BvS All Things Batman v Superman: An Open Discussion - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Part 2

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Ok wow. Seeing where that platform angle is, it looks like they totally swapped the Batman pose and the lighting since we first saw this shot in April. Unless they're two separate scenes...
 
No, I don't think they swapped anything. Just a different shot of the same scene. My guess is, we get a full.. what's it called ? circle shot ? of Batman standing there holding the rifle :

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When we make the full circle around him and get the view from the back again, he takes aim :

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Nope. He was one of the defenders of the casting of Ben from the start.

Off topic...

I like Campea A LOT. I think his operation is one of the best, despite that there have been many times when I have disagreed with him. When Movie Talk discusses rumors, they make damn sure they tell you, "Hey, this is a rumor, it's not been confirmed by credible sources, it's just something in the pop culture ether right now and we are going to discuss it, but that don't make it so" or word to that affect.

It's a good group and for the most part I think they are giving us their honest takes on the Entertainment news of the day. Do I think Campea is being unfair (less recently) to Gal Gadot? Sure. It's a bit over the top. But he and the others are entertaining, insightful and passionate and are not TOO fanboy bottom of the barrel, which is why when those types are guests are on the shows. The new narrative is that Campea and the Movie Talk Crew are anti-BVS and that people only ever liked him around here because he has publicly stated how much he loves MOS. See... If they see BvS and all HATE IT, well... if I end up liking it, then I suppose that's just one more point of disagreement I would have with him, but that wouldn't affect how I view the show or how I enjoy the product he brings to us pretty much daily.



Anyway... How bout dat Dark Knight fighting dat Man O' Steel?

I started watching Collider Heroes recently and at least over the last couple of months they have been totally hyped for BvS; and they (Schnepp, Campea, and Burnett at least) also all seem to love Man of Steel and defend it to the hilt.

The only real nitpicks from Campea have been:

1) Gal Gadot was miscast; he seemingly can't get past that the film didn't go with his preferred fancast :whatever:)--so he continues to express reservations about how well Gal will do, but he also grudgingly admits that she seems to be looking pretty convincing in the role from the glimpses we have seen, and

2) a continuing narrative Campea has going that the second full length trailer "revealed too much" by showing Doomsday and WW; and that the film should focus squarely on the fight between Batman and Superman, and show nothing else!

I think both criticisms are designed to position him to be able to say "Ha! I told you so!" if 1) Gal were to flop, or 2) if the reddit postings claiming to be from advanced screenings and/or Faraci's claim of a "fourth act" take the film way over-the-top in terms of trying to catch up with the MCU.

Otherwise, if Gal does as great as it looks, and the film does stay focused on the Batman-Superman conflict mostly while also introducing Wondy for the formation of the JL trinity, then he can simply shrug and say, okay well I'm glad that I was wrong about Gadot and that they listened to me and others (!) about not trying to assemble the entire JL in this film (turning it into a rushed version of AoU).

Anyway, I have to wonder if he is being a bit canny in those two nitpick positions.

And beyond that, otherwise, Campea does seem to be genuinely stoked about BvS. As he has said, "a rising tide lifts all boats" regarding any of these blockbuster CBM films being really good--and that includes lifting the boat of Collider and his own career! So I have to believe that he is most definitely for all of these films doing well, and hopes that they will all be great. I do believe that.
 
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Actually you raise an issue that was to me once something that I took issue with same as you have. Superman has literally saved the entire world. And Batman is truly a genius detective on the order of a Sherlock Holmes. How would he come to the conclusion that Superman poses such a grave threat? Conceptually that did not square for me. So I came up with my own theory:

1) Batman by now has become as cynical as can be about the military industrial complex and the evil things that are done in the name of "defense"; and he sees Superman's possible alliance with the military as a threat (an uneasy and loose working relationship, but still agreeing to work with them for some things for which he is truly needed),

2) Superman's apparent decision to leave the scout ship in the military's hands (which was just monumentally bad judgment--as we see with what Lex does with it), and

3) the conflict between the two being cued by Amanda Waller directing Swanwick to ask Superman to set limits in Batman (because Batman risks mucking up her A.R.G.U.S. plans); i.e., she knows Batman is likely to go on a suicide mission against Supes if that were to happen.

But in some conversations with other about this in the above linked thread, I realized that while the above theory would be more satisfying to me intellectually, it would probably be too cerebral for the GA.

