Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice

[Vee]

Oh, many fans hate it, not just critics. There's just also a very fanatical DC mob that wants to save the movie's rep at any cost (lumping critics like Manohla Dargis in with claims of a supposedly payola-fueled 'Marvel conspiracy'). And everybody loves trashing Age of Ultron simply because of the rule of sequels - there always has to be a backlash.

 

The truth, for me, is there are very talented actors in the film who try to do good work (Affleck, poor Cavill, Adams, etc.) who are completely abandoned by an adolescent director with no understanding or love for the material, and a studio that has zero faith in any character involved other than a very reductive view of Batman.

[DRW50]

I didn't mean to suggest most fans like it. I said fan opinion seemed more divided than critical opinion, which was very low - lower than I would have expected based on fan comments. 

 

I do think there is a wide berth given to Marvel films, although obviously there is no payola. Marvel films are "hot" at the moment, and it's cool and fun for critics to talk about them. If a film by another company conflated being infertile/sterilized with being a "monster," as AoU did, I think they would have been torn apart.

[Vee]

I didn't take that scene that way at all and I've never agreed with that interpretation of it. The Black Widow was talking about her decades of killing as a secret agent (she is shown being trained as a child by Julie Delpy's character, which is the impetus for her later confession to Banner). Her fertility was just one thing taken from her during that process. And AOU was torn apart for that (deeply incorrect, IMO) interpretation of that scene - nobody gave the movie a break because it was open season. There are certainly things to critique about the film, which is imperfect, but I always felt the most prominent attacks on the film by a slew of online voices - claiming it said Natasha called herself a monster for being barren - were wrongheaded, inaccurate and ignorant.

[DRW50]

 

It was torn apart by fans, not critics, which was what I was talking about. There was a hesitancy/tension/strangeness surrounding that film in how it was made and how it was sold to the public, IMO, but from critics and the media it generally got a pass (compare their messy press tour to the media coverage of the BvS one, for instance, where you got lengthy negative articles because Ben Affleck looks sad or Henry Cavill says something pretentious in an interview).

[Vee]

That whole storyline was torn apart by both fans and critics online, it wasn't some grass-roots movement. And I remember a ton of articles about that press tour on AOU. Beyond that we can agree to disagree, but neither of these films is or was the underdog or the prom queen being pilloried or glorified by the press. Neither multi-million-dollar blockbuster got a pass.

[quartermainefan]

I didn't understand why Lex Luthor hated Superman, wanted Batman to kill Superman, knew who Superman's mother was, how he got the US Capitol rigged with bombs, and how he knows the next villain is coming.    Was he sharing Batman's dreams? 

 

Lois took a helicopter to Gotham to break up the fight, but then when everyone left I could swear we saw her back in Metropolis in a brief scene with Perry, and then she was magically back in Gotham trying to get the spear.

 

Bstman decided Superman needed to die for some reason not really explained, and then when he found out their mothers had the same name he not only stopped fighting he became Superman's best pal (who used to be Jimmy RIP)

 

Wonder Woman came to town looking for a photo but how did she know Luthor had it?  And why did she care?  And if she was back on Paradise Island all these years how did Luthor get intel on her if he didn't know she existed?   For that matter, how did he get any of those videos?   Why would Aquaman be posing for cameras at the bottom of the sea?

[AdelaideCate007]

I think Vee's predictions of heads rolling at WB over this is about to become true since this is about to have one of the biggest weekend USA box office drops of all time with a plus 70% nose dive for the weekend (it already set the record for Friday to Friday drop with around a 81% drop). This is an unmitigated disaster on every front which is a shame because these characters and actors really do deserve so much better.

http://deadline.com/2016/04/batman-v-superman-box-office-second-weekend-gods-not-dead-2-1201729796/

http://screenrant.com/batman-v-superman-box-office-drop-off/

 

No way this catches Deadpool in USA or worldwide box office (it's pretty much already done here in Australia after just a little over a week) or gets to a billion worldwide. I'm guessing The Civil War, X-Men Apocalypse, and probably Dr. Strange will all pass it. WB is now in panic mode over Suicide Squad as well and is now doing reshoots to try and retool it to be "funnier" and I'm going to guess Justice League gets delayed again or never gets off the ground and they just go with the solo Batman film.

