WW is my second fave. I loved it all the way up to when she encountered Ares in his digital DC suck form.
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“Hey, you know that episode of Game of Thrones everyone was talking about, where it was too dark to see anything? We should make a whole movie of that!”
I like everyone involved with this, so I’m reserving judgment, but I’d like to see what Batman’s fighting. Unless he’s fighting literal black smudges, then I’m cool.
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And shake the hell out of the camera instead of really showing fighting.
Powerful diety with head of middle-aged David Thewlis? Yeah, that was a little weird.
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Batman Begins was a pretty watchable and commercially successful film despite having several antagonists culled from the comics (Joe Chill, Carmine Falcone, Scarecrow, Ra’s al Ghul). So I guess the most important question isn’t “how many villains are in the movie?” but rather "did they come up with a decent enough script to justify this many villains in the movie, and is this particular reimagining of the characters going to be something worth watching?
I guess a movie that puts Catwoman in the same story as Riddler and El Diablo is less likely to suck than the movie where the woman who loved tropical plants decided to team up with the guy who wanted to turn Gotham into a frozen wasteland.
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The Riddler is a lame too contrived villain for these days. More attuned to the camp of the TV show.
They need to update him to make it work - more like a Zodiac Killer version.
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I’m hyped for this. I know some folks aren’t happy with the look of the suit but I think Matt Reeves is going to keep the film more in the noire/detective aspect of Batman that’s been lacking since Tim Burton’s first film (even Keaton Batman did some detective work). Like sure, it’s cool to see action and fight scenes but having Batman have to catch up with his opponent who’s two steps ahead gives me a feeling that’s been lacking even from the Rocksteady Arkham games. Plus, no Joker. I’m sick of the whole Joker hyperfocus (I’m even getting tired of the whole Joker War thing that’s the latest comic event).
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This new Batman looks pretty dark. I bet it’ll win an Oscar for best makeup/FX.
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Well they definitely don’t stick to the source material in terms of plot points and continuity.
What they do is stick to it in terms of tone and general depiction. Especially once Feige took over the movies they never shy away from these movies being comic book movies and the way superhero movies are inherently rediculous, and over the top. The humor and topicality of the Marvel Universe. Costumes and weird fiction and the soap opera of the whole thing.
It’s that combination of rooting things in comics, while reworking story and character. Adding new stuff we haven’t seen that makes it work. Along with a dedication to actually being pleasant.
DC has very much been stuck in the past like you said. Everything is an origin picture. They kind of peak at 2000’s grade rote action picture. Everything is incredibly self serious. Complexity and maturity come from scowly grimness and dark lighting. They’re very, very dedicated to the idea that people don’t want any of that comic book stuff in their comic book movies. No costumes that look like costumes, no bright colors.
But worse than that a lot of what they’ve made are just worse, more rote versions of other movies. Even when it’s not Snyder murderverse. The first Wonder Woman is almost exactly Captain America the First Avenger. But in WW1 and poorly written. That new Birds of Prey movie is basically Deadpool 2, almost beat for beat.
And they often seem to take the wrong lesson. Like they’re still wedded to the auto aisle at Walmart aesthetic of the first Suicide Squad for associated movies. They bought into the Snyder cut bullshit. Joker played into the edge lord obsession with Health Ledger’s Joker hard. And our first trailer for a new Batman movie is emo as fuck, features a voice clearly meant to emulate Tom Hardy’s Bane, and is set to a Nirvana song.
They also seem to pick and choose various bits of various comics runs without actually adapting them. Like how many times have we seen Dark Knight Rises mined for aesthetics? Why are they so obsessed with visually referencing the Richard Donner Superman most of the audience probably hasn’t even seen? By all means run with a particular version of these characters and do something different with them. But why bolt a particular take into something you aren’t working with, or mish mash different in compatible takes together.
Like the new Wonder Woman. It takes place in the 80’s and we appear to be getting high 80’s Max Lord. The usual DC approach would be to wedge 00’s murder beast Max Lord in for some reason.
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I’d managed to forget about CGI Ares… 
I’ll just be glad if The Batman’s climax isn’t two people slugging each other.
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It’s been the most watchable DC flick so far. It’s definitely a stock origin picture in a lot of ways that hamper it. And I think it pulled the trigger on some things way too early, like the whole Shazam family thing. And it definitely went cg monster fest punchy time on the villian at the end.
But hey it’s fun! And it doesn’t wedge the most wholesome of wholesome DC characters into like Hush or something!
