Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016) 10 Year Retrospective

Hello everyone and welcome to Movie Goodness where we examine life through cinema here on the KB Radio Network.

I am your host Kevin Reed and this is a very very special episode and I know I say that every episode but this is special to me because I've been a comic book fan as long as I can remember.

I've you know I'm a football fan.

I love the New Orleans Saints.

been a new orleans saints fan my entire life i love history i'm a history buff been a history buff my entire life i i love greek mythology real big on that that's why i can't wait for the odyssey to come out later this year but

when it comes to comic books it's something about comic books that i guess you can kind of equate to greek mythology in a sense with these superhero characters

Just like it's depicted in Greek mythology with those characters.

But it's something about comic books.

I can't pinpoint the moment that I just became a comic book fan.

And as much as I followed

DC and Marvel,

love all those characters.

We all have a favorite if you're a comic book nut like me.

You all have a favorite.

You know,

my best friend,

his favorite is Superman.

my favorite is Batman.

And as much as I love

Spider-Man, which comes a close second,

I mean,

very close,

but

Batman has always been number one as long as I can remember.

Now,

I've bounced back and forth on who's my second,

who's my third,

who's in my top five.

But at number one,

that has never in my entire life.

never changed and that was batman still is to this day even though the older i get i i kind of lean towards the joker more than i lean towards batman but uh that's that's due to the uh social construct of of

the world right now but i am a huge batman fan and a lot of that is probably because of what i was exposed to we were

you know around my age i was exposed to more batman than anything you know you had the reruns of the adam west batman show that came out in the

60s but you know uh in the 80s they were they were rerun them and i will watch them and then in 89 of course we got batman from tim burton starring michael keaton and jack nicholas nicholson as the joker and all this here it was just a pop culture.

explosion of batman and before that before that you know of course i was into comic books but it was the dark knight returns frank miller's uh version of batman in that graphic novel that really blew

me away around that time which is the 40 year anniversary of that graphic novel i did a show on that if you haven't checked it out please check it out but batman is my jam

so when we got this live action comic book adaptation boom in the early

2000s you know we got the x-men and you had uh uh the mcu kickoff in what was that 2008 uh with with uh uh iron man and people started taking comic book adaptations a little more seriously and then when christopher nolan

uh hit us with batman begins in the dark night and the dark night rises it it really it really showcased the fact wait we can take this seriously you know but still honor the

source material and it was off to the races you know it mcu went nuts with the avengers and all of that and we got uh uh top tier actors

vying for these roles you know because you would think this would be less than to certain performers you know especially uh actors of a certain ilk you know a-list actors and we got big name stars who

were dying to be in these franchises and it just added a little gravitas

to the genre and so with all this going on around this time we got a film from dc dc was kind of lagging back while marvel was taking over marvel had it fully established their cinematic universe at this point and

dc was just there you know you know you get you had the christopher nolan dark knight trilogy you know but

you knew it was no cinematic universe being birthed out of that you weren't going to see superman pop up in a christopher nolan film you wasn't going to see the flash or the green lantern pop up in those films and so when was when

was dc gonna do something to kind of compete a friendly competition mind you with dc or with marvel i should say well they started off

with man of steel which was a divisive film for a lot of reasons for a lot of folks i actually enjoyed man of steel a lot still to this day i think it's one of the best comic book movies to come out in

a long long time or probably ever it was that good i felt now did i have problems with it of course i had i had some issues with it i still to this day can't wrap my head around

the snapping of Zog's neck.

Now,

I get it for that particular story.

I get why he did it,

but it just didn't fit for me.

And as much as people love Henry Cavill in that role,

I didn't.

I didn't like Henry Cavill as Superman.

Now,

did I hate him?

No.

I think he was decent,

but he just didn't scream Superman to me.

a superhero yeah but not superman superman is the ultimate boy scout and i didn't get that vibe from henry cabell but with that being said i was fine with it you know this is the direction we go on a different route with this universe obviously it's darker universe and you have zach snyder who directed this film it

fit his sensibilities you know zach snyder had given us three

hundred uh dawn of the dead remake so he he has a certain style and as part of the problem with the fandom that his style he's more style over substance you know it that's a problem for a lot of people and especially in uh

uh man of steel where folks were just upset how they destroyed metropolis in that final battle with general zod but

It didn't bother me,

but I saw a lot of people super upset about it.

They were more upset about that than when Superman snapped

General Zod's neck.

But that's neither here nor there.

The movie was good enough to warrant a sequel and set up a bigger universe.

Now,

in Man of Steel,

we saw a lot of Easter eggs.

It was an Easter egg,

just a wet dream,

man.

It was full of...

of little shots nuggets from the uh dc comic universe one of the biggest ones aside from seeing lex corp trucks and all this here was the satellite that

had wayne industries on it and immediately the world went nuts i think collectively everybody loved that easter egg because that let the world know

that batman exists in this world so how are we going to get an introduction we after the movie was released in the sequel was green lit and zach snyder uh announced in warner brothers they all announced that they're going to create a cinematic universe it

is going to spawn off of man of steel we all knew how okay it was just a matter of time before we got you

batman in this universe now the question was would it be christian bell because this came out around the same time or right after uh dark knight rises i believe and so everybody was a big fan

of christian bell as bruce wayne batman not me now let me clear it up for all of you who's probably about to click off of it wait relax for a second just remember

Just think now,

I'm a Batman fanatic.

