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 gorgon wrote:

 LunarSol wrote:
I'm a huge DC fan overall, but I've never been a huge fan of the League itself. There just aren't enough villains worthy of throwing the big 7 into, so pretty much all of their memorable depictions are "something, something Darkseid". I think the League as a background concept is super important though, as the 1 on 1 pairings of these characters have produced some of the strongest moments for DC by leaning on the extensive history these characters share.

I'm surprised that any DC fan would claim that. The JL is widely acknowledged to have a *very rich* rogue's gallery of its own beyond the nemeses of the individual heroes -- Starro, Kanjar Ro, Felix Faust, Royal Flush Gang, Crime Syndicate, Doctor Destiny, The Key, Amazo, Vandal Savage, etc. It's really good for a team concept, and a better RG than certain individual members have, including GL and WW.

And any of those villains would be far more iconic for the JL's first film outing. But again, this movie represents plans gone awry, and so we're left with the appetizer without the main course. *shrug*

I don't expect very good reviews at this point, but I'm going on Thursday and will decide for myself.

I fully expect we'll get a JL2 with Darkseid in a few years, even if it's not until about 2020. Too much work has gone into setting that up to ignore it, and it's the logical choice for a sequel which I'm confident will happen (if they're willing to invest in a Suicide Squad 2 after the reception that got, JL2 has to be on the cards unless this totally bombs). Admittedly though, while I do like Darkseid, I do feel they should have just opened with him then gone on to something like the Crime Syndicate or the Legion of Doom (properly, not the mishmash gang of villains Legends of Tomorrow did) in a second film.

Well, remember that this film was supposed to be part 1 of a 2-part story, presumably with Darkseid showing up at the end in a cliffhanger. And even though the revised plan ends up on a weird note with Steppenwolf as the big bad, I have a hard time blaming the studio's instincts. I'm not sure that a cliffhanger -- probably involving an evil Superman -- would have played well to audiences coming off BvS. I'm not a Snyder hater, but it's clear that audiences just weren't responding to him the way WB hoped.

Looks like MC and RT are coming in right around the 50 mark. Sounds like it'll be crowdpleasing though, and probably a little kid-friendlier than BvS. That's probably an acceptable result for WB. I saw some people asking why they didn't push it back and spend more time working on some things, but it seems clear to me that WB is eager to move on to DCEU 2.0 and some of these solo films they have more confidence in.

 gorgon wrote:

 LunarSol wrote:
I'm a huge DC fan overall, but I've never been a huge fan of the League itself. There just aren't enough villains worthy of throwing the big 7 into, so pretty much all of their memorable depictions are "something, something Darkseid". I think the League as a background concept is super important though, as the 1 on 1 pairings of these characters have produced some of the strongest moments for DC by leaning on the extensive history these characters share.

I'm surprised that any DC fan would claim that. The JL is widely acknowledged to have a *very rich* rogue's gallery of its own beyond the nemeses of the individual heroes -- Starro, Kanjar Ro, Felix Faust, Royal Flush Gang, Crime Syndicate, Doctor Destiny, The Key, Amazo, Vandal Savage, etc. It's really good for a team concept, and a better RG than certain individual members have, including GL and WW.

And any of those villains would be far more iconic for the JL's first film outing. But again, this movie represents plans gone awry, and so we're left with the appetizer without the main course. *shrug*

I don't expect very good reviews at this point, but I'm going on Thursday and will decide for myself.

Of that list, the only ones that stand out to me as amazing characters instead of fun concepts are Vandal Savage and the Crime Syndicate (the latter of which I only really found a love for in Forever Evil as a way to really nail Lex as a character). I like the Royal Flush Gang well enough, but it takes a lot to make them a league worthy villain group. In fairness, I'm not overly fond of the Avenger villains either, but Marvel has done well with each of them so its really up to the translation.