I had also observed in earlier formulations about Bruce's reaction that there are some really major psychological issues that Bruce has that are tweaked by all this. Helplessly watching 5000 people die during the Black Zero event as two god-like aliens duke it out taps the helplessness that he felt as a child. What Batman ultimately struggles with the most is how to control the rage that stems from his experience of helplessness as a child at his parents' having been murdered before his eyes. In Batman: Earth One (from which it seems BvS's Alfred is drawn) you see also that Bruce's childish impulsivity and self-centereness directly leads to his parents' death, even though by chance. So I think it's reasonable to infer that as a child he felt not just helpless to prevent, but also directly responsible for, his parents' murders as well. Batman, both as as an identity and a life-style, is a way of controlling and directing his rage at that helplessness. His darkest fear is to lose control that rage (which gets translated adaptively for a crime-fighter into his hyper-vigilance/paranoia, thinking five steps ahead of opponents, always developing contingencies, etc.). The nightmare dream that Batman has includes a scene of him snapping a neck (breaking his no-kill rule) which I feel is an unconscious association with Superman having snapped Zod's neck (i.e., Supes also traditionally has a no-kill rule). The neck-snap merges the two of them symbolically. The evil tyrant Superman that appears in Batman's dream is a projection of what Batman fears most about himself: that he has, sadly, indeed become a "one-man reign of terror." The crisis that he's going through is that all that he has worked for as a crime-fighter over the course of his life is 1) now rendered obsolete and irrelevant by god-like beings and an extinction level event, and 2) ultimately a sham in that he has become not so different after all than the thugs that he hunts down.

Anyway, even if I don't have every detail right there, the accumulated force of something along those lines has precipitated a kind of a breakdown for Bruce. I'm pretty sure I recall reading that Ben Affleck has alluded to this in more than one interview. (See this for one salient Affleck quote.)

Anyway, it's looking more to me now that Snyder probably went the more psychological and emotional route to explain why Batman essentially goes on a suicide mission to take out Superman. I still hope the story will also include something along the lines of my conjecture about why Batman would fear Superman's potential for evil from a more rational perspective. But it's okay with me now that Batman is being portrayed as more human and vulnerable to his own demons. It's actually better drama, imho. It will connect better with viewers in the theater (the vast majority of whom are not CBM or comic book nerds like us).

You actually bring up a very interesting point and I appreciate the response and if I'm honest I can't really argue against much of what you're written. That said this basically comes down to personal preference. One of the main issues that I'm having with this film is it risks painting Batman in a bad light the same way Man of Steel did to Superman. Superman wasn't universally embraced after MoS, the last thing needed is a Batman who gets a similar response. The DCU can't afford to have both of its poster boys getting lukewarm responses.

I'm all for the DC Universe tackling heavier themes, but at the same time these characters have to represent something better in my eyes. I have no problem with either having faults or problems, but at the end of the day I also want them to be beacons of hope and characters that can inspire. At present we've got a Superman who came across as reckless in the last film and a Batman who looks unhinged in this one. That's not good enough in my book. For all the crap the Nolan series got about taking itself too seriously at its heart it was making Batman be a symbol for change in a city that desperately needed it. I want the same heart given to these characters but at present I'm seeing a lot of cool looking things that lack a lot of soul.
 
Great input, rogbngp ! I can tell you have some serious academic background with that writing flow lol. But I've always thought that Bruce's outlook would be a combination of emotional instability, past remorse, and direct fear from what he witnessed in Metropolis. For the people that keep asking "Why are they fighting?", there are plenty of answers, and you need only to poke your head into what we have of this universe so far to understand the answer.

Thanks, re: what I do still apply from undergraduate days long past, perhaps a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, lol. There's only a handful of core ideas that I retained from studying film in college all those years ago.

Yeah, what I think what TV spot #4 demonstrates really vividly is that once we get the full context in the film for all these little snips we've been shown in trailers and TV spots, this conflict between these two titans is going to be a richly layered and nuanced. Snyder has said that the conflict is going to be used to show us what makes each of them tick. If it works as well as that scene between Bruce and Alfred looks like it will, I think BvS could be a truly amazing film.
 
https://***********/Batmancanseeyou/status/691623009946185729
 
rewatched the 2 tv spots a couple of more times this morning. So much awesomeness. I feel we're going to see some real character development
 
Sometimes you have to break a few eggs (heroes) to make an omelet (Justice League).
 
They're treating the characters as real people so they're not going to be idealized. They won't make perfect decisions or behave completely in people's favor. They succumb to emotions which makes perfect sense for people who are willing to be these extreme forms of vigilantism. Snyder has said before that emotion is Superman's kryptonite and it's true for anyone who has emotions including Batman. No real person can act completely rational, intellectual, or be morally right. It's cartoonish if a story favors a character that much. Fans like to go on about how mythic and godly these superheroes are, but they forget how human the gods were in mythology.
 
You actually bring up a very interesting point and I appreciate the response and if I'm honest I can't really argue against much of what you're written. That said this basically comes down to personal preference. One of the main issues that I'm having with this film is it risks painting Batman in a bad light the same way Man of Steel did to Superman. Superman wasn't universally embraced after MoS, the last thing needed is a Batman who gets a similar response. The DCU can't afford to have both of its poster boys getting lukewarm responses.

I'm all for the DC Universe tackling heavier themes, but at the same time these characters have to represent something better in my eyes. I have no problem with either having faults or problems, but at the end of the day I also want them to be beacons of hope and characters that can inspire. At present we've got a Superman who came across as reckless in the last film and a Batman who looks unhinged in this one. That's not good enough in my book. For all the crap the Nolan series got about taking itself too seriously at its heart it was making Batman be a symbol for change in a city that desperately needed it. I want the same heart given to these characters but at present I'm seeing a lot of cool looking things that lack a lot of soul.

