[Rama Set]

If they recast batman, they will have to reboot the whole thing and that will suck.

I honestly think that all they'd have to do is downplay the idea that this Bruce is at the end of his rope and entirely burned-out, and they could keep going with a slightly younger and hopefully far more enthusiastic actor. I agree with you that a reboot would suck, as would a prequel, because WB would no doubt decide that the problem with their last two movies was that they were out of their comfort zone with Batman, and therefore the new movie should be a return to the pseudo-realism of Nolan's movies where Batman fights street thugs in a boring, generic city.

If they wanted to do a prequel that showed Batman’s triumph over the Joker and Penguin that has been alluded to, I would be fine with that. If it didn’t suck.

[honk]

They already made the prequel showing Batman defeating the Penguin:



The Burton movies are in continuity with the DCEU! Burtman and Batfleck are one! This explains so much, like their shared willingness to murder their enemies! (I actually feel that there are some defenses to be made of Burtman on that subject, but I don't want to get into that without exploring the movies in greater detail, and I'm trying to convince Crudblud to join me on a side-by-side retrospective of all the live-action Batman movies. That's not including the serials, because they are horrendous.)

[juner]

They already made the prequel showing Batman defeating the Penguin:

This was the first movie I ever saw in at a drive-in cinema. I was around 7 or 8 at the time. I remember the Penguin vaguely, and then falling asleep. Also popcorn. Good times.

[honk]

Why did Whedon even reshoot this scene? Seriously, Affleck randomly turns fat, delivers a dumb joke about Atlantis, and then slims down again. Also, I meant to talk about the fact that there's an action scene where the Flash trips and faceplants into Diana's chest. Because that joke was so fucking funny the first time in AoU, Whedon apparently felt he had to do it again!

Mugthulhu: Steppenwolf is a video game CGI cutscene from 10 years ago
moobs: Did you watch it
Mugthulhu: I currently am
moobs: good
Mugthulhu: someone should make an edit that cuts out all Barrys lines
moobs: Yes, he is terrible
Mugthulhu: done
moobs: on the notion of it being bad
Mugthulhu: better than expected
moobs: terrible quips from Batman
Mugthulhu: cyborg was good
moobs: He looked like a Transformer
moobs: write a review plz
Mugthulhu: It would probably be moved to CN for being low content

[honk]

Just look at Fox still stubbornly clinging onto the Fantastic Four rights.

so much for that comparison lol

If they wanted to do a prequel that showed Batman’s triumph over the Joker and Penguin that has been alluded to, I would be fine with that. If it didn’t suck.

An adaptation of "A Death in the Family" would be interesting. Suitably grimdark, and yet not based on those same two Batman stories from Frank Miller that Hollywood loves to mine for influence. What I really meant, though, was that I like that we have a Batman who lives in a world that's now firmly immersed in fantasy and science fiction, where people can yell out nonsense about soul-capturing swords and nobody blinks an eye, and it would be neat to see later movies exploring the possibilities further. But I feel like WB is thinking that now they have to backtrack with Batman and return to grounded, "realistic" stories where nothing supernatural happens, and that idea was beaten to death by the Nolan movies.

https://www.polygon.com/2018/1/5/16853524/justice-league-zack-snyder-alternate-cut-youtube-cosplayer

On the notion of people who don't understand how movies are made. I can sympathize, though. If this "Snyder cut" really does exist, it would be a lot more interesting than the chopped-up mess WB gave us, along with looking much better. On that subject:



One of these pictures is of Batman. The other is of a guy waiting for his order in a drive-through.

[Lord Dave]

Hey, they wanted realism.  What do you think Batman eats at 2am while out on patrol?

[honk]

He gets McDonalds:



No, but seriously, I'd guess that he eats something like MREs, possibly a homemade style with a recipe designed to ideally suit his nutritional requirements. I have no idea if the comics have touched on this subject before, but it would be a neat detail for a movie to include. On the notion of Batman's diet, there's one dumb part in BvS where Alfred comments on Bruce's excessive drinking and questions if Bruce will leave an empty wine cellar to the next generation of Waynes, or if there will even be a next generation. It's one of many scenes lifted from TDKR:



And like so many of those scenes, it doesn't work because it's been stripped of its original context. In TDKR, this takes place before Batman comes out of retirement. Bruce has been drinking due to his boredom, frustration, desperation, and general inability to fill the void in his life that's been there since the end of his capeshitting. But once he revives Batman, he puts the wine away. Which makes sense, as a guy who goes out at night to climb buildings and beat criminals up is hardly going to be pounding back drinks when he gets home. He's got to stay in shape and keep his mind sharp. It's a hollow recreation, designed to pander to fanboys rather than faithfully adapt anything that was going on in the comic in terms of story.

[honk]

What a ridiculous scene. What the hell were they thinking with this? It's almost like a short film just nestled within the rest of the movie.

[Snupes]

AM I TOO EARLY??? I'M TOO EARLY!!!