I love Batman.

And the Batman that I grew up with,

the Batman that I envisioned on the big screen,

that wasn't the depiction that I would like to see.

You know,

and Christian Bale is a phenomenal actor.

If you haven't seen him in The Bride,

which was just released,

now the movie is being torn apart by critics,

but his performance was phenomenal,

and he's phenomenal in everything.

And he was good as Bruce Wayne.

The problem I had with it,

and it isn't his fault.

The problem I had with the Dark Knight trilogy,

the villains were showcased more than

Batman to me.

And especially in the Dark Knight.

I mean,

come on.

Heath Ledger,

God rest his soul.

I mean,

just it was an armed robbery.

How he stole that movie from.

everybody that was involved you don't even remember two-face was in that movie because he stole every second of film in that movie uh in the dark knight rises

bang was the showcase uh talia ghoul was the showcase now in batman begins he had he had the he had the stage and he did great i thought he did good as far as an

origin story we never saw a true origin story on the big screen and i thought that was great so it was immediately axed that christian bell would be in this universe christian

bell only wanted to do it if christopher nolan was directing it and christopher nolan has said after the dark night rises he is done with comic book movies uh he did produce uh

man of steel and he executive produced this movie we're about to talk about today but as far as leading the charge that wasn't on him he handed it over to zack snyder and with that being said the

internet went nuts at comic-con i think in what 2014 maybe 2015 it was 2014 and zack snyder came out he announced like yes we're gonna do a sequel

sequel we're gonna uh it's gonna be based on this certain comic but it's not gonna be based on it we're just gonna take elements of this comic and the comic was the dark knight rises but he didn't oh the dark knight returns i'm sorry and he didn't say that he brought out uh henry lennox who

was in man of steel to read a quote from that book and that quote that quote i had already i'm I put it in my will.

that I want this written on my tombstone.

Now,

will it equate to anything I accomplished in life?

No,

but I love this quote so much.

It is so gangster.

And I'm probably going to say it wrong right now,

but you get the gist.

I want you to remember,

Clark,

in all your private moments,

I want you to remember my hand at your throat.

I want you to remember the one man.

that beat you and that's from the dark knight return and all of a sudden when he read that and the theater went black we saw the superman logo silhouetted in this light and then when the light shifted the

bat symbol illuminated behind the superman logo and immediately everybody just lost

dare mine because finally we're gonna get the basically the world's finest superman and batman in a film together for the first time ever i

was just blown away but then it's sat down settled down a little bit and i thought about that quote and at the time i had to research it because i couldn't quite pick

where that came from and so i had to research it down like oh that came from the dark knight return i'm like well he told clark that when he was about to kill clark he was about to kill superman wait so they're going to be fighting and then the title was released a few months later batman

v superman i oh they're gonna be fighting so is superman the protect or the antagonist in this movie okay

Okay.

Well,

let's see where this goes.

I mean,

we're jumping pretty quick into this universe.

They're skipping.

over a lot of stuff because if you haven't read the dark knight returns that is set when bruce wayne is like in his

50s close to 60 and he's retired and you know we've been he's been through all of the battles with the joker and two-face and the rittler and catwoman and uh robin died and well at least one of the robins had died and all this other stuff so it's like we're skipping been over a lot of

lore to get to this point to try to catch up with Marvel that

I just could not wrap my head around but all that was dashed away well

I say dashed away but it was kind of put on a back burner when they announced who was gonna play

Batman in this movie who's gonna be the Batman in this cinematic universe and it was none other than Ben Affleck

And,

you know,

I can remember when it was announced because it was it was the craziest,

craziest coincidence of all time.

I was sitting down with my wife.

We were watching

Gone Girl.

And

I mean,

literally watching Gone Girl in my phone went off.

I got an alert and I looked at it and it said Ben Affleck's been cast as Bruce Wayne.

batman in batman v superman and all i could all i did was yell out what and my wife my wife was like what's wrong what's wrong what happened and

i said ben affleck is batman in her words and i'll never forget it her words to me was i'm not watching it now we're watching gone girl

And Ben Affleck did a great job.

And

Ben Affleck,

the problem wasn't Ben Affleck's acting.

I enjoy Ben Affleck's acting.

He's even better director,

but I enjoy his acting.

But as Batman,

just,

you know,

I'm literally watching him on television.

I'm watching him,

looking at him,

and I just didn't see it.

I just could not see

Bruce Wayne.

Anybody can be Batman.

You put the cowl on,

you can disguise it.

But as Bruce Wayne,

that's the litmus test for me.

Can you portray that version or that half of the character?

You know,

I just couldn't see it.

So the trailers come out.

We're getting closer to the date.

The trailers come out.

I'm like,

okay.

Okay.

I'm interested.

This looks like it's...

gonna be a pretty pretty pretty gangster you know and then more trailers came out and more trailers came out i think about five trailers for this movie came out and i'm gonna address that a little later on probably after we go through the review or the recap of this movie but

the date arrives march the 25th 2016 yes 10 years ago

today and well not today in a couple of weeks at least the time of this recording and i was blessed to have received an early screening for the movie i think i saw the movie on

the 18th something like that because it was right before my birthday and i was like this is the greatest birthday present of all time because my birthday is on the 20th

And I'm sitting there like,

wow,

I can't believe I got these tickets.

