Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice

cinema, Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016) film

It's tempting to call it Boredom V Stupidity, but it wasn't too boring, there was just very little reason to care - even less for me as I hadn't seen this world before, having missed 'Man of Steel.' But something happened very early in the film that informed me as to the way I was likely to watch this film and made me think I wasn't going to be drawn in enough to avoid nitpicking, and that was Bruce Wayne ringing the boss of his building and telling him to get his people out of there. He receives this call as he and his employees are standing, staring out of the window at the ensuing destruction caused by the fight between Zod and Superman, as buildings crumble and explode in front of them. If they had any sense they'd have been out of the building long before that point! And then, like a Captain that can't leave his sinking ship, the boss hangs around to witness more destruction and the building comes down around him. Wouldn't it have been prudent to escape with everyone else? But prudence isn't the domain of superhero films (these days? Or ever?), and as fine and dramatic as it is to see Wayne running towards a collapsing building's cloud of debris (probably the best shot of the film), I was already finding fault, which told me I wasn't being pulled in. It is weird to me that we live in a world where the same stuff is churned out like a factory - the same, regurgitated car with new, shiny coating. But the engine's broken down and it's leaking oil all over the museum pedestal it's been placed upon. And like unthinking drones we keep turning up for it, myself included.

Or perhaps that's a mean reading and we're actually hopeful and optimistic that the Next Big Thing, which is the same as the Last Old Thing, will be as good as the Once Great Thing. Certainly in terms of Batman films we've been well served over the last eleven years, but like the Bourne franchise, and most others, perhaps, we get something good and we want more, even though it turns out not to be such a good thing. The cinematic reboots keep coming thick and fast, Spider-Man only lasted two films before he's returning again (again), so in the space of fourteen years we'll have had three different Spider-Men. Batman did okay with just one in the last eighteen years until now. But this isn't a Batman film, and it isn't a Superman film. It isn't even a Wonder Woman film (thankfully). It's an amalgam, going for the same box office pull of the colourful 'Avengers,' and seemingly the same empty-headed action fare. Maybe superhero films have always been empty action fare, but that isn't the reason why I still like to rewatch the first two Spider-Man films, the Nolan Batman trilogy, and even a couple of the old Christopher Reeve Supermans. After the disillusionment inflicted by 'Age of Ultron,' I didn't think I'd get caught out again (even though I had no expectations, the Marvel filmography being take-it-or-leave-it for me), but I reasoned that this was a Batman-starring vehicle for the formation of the Justice League, emphasis on the starring part, and I ignored the bad reviews, hoping it would be enough to see my favourite  masked hero again, as so many must have done, judging by the cash it's made. But it wasn't.

If you like comics, the film will likely appeal, and maybe even cheesy moments where the three heroes take a few seconds out to pose photogenically together in the face of the monster villain, will please you rather than make you wonder if this is actually some kind of spoof parody (yes, those words mean the same thing, but this film doesn't mind underlining itself so why shouldn't I?), but if you don't warm to the multiple continuities and difficult suspension of disbelief that comics demand you accept then it's not for you. And it wasn't for me. It's hard to go from something relatively intelligent, as seen in the Nolan Batverse, to something like a grim mirror image of the lightweight Marvel team-ups - even if the Nolan films weren't trying to be Shakespeare they did at least have something of a coherent plot, and a warmth and draw to the characters, where this film is hard to accept simply because it's those same characters that have become cold again, and there isn't a lot to connect with. I can't deny I'd much rather have had another instalment in the Nolan world, perhaps with Joseph Gordon-Levitt taking up the mantle, or even Christian Bale's Bruce returning from the 'dead'? But I wasn't too bothered that they were rebooting again as I become less interested in superheroes the older I get and the more I see of them! My experience wasn't coloured by sour feelings to the new cast, in fact I thought it would be interesting to see an older Batman, grizzled and tired (though they'd somewhat done that in 'The Dark Knight Rises'), and what he'd be like with the experience of age, and his supporters either gone or getting very old.

Except I couldn't see much difference between Affleck's Batman, and Bale's, except that we hardly get to see him do much as Batman, aside from post-fight with Superman where he goes off to rescue Martha Kent (was Batman's Mum really called Martha? I didn't have the required knowledge, but if so, as nice a moment as it was for him to realise it was wrong to take down Superman because their Mum's share the same name, it does make you think they weren't very original in naming characters back then, nor was it the most realistic reason to stop him from killing Superman). It was good seeing him take out multiple villains alone, but this Batman's a bit nastier, despite his Alfred being a lot younger than Michael Caine's, clearly less age difference, otherwise he'd be a decrepit old man, and barely still around to help (though there's no sign of Commissioner Gordon). Batman's taken to branding villains and no longer believes he's doing a worthwhile job because when one criminal's taken care of, another springs up in place. I suppose that's what they meant by a different Batman… Oh, and he has a little grey in his hair. Very daring. So no, there wasn't much point in going for an older Batman if he acted exactly the same, had all the same physical ability rather than having to use his brain and experience to counter his aged and strained body. As I said, there was a greater impression of a weakened Batman in 'TDKR.'

