BvS The Zack Snyder Validation Thread (big rant)

[DA_Champion]

As others have pointed out, what happened to BB at the box office is nothing like what happened to MoS. The "Bad Previous Movie" stigma primarily affects opening weekends. BB had a crap opening thanks to Batman's tarnished reputation, but ultimately ended up doing quite well because it had great legs from all the positive word of mouth. MoS had the opposite experience: Great opening weekend, crap legs.

MoS had drops of 65% and 50% in its second and third weekends, better than Days of Future Past for example, or Godzilla.

MoS also faced Monsters University and World War Z in its second week, tremendous competition really. They combined for 471 million domestic.

 

[sf2]

As others have pointed out, what happened to BB at the box office is nothing like what happened to MoS. The "Bad Previous Movie" stigma primarily affects opening weekends. BB had a crap opening thanks to Batman's tarnished reputation, but ultimately ended up doing quite well because it had great legs from all the positive word of mouth. MoS had the opposite experience: Great opening weekend, crap legs.

to me, the opening performance was due to the hype it can pull in. sorry to say, BB had poor hype. bad trailers perhaps? the legs depends on besides the WOM, it is also the personal perception of the moviegoers on the movie. people who has bad experience of SR or thinking superman is a lame character wouldn't go to watch the movie, as simple as than. therefore poor legs.

you know, just like xmen: DOFP. the WOM is great, still the legs are poors. it's the personal perception... same to CA2 to a certain degree. (CA2 has great WOM. it should have make much more) same to GotG, it should have the gravity's / frozen's kinda legs!!!

 

[sf2]

I wasn't mention Reeve in a literal sense. I was saying that the perception of Reeve's Superman as a peaceful beacon of hope who was much more confident in his place in the world in addition to his abilities still lingered.

Beleive me, I don't think Man of Steel was that strong a film either, but I think that people still had some preconceived notions about Superman that was an effect of Reeve's Superman (and to a lesser extent, Routh's Superman) movies.

there lays the irony. on one hand, they think the reeve era superman is lame and bored; on the other hand, they expecting the same thing from a new superman movie.

 

[DA_Champion]

It's different people. The ones who loved the Donnerverse probably don't find it lame and boring.

 

[flickchick85]

MoS had drops of 65% and 50% in its second and third weekends, better than Days of Future Past for example, or Godzilla.

MoS also faced Monsters University and World War Z in its second week, tremendous competition really. They combined for 471 million domestic.

Legs = long-term, and DoFP has already proven to have better legs than MoS (2.49x multiplier vs. 2.56x), and both of those movies you mentioned faced competition equally as bad, considering they opened a week apart and were therefore competing against each other, as well as Maleficent, Neighbors and Spider-Man in that May bloodbath. Still, DoFP did have weaker legs than one would expect from such a well-reviewed movie, but my theory about that comes down to the franchise's history of never really catching fire with general audiences as much as it did with the fanbase and critics, as their legs have never been all that impressive over the years, except for First Class...but I think that's a conversation for another thread.

Also, Godzilla got extremely mixed, borderline negative WOM, and its legs after its breakout opening weekend were infamously bad because of it, so I'm not sure what argument you're making with that one. MoS having better legs than that is hardly an achievement.

Anyhoo, I'm not sure what the debate here is really about anymore. Are you in disagreement that MoS was not as well-received as WB would have hoped before release, after all of Nolan's Batfilms (as well as the last few Marvel films except TDW) had much better reviews and box office legs (even with the "mixed" WOM of TDKR and IM3)? Do you feel MoS met or exceeded studio/audience expectations after the hype?

 

[sf2]

It's different people. The ones who loved the Donnerverse probably don't find it lame and boring.

you're right. they are 2 groups of people.

 

[DA_Champion]

Legs = long-term, and DoFP has already proven to have better legs than MoS (2.49x multiplier vs. 2.56x), and both of those movies you mentioned faced competition equally as bad, considering they opened a week apart and were therefore competing against each other, as well as Maleficent, Neighbors and Spider-Man in that May bloodbath. Still, DoFP did have weaker legs than one would expect from such a well-reviewed movie, but my theory about that comes down to the franchise's history of never really catching fire with general audiences as much as it did with the fanbase and critics, as their legs have never been all that impressive over the years, except for First Class...but I think that's a conversation for another thread.

