Batman v Superman Trailer 2

This trailer has been the bright light in a dark tunnel that has been this week. I was looking forward to this trailer so badly that I considered staying up to actually watch Jimmy Kimmel, as the trailer premiered on his show. That being said, I was way too tired for that but waking up and knowing that there was another Batman v Superman trailer was my mini Christimas before my mini Christmas before the actual Christmas which is Star Wars.

Now a little bit of context, on Monday this dropped…

I loved this little teaser to the actual trailer. There was a lot of good acting without even saying anything between Henry Cavill as Superman and Ben Affleck as Batman. It was only about a 50 second clip but it was promising to be the herald to the actual trailer that came out last night.

Now I didn’t do a post on that teaser because first off, it was 50 seconds of two guys looking at one another. As awesome as it is, I didn’t think that was worth doing a whole deal on it. Secondly, I knew I was going to do this post so I didn’t think that it was worth doing a mini posts on a teaser and a post on a trailer when I could just do a regular (Maybe larger sized) on both. And thirdly, I’m tired as hell guys. I’m have a real job now. I want to keep doing these things but I’m getting tired as hell.

But anyways, so this morning came. My mini Christmas had arrived and…

My initial reaction was a little disappointed…

Don’t get me wrong, this is a good trailer. I’m still incredibly excited for this movie. I still thought a lot of the stuff in this trailer was really great and I will definitely talk about those things in this post. But for a couple reasons, this trailer just didn’t sit well with me initially.

1. The Tone: Now I do have to give DC credit for trying to lighten up a little bit. Up until this point, all their trailers have been incredibly dark and bruiting. Its definitely not Marvel where they throw in a quip here and there. DC has gone on record that their movies are not going to have a lot of comedy in them like Marvel. 

But for some reason they decided that they wanted to show a little bit of the lighter comic relief element that is going to be in Batman v Superman. 

Now I don’t want to say that it didn’t work at all. There were just moments where the movie seemed like it was trying to go a little bit more Marvel than I would want it to. I’m okay with Man of Steel only having a crappy joke about how one of the Captain’s thinks Superman is hot. Yeah it was a dumb joke but I’m okay with the movie not having too much of that humor. I’m okay with the DC universe being more serious and maybe even more about ideas, kind of like the way Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy was.

Furthermore, when I first saw Man of Steel, I was impressed on how it didn't exactly feel like a comic book movie. It felt more like a really good movie about a man who has superhero abilities. I know these are comic book movies and I'm glad that they are, but I kind of saw a way for the DCU to distinguish themselves by instead of making epic comic book movies, they make epics that happen to also be based off comics. If that makes any sense at all. Bringing this back to the trailer, the tone gave off a little bit of a comic book vibe with the jokes and I wasn't incredibly wild about that

Let me be clear, this is not a light hearted trailer and I'm sure its going to be just as dark and bruiting as Man of Steel was. And I'm sure in context of the movie, these little jokes will land a little bit better. But for the moment, I didn't think the tone served the trailer very well. 

I feel like it has everything to do with the way the trailer was structured and not so much with the movie, but sometimes you assume the worst with these trailers and when it comes to a property like Batman v Superman that has so much riding on it, you get a little bit nervous. 

The big moments that I’m talking about are at the beginning and the end when Lex Luthor (and I will get to Lex Luthor) comes up and flat out says, now you too don’t go fighting now you hear. 

The other moment came at the end when Wonder Woman appeared and Batman and Superman look at one another and say, “Is she with you?” “I thought she was with you”. 

Again, it’s not horrible and I commend DC for trying, especially if it works within the context of the movie, but I don’t think it really landed as well as they probably thought that it did and I’m hoping that this battle between Batman and Superman isn’t a tongue and cheek battle, I’m hoping that they are legitimately fighting for a reason. 

All the commentary I’ve heard on these trailers is that the best part is that these two look legitimately pissed at one another. Like they aren’t just fighting because its Batman and Superman, but that this battle is personal. And while I still think that is going to happen, I just don’t see that personal reason yet, at least for Superman. I don’t quite see the reason why Superman is fighting Batman and I want to see this become a personal story for Clark Kent. 

2. Lex Luthor: Now maybe I haven’t been as vocal about it on here, but I recently started warming up to the idea of Jesse Eisenberg being Lex Luthor. I liked what I saw in the first trailer and it opened me up to the idea of him being the character. I feel like I still needed to see more but I was optimistic for now

This trailer makes me reconsider that faith that I was beginning to have in Eisenberg. 

When I think of Lex Luthor, I think of a collect megalomaniac who is one of the most brilliant but also most evil men in the DC universe. And he does this by maintaining a face of a legitimate business man while hatching schemes in the shadows. 

Jesse Eisenberg’s Lex Luthor just seems a little bit more like a cartoon mad scientist than he does a collect and scheming super villain. He’s all animated and pulling off that stupid joke in the beginning. There doesn’t seem to be anything subtle about him. 