I guess to me its just that DC's best villains don't really demand the League as foils. Sinestro, Black Adam, Lex, the Rogues and plenty of others are just fantastic characters I'd love to see in films, but none of the stories I love them for are League stories.... except of course Lex as the legit president of the US, which would be a particularly hilarious film to do right now.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 gorgon wrote:
Well, remember that this film was supposed to be part 1 of a 2-part story, presumably with Darkseid showing up at the end in a cliffhanger. And even though the revised plan ends up on a weird note with Steppenwolf as the big bad, I have a hard time blaming the studio's instincts. I'm not sure that a cliffhanger -- probably involving an evil Superman -- would have played well to audiences coming off BvS. I'm not a Snyder hater, but it's clear that audiences just weren't responding to him the way WB hoped.

When I saw Batman's evil Superman future I assumed they were going down the route of the "Legacy" episodes of the animated series. Could it have worked? Maybe? Honestly, the biggest problem with it is the strongest character ideas from it are kind of redundant with the whole "world fears Superman" angle that Man of Steel launched everything with in the first place.

 LunarSol wrote:

 gorgon wrote:

 LunarSol wrote:
I'm a huge DC fan overall, but I've never been a huge fan of the League itself. There just aren't enough villains worthy of throwing the big 7 into, so pretty much all of their memorable depictions are "something, something Darkseid". I think the League as a background concept is super important though, as the 1 on 1 pairings of these characters have produced some of the strongest moments for DC by leaning on the extensive history these characters share.

I'm surprised that any DC fan would claim that. The JL is widely acknowledged to have a *very rich* rogue's gallery of its own beyond the nemeses of the individual heroes -- Starro, Kanjar Ro, Felix Faust, Royal Flush Gang, Crime Syndicate, Doctor Destiny, The Key, Amazo, Vandal Savage, etc. It's really good for a team concept, and a better RG than certain individual members have, including GL and WW.

And any of those villains would be far more iconic for the JL's first film outing. But again, this movie represents plans gone awry, and so we're left with the appetizer without the main course. *shrug*

I don't expect very good reviews at this point, but I'm going on Thursday and will decide for myself.

Of that list, the only ones that stand out to me as amazing characters instead of fun concepts are Vandal Savage and the Crime Syndicate (the latter of which I only really found a love for in Forever Evil as a way to really nail Lex as a character). I like the Royal Flush Gang well enough, but it takes a lot to make them a league worthy villain group. In fairness, I'm not overly fond of the Avenger villains either, but Marvel has done well with each of them so its really up to the translation.

I guess to me its just that DC's best villains don't really demand the League as foils. Sinestro, Black Adam, Lex, the Rogues and plenty of others are just fantastic characters I'd love to see in films, but none of the stories I love them for are League stories.... except of course Lex as the legit president of the US, which would be a particularly hilarious film to do right now.

That's where something akin to the Legion of Doom or Injustice League comes in. After a few solo movies all the major villains have taken a beating, and someone (maybe a more mature and focused, less deranged Lex) brings them together to bring down their mutual enemies. I could really go for a film that pits the League against Lex, Sinestro, Adam, Reverse Flash, Ares/WW's second villain, maybe even Joker as a wild card. I can't believe that nearly 10 years into the Cinematic Universe craze, we still haven't seen anyone do a real villain team (I guess the closest was the Horsemen in X-men Apocalypse). Suicide Squad doesn't count because that film really missed the point of them being villains, they basically act like edgy heroes for most of it.

Yeah, if there's anyone that SHOULD do a villain teamup movie its DC. The problem with that is just that to pull it off, you've got to have the patience and vision to sell the audience on all the villain characters individually in their own films to establish their connection with the characters. I really don't see WB having the chops to pull that off. I suspect if it ever happens, it will first be in the form of a Sinister Six movie, but even that hasn't ever found its footing.

Reviews are decidedly mixed, and all over the place.

From the 2 or 3 that I trust, it looks to be a solid C+ to maybe a B-.

I'll take it!

I'm seeing it early Friday - and I'm now actively avoiding most things JL so as to avoid spoilers!