And I got four tickets.

It was enough for my family,

my wife and my daughters.

And so we went to go see this early screening of Batman v Superman

Dawn of Justice.

And early on,

once I left the theater,

I was so blown away.

I thought this was the greatest thing to have ever happened.

in comic book movie history and i'm gonna explain why i felt that way

10 years ago and why that shifted about three months later three months later i just i don't know if it was peer pressure or whatever because nobody else felt the way i felt after

i watched that movie uh i want i brought my friend.

He passed away not too many years ago.

I think it was right before COVID in 2019.

Yeah.

And

I brought him to go see it.

I wanted him to see it so bad.

I paid for his ticket.

I said,

you need to see this.

And so

I brought him to the theater.

We went to go see it.

And he really didn't have much to say.

He was like,

yeah,

it was interesting.

You know,

and that was it.

He didn't elaborate or nothing.

Normally,

we'll go watch a movie.

together we'll stand outside the theater for about another hour and a half to two hours breaking down the movie we didn't do that this time and i knew then i was in trouble i knew then that he was not feeling this movie and

so i left it alone you know i told him my feelings well i had been telling him my feelings and

He was like,

man,

I got to see it.

So that's where the offer came from.

I'm like,

look,

I'll buy your ticket.

Let's go.

And so we went to go see.

But anyways,

I left it alone.

And

I went to go see it for a third time by myself this time.

No family,

no friend.

I went by myself.

And when I left out this time,

I fell in the camp with everybody else.

Because I sat there and I didn't want to watch it.

You know,

normally when you watch something for a third time,

by that time you're at home.

You know,

so you could just change the channel.

But I couldn't.

I was in the theater.

So now I'm just stuck there and I don't want to see this.

I just immediately felt,

I don't want to see this no more.

I'm good.

This movie is not that good.

The structure and the way it was laid out.

everything was just silly and it was like i woke up i was in this euphoric dream state the first two times and then i woke up and watched it fully

awake and i was i felt so ashamed i just felt bad like why did i like this movie and the reason is i loved elements of this movie

I mean,

look,

there are elements in this movie that I would consider some of the best live action comic book stuff in all of comic book movies.

The fight,

the Batman fight,

not the fight between him and Superman,

but the fight in the warehouse with Batman.

It was like the Arkham

Asylum game coming to life that I owned all four of those games.

I knew those moves.

It came to life to see Bruce Wayne in his in his

Bruce Wayne ism.

Ben Affleck is arguably one of the best

Batman in live action.

In my humble opinion,

that never changed.

And so those elements were good.

I got to see a few comics that I've been hoping and wishing and praying.

to see on the big screen in live action i got to see a version of the dark knight returns i got to see a version of injustice i got to see a version of kingdom come even i got to see a version of a crisis

on infinite earths it was a slight version of those a flash point i got to see that but the problem was it was compacted into one movie

and it was too doggone much and i it clicked that day sitting in the theater after i on the third viewing and i just had not watched it since

i've seen bits and pieces of it but i i didn't watch it again until a week ago when when i was doing research for my uh

40th anniversary show before the dark knight returns and you know i acknowledge the fact that that movie or that comic book uh inspired this film in a lot of ways and

it got the juices burning now like you know i want to watch this again and then it dawned on me that it was uh it was 10 years so i say you know what what better time than to look back

10 years

since batman v superman dawn of justice and ask the question is it as bad as everybody said it was

I don't know.

Well,

I'll let you know my answer at the end.

But let's break it down.

Batman v Superman Dawn of Justice was released

March the 25th,

2016.

It is directed by Zack Snyder.

It was written by Chris Terrio and Michael S.

Not Michael,

but David S.

Goyer.

And it is the kind of sequel,

not technically.

or really the sequel to Man of Steel,

but depends on who you ask.

But it's the second film in the DC Extended Universe,

and it stars Ben Affleck as Batman,

Henry Cavill as Superman.

You also have Amy Adams,

Jesse Eisenberg,

we'll get to him,

Diane Lane,

Lawrence Fishburne,

Jeremy Irons,

Holly Hunter,

and Gal Gadot.

We'll get to that too.

Batman v Superman Dawn of Justice is the first live action film to feature Batman and Superman together,

as well as the very first live action cinematic portrayal of Wonder Woman.

The film,

basically,

a criminal mastermind,

Lex Luthor,

he manipulates Batman into a preemptive battle with Superman,

HOOM

Lex is obsessed with destroying.

Now,

there are two versions of this movie.

There's the theatrical version that came out,

and that's the one we're going to talk about today.

And there's also the director's cut,

which is ultimately the ultimate edition that came out.

I don't know,

maybe a year after this movie came out.

And it's it has what about 30 minutes.

of additional footage it is rated r and i didn't see how it was rated r yeah they had the only differences i saw there was blood involved they had some blood especially in that warehouse battle uh

it did seem a little more violent but you know it wasn't like full-on f-bombs and gratuitous sex scenes and all this here it was it was just stuff that

they cut out to make sure that it was a PG movie when it was released.

but we're going to talk about the theatrical version.