Also, Godzilla got extremely mixed, borderline negative WOM, and its legs after its breakout opening weekend were infamously bad because of it, so I'm not sure what argument you're making with that one. MoS having better legs than that is hardly an achievement.

Anyhoo, I'm not sure what the debate here is really about anymore. Are you in disagreement that MoS was not as well-received as WB would have hoped before release, after all of Nolan's Batfilms (as well as the last few Marvel films except TDW) had much better reviews and box office legs (even with the "mixed" WOM of TDKR and IM3)? Do you feel MoS met or exceeded studio/audience expectations after the hype?

I think MoS had underwhelming legs but not awful by any means given the situation.

Otherwise, good post.

 

[flickchick85]

I think MoS had underwhelming legs but not awful by any means given the situation.

I agree, it's legs are not awful. Just...a far cry from what WB had gotten used to with the Nolan films, and not nearly as strong as they could have been or would have been if the film had been as well-received as some here seem to be suggesting.

I'm not an MoS-hater, truly. In fact, as I've said before, I kind of love the film, in spite of its glaring flaws, because I'm in that camp that doesn't care for the Reeve/Donner films, and I'd been dying to get a cinematic Superman that wasn't beholden to them. And I got it, complete with an actor tailor-made for the role and scenes/dialogue taking direct inspiration from my favorite contemporary Superman stories. But I'm also not going to re-write history and paint the film as some kind of rousing success. It wasn't, creatively or financially. It did well enough financially to not be labeled a failure and warrant a sequel, and it did a good enough job of laying a foundation for the new DCCU to build from. But for the sequel and the rest of the DCCU, I want better than "good enough." I'm just hoping that with the writing addition of Chris Terrio, Snyder/Goyer might be able to pull that off. I certainly have my doubts, but of course, I'm hoping for the best. Superman's my #1 in all of comics, so I'll always be rooting for him to be in the best movies possible.

Otherwise, good post.

Thanks.

 

[Mrs. Sawyer]

Agreed, Flickchick I also don't hate MoS. There are several elements I do like about the movie, and to be honest, the thing that frustrates me most about the movie is that it's that some of the biggest problems with the movie could have easily been rectified.

 

[The Batman]

I wasn't mention Reeve in a literal sense. I was saying that the perception of Reeve's Superman as a peaceful beacon of hope who was much more confident in his place in the world in addition to his abilities still lingered.

Beleive me, I don't think Man of Steel was that strong a film either, but I think that people still had some preconceived notions about Superman that was an effect of Reeve's Superman (and to a lesser extent, Routh's Superman) movies.

I gotta disagree with this. I don't think reeve style Superman has as strong a stranglehold as people think. Certainly not strong enough to affect BO in anyway.

Also, the Superman you described, the "peaceful beacon of hope who was much more confident in his place in the world in addition to his abilities" is not exclusive to Christopher Reeve.

 

[zryson]

WB screwed up, releasing the movie very late overseas by which time negative buzz from the USA had cone through. I know of some Australians who didn't see it because they heard it was bad.

Marvel is smarter as it usually goes for synchronized international release, and thus they gross two dollars overseas for every dollar in north america, for most of their movies.

Snyder might be good at spectacle but unless you match that with great performances from the actors and actors who hold your interest on screen, not just waiting around for the next big CGI sequence, it makes for an empty film.

 

[scifiwolf]

Snyder might be good at spectacle but unless you match that with great performances from the actors and actors who hold your interest on screen, not just waiting around for the next big CGI sequence, it makes for an empty film.

Nothing's ever been wrong with the performances. The stories might be weak, but the actors have all been fine under Zack's direction in his films.

 

[shauner111]

Nothing's ever been wrong with the performances. The stories might be weak, but the actors have all been fine under Zack's direction in his films.

I disagree. There's plenty of times when im watching MOS and acting legends like Crowe or Shannon are just not delivering. And it's probably due to the situation (having to wear pyjamas to try to look threatening) or having to deliver bad dialogue, trying to make it sound believable. Then you have the acting from the teenager who played Clark, who i thought was pretty bad. Even Diane Lane had a couple of moments where im like good God..

