Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (Zack Snyder, 2016)

[Luke M]

I think I'd rather have Gus Fring play Lex Luthor.

[knives]

Esposito would be genius casting, though he's already perfected that role.

[flyonthewall2983]

Christopher Nolan's out surprising no one.

[HistoryProf]

Apparently Warner forgot how bad Affleck was in Daredevil. This is a horrible casting decision that shows how WB/DC Comics don't know how to do superhero films the way Marvel Comics have done it. Their rumored first option was Armie Hammer, who ruined his chances after the Lone Ranger bombed. Now, the get Affleck who has rebuilt his career by directing great films, not by acting (although he was decent in Argo). Why was it so hard to bring Bale back to the fold? Is not like he that choosy with his roles as he has done bad films like Terminator Salvation.

By the way, when I saw the news of this, I really thought that it was an April's Fool prank.

The Daredevil fiasco has me most concerned here. I love Daredevil - I Have almost every comic he's ever appeared in (I've collected since the 80s and he's always been my favorite) but that movie was a complete disaster and he is the reason. Everything about it sucked, but his portrayal of Murdock was so off as to be utterly unrecognizable. It was just AWFUL.

My only hope is that Christian Bale showed us that playing Batman doesn't actually require much acting skill, so I'm just hoping he doesn't sound like a constipated goat I guess he could be okay. I don't know though....acting has never been his forte. This is just a bizarre choice all around.

[knives]

The Daredevil fiasco has me most concerned here. I love Daredevil - I Have almost every comic he's ever appeared in (I've collected since the 80s and he's always been my favorite) but that movie was a complete disaster and he is the reason. Everything about it sucked, but his portrayal of Murdock was so off as to be utterly unrecognizable. It was just AWFUL.

My only hope is that Christian Bale showed us that playing Batman doesn't actually require much acting skill, so I'm just hoping he doesn't sound like a constipated goat I guess he could be okay. I don't know though....acting has never been his forte. This is just a bizarre choice all around.

It strikes me as bizarre to blame an actor for the bad qualities in a Mark Steven Johnson film.

[Luke M]

I similarly blame Bale's poor performances as Batman on Christopher Nolan. Though I'm not really blaming, I'm quite sure it was all intentional.

[d-less]

Ben Afleck could be Batman for all I know. Aren't superhero movies past passé?

[hearthesilence]

Even when I was really into the Batman movies, honestly it was hard to get excited about who they cast.

It seems like the type of role that depends more on the director than the performer. The actor is covered head to toe in latex, with black make-up around the eyes to further hide the face. The cowl made it difficult to turn your head, there's a limited range of how they can effectively pose Batman (as if he was a life-size action figure), and honestly, it was often more effective to keep Batman in a shadow. Every tool he has for visual expression has been greatly obscured.

The opportunities may come in the Bruce Wayne scenes, but in some of the films, they were merely pro forma, and while Nolan had more of them, what they did with him didn't leave a huge impression on me. It's nothing against the actors, but I think the nature of the role really limits what they can do.

[HistoryProf]

The Daredevil fiasco has me most concerned here. I love Daredevil - I Have almost every comic he's ever appeared in (I've collected since the 80s and he's always been my favorite) but that movie was a complete disaster and he is the reason. Everything about it sucked, but his portrayal of Murdock was so off as to be utterly unrecognizable. It was just AWFUL.

My only hope is that Christian Bale showed us that playing Batman doesn't actually require much acting skill, so I'm just hoping he doesn't sound like a constipated goat I guess he could be okay. I don't know though....acting has never been his forte. This is just a bizarre choice all around.

It strikes me as bizarre to blame an actor for the bad qualities in a Mark Steven Johnson film.

everyone involved in that disaster is equally responsible. But Affleck sure as hell didn't help any.

[rohming]

Apparently Warner forgot how bad Affleck was in Daredevil. This is a horrible casting decision that shows how WB/DC Comics don't know how to do superhero films the way Marvel Comics have done it. Their rumored first option was Armie Hammer, who ruined his chances after the Lone Ranger bombed. Now, the get Affleck who has rebuilt his career by directing great films, not by acting (although he was decent in Argo). Why was it so hard to bring Bale back to the fold? Is not like he that choosy with his roles as he has done bad films like Terminator Salvation.

By the way, when I saw the news of this, I really thought that it was an April's Fool prank.

The Daredevil fiasco has me most concerned here. I love Daredevil - I Have almost every comic he's ever appeared in (I've collected since the 80s and he's always been my favorite) but that movie was a complete disaster and he is the reason. Everything about it sucked, but his portrayal of Murdock was so off as to be utterly unrecognizable. It was just AWFUL.

Ben Affleck is Daredevil is blind as a Bat-man!

[hearthesilence]

I remember a stretch in the Batman comics where Batman decided the difference between his public identity and Batman wasn't different enough, so he consciously tried to be more douche-y as Bruce Wayne. (It was mentioned in this story, included in Volume One of The Greatest Batman Stories Ever Told.)

Anyway, if I was hired to deal with the backlash surrounding Affleck's hiring, that would be Exhibit A in my opening argument.