Well,

I'll say this,

the ultimate,

the ultimate version,

the differences that it had,

they had an extended,

investigation going on with Clark trying to find out,

who Batman is or why Batman is back.

and we got a little more with the character played by

Uemma Musaki,

who was in Sinners,

nominated for Academy Award this year.

Hope she wins it.

Well,

not really.

I want

Amy Madigan to win,

but I wouldn't be mad if she won't.

But this was the first time I ever seen her in something,

and it was only brief in the theatrical version,

but we got more of her in the Ultimate Edition.

There was...

Bleh.

what was it well it was more of no i'm thinking of the justice league don't worry about it but anyways not important who cares let's let's break down this movie this isn't your standard review of the film more

of a breakdown and i'm gonna try to do it quickly because this will be a five-hour show and i'm already close to 30 minutes into this episode so we're not gonna go beat by beat

per se but we'll break it down in acts so let's go through act one act one it starts with a flashback and for the umpteenth time we got the flashback we got the origin of

bruce wayne's parents being murdered in those doggone pearls uh being shattered down the alley but uh it starts off with bruce wayne he's running

uh from the funeral from where his parents uh are being laid to rest and then he falls into this cave and so uh he when he falls in the caves he sees bats and then the bats surround him and they create like this wind vortex type deal and he starts levitating up

up the hole

And immediately I'm already,

we already five minutes in and immediately.

And this goes back to the first time I watched it.

I'm like,

Oh no,

no,

they are not about to do this to me.

Cause that was silly.

It did.

He snaps out of it.

Present day.

And he was doing the narrow way narration.

And he was like,

Oh,

in the dream.

I was like,

Oh,

thank you,

Jesus.

Thank you,

God.

This is just a vision that wasn't real.

But we,

we,

we pop into the present day,

is 18 months,

after,

this giant battle,

that took place in metropolis between Superman and Zod.

And you have Bruce,

who's a billionaire.

Now he,

he arrives in a metropolis to go,

rush to one of his buildings.

That's,

that's a Wayne.

Enterprise is building and he has workers there.

And I thought this was a cool scene because we get to see this battle from a different perspective.

In Man of Steel,

we saw it from the air because it was Superman and Zod flying around,

going through buildings and so on and so forth.

But now we get the ground level,

the ground zero level almost.

And I mean this with no disrespect,

but it was almost in a

9-11 perspective.

that we saw all of this chaos that is taking place in metropolis and so bruce wayne he's rushing in and then one of the coldest moments and this was in the trailer the coldest moment was

when the building started falling down weighing enterprises and you see the dust and the smoke and people are running away because the building is collapsing you see one idiot running towards the action

And that is Bruce Wayne.

And he's running towards the danger.

And I thought that was excellent because

I call him an idiot,

but I don't call our first responders those firefighters.

Those are not idiots.

Those are heroes.

These are comic book characters,

but those are real life heroes because they did do that in 9-11.

They do do that when your house is on fire.

You're trying to get out,

but they're trying to get in.

And so my heck.

goes off to them uh nothing but respect because i'm not built for that i can i can say that with my whole chest uh i'm a man but i i just can't do that you know i don't have that gear in me and now in in situations who knows you know but i've never been put in that situation i pray i never be put in that situation but

bruce wayne he ran to it and it really puts things in perspective because

yes this is a superhero movie we got superpower beings and whatnot but he's not he's a normal person he can be killed just as easily as those people in those buildings could be and that's what makes it more heroic and

so at that point this is where the hatred started towards superman for bruce wayne because of his actions here you know cool all right we started off good

Problem was we saw this entire scene in the trailer.

And you're going to hear that a lot throughout this show.

You saw this in the trailer.

So nothing really shocked me watching it on the big screen.

Skipping around,

we go to

Lex Corp.

And we meet Lex

Luthor.

Jesse Eisenberg.

I love Jesse Eisenberg and the social network.

Love him in a lot of things that he's Zombieland and whatnot.

He's a he's a really quirky character.

You know,

now you see me and all this.

I love

Jesse Eisenberg.

Hated his guts as Lex Luthor.

You want this was probably the biggest miscast in movie history.

I don't know what the thinking was.

I have no idea.

He probably could have pulled it off with better direction.

You know,

he was so over the top.

I just could not,

had no viewing.

Even when I liked it,

when I enjoyed it,

when I thought it was the best thing since sliced bread,

my first viewing,

I still hated Lex Luthor.

I did not like his portrayal of Lex Luthor.

I will give them this.

It was different.

You would never say you would never hear anybody say that.

He tried to rip off Gene Hackman.

He tried to rip off Kevin Spacey.

You know,

it was none of that.

None of that.

He made it his own and he can keep it to it.

And so we get introduced to him.

We find out that he found kryptonite,

trying to get it back to the United States,

needs to help from the senators and all this other political stuff that all that was interesting.

It just

I couldn't get into it because of the.

Jesse Eisenberg of it all.

And so we fast forward to a gala at Lex Court.

we find out that Bruce is searching for this ship and he tells Alfred that there's a bomb on it and going to blow up Gotham and blah,

blah,

blah.

So he knows that Lex Luthor probably knows about it.

He tracks it down.

