User blog:Berrybrick/What's wrong with Batman v Superman?

(This blog was originally published at The Armchair Critic's Guide to World Domination. It is no longer an eyesore of a text wall o'er there.)

I am sorry to say that I didn't like it. Here is a mega-mini-review of it. There will be spoilers for BvS, but not Inside Out, so don't worry.

One of my favorite quotes is this, from Joseph Campbell's The Hero With a Thousand Faces:

And where we had thought to find an abomination, we shall find a god; where we had thought to slay another, we shall slay ourselves; where we had thought to travel outward, we shall come to the center of our own existence; where we had thought to be alone, we shall be with all the world.

This is from the book that George Lucas used when he couldn't get A New Hope quite right and, as I was later excited to learn, this quote was translated into Kryptonian and hidden in the background of Man of Steel. It gets straight to the heart of literature and this is what I love about the Minotaur and the Little Mermaid and Inside Out and Over the Garden Wall and, as flawed as it is, Man of Steel. Batman v Superman even hides the last part about being alone on Superman's costume. Despite having this amazing book at their disposal though, BvS makes a mockery of it. Most people won't realize it, but these words have more to do with DC heroes than is obvious; this book was heavily influenced by nihilistic philosophy, but Superman, Wonder Woman, and I'd argue Batman by extension (since he was a response to Superman), are responses to nihilism. They were created to show a better way than the ubermensch had to offer, yet, here we have a movie that is devoid of hope and love. Darkness isn't the problem, but in trying to be philosophical, the movie is dull to watch and painful to reminisce.

The first thing that I have to say, because I think that all of my issues can branch out of it, was that all of the "god" talk was terrible. Because of my literary background, I usually like that sort of thing. My favorite books and songs tend to use them not because the writers are necessarily religious, but because religious images that are embedded in our culture (if not our psyches) are a powerful way to explore things like salvation, sin, rebirth, and redemption. The Hero with a Thousand Faces tries to make the case that all stories follow an ancient pattern of a hero who goes on a quest, symbolically or literally dies, and comes back to life with the knowledge needed to save people. So basically Christ, but it is also Theseus, the Little Mermaid, Luke Skywalker, or, as some people will try to claim, every person we have ever told a story about including ourselves and everyone we know.

I was ecstatic when I realized that MoS knew this, but BvS is really really stupid about it. Yes, Superman and Christ are similar, but when Snyder said DC characters are "biblical" I didn't realize he meant it literally. If you want to make Clark 33 years old for the sake of your symbolism, go for it. Baptism scenes are fine too. Those are staples of western literature. If you want to call Superman "God" and have Lex taunt him with faulty medieval theology. Don't. Please don't. That is really painful. The movie seems to think that by using religious symbolism, it somehow has the potency of dying and rising god stories, but no. If you are going to do those overtly, as this movie this movie tries to, it needs to be simple and with a healthy dose of mysticism. The other way of going about it is to use that as the framework, but to do it subtly; that requires actually developing characters. Superman's sacrifice at the end was meaningless because I had stopped caring about him as a character. I was no longer seeing things from his perspective like in MoS. He wasn't a man, they had to hammer in that he was God, and I stopped caring. I also utterly despise comic book deaths and hate that DC seems to be okay with using them. There are really good ways to go about it without actually resorting to literal death and resurrection; I gushed about Over the Garden Wall up in blogus-prime and that is a fantastic example of it; you've also got things like (and I am going to color this white because I am more worried about spoiling Inside Out than the movie this review is actually about) Joy giving in and allowing Riley's memories to be tainted with Sadness, and I actually think that MoS has a really good example in Superman killing Zod and therefore choosing to die to his Kryptonian heritage.

And basically the entire movie is this conversation of how Superman is God and how he has to be stopped because Nietzsche said we killed God so this isn't okay! This lasts for at least an hour and a half. While MoS was delivering its questionable questions, it was at least paced with the Krypton prelude, the Battle of Smallville, and Superman's first flight. I don't know what this movie was trying to do. It's a blockbuster. It's a superhero movie. You can't wait almost two hours before you have any real action and then have nothing else in the last fifth. I should also complain that it hardly feels like Superman is in those two hours, because the only way I can even imagine this premise working is if it is told from his perspective with Batman as the antagonist. But no, they couldn't do that, because Superman is God, and Batman is Man and you Tarzan and me Jane and agh. And for the record, I think that Batman as Man is nearly as bad because of how pandering and easy (and not very good) of an interpretation it is, but I'll let it slide because it doesn't matter as much what they decide he is as much as they make it work someway. And they don't. They give these two guys labels and that is pretty much their characterization.

This is mostly Batman's movie and I'm not bothered by that because he just came off of his own trilogy or because he and Superman are both getting billed (though those are both issues) but because I don't like him. I have to confront that because of this movie. I like Bruce Wayne, but Batman? I'm obviously not interested in seeing him the way most people are. Yeah, he punches stuff and has no powers and drives cars and vroom and he can't accept love because he never resolved the Oedipus complex and yeah manliness! That's great and all, but the mythology and the atmosphere surrounding him are so strong, that I don't care that I don't like Batman. I like Gotham City and Alfred and Joker and Harley Quinn and Two-Face and Scarecrow and Mr. Freeze and Nightwing and Batgirl and all of those great characters. Batman is a blast to explore that world through. I'm not saying that they should have shoehorned that mythology in to the movie, but I think that it reveals Batman's shortcomings as a character and they do nothing to compensate for it because he's Batman. He's fine when he's interacting with Lex or Diana or bantering with Alfred (exchanging detectoobabble doesn't count), but those are very small parts of the movie and he doesn't hold my interest for much of the rest. He's a frustrating character.

