Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice – Movie Review

Zack Snyder’s sequel to Man of Steel continues the heroics of Superman, while introducing the audiences to a larger cinematic world as before. The story of Superman parallels with Jesus Christ, as the almighty and powerful hero simply wants to do good, but humanity doubts, mocks and attacks him.

 

The world has become sceptic and cynical, but Superman doesn’t stop there, because Superman never gives up.

 After the horrific events from Man of Steel, the Dark Knight (played by Ben Affleck) returns  to do the impossible: Kill the Man of Steel. (Henry Cavill)

But behind the curtains lies a darker threat, the world’s smartest man, the menacing Alexander Luthor (Jesse Eisenberg), manipulates everyone behind the scenes.

 Making the world doubt our saviour, pushing the mentally damaged Caped Crusader to a darker path, making him the judge, jury and executioner to Gotham’s worsts.

 “Black and blue. Fight night. The greatest gladiator match in the history of the world. God versus man. Day versus night! Son of Krypton versus Bat of Gotham!”- Lex Luthor

Ben Affleck’s Batman is easily the best part of the movie, it is the biggest tribute to Frank Miller’s take on the Bat.  The combat scenes are exhilarating, Batman does detective work, the Batmobile chase sequence is out of this world and Batman’s nightmares are blessed with Snyder’s artistic visuals.

Hans Zimmer’s & Junkie Xl’s score has a variety of tunes, using the Man of Steel tunes again for Superman with adjustments, while giving new scores for Batman, Lex Luthor and Wonder Woman. It pumps up the adrenaline with action sequences for sure.

So what went wrong then? ”the Dawn of Justice” segments, the movie is 2 hours and 30 minutes long & could have easily squeezed out thirty minutes, to have a better flow with the main plot.

 Scenes become padded with cross-marketing for future DC Comic movies such as Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot) and the Justice League, world building is done once again to rich the DC Cinematic Universe while leaving characters hollower.

The scenes could have been better to just leave in the upcoming 3 hour Ultimate Cut. Granted, Batman v Superman might become another “Watchmen” or “Kingdom of Heaven” situation, where the Ultimate cut becomes a vastly superior, cohesively story-structured movie that fans will actually like and praise. 

Already, we are receiving marketing for the said cut, which shows important character development and what will reflect upon the sequel – Justice League.

The movie has a lot of good, but sadly the cross-marketing just drags the enjoyment down, making the experience just about average.