Zack doesn't elevate actors like a lot of my favorite directors do. I still felt like a number of them in MOS were going into it with the mindset of "yep, im in a comic book movie, ill perform that way". Even if the movie was a little more serious than Marvel, i still felt like every actor has done MUCH better, and theyre holding back for Zack.

 

[Travesty]

I thought Crowe was really good in MOS.

 

[I Am The Knight]

Dat ben Avvy!

Anyway, I thought the acting was fine. Cavill didn't have much to do though but he pulled off the role of drifter mutey Superman very well. There wasn't any cringe worthy extras or TDKR goofyness. Just plenty of stupidity, which can be funny, and it was I guess

 

[WBwins]

Agreed, Flickchick I also don't hate MoS. There are several elements I do like about the movie, and to be honest, the thing that frustrates me most about the movie is that it's that some of the biggest problems with the movie could have easily been rectified.

This x100.

 

[shauner111]

I thought Crowe was really good in MOS.

So did i. I said a few times where i thought he wasn't delivering. Most of the time he was great but there were a few scenes where his delivery of the horrible dialogue was just not cutting through. "THIS IS MADNESS!". Same thing happened with Michael Shannon "CONCENTRATE ON THE MAIN DOORS!" cheesy crap like that where the writing or the delivery is like you're watching a goofy comic book movie from back in the day.

 

[BatLobster]

Yep, I agree. There were a few times in the opening sequence where I was like, "Uh oh...why are Crowe and Shannon so stiff in this?". But they got better for the most part as it went on. I think it was probably just the blatantly b-movie/sci-fi dialogue that they weren't 100% at home with, like shauner said.

Still think Shannon's performance didn't scratch the surface of what he's capable of though. Fishburne kinda phoned it in too, but I feel like he usually does nowadays.

 

[I Am The Knight]

So did i. I said a few times where i thought he wasn't delivering. Most of the time he was great but there were a few scenes where his delivery of the horrible dialogue was just not cutting through. "THIS IS MADNESS!". Same thing happened with Michael Shannon "CONCENTRATE ON THE MAIN DOORS!" cheesy crap like that where the writing or the delivery is like you're watching a goofy comic book movie from back in the day.

There's nothing wrong with those lines, to be honest. BTW when he said "this is madness" he wasn't yelling or anything. He was concerned, but not in an over the top way.

 

[flickchick85]

Agreed, Flickchick I also don't hate MoS. There are several elements I do like about the movie, and to be honest, the thing that frustrates me most about the movie is that it's that some of the biggest problems with the movie could have easily been rectified.

This is so true.

 

[shauner111]

There's nothing wrong with those lines, to be honest. BTW when he said "this is madness" he wasn't yelling or anything. He was concerned, but not in an over the top way.

"This is madness" was a horrible line and delivery from Crowe. THIS IS SPARTA! THIS IS MADNESS!! Ugh.

"Concentrate on the main doors", dialogue is OK but the delivery was b-movie. And im saying that as a huge Shannon fan. He wasn't able to loosen up throughout the film. And yet i still thought he was one of the highlights.

Yep, I agree. There were a few times in the opening sequence where I was like, "Uh oh...why are Crowe and Shannon so stiff in this?". But they got better for the most part as it went on. I think it was probably just the blatantly b-movie/sci-fi dialogue that they weren't 100% at home with, like shauner said.

Still think Shannon's performance didn't scratch the surface of what he's capable of though. Fishburne kinda phoned it in too, but I feel like he usually does nowadays.

Everything you said is spot on. Crowe was fantastic with Lara. Buthis scenes with Shannon early on were like "uh oh..".

 

[Boom]

Zod: This council has been disbanded.
Judy Dench: On whose authority?!
Zod: Mine!
Jor-El: What are you doing, Zod? This is madness!

Eloquent.

 

[Mrs. Sawyer]

Judy Dench

 

[DA_Champion]

The script problems in MoS would not all have been easy to fix, though certainly a four week polish with a dialogue editor would have helped.

 

[Mrs. Sawyer]

The script problems in MoS would not all have been easy to fix, though certainly a four week polish with a dialogue editor would have helped.

Agreed.