There are disputes that Superman and Batman can have over their philosophies, but this movie does not use them. Superman's reason (bat-branding; I hope they are teasing Bat-Cow) was pretty much invented just for this movie, and Batman's reasoning is really stupid. "Hm, somebody is sending me newspaper headlines spray painted with stuff that makes me mad. I should make Superman pay because I have no idea how to deal with my issues like a real man." Really, aside from the branding, Superman and Batman are hardly different in this movie. Its brooding meek vigilante vs brooding mean vigilante. Again, they stuff them into extremely generic archetypes and do little else for their characterization; sure, we get to see all sorts of things that Batman can do and we see that he is mean and hardened, and maybe that works for a 20 minute cartoon, but this is a movie about contrasting him with other people. You can't just do good cop / bad cop (and the movie doesn't even do that).

And the tone! It's just so boring. Again, Man of Steel, even if it was dour, had things happen. This movie gives me almost nothing to enjoy over its two and a half hours and that is terrible. The characters don't even meet until something like an hour in, and they just have a scowling contest. Dark things can be hopeful. Use the dark tone to make light moments feel good and special in contrast. You can have your philosophy. I actually think that you should have it; if Avatar: The Last Airbender can explore Eastern philosophy, go ahead and explore the Western tradition! Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman were all created in response to nihilism (to varying degrees). Superman is actually called Superman! And sure, make them feel believable, that's good too but you aren't doing any of that with this stupid death of God allegory.

That's most of the negative out of the way. Again, I don't think that it was as bad as everyone says, even though the movie can't be very good with such hamfisted symbolism, terrible pacing, and bad leads. The scene which opens up the movie, even if it is a recap of Batman's origin, I actually found really good even if I have seen it so many times. I don't understand how the filmmakers would be so stupid about the religious symbolism when they were thoughtful enough to do everything surrounding Batman's character so quietly (this scene, a "clown" reference, and the Robin suit cameo); though that itself becomes a fault, since there is still very little there. Anyway, aside from hammering in all of the symbolism, I actually liked Jesse Eisenberg as Lex Luthor. Again, I am bothered by how little this movie manages to do in so much time because in many ways the character is poorly defined, but even if the fan favorite Lex Luthor has never made it to the big screen, the archetype of the big evil businessman is all over the place. And I actually kind of liked this take. It's fresh, and though I don't like how they handled everything, I can appreciate it.

Holly Hunter's character was decent too, and what she had to say about democracy was interesting; there is another philosophical "discussion" (I hesitate to call it that because of how half-formed it is) about democracy, which I actually kind of liked. As far as I can tell, the in-universe excuse for everyone to keep calling Superman God is that if he is so powerful, does he get to decide what is good? And if he does, what does that mean for democracy? Holly Hunter's character does seem to be critical of him, but she is actively trying to have a conversation with him to figure these things out. Does that sound weird? I think it does, myself, but also that these are more inline with what the film should have done because this is actually something sort of relevant, it goes back to Superman's roots, and holy Holly she is open to having a conversation with him. In a movie which devolves into the most contrived of fights.

Aside from that, I liked Alfred. He was probably the only character which got any laughs for actually being funny, and not because the dialogue was so serious. I enjoyed Perry in the one scene he was in too. I think that something very essential about Lois Lane continues to evade this movie. I don't know if it is Amy Adams or Hollywood sexism tropes that are making me saying this, but unlike most of the other main characters, I don't actually notice how poorly defined and developed she is. I enjoyed what Wonder Woman was in here and though it wasn't necessary, she was integrated decently. The handling of Superman and Batman doesn't give me much hope for her in future movies though; if they can't even get Batman, how can they get her. Metallo reject was bothersome and Flash's cameo was really confusing. I don't care about Doomsday because Doomsday is stupid and I say that if they needed a monster to fight the Trinity, why not? If I haven't made my thoughts on Superman's death clear though, here you go:

Hamfisted religious symbolism ruins this movie in every way it conceivably could
Batman's character arc (if you can even call it that) is bad and lazy, and nobody else gets one
Dying gods are supposed to be cathartic
Outside of some rare fantasy setups, I hate comic book deaths with a passion; I was bothered when Arrow decided to bring Canary back from the dead and Marvel to revive Coulson, but to see it used here with the intention of later resurrecting a character infuriates me

Actually watching the movie, BvS did little for me. I found it too long, but didn't think it was bad as everyone was saying, so there will be people who enjoy this movie. And that's good; I'm jealous of them. It's only by thinking about the movie (which it wants you to do) that it becomes so frustrating. At the time, I found it mostly boring. There is a lot more that I want to say; I want to go into Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman and the ubermensch and the Hero with a Thousand Faces and the dying and rising god because this is where so many things that I love converge. This was an amazing opportunity that someone looks at DC heroes and thinks "Joseph Campbell!" but then fails to get it on every single level.

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