WRONG now my disclaimer is batman vs superman was not a great film, was it bad?, did it deserve the panning it got?
NO
Right I consider myself a pretty up to speed guy on comic books I can usually tell you the powers, origin, their enemies and a good chunk on a LOT of comic book people from DC to marvel heck maybe even some others ( even some of the newer new 52 stuff that i shied away from for a while). Am I nerd or a geek? Debatable I wouldn't say I know enough but my friends say yes lol. So when it comes to films I don't like a whole lot changed when it comes to my bread and butter superheroes.
Right batman vs superman when announced I jumped for joy, when Zack Snyder was attached I did a little less joy, but I actually liked MoS despite it being overly CGI heavy. I didn't like supe's killing of Zod but I felt it was the was the ONLY choice he had. Which is like the comics, it's happened in there before. I also was not to hot on Affleck being chosen as batman, hands up how wrong I was and that guy needs to hold his head high at such a great performance.
So the film sees superman rescue Lois from some terrorists near the beginning of the film. This will come back to bite my ass later in the review. Anyway so militants cuase havok and supe's gets the blame. Also we get bruces parents funeral, Bruce runs off discovers bat cave. Now I had (yes right at the beginning) a massive wtf moment as Bruce Wayne seeming floats under the updraft of the bats flying out.
Not to worry! It's all a dream, my anger flared at this until it was explained. I think that's the problem with this movie, some people get\got angry at segments then either dismissed the explanation or plain missed it's point through rage.
The thing is a CAN see why for critics and nerd\geek types these points might subtract, but they WERE explained for later on or felt justified by other things that happened. You need to get past these misgivings as a critic or die-hard fanboy and think OK then that's why, not be blinded by your initial reactions.
Bats hates superman because he witnessed firsthand the destruction him and Zod wrought while fighting. He now fears that if there's even a 1% chance supe's could go rogue someone has to be there to stop him. Totally justified if you ask me.
Enter lex who also has plans to make a 'just incase weapon' should superman turn. He gets backing but not without some opposition. He asks to have the green rock imported and access to the kryptonian ship. A senator does all in her power to stop this, more on that later.
Now this batman is not a batman many people will know, the cartoon series batman beyond? If you ever watched that this batman is halfway there. Soured by past mistakes, hardened by tradegy and holding a vendetta against an alien he sees as a massive threat. Now earlier in the film we see a massive amount green rock, yes kryptonite found at the world engine superman destroyed in MoS, this is quite a large plot point.
We see supe's get asked to defend his actions which he agrees too. Lois on the other hand thinks it's a set up and goes to prove it with bullet she found well above even black market grade.
As Clark Kent we see supe's disapproving of Batman's heavy-handed way of dealing with bad guys.
Branding them with a bat symbol so that's where he starts his hate towards batman. See it's all good so far right?
Bruce follows leads under false pretences of looking for an undesirable named the white Russian. This is to throw his ever protective butler of the scent that he's up to something more dangerous. Enter wonder woman, all three end up at a bash thrown by lex. Batman/Bruce attaches a device to get info from lex's archives, much to our amusement and Clark's super hearing he can hear the conversation between Bruce/Alfred. At this point I was thoroughly enjoying the film. I wasn't to hot on Jesse's Luther I have to admit. His flinching twichy madman just didn't seem to bely all the different Luthors intelligence throughout the ages/comics. The intellect was there though as we'll see more that (unfortunately) later.
Bruce goes to retrieve his gizmo but finds it gone, stolen by Diana. He chases her but she drives away before he can catch her.
Batman eventually gets the info back after Diana can't decrypt the high level codes on the drive. While it's decrypting he has a nightmare of a future where superman has gone rogue. We see batman meeting a convoy where he thinks they have kryptonite for him. It's a trap!
Now for die hard batman fans here this may be to much as yes batman uses guns. But! And this I can say as a massive batman fan I hated it to, again but! I say he has NO choice here this is all he can do to defend himself. Besides it's a futuristic dream sequence it's not even real!