[Ghost Spaghetti]

Yeah, this is the kind of out-of-context ridiculous franchise-building that Marvel sensibly leaves until after the credits have rolled. As someone who isn't a massive comic reader, I had (and still have, even after reading a bit of Wikipedia around it) no idea what the hell was going on.

[Lord Dave]

I watched the first minute then flashed through the key images, then the last minute.

So... it's a dystopian future where Superman is evil and rules the world?  But the Flash comes back in time to warn bruce about it and that Lois Lane is the key?

Is there more to this than: "If Lois Lane Dies Superman goes crazy"?
And why the fuck doesn't batman have kryptonite already?  He's the god damn batman.  That was the first thing he'd get.

[Ghost Spaghetti]

My thoughts when watching it the first time:

-Why is Supes evil?
-Who are the flying mothmen?
-Is the world becoming a desert because of Supes or is it the other way around?
-Wait, is this a prophecy or a paranoid dream sequence?
-What is the flash doing appearing out of Bruce's computer? Isn't his thing that he runs fast?
-Wait that's a dream? Is it a dream within a dream, or are they two separate dreams?
-Why is everything so murky and hard to see?
-If this is Bruce's dream then why can he see the world around him before the blindfold is taken off?
-Why did they clearly spend a lot of money on something that expands an already bloated film for no reason?

[Lord Dave]

Wasn't this in one of the trailers?

[Rama Set]

I would be this was Zack snyder giving a “strong emotional foundation” to his vendetta against Superman. It also could be Zack Snyder trying to be as good as Terrence Mallick. It was weird and ineffective though.

[Lord Dave]

The "strong motivation" for batman to want to stop Superman doesn't need to be anymore than "Superman leveled a city in a fight."

Like seriously, Batman would have tried to take him out anyway.  Why would you need to add in "Dystopian future dream/premonition"? I mean, is there a version of batman who would trust Superman before they really got to know each other?  Or... you know... ever?

[juner]

Wow, what did I just watch.

[Ghost Spaghetti]

I don't understand why they went so convoluted in this, apart from trying to shoehorn The Dark Knight Returns in.

Given the chance to write the BvS script, I'd have doubled down on the Superman as an Act of God vs Bruce as Humanity metaphor. After the destruction of Metropolis, Bruce would have already resented Supes enough anyway, but in my version I would have had him reacting to a couple of big disasters (probably some big supervillain stuff masterminded by Lex Luthor) but in a way that, despite his best efforts, leaves lots of collateral damage and innocents dead.

Bruce decides Supes is a menace and sets out to find ways of stopping him. Lex let it slip that he's recovered some kryptonite from Zod's ship but oh-no, it's been stolen by a B or C-List Batman baddy. Batman stops the baddy, recovers the kryptonite, and then there's one last big super-fight and Bruce resolves to stop Supes, as Lex knew he would.

They get into a fight, Supes tries to explain that he didn't mean for people to die, there's a big argument (intercut with kryptonite punches) where Bruce flat out tells Supes that he's too dangerous to let live. At this point, both of them are on their knees, bleeding and weak, but they begin to understand each other. Bruce begins to see that Supes never meant for anyone to die and Supes realises that in his titanic battles, he hasn't been paying enough attention on the little people caught in the crossfire. (Hey! Character development)
 Lex suspected this would happen, so he decides to finish off the weak superheroes himself. Neither is strong enough to  beat Lex alone, so they have to learn quickly to work each other's strengths and cover each other's weaknesses to beat Lex.

Blah blah blah, they realise that they could each learn from each other and make a bigger difference to the world together and form the Justice League.

Post Credits sequence: There's a baddy tearing up Metropolis/ Gotham, Supes and Bats arrive together to stop him, but then the smoke and dust clears and the baddy lies beaten on the ground, cut to Wonder Woman all sweaty and battle-scarred. "What took you boys so long?" Or words to that effect.

[Ghost Spaghetti]

Basically, I'd strip it back to the bare bones as much as possible, and let the characters and their different perspectives be the main focus of the story. Throw in a couple of easter eggs with the disasters and baddies from the comics, and save the franchise-building for after the main story is over.

[juner]

Instead we get Batman walking around in a trench coat concealing a small handgun that he pew pews someone with.

Why on earth would anyone watch this?

[honk]

What especially kills me about the Knightmare is the sheer fanboyism that was clearly driving it. It practically revels in its obscurity and inaccessibility to most viewers, making it a lousy teaser even in purely commercial terms. Like others have pointed out, if you aren't familiar enough with DC lore to understand what's going on, you're going to get absolutely nothing out of this scene, because of how vague, bizarre, and confusing it is. And it's so long and extravagant, too. How much time and money went into this scene? I understand that creating an action scene in a movie like this is always going to be expensive, but when you've got a scene that doesn't serve the narrative in any way and is clearly just the director spending millions of dollars smashing his action figures together...well, you'd think it might call for a bit more oversight from the people in charge.