 LunarSol wrote:
Automatically Appended Next Post:

 gorgon wrote:
Well, remember that this film was supposed to be part 1 of a 2-part story, presumably with Darkseid showing up at the end in a cliffhanger. And even though the revised plan ends up on a weird note with Steppenwolf as the big bad, I have a hard time blaming the studio's instincts. I'm not sure that a cliffhanger -- probably involving an evil Superman -- would have played well to audiences coming off BvS. I'm not a Snyder hater, but it's clear that audiences just weren't responding to him the way WB hoped.

When I saw Batman's evil Superman future I assumed they were going down the route of the "Legacy" episodes of the animated series. Could it have worked? Maybe? Honestly, the biggest problem with it is the strongest character ideas from it are kind of redundant with the whole "world fears Superman" angle that Man of Steel launched everything with in the first place.

I think the inspiration was more from Injustice...you can even see that in some of the costumes. But while that's a very popular franchise, critics and audiences don't seem to want those kinds of themes on the big screen. *shrug*

You're right that it would have felt like doubling down on 'fearing Superman'. I don't think MoS is *anywhere near* as dark or depressing as people claim, but BvS definitely took the franchise there at a time they probably just needed to push off from MoS with a solid sequel. Batman Begins wasn't universally acclaimed either, but it broke the eggs that needed to be broken and set up a great film in TDK.

The fact that MoS still doesn't have a proper sequel lined up is kinda ridiculous. That suggests WB is being far, far too sensitive to criticism, even though they probably made some financially correct decisions in moving away from Snyder's vision. Cripes, there's no good reason that Hal Jordan isn't in the JL movie other WB still feeling burned by the Reynolds film. They could have moved on from that and just given the character a soft reboot with a different actor...audiences would understand.

.... " do you bleed ?!"

 LunarSol wrote:

 gorgon wrote:

 LunarSol wrote:
I'm a huge DC fan overall, but I've never been a huge fan of the League itself. There just aren't enough villains worthy of throwing the big 7 into, so pretty much all of their memorable depictions are "something, something Darkseid". I think the League as a background concept is super important though, as the 1 on 1 pairings of these characters have produced some of the strongest moments for DC by leaning on the extensive history these characters share.

I'm surprised that any DC fan would claim that. The JL is widely acknowledged to have a *very rich* rogue's gallery of its own beyond the nemeses of the individual heroes -- Starro, Kanjar Ro, Felix Faust, Royal Flush Gang, Crime Syndicate, Doctor Destiny, The Key, Amazo, Vandal Savage, etc. It's really good for a team concept, and a better RG than certain individual members have, including GL and WW.

And any of those villains would be far more iconic for the JL's first film outing. But again, this movie represents plans gone awry, and so we're left with the appetizer without the main course. *shrug*

I don't expect very good reviews at this point, but I'm going on Thursday and will decide for myself.

Of that list, the only ones that stand out to me as amazing characters instead of fun concepts are Vandal Savage and the Crime Syndicate (the latter of which I only really found a love for in Forever Evil as a way to really nail Lex as a character). I like the Royal Flush Gang well enough, but it takes a lot to make them a league worthy villain group. In fairness, I'm not overly fond of the Avenger villains either, but Marvel has done well with each of them so its really up to the translation.

I guess to me its just that DC's best villains don't really demand the League as foils. Sinestro, Black Adam, Lex, the Rogues and plenty of others are just fantastic characters I'd love to see in films, but none of the stories I love them for are League stories.... except of course Lex as the legit president of the US, which would be a particularly hilarious film to do right now.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 gorgon wrote:
Well, remember that this film was supposed to be part 1 of a 2-part story, presumably with Darkseid showing up at the end in a cliffhanger. And even though the revised plan ends up on a weird note with Steppenwolf as the big bad, I have a hard time blaming the studio's instincts. I'm not sure that a cliffhanger -- probably involving an evil Superman -- would have played well to audiences coming off BvS. I'm not a Snyder hater, but it's clear that audiences just weren't responding to him the way WB hoped.