[Vee]

Whoa, really? I'm surprised, I thought they'd rode it out.

[DRW50]

Last week the box office sites said it would probably have a big drop (only question being how big), so, yeah.

 

Everything about that Dr. Strange movie smells of misfire so if that has a better box office haul then that would be, I guess, a sign of the Marvel movies strength...I still have no idea why that particular actor was cast in the lead role.

[Vee]

I think he's a fine choice, really. I just think he's become a bit too ubiquitous in a few too many genre properties, so people feel oversaturated. He should never have done Star Trek. I think Strange will do well - the director is great (Sinister and The Exorcism of Emily Rose are better than they have any right to be) and the concept, when handled with the down to earth touch that they used on Thor and GOTG, should work.

[DRW50]

I think he's just done a few too many movies all at once, beyond Star Trek (the Zoolander cameo was especially dumb to me), but I mostly meant the photos and such of him in the role. He just looks wrong for me. But then my favorite part of Dr. Strange was always Clea (I don't even know where she is now) so fans or people with fresh eyes may enjoy it. I personally would have given him a Netflix show rather than a movie, but we'll see. Ant-Man did decently and that was written off by many beforehand, so I will probably be wrong.

[Vee]

He looks fine to me, really. But I think the costumes for any of these sorts of movies often look goofy as hell on the set in natural light, and then fix up properly with real lighting on-camera.

 

I think Ant-Man was fun and fine but I consider it minor Marvel and more of just a romp. The cast was great but I think it would've been a richer film if Edgar Wright had stayed onboard. (Ironically though, the sequences that really remind me of him - Michael Peña's various interludes and the miniature battle scored to The Cure - were apparently all Adam McKay.) But everyone else just loves it so whatever. I do think Paul Rudd was wonderful, and I'm glad the next movie is all about the Wasp (even though I am still lukewarm on Evangeline Lilly).

[Toups]

If the WB execs are really terrified by that big drop and are thinking of making changes, I think they should go after JJ Abrams, who doesn't have his project as a director.  This would create good buzz after how The Force Awakens did financially, critically, and from fan response.  Another option would be to give Affleck the directing job.   Since Justice Leagues starts shooting on April 11 for a November 17, 2017 release, they can delay the shoot for a couple of months (say 4-5 months) to let the new director work on the script.   Then just move the release date to March 30, 2018. 

[Vee]

Oh God, no. JJ Abrams is a nice guy hack, but he's a hack nonetheless. A gifted technician and skilled director, but still creatively a hack. He did a very fine job with Star Wars, which I liked a lot, because it was his dream job, because he'd spent his whole career emulating the Spielberg/Lucas school of filmmaking and because he had many other creative minds helping him craft and script that film. But left to his own devices, he is a hack with an ADD sensibility for narrative and character that breathlessly comes through every time. He is also a master of marketing his original products in such a way as to camouflage his failings.

 

JJ Abrams worked on a Superman script in the 2000s - it was called "Flyby" and featured endless cross-cuts to an ongoing war on the still-existing planet of Krypton, a flying and pooping Superbaby, and Lex Luthor as a CIA agent who was also secretly an alien. It was so derided when it leaked online that WB was forced to drop him and the project. Not unlike Zack Snyder, Abrams has no affinity for any existing property which he does not already have a slavish reverence for (see also: Star Trek). This would be a terrible idea.

 

My best advice? Use the events of this film to reboot the Superman property with a brighter, more optimistic approach and an all-new director, perhaps Brad Bird. Let Affleck do his Batman film but let the tone lighten somewhat and introduce more shadings of the various eras of Batman, like the detective days of the '80s and '90s in which Batman built his family of allies and sidekicks. And let George Miller return to the Justice League project (he'd been attached to it in the mid-2000s, but WB pulled the plug at the last minute after it was cast) and completely reconceive it and the entire DC Universe.

[quartermainefan]

He looks like him.  He's the perfect choice.   Maybe if we could channel in John Carradine from 1940 that would be better, but BC gets the job done.