Supe's obliterates him and he snaps awake, quick mini dream sequence, or is it? When the flash using his time travel suit (not many people realised this, I had to explain this to my friend) comes to warn Bruce to not let Lois die. He gets his information and also learns Diana is not a normal woman either.
So supe's stops bats from getting his mitt's on the kryptonite he's found that lex has snuck in. Threatens him not to answer his bat signal anymore.
The senator who wronged lex is the one in charge of superman's trial. Now at the beginning of the movie we see Bruce Wayne help an employee who unfortunately loses his legs. Lex has given him an automated chair packed with explosives. At the hearing he sets it off killing the senator and framing superman for the deaths.
Superman vanishes after this in a slump thinking he really can't do any good. Batman gets hold of the kryptonite and starts prepping for his battle vs superman. Lex enters the kryptonian ship with Zods body and starts experimenting.
Right for me now the film took a nose dive as some of the plot holes that I had read do start to open up and effect the film now. Lex kidnaps Lois and Clark's mum. Clark who was last seen up a mountain talking to his dead dad suddenly appears in metropolis (plot hole 1 was the mountain a dream?, how did Clark know and get there in time?) To rescue a falling Lois.
In between this Diana checks out the drive sent to her by Bruce, she realises he knows about her. We then see what feels like to me three shoehorned in clips of cyborg, aquaman and another flash cameo.
Batman goads superman into a fight using his bat signal, but he is further goaded into fighting him when lex tells supe's that he's got an hour to kill batman or his mother will be roasted alive.
(Plothole 2 a whole hour? Why does superman just use his super hearing to listen for her? Thus rescuing her faster and easier than batman does later on?)
So superman goes to try and convince batman not to fight and work together to stop lex. Batman in rage just tries to beat superman before he can convince him. Superman retaliates telling him he can kil him if he wants. Batman uses a gas form of kryptonite and weakens superman enabling bats to fight him on par. I loved this fight it actually felt gritty and on par with fights from winter soldier (easily some of the best comic movie fights to date) not over the top CGI either.
Back and forth the fighting goes until batman is about about finish of superman with a kryptonite spear. Hes stopped in tracks when supe's asks him to save Martha, now most people (non comic people mostly) don't know that Batman's mother was also called Martha.
Lois runs in confirming that supe's mum is called Martha this is seemingly enough for batman to become supe's best friend and even offer to rescue his mum. I voiced my views on this earlier. Power outages around the city centred on the ship means supe's goes there. Lex cajoles him for not killing batman and says he'll just have to do it. Made from Zods body contaminated with human blood (why?) Someone we all know in comic book circles as Doomsday.
Fight of the CGI century breaks out. Diana sees this on the aeroplanes screen and runs off the plane. Superman takes Doomsday into space where the President nukes them both. Doomsday doesn't die he just absorbs the energy and mutates further (yes we all know Doomsday can evolve and it usually isn't like this he evolves once beaten to not be killed in that way again)
Superman got nuked but regenerates thanks to the sun (supe's has taken a nuclear blast before) Lois threw the spear into some deep water earlier. Bats tries to get Doomsday to follow him FROM THE UNDESERTED RIKERS ISLAND BACK TO GOTHAM CITY FULL OF LIVING PEOPLE.
Even wonderman tells him off. Anyway I'm getting bored and it's nearly the end of the film anyway. Lois nearly drowns getting the spear (superman hears this over the sounds of battle) superman severely weakened using the spear (though he could have thrown it to Diana to use surely?) Kills Doomsday but not before getting speared himself and (apparently) dying.
So yes there's a bit more to it after this, supe's not really dead, bats saying about getting the rest of the metahumans together hence for justice league.
So it wasn't great but it was also not bad a decent 3 out of 5 at least and I will never ever trust critics on the rating of a film ever again.
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