So he goes to this gala to,

um,

get information to steal files from lex luto so while he's there we get the first meeting the first on-screen meeting between bruce wayne and clark kent epic

should be should have been the crowning moment of the movie that we get to see these two face to face and i love the back and forth between those two and i especially love ben affleck this is when i was sold

on Ben Affleck in this moment.

His just taking down

Clark Kent in this moment,

it was just money to me.

And it was so Bruce Wayne.

Everything that I love about Bruce Wayne from the comics,

from the animated series and so on and so forth,

it was wrapped up in this scene in his portrayal because nothing scares Bruce Wayne.

He doesn't care who you are.

He doesn't care what you can do.

Now,

at this point,

he didn't know,

at least as far as we knew,

he didn't know that that was Clark or Superman,

that Clark Kent was Superman.

But he didn't care.

He doesn't care.

But I thought that was a great scene.

We also got introduced to Diana Prince at this same gala.

Diana Prince,

played by Gal Gadot,

who we all know as Wonder Woman.

She was at the gala as well.

Um,

well,

I'll save that till later.

But anyways,

Wonder Woman end up taking the files and stealing it from the original thief,

Bruce Wayne.

So you have that.

And they track each other down.

Like I said,

I'm bouncing all around with it because I'm trying not to stay here until the 20 year anniversary trying to break it down.

But anyways,

he tracks her down.

She tells him,

look,

I'm looking for a photo.

This is in later scenes,

of course.

I'm looking for a photo that Lex has,

and I know it's on this drive,

but I can't break it.

Maybe you can break it.

I left it in your car.

All right,

cool,

whatever.

And so when Bruce breaks into this file,

he finds the photo.

He finds the white Portuguese.

He finds all the information that he's looking for.

But also,

he found the files for...

other metahumans so he clicks on it he clicks on the file and in the file we already got the logos we already got the symbols and the nicknames for

these metahumans wonder woman flash and aquaman and that that just rubbed me once again even in the first viewing did not like that scene

did not like the fact that lex luthor knows who everybody is not only knows who everybody is but named them and though and cyborg i left him out cyborg as well but

they weren't even superheroes at this point they they were just man of humans they would they were just mutants so to speak if you want to talk in uh marvel terms but why Why?

why is this on file but anyways uh bruce finds the photo he clicks on the photo and we see diana prince in her full wonder woman get up in world war one with

a group that she fought in world war one with so immediately he's like wait this is so she's one too and so you have that and all right

we bounce around we go back to uh congress is still questioning the superman uh of it all

do the world need superman but we do have superman but uh should he not do good but if he does good he needs to run that through congress first he needs to run that through the u.s government first uh typical u.s government stuff uh

so yeah that that makes sense all right that's fine you're gonna say i like all of the political intrigue section of this movie and that that made sense you know that broke it down it gave it that realistic

touch that you needed um uh to kind of ground the movie a little bit so all right cool all right superman he shows up at this hearing due to what took place in this nation i think it was the african nation but

where lois was there jimmy olsen was there and i guess i might as well touch in on that jimmy olsen yes he made his grand opening grand closing

at this in this scene he will he end up being a cia operative or something disguised as a photographer working for lois and he gets killed there wait and then he was a full-grown man actually he was older he looked older than lois it

was dumb that threw me off but anyways uh Superman goes to save her like he always does he kills

this terrorist leader and all this here but he gets blamed for multiple deaths in this village and and i i don't know how he gets framed for this or if he actually did it if because he never cleared it up oh i didn't kill anybody i

didn't do that but okay if you if you if you did do it you need to account for it but it

That was never cleared up.

And this is why Congress is at him,

you know,

wants him to be apprehended or whatever,

or some accountability for what took place.

And so with that being said,

he's at this hearing.

One of Bruce Wayne's former employees who was in that building during the Metropolis tragedy,

he lost all of his legs.

And Lex Luthor got to him,

gave him.

this robotic chair that end up being a bomb and he goes to talk to the senator who was played by holly hunter um convince her to speak at this hearing so he's in the place and

the bomb blows up the bomb explodes he kills everybody for what i don't know that still has never been explained because you wasn't going to kill superman and the fact that he didn't see the bomb

the chair and now

I read in breakdowns I read in breakdowns that the chair was made out of lead but that was never explained in the movie now in case you've been living under a rock and don't know about Superman's lore he

can't see through lead you know his x-ray vision doesn't go through lead but if that was the case

how did lex luther know he can't see through lead keep in mind now superman's only been around for about a year two or three years tops at this point and so knowing all of this information it's

almost impossible virtually impossible but we were led to believe that in this film anyways and so the explosion happens and uh batman he

Breaks into Lex Corp.

He steals the kryptonite.

He starts to build this kryptonite weapon.

Well,

actually several weapons from this kryptonite that he stole from Lex Luthor.

Lex,

he manages to lure

Superman by kidnapping Marta.

Marta?

Kent and

Lois as well.

So he he saves Lois he confronts Lex

Who reveals that you know

I have Martha I have your mother

And so if you don't go and kill Batman,

I'm gonna kill your mother.

All right,

that's how the fight starts people

That's the fight

That was the opening bail and so

Batman well Superman he tries to explain it now give him this

He didn't go over there and just try to fight Bruce.

He went over there to try to tell him what was going on.

Bruce didn't want to hear it.

