Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice
Hmmm, interesting. But I will admit, I'm not a fan. First off, why are we still considering this a Man of Steel sequel, because it's clearly not. Zack Snyder can talk about it being a MOS sequel until he's blue in the face, and yet, when your film's title doesn't even suggest anything close to that, it's kind of hard to swallow. Yes, yes, I know that it's possible that Snyder and Goyer didn't actually have any say in the matter, that this was completely Warner Brothers doing what they do. Regardless, I'm still not sold.
First off, if it's his movie, why is Superman playing second fiddle to Batman? Is it an alphabetical thing? A bigger star-power thing? A character recognition thing? (Although how you can argue that one, I have no idea. I mean, yes Batman is Batman... but Superman is SUPERMAN! Probably the most recognizable superhero on the planet!) Okay, I get it. By putting Batman before the versus, it looks like he's the aggressor, the one doing the pushing. But then, how is this a direct sequel to Man of Steel? It's obvious that Batman is going to play a huge role in this movie, possibly a bigger one that most of us expected... okay, so maybe that was just me, but I was actually hoping for a true sequel to MOS. I think that Superman deserved that much, at least!... And, while I wasn't a huge fan of the first Man of Steel film, I was looking forward to the film makers exploring the ideas and threads that I did like, in greater detail in the sequel. Now, it looks like Superman is going to have to share a great deal of his screen time, and character development with a brand new Batman. And while we've seen Batman before, and know the general gist of his story, this will be a new Batman to the movie going audience, so regardless of back story or not, his character is going to have be developed to a certain degree, pulling even more screen time away from Superman. Because let's face it, the Kal-El/Superman that we saw in Man of Steel was still coming in to his own. His character was far from complete, and now instead of watching him grow and adapt to his powers and what they mean to both him and the world around him, instead of building and growing his relationship with both Lois Lane and Lex Luthor, instead of watching him struggle to keep his identity secret, we're going to get he and Batman, (instead of Zod this time) punching each other through buildings. Yes, I know that Clarke Kent/Kal-El/Superman can do all of those things with Batman hanging around, I just wish that he didn't have to.
Now, on to the "Dawn of Justice" bit. Could you be any more blatant, Warner Brothers? Why don't you smack us in the face with the fact that this is leading directly into a Justice League film? Oh wait, you already did. So, not only is Kal-El getting screwed out of his own sequel with the addition of Batman, you're also going to throw Wonder Woman and Cyborg into the mix, just for good measure. And, believe me, I'm pretty sure that we're going to hear about the addition of an Aquaman or a Martian Manhunter or a Green Lantern pretty soon, too. So, now, instead of a Superman movie or a Batman versus Superman movie, we're now talking full on Justice League territory. Regardless of the amount of screen time they get, just the addition of these extra characters changes the way that this whole thing is going to be perceived. And as their new title suggests, that's exactly what Warner Brothers wants. So what's with the charade? Let's call a spade, a spade, and stop fooling around. This is no longer a sequel to Man of Steel, it's a prequel to the Justice League. Plain and simple.
Did we learn nothing from this whole The Amazing Spiderman 2 debacle? Sacrificing your story for set-up is definitely not the way to go. And I truly hope that this isn't what's happening here. I hope that they did learn from TASM2 and are looking at alternative ways to tell a great story. And I get it, no matter what they do, they're going to be compared to Marvel, and that really does suck. If Warner Brother's starts their cinematic universe with origin stories, then they're just copying Marvel. If they try something different, then they don't know what they are doing, and why don't they do it like Marvel did? It's a no win situation for them. These days, Marvel is a well oiled machine and let's face it, they make it look easy. And it's definitely not.
So let's hope that Superman doesn't get lost in the midst of everything going on in the background. Because I can guarantee you, when Ben Affleck gets to do his Batman solo film(s), he's not going to have to battle for screen time with anyone. He will not be second fiddle, that's for sure. I think that Warner Brother's owes it to Kal-El to treat him with the same amount of respect. Although it doesn't look like it'll be this time, maybe eventually he'll get there.
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