Google News today!