Sorry for the preamble, it's just given the reaction in some quarters, you do have to raise the flame shields before you start. (And I have some words to say about this mentality on both sides of the issue for another time). Now all that's out of the way, time for the dissection! (Seriously, SPOILER ALERT, I am going to reveal almost everything after the jump.)
The frustrating thing about writing a review of Batman v Superman is that I can't actually give a full, final opinion on the film now, because even though I was sat in that cinema for two and a half hours, plus ads and trailers, I haven't really got the full picture yet. See, I am forced to wonder if the big announcement several weeks ago about the fact that the home video version of this will be a director's cut that will be half an hour longer, was done then to help brace us all for the fact that with this film, it's blatantly obvious that over a sixth of it is missing. This is without a doubt the worst storytelling in a major blockbuster in years, but given the state of it, it's hard to say what's more at fault; the script or the editing.
Let's look at the latter first. There's a saying that good film editing should be invisible. It must match the flow of the story, taking us from one point to the next naturally. If you've notice it, if you wonder "why have we come to this scene from there?", it's not doing its job properly. This really matters in action fare most of all, when there's a lot of visual spectacle to convey;it's one reason why I was really pleased Mad Max Fury Road won the best editing Oscar last year, Margaret Sixel's work is a masterclass on how it should be done. BvS is how not to do it. The best editing comes fairly early, with the scene of Bruce Wayne's actions during the climax of Man of Steel. After that though, it's all over the place. We jump from character to character, scene to scene without much thought or care, it's all over the place, and very disorientating.
There are moments like a montage of Superman saving people, that looks like how proper Superman scenes should be, but it happens at a very odd point, close to a third or half way into the movie. To me, something like this would make a lot more sense to happen earlier, perhaps just after the opening flashback, to show what he's been up to since that happened. Montages are usually there to show a lot of time passing, so why stick one in between two scenes that probably only take place a day or two apart at most, and more likely a matter of hours? There's another scene when Clark's not around at the Daily Planet and Perry White says "What does he do, click his heels three times and go back to Kansas?" You'd expect then for it to cut back to him visiting Mom in Smallville Kansas, right? WRONG! We actually get some chunks from three different subplots, and then finally him in Kansas; again, why? Then there's towards the climax, with the big shot of Batman lighting the Batsignal and waiting for Superman to come. Thing is, so many other things are shown in between that and Superman showing up that it looks like Bruce has just been standing there in that armour for hours, probably just twiddling his thumbs and realising he forgot to include the most important part of that Batsuit; a fly. It goes on and on, leading to a very muddled feel that doesn't flow at all, a terminal case of "and then" storytelling.
This brings me to the point where the blame between the editing and script comes very murky; plot holes. Major story beats and important information are just missing, and until we have that full director's cut, I can't say if there is an explanation left out, or was there none to begin with. For a start, Lex Luthor's plan of turning the people against Superman includes a disastrous incident in Africa that he stage-managed, making it look like Superman's presence got a lot of people killed. Thing is, it's left very unclear how exactly this happened; Lex's goons just shot up the place, what precisely did the UN and State Department think Superman did there? Was there another scene to make it clear that an explosion wrecked the place or something? There's a point where Superman mentions Batman using the Bat-Signal... which we've never seen before in the film. Towards the end, Lex knows Superman is Clark Kent; how and why did he find this out? In fact, there's a plot point of Batman nicking some of Lex's data on metahumans; was that info in there too, so did he find out then as well? Lex also suddenly hints in his last scene that he knows about some big alien force on its way (*hintDarkseidhint*); again, how? When did he find out, when he was on the Kryptonian ship, or sometime before by other means? Suffice to say, the director's cut really had have some answers in there.
Now the other major source of trouble, the script. It's kind of understandable that the storyline can be a cluttered mess given how much it's trying to do. That does not however excuse just plain lacking plotting, characterisation, dialogue. Everyone is pretty one note, so as fun as it is seeing Alfred be disapproving (Jeremy Irons is great, his scenes are some of the highlights of the film), that's almost all there is to him. Superman has it particularly bad; you know how it was implied he now has his stricter moral code after being forced to take Zod's life last film? Well, he's forgotten all that, as literally first scene with him, he flat out murders a guy. Yes, that guy was threatening Lois, but still, murder, bad. The rest of the time is him moping existentially for almost every scene, which a real waste of Henry Cavill; if you saw The Man from UNCLE last year, you know how cool he can be given the chance. Pretty much the only time he smiles all film is in a really awkward romantic moment with Lois in a bathtub, which comes off as kind of bizarre. Speaking of her, just like in Man of Steel it's clear Zack Snyder and co, really have no clue what to do with Lois, she's just sort of there, with her subplot of finding out Lex is behind what's going on falling flat since Batman also works it out. There's a dramatic moment towards the end with her trying to get a crucial McGuffin, which would be a real contribution to the plot, were it not for the fact that the it was lost was because she threw it away for no damn reason. Oh, and then Superman saves her and gets it himself. I mentioned before that you could have her written her out Man of Steel entirely, and almost nothing in the plot would really have to change. It goes double here, showing that Zack Snyder really hasn't learned the right lessons from that. Amy Adams really deserves better.