The funny thing is, I don’t think I would mind this character so much if he wasn’t Lex Luthor. I think there’s a theory floating around that Jesse Eisenberg is not actually Lex Luthor… yeah and Ben Affleck is not actually Batman give me a break. But in reality, I would be more interested if Eisenberg was a different character entirely, because that would fit better than this weird interpretation of Lex Luthor that we’re obviously going to get. 

Now, what I am interested in with Lex Luthor is this complex that he has going on like he’s starting up a gladiator battle between Batman and Superman. My theory is that they are going to remain true to the character of Lex Luthor in that he hates Superman probably just as much as Batman looks like he does in these last few trailers. And Luthor is going to use Batman to prove man is greater than Gods. 

And when that doesn’t work obviously, he says, if Man won’t kill god, then the devil will. (And We’ll get to that in a second). I do like how he’s trying to destroy Superman already and there does seem to be a little bit of a classical feel to that drive. I don’t know quite how to explain it but he sees it as Gods vs men and that’s really how this movie should be. The Justice League are suppose to be titans, almost the modern retelling of the Greek Gods. And I do like that tie in there as Luthor tries to destroy the gods.

I’ve said in earlier posts that I wish they had limited the role of Luthor in this movie and given the villain spotlight to a Superman villain we haven’t seen before or just have it be a personal battle between Batman and Superman. I think Luthor could have been built up to return in later Superman films or be a quintessential villain in the justice League. But instead they just decided to go with Luthor as the villain… again. 

We haven’t seen Metallo, we haven’t seen Brainiac, we haven’t seen any other Superman villain besides Zod and Lex Luthor and that sucks because they are good villains. Now I’m sure that they will show up in later Superman and Justice League movies, but I just wish they wouldn’t have gone back to the same ol’ stuff they’ve done in the past. 

Now… that being said, that does lead me into probably the biggest problem I had with the trailer. 

3.Doomsday: Why?

Why Zack? Why did you do it? 

Now I can’t act too surprised. This was something that had been rumored for about a year now. The reveal of Zod’s body in the first trailer only furthered that theory. And Michael Shannon mentioned that he had some weird part with flippers or something. 

But why Zack? Why blow your load with Doomsday so soon. 

Listen, I have a lot of faith in Zack Snyder. I loved Man of Steel. I have a collection of Zack Snyder’s movies at home. I know he’s had some bad movies, but he’s also had some good movies. I still have faith in Zack Snyder. 

But if they blow their load and ruin this movie by shoehorning in Doomsday into this movie. I might cry. 

This is the biggest issue I’ve had with the trailer. Because this just makes me think that perhaps Snyder is blowing his wad with this movie which could have just been a personal dual between Batman and Superman. You have the potential for a great movie there. The scene with Bruce and Clark talking about how Batman and Superman are basically the same thing but at the same time they’re not. That was great. I feel like I would love that if that was the whole movie, them fighting between who is right and who is wrong. 

But then you throw in Doomsday and everything gets thrown out the window. Now longer is this a thought provoking film about two titans clashing, it’s going to turn into a “Let’s defeat the monster movie”. 

I have no problem with teasing Doomsday. I think that Batman v Superman could have easily been a tale of two titans butting heads and eventually joining together to take down a different villain all the while Luthor is biding his time like the Emperor, obtaining Zod’s body, creating Doomsday, and the end of the film could be Luthor bringing life to Doomsday to perfectly lead into the Justice League. 

But instead we Luthor revealing himself as the villain too early. We have Doomsday being put into action too early. And it all seems to be focusing on creating a larger franchise before we can even decide on whether or not the movie was good or not. I want there to be a Justice League, don’t get me wrong, but I want it to happen naturally and in due time. 

Now, I could be overreacting. This Doomsday isn’t really what I expected Doomsday to look like. And if you know anything about the comics, Doomsday was created to become the perfect death machine. He was exposed to elements and torture and death multiple times but kept on being recreated until he was the death machine that led to the death of Superman. I could see them defeating Doomsday in this movie, Luthor picking up the pieces and coming back with an even more powerful Doomsday in later films. I'm willing to put money on the idea that this will not be the last time we see Doomsday, and if it is, they wasted a huge opportunity. 

I just don’t want Snyder to blow his wad too early on this one and it ends up blowing up in his face. 

But along with all of that, I guess Doomsday is my biggest issue because it gives away the entire movie. Put aside my personal feelings, it potentially gives away the third act and shows that Batman and Superman are going to resolve their issues and fight side by side. 

Now we all knew that was going to happen. We knew Justice League was happening so they'd have to resolve their issues. We knew that these two were friends in the comics and they weren't going to be enemies forever. I just don't see why they dropped the whole Batman v Superman that was going so well for them in previous trailers and jumped to the Dawn of Justice which nobody seems to be excited about. At least not as much as the personal battle between these two. 

And finally

Wonder Woman: What the hell is she doing in this movie? I mean the only scenes we’ve seen her in is all dressed up in what I can assume is that party that lex Luthor is holding that has been in every trailer, and in her battle garb in what looks like the final battle with Doomsday. So what is her role in this movie?