[jbeall]

Ben Affleck Is the Batman Gotham City Needs

Having seduced viewers into a deep suspension of disbelief, Nolan's trilogy goes on to present them with a narrative which implicitly endorses a pro-fascist framing of contemporary human life. In this world, crime is not a symptom of social ills, but the natural consequence of weak law enforcement. Cleansing a complacent society of such corruption is a major theme throughout the films. Two examples will illustrate this point. In The Dark Knight Batman performs an extraordinary rendition on a Chinese citizen before trying to beat information out of a handcuffed Joker while the Gotham Police Department watches. In The Dark Knight Rises, Batman joins an army of police in a Braveheart-esque battle against a brutal caricature of Occupy Wall Street. Throughout Nolan's films, external others endlessly threaten the good citizens of Gotham, and the only real solution is always shown to be a few strong men.

Of course, Nolan's formula only works if the audience can take it seriously. This is why Affleck is such a serendipitous choice for Batman. In conjunction with director Zack Snyder's penchant for style over substance, Affleck's Batman is likely to be shallow and wooden enough to remind audiences that they're watching escapist fiction, not stylized reality.

[matrixschmatrix]

That's an extraordinarily selective reading of Nolan's Batman films, which pretty clearly rejects Bats beating the Joker (it's depicted as counterproductive and horrid) counterposes the Patriot Act-esque measures of the cellphone spying network and kidnapping with Fox's moral horror at what Bats has become, and depicts Bane's rebellion not as a populist movement arising from peaceful protest but a fascistic and top-down one brought on by terrorist violence. Then too, the key moment in The Dark Knight is one in which a prisoner makes a moral choice that belies the authoritarian ethos attributed to the movie. Moreover, Bats generally isn't fighting street crime- individuals driven to crime by desperation- but organized crime which has largely taken over the city government in Begins- he's pretty far from Dirty Harry murdering 'punks' and 'scum'.

Also, if this guy thinks a Snyder Batman is going to be less fascist, he's a poor reader indeed.

[flyonthewall2983]

For a film critic he sure is a good left-wing columnist.

[flyonthewall2983]

Pushed to 2016

[flyonthewall2983]

Jesse Eisenberg as Lex Luthor, and Jeremy Irons as Alfred.

[dx23]

This movie seems to be on its way to becoming one of the biggest trainwrecks ever. Huge cast of characters. Well-known actors seemingly being miscast in roles that are in no way close to the original source material. Huge budget. Already delayed. WB and DC Comics are in the path of destroying comic book films like they did back in 1997 with Batman & Robin. The way they are going, I'm expecting this

[Movie-Brat]

Jesse Eisenberg as Lex Luthor, and Jeremy Irons as Alfred.

I'm curious to see how Eisenberg will approach the role. Honestly when I heard about this, I was downright confused. I was like, "Really? Dude kind of looks too young."

Though I guess when you apply The Social Network to this, it kind of makes sense.

[flyonthewall2983]

This movie seems to be on its way to becoming one of the biggest trainwrecks ever. Huge cast of characters. Well-known actors seemingly being miscast in roles that are in no way close to the original source material. Huge budget. Already delayed.

Also you know there won't be sufficient enough screen time for everyone to be as complex and interesting as they should, unless Snyder plans on making it more than three hours long.

[Movie-Brat]

Apparently Henry Cavill let loose that the film will shoot for 10 months. Which apparently means they're shooting a Justice League movie back to back.

[captveg]

Personally, I love the Eisenberg casting. No human can physically defeat Superman, so that is beyond irrelevant. What is needed is someone who can be believed as a ruthless executive/politician, and The Social Network certainly convinces me that Eisenberg can pull that kind of performance off.

[dx23]

This movie seems to be on its way to becoming one of the biggest trainwrecks ever. Huge cast of characters. Well-known actors seemingly being miscast in roles that are in no way close to the original source material. Huge budget. Already delayed.

Also you know there won't be sufficient enough screen time for everyone to be as complex and interesting as they should, unless Snyder plans on making it more than three hours long.

Yeah, I think that is the biggest problem of all this. No way to develop characters at all. This reminds me of the first story arc of the most recent Justice League comic book series that launched what is called The New 52 universe. All characters were exactly the same, the story was uninteresting and it was 100 pages of superheroes smashing things.

[captveg]

I don't know - when planning/casting for multiple films it doesn't bother me if the screentime is smaller for some in their first film. For example, I expect Luthor to be pulling strings more than being a forefront villain in the first of these new films.

[flyonthewall2983]

I actually don't mind Eisenberg as Luthor. I would loved to have seen Cranston do it, but I don't think I would have liked to have seen it take him away from more interesting projects. Someone on another site brought up the idea of Tom Cruise, which I kind of fell more in love with because the way it was pitched made a lot of sense.

I'm also happy to see Jeremy Irons in a big Hollywood production for once. He has kind of toiled in obscurity for awhile, so it's nice to see him in something big. Not sure if I buy him as Alfred, though.

[captveg]

Irons' screentime will probably be quite minimal until the next solo Barman film I would think.