If the bangs and flashery make you think the film's all showboating, they do throw in the occasional attempt at theme, such as Superman's godlikeness being questioned and it becoming a Man V God struggle. In name only, of course, nothing's really explored, it just gives Superman something more to scowl about. The only thematic thread that worked was Batman ultimately not crossing the line: instead of branding the babbling Lex Luthor in his cell, he slams the brand into the wall as if realising his own failure to control himself previously, but none of the character was organic - Alfred showed disapproval, but I didn't get any sense of a man driven to desperation or being slightly unhinged to bring out such callous cruelty. And even Batman showing he won't cross a line had been better shown before. Lex was the Joker in all but white face paint, even setting up the same trick as the two boats thing from 'The Dark Knight,' or in fact the first 'Spider-Man': you have to choose between one innocent or the other, whether that's two boatloads of people, Mary-Jane or a cable car of children, or in this case, Superman forced to kill Batman to save Martha. I didn't like the Joker, but at least he was interesting.

Lex was merely annoying and never a serious contender for global villain, there because we expect him rather than having strong motivation or history with any of the characters. His whole purpose and role within this world isn't explained - is he a metaphor for big business, as his money seems to be his only asset and he uses it to influence politicians? He's allowed access to the alien ship and Zod's corpse, and by scraping the skin off the dead Kryptonian's fingers he's able to fool an alien computer into giving him full access?! This is supposed to be advanced technology and it can't even tell the difference between living tissue and dead? And how does he know the identities of Batman and Superman, or does he in fact know? Nothing is very clear, it's all muddily squashed together, and it's not like the film's running time couldn't have justified the time for coherence. There are nightmares, dreams and visions, though we're not sure which of those they are, and hearing those who know there comics talk, it's apparent that if you have that preexisting knowledge it's all part of other stuff, but to someone that only knows the basics it's completely inaccessible. I didn't even know how who knows Superman's identity and who doesn't - Wayne shows up for Clark Kent's funeral in Smallville and no one asks how he knew this journalist guy. 'Yeah I met him at a function a few days ago and spoke to him for all of five seconds so I felt I had to come.' And is it these same visions that prompt him of the coming of some evil being? I had no idea what his forebodings portended to.

Also, this world is far from the familiar, not even the Nolan series was so depressed and ugly. If I was struggling to see the differences between this Batman and the last one, then the biggest change seems to be that he isn't shy of using guns, even if they are still attached to the villain he's fighting, and doesn't mind if people die. Surprisingly we get a lot of that, although much of it happens in a nightmare - in that sequence the gun-toting riot police/soldiers, or whatever they were, never once fire, preferring to stand there waiting for him to knock them down or rush at him using the rifle as a melee weapon, all overly choreographed and extremely unreal. But it's okay, because it was all a dream. But then neither is Superman averse to a spot of killing, apparently, having already offed Zod in the previous film, and is a much moodier and grumpy son of Krypton than I've ever been used to. Less boy scout and more traffic warden with issues. And let's have Batman swear, because that's 'funny.' Maybe this Batman isn't as undignified as Adam West's cartoonish version, but while I wasn't enamoured of his standard look, in his armoured suit he comes close - in the first place, wearing a tank shouldn't make any difference against Superman, and in the second he ends up looking like a turtle who's been flipped onto its back. It's supposed to be about brains versus brawn, yet I never had that feeling: Batman shouldn't even be engaging in hand to hand fighting with this super-powered alien, he should have kept his distance and taken him out ingeniously, the way we know he could.

As has become the norm with these films (maybe all blockbuster franchises?), a lot of it is about setting up the emerging continuity rather than taking the opportunity to tell a story, something that reflects the world or makes you think about something, the film taking an intermission to show Lex' data on the other emerging 'meta-humans' who will be starring in their own films soon (the only good thing being that I thought the guy working on Cyborg was played by Joe Morton who was Dr. Hamilton in 'Smallville'). Nothing to do with this film, purely to get us excited about other films to come. Yet not realising that they need to make us care about characters in their own right, not from their famous names or legends. Maybe doing what it says on the tin is all we should expect - Batman did fight Superman, I can confirm, so I did get what I was expecting, but somehow I still went in hoping for more than that. More than the age-old and very tired device of replicating a child with an action figure in each hand repeatedly slamming them together. It may have been 'The Matrix Revolutions' that first began this trend that so many superhero films have followed - that's when I first became aware of it, anyway. There's nothing to grip onto, nothing to root for, not even the basic concept of good versus evil: it was a case of two people not trying hard enough to communicate, followed by pride and misplaced vengeance. If the whole film had carried it through, examining what misrepresentation and the refusal to see reality led to, but they were ultimately vindicated in their actions, we might have had a satisfying finale, built from the ground up, instead of a mishmash designed to get them artificially to fight.