Don’t get me wrong, the trinity looks awesome. I’m definitely looking forward to Wonder Woman in this movie. But the fact that they haven’t given her any dialogue means one of two things. Either she doesn’t have that big of a role in the movie and she’s just coming in for the last fight to hint at a Justice League movie in the end, which I’m kind of okay with… sorta. Or (worst Case scenario) she looks really great, she doesn’t act that great. I don’t think that’s the case. I’m still very pumped that Wonder Woman is in this movie even though I still think that it’s too early. I think that Gal Gadot is going to do fine. 

However, I just didn’t feel like this trailer gave me enough that I didn’t already see in the first trailer. There were a lot of cool shots, but I don’t feel like anything was really revealed outside of Doomsday which we already could speculated and could have been held off on revealing until closer to the movie. 

I still don’t know how this fight is going to be personal between Batman and Superman. I don’t know what is driving Superman to take part in this fight. Something that was missing from Man of Steel was really getting to know Clark Kent as a person as much as they should have and this could be a really good opportunity for that. There has to be a reason Superman is so pissed and a reason why he’s doing this fight. 

Now before I talk about the good things, and I promise there are things that I did like about this trailer. I want to talk about the teaser we got on Monday and all the scenes that are set in that desert area. 

Now the desert scene has intrigued me for a couple reasons. In the teaser, it looks like the moment that Superman realizes that Batman is Bruce Wayne. On top of that, there are soldier who seem to be working for Superman inspired by Injustice Gods Among Us (A phenomenal video game on a somewhat related note). Now for some reason, from the teaser trailer, people have been speculating that this sequence has been a dream sequence for a couple reasons. 

While I was a little bit confused on why this would be a dream, it kind of seems like, from a certain shot in the trailer that that probably is likely. I mean you see a bunch of guys with wings (which if it is a dream they're probably bats, and if Batman is scared of bats it all checks out), and suddenly a dream sequence seems a little bit more probable. 

Now this is all meaningless if there isn’t any context to it. I’m sure there is a reason why Batman is having a weird nightmare about Superman having an army of henchmen and thinking about it more, the scene in the trailer with a lot of bats makes sense that this is a dream. So I am intrigued, I just hope that it make sense and it doesn’t take away from bigger things happening in the film. 

Now I do want to talk a little bit about the good things. And I feel like I already have been because while there were a couple things that didn’t quite sit right with me on this trailer, even those things had a silver lining that could make this movie great. 

The first thing I loved about this trailer was the opening scene where you have Clark Kent and Bruce Wayne already starting their battle as their alter egos. I do love how they’re questioning one another on the ethics of the other hero while the other one is doing the exact same thing. 

I mean we’ve always seen the scenes where someone who doesn’t know who Batman is asks Bruce Wayne what he thinks of the Batman, but we’ve never seen Superheroes, unaware of who the other one is, ask each other about their respective hero. It just continues to really point towards a great dynamic between these two. Everything that comes out centered on Batman and Superman as characters and the rivalry between them so far has looked great. I want more to be revealed and be developed in this rivalry, but I love it so far. 

I'll be very interested in seeing Superman's side of this argument and what brings him to odds against Batman. Right now it seems like he has a problem with his vigilantism and his methods but I really want to see this fight get personal. There's a great part where Superman just says, "Just stay down, if I wanted it, you'd be dead already". I want to see him have his own arch and personal trials in this movie that they kind of alluded to in the comic-con trailer with his conversation with his mother. 

I already mentioned a little bit that I do love the theme sitting in this movie of Man versus God. It is facilitated by the rants of Lex Luthor and his desire to see this ultimate Gladiator fight. This was something that was apparent in the first trailer with the Superman statue that said false god. I really think that there are ideas being thrown around in this movie and I want to see those ideas developed. 

All the fight scene shots are great. I have no doubt that the fight between Batman and Superman is going to be fantastic. 

All around, the film looks beautiful. The visuals look stunning and I’m looking forward to seeing this epic unfold in March. 

Overall, I’m still 100% on board with this movie. I still have faith that its going to be awesome and it’s going to launch this new wave of legitimacy for DC. But the questions that I had, and I think a lot of people had, I don’t think were totally answered in this trailer. We just got more questions and I feel like my confidence in this movie was shaken just a little bit with this trailer. 

I’m still super pumped for this movie and I can’t wait for March. We got even more of a look into this film and the question marks that this trailer provided will hopefully be erased when the movie finally arrives. 

But I really want to know your thoughts on this trailer. Does it fill you with more confidence or give you more question marks about it? Comment and Discuss below!

You can also send me your thoughts @cmhaugen24 on Twitter as well as requests for future reviews and movie rants. If you subscribe, you can get updates on movie news and reviews of the future and also some live tweets while I'm watching movies. 

I'll leave you with this. I recently saw a recut version of this trailer without Doomsday and much less Lex Luthor and it actually makes the trailer a lot more awesome. If they had left it to this, I would have absolutely no doubts. Not that I have a lot right now. Anyways, Enjoy!