At this point,

Bruce was,

he got his prep time.

he got his prep time he set up all these traps he got his kryptonite weapons he got his anti-superman suit on it was it was there's no more talking it's time it's time to it's time to go to blows and they went to blows i actually enjoyed that fight i enjoyed that fight um

i thought it was a convincing fight for superman and batman to have

You know,

it wasn't far fetched,

you know,

because the comics in the comic in the Dark Knight Returns,

that's pretty much blow by blow how it went down.

You you you you couldn't have done it any other way and made it,

quote unquote,

believable.

So it all made sense.

So we get to the point where the Batman gets the upper hand.

He's about to launch the final blow on Superman with this kryptonite.

spear that he created and then superman and his final breath spews out two words the two most powerful words in all of dc comics save

marta now at the time at my first viewing it didn't bother me it was it bothered me but

I didn't see why it bothered other people.

It bothered me because it was so abrupt.

I didn't really look at it because I was too wrapped up in the fact,

and I felt like an idiot still do to this day,

the fact that I never put two and two together,

that Batman and Superman have,

their mothers have the same first name.

As much as I read comics for over 40-something years,

I never...

put that together and so when it's when this moment happened i'm looking around i'm like oh my god they got the same name i didn't even care about the fact how stupid that this would end the fight but

i was too caught up in my own foolishness to really to really pinpoint the fact that this is dumb but anyways

save Martha so with Bruce here's Dizzy hold on how do you know that name and blah blah blah it then conveniently that's ex machina uh you have uh Lois Lane rush in and say that's his mother's name and then that was that that

was the end of the fight and it not only not only did that make Bruce Wayne come to his senses he automatically he just shifted tones all together

Alfred tried to convince him through this movie.

Other things that took place throughout the film.

Superman talked to him earlier and told him to stop.

He wouldn't listen.

But the fact that Martha,

Martha,

hearing that name just changed his whole world view.

He,

all the men,

oh,

Martha,

because they were going to split up.

One was going to go after Martha.

One was going to go.

and uh stop lex and this that and the third and batman is like i'll go after martha or martha won't die tonight you know it's like what is what is this now

in the comics you can read that in the comics and buy it it did not work on the big screen it did not work but going back to my thinking

telling you this is a therapy session for y'all yeah or at least for me to y'all i didn't that didn't bother me at the time it did in the third viewing but in the first one it didn't bother me and

so because i knew where it was going to lead i knew it was going to lead to the warehouse fight which we got next and which we saw it wasn't leaked

Warner Brothers showed the whole fight a few days before this movie came out.

They put it on YouTube.

They showed the whole fight.

And so when you saw it in the theater,

it didn't have the impact.

It had zero impact when it happened.

Now,

I was still excited.

I still loved everything that I saw,

you know,

compared to me watching it.

at home on the television and then watch it in an IMAX yeah it was a different feel

it was it was a completely different feel but it just didn't have the impact you know it's like the first time you get to see it at the on the big screen but uh warner brothers spoiled it so anyways uh bruce

needless to say he rescued martha kent uh superman he goes finds lex and then lex he awakens the old body of zod and he uh bug.

turns

Zod into Doomsday.

Another comic that I loved,

The Death of Superman,

that they implemented into this movie.

Didn't want it in this movie.

Once again,

spoiled in the trailer.

They showed him in the trailer.

So immediately when I saw this in the trailer,

I knew,

well,

Superman's gonna die.

it's doomsday why else would you put doomsday in the movie it's doomsday and so they have this battle battle and wonder woman she shows up wonder woman shows up out of hiding after a hundred something years of hiding and whatever and

this was the best part of the movie best part of the movie because we've never seen it and then that score

that came out when she dropped down and blocked doomsday's uh uh beam uh and it was just great it was a great into the introduction one of the greatest introductions in comic book movie history okay

so here we are then we get the epic shot which is still one of the greatest shots ever man zack snyder he knows how to film now you can say what you want he knows how to frame a scene

And when he had

Superman, Wonder Woman in the middle,

and Batman on the other side,

the Holy

Trinity of DC Comics,

if not all of comics,

on the screen together for the first time,

an epic battle-ready shot.

Oh,

my God.

It brings tears to your eyes.

Unfortunately,

those tears came in my eyes in the trailer because we've seen it already.

But anyways,

they fought

Doomsday.

Lois goes back for the spear with Kryptonite because

I guess she just knew that that was going to kill

Doomsday. She goes back to try to get the spear.

She ends up getting trapped under some rubble.

Superman hears this from three miles away.

He flies over,

saves her.

He goes get the spear,

even though it's killing him because it's Kryptonite.

tonight then he grabs the spear he kisses lower lois tells her that you're my world and all this here uh can barely hold the spear up stabs doomsday in the heart but doomsday

had his arm severed by wonder woman and he had the bone grow out of that that snub that that that uh stub in his arm

And he uses that bone.

to impale superman because he's weakened by the kryptonite and they both perish right there amongst the rubble and that's that was basically it for that superman dies and

lex luther goes to prison batman is feeling remorseful he pays for the funeral you know which is ironic because he was trying to kill the man the entire movie

But you pay for the funeral.

He tells Wonder Woman that we got to get the team together and,

you know,

find the others because something bigger is coming and blah,

Lois spreads dirt on a coffin.

And in the final shot of the movie,

we see subtly dirt start to rise off the coffin and it cuts the black.