It’s almost like running with how inherently goofy the concept of superheroes is, is a core part of what makes them work!
I still can’t get past the scene where the supporting characters literally walk up to the camera one by one. Explain their back story and motivation, then tell Wonder Woman how great she is.
Whatever was good in that movie, it’s problems are far, far deeper than CG Ares. Which I also forgot. But mostly because while that is forgettable and boring, the dumb as fuck script is so bad it’s unforgettable.
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Yeah, that definitely took the movie down a few notches. Aquaman calling upon Copyright Friendly Cthulhu makes for a much better ending than WW’s.
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You know, my idea from earlier could be changed to a movie about a Bruce Wayne who is over 60, hasn’t been the Caped Crusader for many years, everyone knows he was Batman up until Jason Todd was killed in 1982, yadda yadda. Only… not The Dark Knight Returns. Instead, make it a tale more like Batman Beyond, where some young hothead policeman decides to take up the mantle, and make it a buddy movie about the old man learning to wisecrack and have fun again, and the new Batman learning just how risky and morally grey being a vigilante is.
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Guess I’ll have to get used to the idea that skinny Pattinson can beat down large henchmen, much in the way I had to suspend belief for Pierce Brosnan doing the same as Bond.
I’m not entirely sure Pattinson could best Kristen Stewart in a fight.
Ooh, and I bet the twist ending is about how Commissioner Gordon was a robot all along!
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I feel like I’ve already seen this exact movie even, when Nolan did it. So much deja vu watching the trailer…
Yeah, same. I already saw the Nolan Batman films, so I’m not sure what this is bringing to the table, but I’m also suffering from serious superhero fatigue. At this point, only something that seriously subverts the form and/or engages in some sophisticated meta-head-fuckery is going to excite me at all. Otherwise it’s just, “Ho hum, another extremely formulaic action movie whose big-budget spectacle will largely be lost on me as I watch it at home.”
Wait, his what now? Jeez, spoilers! Some people aren’t aware of this obscure bit of comic lore because they haven’t seen any of the movies, or tv shows, or read any of the Batman comics, or any of the comics of the dozens of Batman analogs, or had any awareness of popular culture in general…
Kind of seemed like that was the direction they’re taking in this movie, if the trailer was any indication.
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They can’t follow up on Batman Beyond. No one wants to see a superhero movie with gasp science fiction elements.
No what we need is Chris Nolan’s Dirty Harry: Origins The Beginning. And does he really have to have an actual Bat on his chest? Can people just misinterpret the eye liner stains from all the crying?
More seriously I would very much like to see that version of Batman where Bruce Wayne is a whole person. If a troubled one. A perpson who does more than beat up crime, where Batman is part of a strategy for using Wayne’s immense wealth to actually fix Gotham. Rather than the other way around.
The 70’s O’Neal and Adams run did quite a lot of this, the DCAU was quite good at it even as it was well nested in “Batman’s a dick” by the time of JLU.
And this flick is clearly drawing from the former at least a bit. Plus Reeves has been talking like the movie is about a young Batman realizing punchy face, Bruce Wayne is the mask is insufficient.
I don’t much trust DC to allow that. But I has hope.
Also that take on Bruce would fit well in a spin on Beyond down the road. Or introducing Robin/Nightwing in any iteration. Realizing he failed due to his singular obsession with punching crime, a newly out of contract Bat-Pattinson takes a step back to focus on all the other ways he can improve things. When an angry, but far more well adjusted, young man lands on his doorstep. He takes the opportunity to first use the man for his own ends. Eventually realizing he can now leave the world with a better version of himself.
There’s an obvious model for transitioning between actors there. But they need to get there first.
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I wouldn’t worry about this film. I think it’s likely to be more of a film noire with a little bit of punching but mostly Batman trying to actually figure stuff out not unlike how he use to be in the comics (and the animated series). I don’t think it’ll get into CSI territory but I expect Reeves’ Batman to have more in common with Bogart’s Sam Spade than with Bale’s Batman.
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It’s not the cyberpunk I was referring to, but the idea of an older Bruce, maybe played by Michael Keaton again, working with a young wannabe. A buddy movie of old crotchety Bruce and a young hothead. In my head, the idea is that Bruce’s inspiration was wresting kayfabe, but quit when it got Jason Todd killed (and his death was accidental, the original Joker was actually just hired by the Batman to be pretending to be a criminal).
What I want is Bruce to yell: “Don’t you get it? Batman was just a distraction! The real villains were my parents all along, I was trying to do good while everyone was watching Batman!”
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