But by far the worst is our main villain, Lex Luthor. It's one thing to have a new interpretation on a character. It's far worse to have that character in your version act and look absolutely nothing like the way he has ever done before. He's just embarrassing, with Jesse Eisenberg giving a performance that's from an utterly different movie, not fitting in at all. Some have said that he brings humour to the proceedings; wrong, Alfred does that far better in pure deadpan. Imagine if you stuck Jim Carey's take on The Riddler into the middle of The Dark Knight, and you've got some idea of how tonally mismashed it is. What's more, there's no real consistency, his motives are everywhere, they seem to change from scene to scene, and some utterly contradictory. Hell, I mentioned earlier about him somehow knowing that Darkseid is watching and ready to strike Earth. If so, then WHY THE HELL TRY TO TAKE OUT THE METAHUMANS, YOUR BEST LINE OF DEFENCE?!!?? Moviebob's review above is one I really can't match for sheer vitriol, but one idea he mentioned was that maybe all this would make more sense if originally the Joker was going to be in this too, but he got written out and Lex took on all the villain actions. If that was the case, it would explain a lot; the Joker would fit better moments like the jar of wee. (Seriously, one of the biggest dramatic moments in the whole film revolves around a jam jar of wee. It is surreal that I'm having to write that. I have to keep making sure I'm not dreaming.) Lex setting loose Doomsday at the end, when he no longer has any means of controlling him, and no Kryptonite weapons anymore, is suicidally moronic, but bringing in a sheer force of unbridled chaos like that is totally the sort of thing Joker would do given the chance.
Because I can. And it's still less embarrassing than Jesse Eisenberg.
I can go on with the script issues for at least another paragraph... so why not, lets!!! This film is meant to be setting up the whole DCU in films as well, and to do this it seems like they have looked to a Marvel adaptation for inspiration as to how to make this work. Unfortunately, the one they went with was The Amazing Spider-Man 2. For those that didn't follow my advise and saw it, remember towards the end how all of the stuff needed to make Spider-Man's enemies was all in the basement at Oscorp just lying there? Well this tops it, as that stolen Lexcorp data includes little video files setting up the Flash, Aquaman and Cyborg, complete in files with their logos on. So towards the end, at the point when we're gearing up for the big climax, we get a moment when the emergency break is pulled on the story momentum (what precious little there is) so Wonder Woman can watch a found footage style DC trailer reel. Unbelievable. Also, this film really overuses Batman's dream sequences, with one so badly placed that the narration has to actually points out it's a dream sequence or it wouldn't make sense. With one of them, it's a vision of Earth becoming Apokolips only with Superman in charge, a bit like Injustice. Then it's a dream in a dream (hey, Chris Nolan did have some real input!) with the Flash coming from the future (I think) giving Batman a garbled message. It's really jarring, especially since the message is so vague, we're not even sure if this prophecy was fulfilled in this film, or if it's sequel bait. As cool as seeing Parademons on screen is,world-building; you are doing it wrong.
Now here's the thing, despite all of this, there are things I liked about it. Ben Affleck is a great Batman, making a good team alongside Irons' Alfred (I'd be happy if the half-hour extra is just more Alfred snark to be honest). There's a good focus on Batman as a detective too, actually tracking the information down, following leads and such. I'm still not happy with how much he uses lethal force, guns in particular (and yes, before someone jumps down my throat, I know he did that in the Tim Burton movies ; I have issues with those too), but his action scenes were great, especially the very Arkham Asylum fight towards the end. A little touch I enjoyed was seeing them tweaking a voice changer for his Batman voice, which sounds way better after Christian Bale. Gal Gadot makes a fine debut as Wonder Woman; while she doesn't get much to do, boy do her scenes count (well, apart from the trailer montage). It says something that despite all of this, I'm still really looking forward to her movie. There are even some funny lines here and there that weren't from Alfred, including one towards the end from Martha Kent that I genuinely laughed with. One extra geeky bonus point my friend Steve pointed out was all the comics creators getting credited at the end; pretty much everyone who contributed characters and concepts that turn up here are mentioned. That may not sound like much, but it's something that both Big Two comic companies have not had the best record of for years, so it's nice that's changing. In fact, major Batman first, it's the first feature film that properly recognises Bill Finger as Batman's co-creator. But it's all mired down in more grittiness, over importance and general lack of fun. Boy, it says something when I have written this much, and haven't even mentioned the far too solemn tone until now.
I don't think I can entirely blame Zack Snyder to be honest (but he does beg it when he opens his mouth a lot of time. Christ, where do I start unpacking this one?). Mark Kermode in the above quotes Terry Gilliam in saying "A camel is a horse designed by committee"; well if the Warner Bros. committee behind this tried to design a dog, I think they'd end up with this. Well, as I said, I'll be doing all this again in a few months as soon as I can get (second hand for not too much) the director's cut, so I can finally put the verdict on this one, and have a better idea for who to blame for what. I will say right now that I am not angry about this the way some other critics are and certain other films have made me (hi Prometheus!), but I didn't have massive expectations to start quite frankly. Do yourself a favour; if you do wish to see this, maybe best to skip the cinema and just wait to rent the full version, so we have the full picture.
OK, so there is one advantage to seeing it on the big screen; an exclusive trailer for The Lego Batman Movie! Not the one below, it's a different featuring Ralph Fiennes as Alfred, and nods to 1966 Batman. Forget the rest of the live action Justice League stuff, that I'm most hyped about!
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