And so that was.

Batman v Superman

Dawn of Justice.

Now was it as bad?

Like I said I watched it last week again in preparation for this show.

Really really just for my own enjoyment to be honest with you but it was for the show.

I wanted to see.

I really wanted to know is it as bad as I remembered?

It wasn't.

I know going by how I described it here today it sounds bad.

But on the screen,

in action,

it's not that bad.

Now,

is it better than I thought?

Like,

oh,

man,

we had it wrong.

It really is good.

No,

I'm not.

No.

I'm not saying that at all because it wasn't it wasn't good it should have been good but it wasn't good and there's a lot of factors that went into it as you heard me throughout the recap of the movie the

first offense of this movie the trailers they ruined this movie you literally saw

70% of this movie.

In the marketing material leading up to the movie.

You saw everything.

You saw Wonder Woman.

You saw Doomsday.

You saw the warehouse fight.

You saw the first confrontation.

Or face to face.

Between Batman and Superman.

You saw what Lex Luthor plan was.

Everything.

You saw.

It was nothing left to the imagination.

When you went in to see this movie.

And they completely ruined the movie.

Now,

for kicks and giggles,

just script away the trailers for this fool.

I'm probably right there.

But for this movie,

would that have improved your viewing for the first time?

No.

It would have been a little better because you would have been excited.

for seeing this stuff for the first time on a big screen but at the end of the day like me if you would have viewed it a second or third time you would have came to your senses you would have had your marked a moment and you would have stopped you know you would have been like this

movie isn't that good so yeah the first offense was the trailer the trailers and like i said i think they released like five of them.

I could be off by two or three and I'm talking on the low end.

But any who's the second offense that this movie had,

it was too much going on.

They tried to put too much into this movie.

They basically tried to take one phase and put it in one movie like a Marvel.

And,

you know,

I hate.

comparing Marvel to DC because there are two different things.

The only commonality that they have is that they're comic book movies,

but

Marvel took their time.

They hit you with

Iron Man,

then came with Iron Man 2,

then gave you Thor and gave you

Captain America,

and then we got Avengers,

you know,

in The Incredible Hulk.

They took their time,

then you got that.

Then they went to phase,

I think that was still phase one.

No,

that was all phase two.

But anyways,

they broke it down again,

gave everybody another movie.

You got another Iron Man.

You got another Thor.

You got Guardians of the Galaxy.

Then you got,

you know,

other movies,

other movies.

Then you got

Avengers, what was the second one?

Age of Ultron.

And so they built up.

these movies you know whether they were great movies or not that's up for debate but at least they built them up it was earned once you got to the avengers not here they tried to put

one phase in one movie and then immediately go into justice league which they did they went straight into justice league and we weren't introduced to no other member

Except for cameos in this movie.

We saw not even a whole scene,

but just a glimpse of the Flash,

literally.

We saw a peek of Aquaman.

We saw a peek of

Cyborg.

And then you want to introduce a movie or go into a movie where we have to feel something for these characters.

You know,

follow behind it.

it made no sense they rushed it they rushed it now i will say this like i said before here here was my argument he was my final argument when i discussed this 10 years ago about

batman v superman dawn of justice when i was asked how did i feel about this movie

I said I didn't like the movie,

but I liked everything that I saw in the movie.

And here I stand,

10 years later,

feeling the exact same way.

The movie was bad.

It was poorly constructed.

But everything that I saw,

I loved.

I loved seeing the Dark Knight Returns version of Batman.

I loved seeing...

the injustice little scene that we saw in that dream sequence with superman pretty much enslaving the world we got to see parademons in this movie we saw wonder woman for the first time now

when gal gadot was first cast as wonder woman i had just seen fast and the furious

13 or whatever whichever one she was in the last one she was

you know i saw that and i'm like oh she's a beautiful woman but diana prince no no she's about as big as my number two pencil i just did not no i did not see her as wonder woman still don't to this day and

i will say out of the what five times that we saw her batman v superman uh wonder woman justice lee uh you

Wonder Woman 84.

And what was the fifth one?

Was it,

what am I thinking about the other version?

The other version,

because there are two versions of Justice League.

Well,

we'll say that five.

Out of those five times,

the best

I've seen her as Wonder Woman was in this movie.

Was in Batman v Superman Dawn of Justice.

This was the best I've seen Gal Gadot in anything.

because she is not a good actress at all i'm sorry but there's no other way to there's no other way to say it she is not a good actress but this movie she did great go

back and look at every scene that she's in before she becomes one one when she's diana prince the chemistry between her and ben affleck was great and i've seen i've noticed that's a pattern

Because when she's bouncing off of a really good actor,

she's good.

Like in Wonder Woman,

as much as I did not like Wonder Woman,

and I know a lot of people did,

but it just didn't do anything for me.

I don't hate it.

I don't dislike it as much as

I'll dislike this movie.

I thought it was good for what it was.

But

I'm not cheering like it was the best out of the DCEU.

Like everybody else,

I did not have that feeling.

But what I did like out of it was the chemistry between

Gal Gadot and Chris Pine.

I thought that was great,

but that movie just didn't deliver for me.

But this this was,

in my humble opinion,

her best portrayal as Diana Prince in this movie.

I loved her in this movie.