When I saw Batman's evil Superman future I assumed they were going down the route of the "Legacy" episodes of the animated series. Could it have worked? Maybe? Honestly, the biggest problem with it is the strongest character ideas from it are kind of redundant with the whole "world fears Superman" angle that Man of Steel launched everything with in the first place.

I would say more like Injustice Superman, where he does do the heart-rip; just on Joker instead of Batman.

I actually find the big, silly, city leveling fight and neck snapping end of MoS one of the least dark things about it. What really drains me on the film is Smallville and how much angst they try to pour into his backstory. The tornado sequence is one of the silliest things out there (could the dog at least still be alive in the present?) and Costner's Pa in general tries to crib too much off of X-Men's niche for my liking.

The world fear/hating Superman isn't the problem with the film, its that Clark is drained of any sense of family or community to contrast against it. Everybody just kind of fear/hates everyone else and it makes it hard to care about anyone. For a character often criticized for being generic and boring, the movie somehow makes him more generic than he's ever been and the film definitely suffers for it.

 gorgon wrote:

 LunarSol wrote:
Automatically Appended Next Post:

 gorgon wrote:
Well, remember that this film was supposed to be part 1 of a 2-part story, presumably with Darkseid showing up at the end in a cliffhanger. And even though the revised plan ends up on a weird note with Steppenwolf as the big bad, I have a hard time blaming the studio's instincts. I'm not sure that a cliffhanger -- probably involving an evil Superman -- would have played well to audiences coming off BvS. I'm not a Snyder hater, but it's clear that audiences just weren't responding to him the way WB hoped.

When I saw Batman's evil Superman future I assumed they were going down the route of the "Legacy" episodes of the animated series. Could it have worked? Maybe? Honestly, the biggest problem with it is the strongest character ideas from it are kind of redundant with the whole "world fears Superman" angle that Man of Steel launched everything with in the first place.

I think the inspiration was more from Injustice...you can even see that in some of the costumes. But while that's a very popular franchise, critics and audiences don't seem to want those kinds of themes on the big screen. *shrug*

You're right that it would have felt like doubling down on 'fearing Superman'. I don't think MoS is *anywhere near* as dark or depressing as people claim, but BvS definitely took the franchise there at a time they probably just needed to push off from MoS with a solid sequel. Batman Begins wasn't universally acclaimed either, but it broke the eggs that needed to be broken and set up a great film in TDK.

The fact that MoS still doesn't have a proper sequel lined up is kinda ridiculous. That suggests WB is being far, far too sensitive to criticism, even though they probably made some financially correct decisions in moving away from Snyder's vision. Cripes, there's no good reason that Hal Jordan isn't in the JL movie other WB still feeling burned by the Reynolds film. They could have moved on from that and just given the character a soft reboot with a different actor...audiences would understand.

Very good points there - I do believe you've hit on something!

It really does appear that WB is listening too much to some of the criticism...

Cavill is on record as saying he'd love to make another Superman movie - it is silly that it isn't scheduled yet.

I suppose we'll see where this heads, going forward from JL.

WB is definitely chasing the back rather than leading. I'm not sure how much of it is an executive thing or how much of it is just the studios making their films, or if honestly Geoff Johns just doesn't know how to express his ability to express what he's able to do for the DCU in his comics in the film medium. Either way, there's no doubt that the films are reflectively trying to play catch up with Avengers or Guardians or Deadpool or whatever made it big rather than being able to sell their own vision to the audience.

 Alpharius wrote:
It really does appear that WB is listening too much to some of the criticism...

Cavill is on record as saying he'd love to make another Superman movie - it is silly that it isn't scheduled yet.

I suppose we'll see where this heads, going forward from JL.

