I must admit before going into this movie i found myself being sucked into the hate Zach snyder bandwagon, me and my best bud shared a drink while speculating and asking the question "whats he done now?"
Just came from the viewing of Batman v superman and I can tell you right now that this movie is fairly good. Its not topping the dark knight like some people have said but its a pretty solid take .
I personally dont think anything will ever top the dark knight as in the top 5 best movies (in all genres) ever made in my opinion.
what are some of the great things about this
Pros
EMotion
"its pretty clear this movie is not just concerned with the gloss, there is a real heart and emotion to it"
This movie is way more emotional than say man of steel. In man of steel when Jonathan Kent died it was supposed to be the emotional moment in the film but it came and passed for me real quick so it didnt register. This movie has that emotional element that ties you to it. from the first moment where they are going through the final act of Man of steel and that guy realises he is going to die and starts to pray, it really brought home the impact of the collateral damage in man of steel. The emotional aspect really comes out in the last act. So those people who talked about the emotion or a "tear jerker" moment, that happens really in the final act.
Its pretty clear this movie is not just concerned with the gloss there is a real heart and emotion to it. Mind you its about as much as you can do for a movie about a couple of guys in capes fighting each other. But its there i dont know if to credit terrio or whoever but im glad they put it in.
Ben affleck's batman
It just goes to show how the internet overreacts and exaggerates things. absolutely nothing wrong with his batman. Watching the full scene from the adverts where he goes in and takes out a room full of bad guys was cool i felt like i was getting batman done accurately for the first time. Its pretty clear that he is a troubled soul, but he also has the detective element in him combined with the tech and most impressively the fighting skills you would expect from one of the best hand to hand combatants in all modern media culture.
Gal Gadot -wonder woman
is pretty sweet as well- again another thing that the internet clearly overreacted for, she puts in a good peformance of wonder woman, there is a moment during the fight with doomsday where she smiles, which got me giddy as it showed the warrior who loves battles. There are also good hints about her origin that i quite liked. it just reminded me of the classic Justice league cartoons that dynamic between her and batman. I cant wait to see her movie.
The action
"Great but measured"
In this movie its pretty sweet. Its great but measured. Its more varied than in man of steel and also more toned down than in man of steel. Despite all the fighting none of it seems excessive, all the fight scenes are necccessary to advance a section of the story. But that is never something in doubt. I was pleasantly suprised that the collateral damage in this movie is substantially lower than in man of steel.
Cons
the only thing i didnt like was that there were one or two loose ends that could have been tied up. The vision that batman gets from a member of the justice leaugeI would like to have seen that explored more or left out all together, but i guess its a neccessary device to help galvanise batman into taking on superman
SO maybe there could have been a wider explaination or more done with the vision but just thinking about that I remembered this movie is 2.5 hours long it flies by literally, to explain that would propably have needed another 20 minutes or so which would have taken the movie to 3 hours. I can undertand why zack snyder mentioned there would be an extended 3hour cut. But overall its a great experience
overall
this movie gets 4.5 stars out of 5 for me. Its superior movie to man of steel which i liked not loved, this movie rights all the wrongs and in many ways redeems superman while making an organic introduction to batman and wonder woman.
I know some critics have been gunning for zach snyder for the last 2 years (and have made no secret of it too) im ashamed to say i was letting myself get sucked into that but now i have seen the movie i can say that quite frankly its unwarranted. He has made a good movie and it deserves all the success it is getting.