That's cool, though, isn't it. It's the box office draw to see these two iconic figures fighting, but, like the misguided original idea for 'Star Trek: Generations' (which was that somehow we'd see Kirk's original Enterprise up against Picard's), there was really no realistic way to get the pair angry enough at each other for it to make sense. They just end up fighting anyway, because that was what was expected rather than it happening organically. And this is written by David S. Goyer who cowrote the other recent Batman films, with Nolan credited as an Exec Producer. Is that a case of putting the brand name on it in exchange for a ton of money, or did he genuinely have a big say in the direction and plan of the film? Something tells me the former, because his brand is usually pretty reliable. This being a superhero film it has to end with a bang, so when Lex has been dealt with, we then get Doomsday emerging like an Uruk-Hai from the Kryptonian ship. A pertinent analogy since it looks like Weta just reused the old Troll model they had kicking around on their hard drives. At one point in the climactic battle, Doomsday starts to morph into the bony, spiky version I recognise, but they didn't go all the way and it still looked like a Troll. It turns into the usual maelstrom of lighting effects, Wonder Woman shows up, having been a mysterious femme fatale who looks like she just stepped off the latest Tom Cruise 'Mission: Impossible,' and she's brought her whacking great sword with her - it looks a little ridiculous when this tiny, slender girl starts heaving around a gigantic blade, not only wielding the sword, but striking ten bells out of the massive alien monster! But that's comics for you, I suppose? They really weren't going for the reality level the Nolan films brought to the table.

One of the few characters that had any meaning was the Senator who opposes Lex' plans to weaponise Kryptonite and calls Superman to court. You can understand her motive, see she's a good woman, and then she's murdered in an explosion, along with a full courtroom, about the only time I cared about a character, because characterisation wasn't at the top of the To Do list for this film. As much as I like Laurence Fishburne (and it was fun to see him share another film with the guy who played Lok in 'The Matrix' sequels), it's jarring to see a well known character (Perry White), altered - again, not having seen 'Man of Steel' I didn't realise they'd changed a character's race. What next, swapping genders? In fact, I've since heard that Jimmy Olsen became Jenny for that film, although he was brought into the beginning of this one to be killed off, leaving me thoroughly confused! That's one thing I don't like about comics: nothing has a sense of reality because anything goes, and I don't understand the need to alter an established character's race to fit in with our modern understanding of diversity. I get that Hollywood films aren't diverse enough (although does Bollywood recast famous characters as, say, Asian?), but they should be creating new characters to add to the mix, not altering existing ones. It's only a small point, but it's something I've noticed in recent years, and the loss of internal consistency concerns me. That's one reason I like 'Star Trek' so much, because (for the most part), the actor is the character and we see them age across the years, like real history unfolding - pandering to please any section of the audience or grab headlines is a cynical way to go, good intentions couched in notoriety.

Too much of the film was built from the same Lego blocks that were used to construct all the other recent superhero films, and we see again the origin of Batman to jog our memories in case we'd forgotten, but because it's not a Batman film it's not that in-depth. A long film, it might have worked better as a miniseries on a TV budget. If Batman and Superman's rivalry had been more than mere bare bones physicality, which, by the way, never made sense (was Batman's armour sculpted from Kryptonite, or sprayed with the stuff? It still wouldn't make sense that he could stop a blow from Superman), so even the in-universe logic carried no weight (all Superman needed to do if he really did want to finish off the Bat was punch him in the mouth!). So I'm afraid they'll have to count me out for the next Superman film, and the Wonder Woman, Aquaman, Cyborg and Flash films. At this point I'm not even sure I'd go and see another Batman, which is how low I esteemed this experience. Given the choice, I'd still rather see this again than sit through 'Age of Ultron' a second time, because I do at least have a kinship with these characters, while, though Marvel has been much more adept at blasting out its cinematic universe on a regular basis, they mostly have characters I care little about. If enough time passes I can imagine giving Batman another chance, but I didn't expect to be feeling that way, even while I had very low expectations of this film. There were many more holes I could pick, but I didn't have the energy to keep track, or the interest to think about them.

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