Yeah, Cavill has been publicly lobbying for another film for a while now. WB is overthinking it based on internet trolling and negativity. I think most people would say they generally like Cavill in the role, and that's half the battle. Now just make a good film. *shrug*

 LunarSol wrote:
I actually find the big, silly, city leveling fight and neck snapping end of MoS one of the least dark things about it. What really drains me on the film is Smallville and how much angst they try to pour into his backstory. The tornado sequence is one of the silliest things out there (could the dog at least still be alive in the present?) and Costner's Pa in general tries to crib too much off of X-Men's niche for my liking.

The world fear/hating Superman isn't the problem with the film, its that Clark is drained of any sense of family or community to contrast against it. Everybody just kind of fear/hates everyone else and it makes it hard to care about anyone. For a character often criticized for being generic and boring, the movie somehow makes him more generic than he's ever been and the film definitely suffers for it.

I see the underpass scene as almost necessary to push that part of the narrative. Ultimately, Jonathan would rather die than risk seeing Clark exposed, because for what that might mean for him. As a parent, this aspect of the film really resonated with me. In the real world, you would absolutely keep that gak under wraps out of fear that the government would come and take your alien child away to be experimented upon.

I'll begrudgingly acknowledge that perhaps the specifics of that scene are too contrived and angsty, though. Personally, I've always felt that the ending should have better framed his arrival at the Planet as Clark's way of honoring both of his fathers. The Superman identity does the things that Jor-El wanted, while Clark maintaining his normal life and identity protects himself and those around him. Ultimately, the story is about Clark and his two fathers, and that could have been underlined a little better IMO.


I don't know about the rest of you, but I keep seeing clickbait articles about JL being a total disaster, while the reviews overall seem to be very mixed. Guess the despair engine is up and running again after it failed to start for the WW release.

Most of the reviews I've seen (admittedly I've not read more than about 5 for fear of spoilers) have been at least somewhat positive, and noted that a lot of the shortcomings (mainly down to the 2-hour run time) can be overcome with a bit of knowledge of the comics, so I'm sorted there. Given how much of a fan I am of pretty much all the DCEU (admittedly, Suicide Squad is a tad mediocre), if people that didn't like MoS/BvS are saying JL is good then I imagine I'm going to think it's great... and then spend the next 2 years arguing that on the internet, if the last few are anything to go by!

I saw this on the BBC.. Frankly, looks like a non-issue to me, and if this is the biggest thing people find to complain about with JL then DC will probably consider that a win...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-41983452

 LunarSol wrote:
WB is definitely chasing the back rather than leading. I'm not sure how much of it is an executive thing or how much of it is just the studios making their films, or if honestly Geoff Johns just doesn't know how to express his ability to express what he's able to do for the DCU in his comics in the film medium. Either way, there's no doubt that the films are reflectively trying to play catch up with Avengers or Guardians or Deadpool or whatever made it big rather than being able to sell their own vision to the audience.

I believe the sequence of events had Johns coming in right about the time that JL started filming. The BvS-JL plan was hatched when Snyder was more or less serving as DCEU godfather. Now, JL apparently went through major rewrites while filming, and then obviously still more rewrites and reshoots by Whedon.

Still, I think it's hard to hang issues with JL around Johns' neck, unless you believe that Snyder should have been left alone to fulfill his vision. Personally, I'm not sure that would have been wise given the stakes, and I even think Snyder is a talented guy.

Aquaman might be the first true look at the DCEU under Johns...which will really be more about individual directors' visions than centralized control anyway. Wan seems to have the Midas touch, so I'm really looking forward to it.

 gorgon wrote:


I don't know about the rest of you, but I keep seeing clickbait articles about JL being a total disaster, while the reviews overall seem to be very mixed. Guess the despair engine is up and running again after it failed to start for the WW release.

Ha!

That one made me LOL at work!

"Despair Engine" indeed!

I'm looking forward to seeing the movie on Friday and then reading the reviews - it should make for an...interesting experience.