Now,

my final my final point,

and it's to add on to what I was talking about earlier.

And what's a lot of people's gripe about this movie was save Martha.

There's not many ways you could have stopped this fight and,

you know,

continued on this buddy thing.

You know,

now we're best friends type thing is really no real realistic.

way they could have done it in this film other than that and that makes me mad it's it's it's upsetting that this is the result of that i get it trust

me i 100 understand where they were going with it but it didn't deliver the way they thought they tried to set it up that way with bruce wayne

moping about and brooding about his mother and uh visiting her gravesite and having visions of her death and stuff like that how it's really making an impact on his life we all know that you know and and they showed that in the film i

get where they were going but it just didn't have the impact plus the fact that why would superman and

At this moment,

say save Martha and not say save my mother.

That would have made more sense to me.

why would he say Martha?

It was just dumb.

It was so convenient.

So convenient.

And it was,

I felt insulted,

to be honest with you.

You're trying to insult my intelligence as a moviegoer at that point.

And so it's like,

I don't know.

But the movie had a lot of potential.

And when you have a movie with two of the biggest.

comic book characters of all time i don't care what nobody say and i and i love marvel i love spider-man i love x-men i love them all but let's be real people batman and superman are the most identifiable superheroes

in all of pop culture everybody knows who those those two characters are i don't care if it was your your little nephew you

or your great-grandfather.

They know who these characters are.

You know,

these are the two biggest characters in comics,

and when you put them in a movie together for the first time ever,

it should have been excellent.

This should have been a surefire hit.

The movie made money.

It wasn't like it was a box office bombing disaster.

The movie made close to a billion dollars.

and end up making uh 875 million dollars at the box off not too bad but when you have these two characters it should have went well over a billion just to put it in perspective joker made

a billion dollars i'm talking about the first one it made a billion dollars uh the dark knight made a billion dollars and so you would think this movie was was like

penciled in for a billion dollars easy it didn't it struggled to get to that uh 875 but to no avail you know that it's over it you know it's 10 years later i

wish it was better i will say this you know after viewing it again uh just this past week i do appreciate it you know i don't hate it

But I do acknowledge that it's deeply,

deeply,

deeply flawed.

But it's not as bad as I thought it was.

But that don't mean it was

10 times better than what I thought it was either.

It's kind of a weird thing.

Maybe in 20 years,

I would think differently.

But 10 years later,

it still stings to know that.

This had a lot of potential that went absolutely nowhere.

And especially,

given that we received justice league immediately after this,

that was

10 times worse.

I, I,

I'm just more disappointed than anything when it comes to Batman V Superman,

Dawn of justice.

But

I will employ you if you haven't watched it in 10 years,

you know,

go back and watch it again see if you still have the same vitriol that you had for 10 years ago or do you appreciate the little things that like i said i appreciate the little things that they were doing in this movie and i think a lot of that i'm not even pinning it on zach snyder i think a lot of that was studio a

lot of studio interference went into this movie and so uh oh

oh another point i wanted to make real quick before we get out of here how dark it was dark it was dark people were spoiled people got spoiled with marvel with the the bubbly you know with the jokes and the you know the lighter tones whereas we got this dark moody raining all the time universe

when it comes to superman and batman but um it is what it is but

If I gotta grade it,

I guess I'll go ahead and grade it since I've never reviewed it in the past.

But if I gotta give it a grade on the

A to F scale,

I give Batman v Superman Dawn of Justice,

which was released in 2016,

a letter grade of a C.

It was a movie.

It exists.

They had elements that I enjoyed,

but they also had elements that I just deeply,

deeply despise.

But that's just my opinion.

I would love to know.

I would love to know two things.

Number one.

how did you feel when you first watched it 10 years ago and how do you feel about it now when you think back it's it's in every movie that you watch you ever watched a movie and went back and watch you know watched it later in life and

like why did i like this movie i watched breaking and i remember breaking being the greatest thing since sliced bread back in the 80s you know with The break dancing movie

And

I tried to watch it again after like 20 years,

a couple of years ago.

And I was like,

this movie is so bad.

I didn't get through it.

I keep saying I'm telling myself that I'm gonna go back and rewatch that movie.

And I've yet to do it and finish watching it.

I should say.

And I just can't do it.

It's that bad.

But I remember loving that movie.

Transformers,

the movie,

not talking about the Michael Bay films.

But I'm talking about the animated film from back in the 80s,

which was a staple of my childhood.

Tried to go back and watch that a few years ago.

I just can't get into this.

I don't know what's wrong.

I don't know what happened,

but I remember this being the greatest movie I ever saw in my life when I was,

I don't know,

eight,

nine years old.

But now it's like.

After Optimus Prime dies,

spoilers,

in that movie,

I was done.

That movie had no substance at all.

But

I would love to know when it comes to this.

Did you watch this?

And did you hate it?

Do you ever plan to go back and watch it again?

Just to see.

Just to see if it was real or not.

Email the show,

kbradiopodcast at gmail.com.

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Subscribe to the KB Radio Network channel and like this video if you don't mind.

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Network. Everybody.

thank you for joining me for this look back

10 years one decade ago batman v superman dawn of justice want you all to know that i love you continue to love everyone and until we speak again you all be blessed

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016) 10 Year Retrospective

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