Batman v Superman v Grimdark

(and if you don’t already know, grimdark is a real thing)

Yeah, I know I’m late to the party. But I finally went to see Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. (For those who aren’t in the know, that whole “dawn of justice” is a reference DC Comic’s Justice League team book, which is the analog to the Marvel Comics Avengers book). Before I discuss BvS in depth, some things to note:

• Superman is one of my very favorite superheroes. He was one of the first I ever read as a 7-year old boy, and I still feel very connected. He was not a “might makes right” bruiser, but a real moral, upbeat hero. Read Grant Morrison’s All Star Superman to read how he can be done right. He is the light to Batman’s dark.
• I was a big fan of Zach Snyder’s previous Superman movie. It was a darker take, but everything made sense, was well written, well acted and directed, and it ended on a note of hope, even a ray of sunshine.
• I’d say my next favorite superhero is Wonder Woman, who makes her cinematic debut in this movie.

So you might be wondering what took me so long to see it. Mostly the trailers made it look so unrelentingly bleak, it seemed to suck all the joy out of these characters that I took joy from. But I know that this is the next installment of the DC Cinematic universe, so I figured I would want to see it, even though it looked so grim and dark.

Ironically, as bleak as the trailers were, I felt the movie as a whole was even grimmer and darker. There truly is no moment of joy in this entire film. You’re allowed to see joy in the Marvel cinematic universe, but apparently in the DC Universe, the only color is dark, and the only emotion is grim.

The plot in key ways is a rehashing of the Man of Steel’s plot of “is the world ready for Superman.” In fact, if you clicked on the link to my review, you’ll notice the screen caps I used for my graphic are pretty similar—Superman is in the same pose, in the first being taken to testify in front of the military, in the second testifying in front of congress. Yes, there are many stories that can be wrung from that question, but seriously, move on. This is fantasy, it doesn’t need to focus solely on that one issue. Let’s just agree yes, he’s a hero, and move on.

In another way, the plot was a sort of unholy mash-up of The Dark Knight Returns, some of Lex Luthor’s mad scientist schemes, and the Doomsday arc in Superman (yup, the Death of Superman one). In that sense, it was too convoluted. And the entire conflict at the heart of “Batman v Superman” was done far better in the comics; in the movie, it could have been handled with one good therapy session.

There were threads that were left open—which I’m guessing were left open to keep the movie length down, the movie was already almost 2.5 hours as it was. And the whole tacked on “hey, lets get a team” really seemed extraneous and unnecessary for the plot at hand. Although it did give me a moment to see that Jason Momoa looks a great Aquaman, but Ezra Miller could not have looked less like The Flash if he would have tried. I can’t imagine it would be a better movie, however, if those threads had been explored. It might have made it more of a treat for DC Comics fans, though.

I almost felt sorry for the actors, they were given so little acting to do. Henry Cavill was great in Man of Steel because he got to show range; here he only got to play pensive and angry. Batman gets a bit more range: he gets to play haunted, suave, pensive and angry, and Ben Affleck acquitted himself very well. And Jesse Eisenberg? Again, he’s a fine actor, but the sort of borderline insane young mad genius he was asked to play was completely one-note. It didn’t help that the musical theme that was written for Lex Luthor was absolutely terrible, so I wanted to shut my ears every time he was on screen.

Even the production values, which were in general very high, were just so overdone—some scenes looked so heavily CGI and color saturated that it could have been a video game cut scene instead of a live action movie. The fact that Doomsday had the face of a Lord of the Rings cave troll didn’t help.

To end on a positive note, Gal Gadot makes a really wonderful Wonder Woman. She had the right look, demeanor, and physical ability. If you’re a Wonder Woman fan, it’s probably worth renting the movie and just watching her parts, both as Diana Prince and Wonder Woman.

There’s an irony that DC’s forthcoming Suicide Squad, about perhaps the darkest team in DC’s books—a team of captured villains being forced to do good things or die—looks lighter and more charming than BvS. As a huge Superman fan, I’m still hopeful that they can manage to pull together a Justice League series that isn’t quite this bleak and hopeless and grimdark, but I can’t say I’m looking forward to it any more. It’s too bad, I thought it got off to a great start with Man of Steel, but I don’t feel it’s promise was realized.

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