It's not just the underpass scene; that's just what sums it up for me. It's the way Johnathan never comes across as a particularly strong father figure in shaping Clark's humanity. It's the way the movie shapes Clark into the sullen loner and outsider It takes Superman and tries to make him interesting by leaning into every dead parents/orphan who finds his importance cliche out there rather than find what makes the character unique in his own right.

I'll compare it to the way Marvel handled Captain America as both are playing to a certain sort of "old fashioned" mindset. It's pretty obvious that Marvel followed Millar's blueprint and fashioned the MCU after the Ultimates. Thankfully, rather than get Millar's bigoted and prejudiced Cap, Marvel found the humor in things like the "language" joke instead.

I don't mind the use of a wash to try and add a little definition, but in this case it seems like it removed all the details and just left us with something without much in the way of character.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 gorgon wrote:

 LunarSol wrote:
WB is definitely chasing the back rather than leading. I'm not sure how much of it is an executive thing or how much of it is just the studios making their films, or if honestly Geoff Johns just doesn't know how to express his ability to express what he's able to do for the DCU in his comics in the film medium. Either way, there's no doubt that the films are reflectively trying to play catch up with Avengers or Guardians or Deadpool or whatever made it big rather than being able to sell their own vision to the audience.

I believe the sequence of events had Johns coming in right about the time that JL started filming. The BvS-JL plan was hatched when Snyder was more or less serving as DCEU godfather. Now, JL apparently went through major rewrites while filming, and then obviously still more rewrites and reshoots by Whedon.

Still, I think it's hard to hang issues with JL around Johns' neck, unless you believe that Snyder should have been left alone to fulfill his vision. Personally, I'm not sure that would have been wise given the stakes, and I even think Snyder is a talented guy.

Aquaman might be the first true look at the DCEU under Johns...which will really be more about individual directors' visions than centralized control anyway. Wan seems to have the Midas touch, so I'm really looking forward to it.

Yeah, I have no real idea how much say Johns gets as DC creative director. His fingerprints are definitely all over things like Green Lantern, the Flash series, and even bits of the Justice League. I assumed he's had a say in things for a while, but as to what power he really has or how much he has to do with the current tone or style is a mystery to me.

The review outcomes are quite mixed, but a lot of the comments seem fairly common.

I still don’t get how DC can kick Marvel’s arse all day long with animated stuff and their TV shows (not including the Netflix, or Agent Carter), but fluff it so badly when it comes to the tent pole movies.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
The review outcomes are quite mixed, but a lot of the comments seem fairly common.

I still don’t get how DC can kick Marvel’s arse all day long with animated stuff and their TV shows (not including the Netflix, or Agent Carter), but fluff it so badly when it comes to the tent pole movies.

Really? You don't get how DC can do well with their animated stuff but not their actual movies?

Take one part nerd dislike for anything "theirs" going mainstream, add another part "rawr we hate Ben Affleck/Snyder/<Insert Name Here> and everything he's involved in" , sprinkle with a dash of "They skirt too close to Real World politics, why can't comic movies be Fun(tm) again?" and call it job done.
The animated stuff is generally praised but even the TV shows tend to be pretty polarizing for DC.

Snyder aside (I don’t rate his work, other than Dawn of the Dead), it still doesn’t click for me.

Their animated stuff I can watch all day long - unlike Marvel’s, which I find a bit crap.

My love for their animated stuff goes all the way back to Batman The Animated Adventures, which were superb. And of course gave us Harley Quinn.

Whether it’s Affleck or whoever, they do seem to be struggling with their casting. Compare to Marvel, where I personally feel only Dr Strange is horribly miscast (I like Cumberbatch, but that accent....ugh)

Even The Dark Knight trilogy casting left me cold. Yes, Heath Ledger was amazing as the villain, but I don’t really think he portrayed Joker that well - there was no real pizazz. Creepy and unsettling? Yes. Effective? Undoubtedly. But Joker? Not for me. Bane was crap. Catwoman was crap. Two Face was crap. I appreciate I’m quite possibly a minority of one there, but hey, just my opinion, and no reason for anyone else to defend there’s or decry mine.