The way I now appreciate the Zod-Superman battle is that if we bring the mythic character of Superman into our modern world, from an increased realism perspective he is invariably going to face some situations in which is forced to choose the lesser evil between two terrible options. (I.e., that's the real world.)

First and foremost, Superman had to somehow contain Zod during that fight! Zod had just watched his dream of giving a rebirth to Kryptonian civilzation get sucked into a Black Hole. And he has vowed to literally kill all human life in revenge. Zod is the highest ranking general in the Kryptonian Warrior Guild--and a highly trained martial fighter. If Superman had turned his back on Zod for even an instant to try to save lives, Zod uses the opportunity to take even more lives.

When Superman issues his scream after snapping Zod's neck, it is not so much due to the fact that he just took a life, imho. It is the pent-up emotion of not being able to prevent all the death and destruction that Zod caused. And on a symbolic level, I believe also that it is like an infant's first painful cry at the shock of being pushed out into a new world. In that moment Superman, the mythic character, has been fully born into our real world of moral grays. That is the crux of the analysis video A Thesis on Man of Steel, and I think it's probably on target. It makes sense.

That arc from MoS is clearly going to get carried forward into BvS.

So, I'm just saying that Man of Steel when interpreted more or less along these lines of a being a reinvention of the myth of these superheroes to bring them into our current real world, is actually pretty mesmerizing and exciting to me.

I totally respect that it may not connect with those fans that cherish a more traditional characterization of Superman, though. That is a matter of personal taste, for sure.

For me, in the final analysis, I'm glad that Snyder took the bold risk that he did (reinvention of the myth to bring the character into a fictional space that connects more with our real world). It's taking these characters seriously from a dramatic perspective. There is so much potentially to work with there. It could never have been done in a way that would satisfy every fan. But I'm willing to go on this new journey with these characters that this 'increased realism' approach is apparently going to take us on.
 
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More people getting his Empire Magazine, still no new info yet

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My question about the magazine got bumped. Is there another BvS non-subscriber edition coming out? I notice this one says March, so could we be expecting another Empire flood of goodies soon?

Also, I'll do my usual instagram "digging" and message anyone I find with the issue, and see if I can get any details or pics for you guys. :sly:
 
Update: requests for info/pics from the issue have been sent..... let's see what's in there.
 
I'm really not sure about that Bruce centric spot.

That just feels very out of line with Batman's character.
If he suspects there's a 1% chance of something like that, he develops a plan, just in case. He doesn't jump straight to executing said plane, and takes that 1% as a certainty.

That's far too out of control for Bruce.
I don't mind Bruce appearing out of control when it comes to his rage in the face of criminals, but he ALWAYS is in control, and has an end game.


Now, that said, I LOVE stuff that puts Bruce on his heels, catches him off guard. The appearance of Superman certainly can do that, though a bit less so when you consider that he's already taken on a number of super-powered individuals with having put the entire SS crew behind bars.

Obviously Superman takes it to another level, and would certainly force Bruce to, appear at least, to change his approach, even getting slightly careless, but never to that extent.


Now, I believe that someone in production has said that those lines were slightly out of context when some of them were used in earlier trailers. So, maybe he's not talking about Superman, but rather, maybe, Lex?
Stick with me, you might think the "power to destroy the human race" makes it obvious he's talking about Superman, but if Lex has the Kryptonian tech through his government contracts, and Bruce knows what Lex is working on, or that he's working on something, based on Kryptonian tech, and Zod's body, Bruce very well COULD be talking about Lex.

However, that does NOT change the flawed logic, and it still being out of character for Bruce.
 
Another thought, assuming he IS talking about Superman, then I'm guessing that this conversation with Alfred happens AFTER Batman's initial confrontation with Superman, the one that ends with Superman telling him the Bat is dead.

Considering we don't know the full extent of that interaction, and what comes before the clip we've seen, we can't know the full context, but it certainly could come across as the start of corrupting power.

This god like creature confronts him and basically says 'You don't play by my rules, you're done.' Certainly comes across like Superman self appointing him judge jury and executioner essentially.
Now, an alien coming to Earth and asserting that kind of 'This is my world now, you're gonna do things my way' could certainly add a bit more context to that speech at Alfred.
 
My question about the magazine got bumped. Is there another BvS non-subscriber edition coming out? I notice this one says March, so could we be expecting another Empire flood of goodies soon?

Also, I'll do my usual instagram "digging" and message anyone I find with the issue, and see if I can get any details or pics for you guys. :sly:

Non subscriber covers are usually shown a bit later on, but I'd expect it today as the magazine comes out Thursday.
 
Patience, I should be hearing back from at least one person soon.
 
The Empire Magazine issue was out since 4 hours ago, it seems really weird we still don't have any article or even a single pic.
 
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I promise I won't let you down guys. I've delivered on first look scans before that got posted on CBM pages and sites. Let's goooooooo
 
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