But their voice casting, and the direction of the animated stuff is just superb. I caught the Suicide Squad animated outing and loved it. The movie? Sucked sucked sucked. They all seemed like dodgy CosPlay efforts, where they’ve got the outfit down, shame they know nowt about the characters. (Seriously, Joker in that film is just awful).

DC is inherently a little more cartoony than Marvel. There big stories sound absolutely ridiculous when you really think about them:

"Evil doppelgangers from a parallel dimension!"
"Zombie heroes defeated by rainbow powered rings!"
"Invasion of the sea people!"
"Monster eating up all of the alternate universes!"
"Evil dude ripping reality into multiple universes!"

It's all very silly on premise but the premise is often less important than the details when it comes to DC stories. They're often about bigger ideas and win out by using those ideas to cut to the heart of the character archetypes. It makes for great, if silly sounding stories.

The challenge they face is just that outside of Batman, most of the DCU is a pretty fantastical place. Marvel can get away with "just like your world, but this guy steps up to save the day" as a premise; and the MCU itself has done a great job of going from normal reality, to an alien invasion, to a post alien world that's no longer quite as relateable as it started, but we were all along for the ride.

DC has a much harder time bridging the gap without starting at Batman, but Batman doesn't escalate quite as well as Iron Man does. Batman has a lot of appeal as a minimalist hero, and while Batmobiles and jets are easy enough to include, the fancier his tech the further away he gets from what really makes him appealing.

 Kanluwen wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
The review outcomes are quite mixed, but a lot of the comments seem fairly common.

I still don’t get how DC can kick Marvel’s arse all day long with animated stuff and their TV shows (not including the Netflix, or Agent Carter), but fluff it so badly when it comes to the tent pole movies.

Really? You don't get how DC can do well with their animated stuff but not their actual movies?

Take one part nerd dislike for anything "theirs" going mainstream, add another part "rawr we hate Ben Affleck/Snyder/<Insert Name Here> and everything he's involved in" , sprinkle with a dash of "They skirt too close to Real World politics, why can't comic movies be Fun(tm) again?" and call it job done.
The animated stuff is generally praised but even the TV shows tend to be pretty polarizing for DC.

What negative reviews are you getting that from?

As someone with a lot of friends who hated BVS, and a BVS hater myself, I've never heard anyone complain about Ben Affleck, real world politics or taking good stuff from the cartoons. those are not the things people would criticize first or second or even fifth about the film.

If these phantoms are what DC is reacting to, they are in serious trouble.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Remember....Zak Snyder. Nothing is too daft.

Zak is actually an excellent director, but no director can outdirect a bad script. Blame the writing, not the director, for ridiculous stories and plotting.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Paradigm wrote:
I can't believe that nearly 10 years into the Cinematic Universe craze, we still haven't seen anyone do a real villain team (I guess the closest was the Horsemen in X-men Apocalypse).

You mean like the Magneto, Mystique, Toad & Sabretooth team-up in the first X-men movie? That doesn't count as a proper villain team?

Or, what about Sandman & Venom?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 LunarSol wrote:
Batman has a lot of appeal as a minimalist hero, and while Batmobiles and jets are easy enough to include, the fancier his tech the further away he gets from what really makes him appealing.

At his best, Batman is more Deadpool than Hawkeye. There is really nothing better than watching Batman drop down onto some random mugger and beat the everliving living gak out of him just because he can, and it's fun. That's the one thing that Burton and Keaton totally got about Batman, that has really been forgotten since then.

Making Batman the only normal in a room full of super-duper supers doesn't work, whereas the Avengers have Tony, Natasha, Pym/Lang and Rhodey in addition to Barton. The balance is very different.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
The review outcomes are quite mixed, but a lot of the comments seem fairly common.

I still don’t get how DC can kick Marvel’s arse all day long with animated stuff and their TV shows (not including the Netflix, or Agent Carter), but fluff it so badly when it comes to the tent pole movies.

People say that they rushed, but it wasn't that exactly, IMO. It's that they committed to one director's very specific vision, and it wasn't the crowdpleasing, goodwill-building vehicle that a brand new cinematic universe needed. And now WB has to try to fix and undo what's been done, and that's a very messy process.

Snyder was a fanboy of The Dark Knight Returns, and he kinda sorta filmed it with BvS, which Jay Baruchel astutely called the most expensive indie film ever made. That source material has a *very specific* take and mood, and is SO not a general audiences Batman story. As a one-off, it'd be one thing, but as a universe-building vehicle? Maybe not so good even conceptually. Then his JL was a continuation of his BvS story, which was supposed to continue on into his JL Part 2. It was just too much commitment to Snyder and what *he* wanted to do.

To be fair, I'm not sure that Snyder even wanted to be DCEU godfather in the first place. WB offered that job to Nolan, but he declined it because he had other stuff percolating.

WW was a different director with her own vision, and it worked...at least for 98% of the audience. I think you'll see the DC films settle down quite a bit after they can move past JL.

Snyder wants to make certain sorts of movies, gritty, yet larger than life, and he was willing to do so with Superman. I'd also doubt that ever really wanted to do a DCEU ensemble movie, but it's clear that he did his best to accommodate all of the post-Avengers studio demands, including taking the hits in public.

IMO, Warner is trying really, really hard and rushing to make a DCEU happen out of things that never really should have. What's interesting is to compare where Marvel Studios was at the same point in their world-building.

One massive ground breaking success in Iron Man.

An awkward, awkward production involving the lead actor taking WAY too much control over the film, that ended up being thought of poorly in... "The Incredible Hulk."

A film where they essentially fully introduced 3 new heroes (not including post credits appearances and non costume previous appearances). - Black Widow, Nick Fury and War Machine. Was seen as another poor film and a glorified toy advert. AKA Iron Man 2.

Thor, a film that divided many opinions on its quality, is generally seen rather negatively, but *did* introduce Loki as the MCU's greatest villain. Also introduced Hawkeye.

And finally, the equivalent of Justice League would be: "Captain America: The First Avenger." Again, a film that divided opinions, but was held together by the charisma of its cast. Also had a remarkably poor villain.

So yeah, not perfect, to be honest.

Marvel gave us 4 years of movies to make Avengers hit. Everyone else is trying to do in less than 2. Marvel also gave themselves a ton of options early on. There's a lot of opportunity to see what's working (if only at a studio level) and what's not and adapt future movies accordingly in all the films prior to Avengers.

Man of Steel 2013
Batman vs Superman 2016

then

Wonder Woman 2017
Justice League 2017

WB pivoted from what was probably their original plan of:

MoS - as is
BvS - as is
Wonder Woman - possibly modified as a reaction against the overall 'grim' tone of MoS and BvS?

JL - PROBABLY was going to have resurrected evil brainwashed Superman show up near the end of the movie, and end in a cliff hanger and lead into...

JL2 - Darkseid shows up, Superman is redeemed and returned to the side of good and off we go.

JL has been changed - from what we 'know' - significantly.

It will be interesting to see/know/learn just how much!

 Compel wrote:
So yeah, not perfect, to be honest.

Exactly. Marvel wasn't all sunshine and roses early on. And don't forget that Iron Man was far from a sure thing - there were a lot of clouds over RDJ when he was cast.

 gorgon wrote:
The fact that MoS still doesn't have a proper sequel lined up is kinda ridiculous. That suggests WB is being far, far too sensitive to criticism, even though they probably made some financially correct decisions in moving away from Snyder's vision. Cripes, there's no good reason that Hal Jordan isn't in the JL movie other WB still feeling burned by the Reynolds film. They could have moved on from that and just given the character a soft reboot with a different actor...audiences would understand.

This is confirmed? So Hal isn't the surprise reveal? I've been really lucky to avoid spoilers thus far...