Dawn of Justice, despite smashing weekend box office records, was unanimously panned by critics (with a 27% score on review aggregate site Rotten Tomatoes) and received a mixed audience reaction. Civil War, meanwhile, is receiving near universal praise (90% on Rotten Tomatoes). How could two eerily similar films render such different verdicts? Critics of Dawn of Justice have lambasted it with everything from not staying true to its characters to having a muddled and confusing plot to Zack Snyder just not being a good director. There's a lot of hate for this movie . . . like, a LOT.
But why?
I think it's far more than the "flaws" its critics thrust upon it. I think there's something more psychological at play, because I truly loved Batman v. Superman. I genuinely enjoyed all the elements and thought they worked wonderfully in the movie, including many of the parts other people seemed to hate. And while I also equally enjoyed Civil War, I can't see a difference in quality large enough to account for Batman v. Superman's divisive critical reaction.
In fact, I think poor DC has been working under several major handicaps that many critics and members of the moviegoing audience fail to acknowledge, all of which resulted in a perfect storm of criticism against the film. Let's look at this situation a little more mindfully . . .
**Spoilers for both Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice and Captain America: Civil War**
1. The Studio Approach: Auteur vs Formula Filmmaking
First and foremost, both Warner Bros and Marvel Studios are taking different approaches to their separate cinematic universes. Grace Randolph, who runs the excellent YouTube channel Beyond the Trailer, labels the different approaches as Auteur vs Formula filmmaking. Warner Bros prides itself on being considered a "filmmaker's" studio, meaning most of the agency regarding their films are in the hands of the director (or "auteur," in film theory lexicon). While there's a continuity that each individual film in their universe plays into, the film's themselves noticeably carry the stamp of their director.
Marvel, meanwhile, has a very formulaic approach to their cinematic universe. They had wild success with Iron Man in 2008 and their approach hasn't differed much a dozen films later in terms of tone and presentation. While some of their directors like Shane Black (Iron Man 3) and James Gunn (Guardians of the Galaxy) manage to inject a bit of their own personality, each Marvel movie is very distinctly a Marvel film. They have a template and overarching plot which doesn't allow for much creative liberty from their directors.
Each approach has its pros and cons. Auteur filmmaking creates unique pieces of cinema with one creative mind pushing forward, but can also yield a mixed audience response; the more singular the artistic vision, the more divided the audience's reaction will be. Formulaic filmmaking, meanwhile, allows for little deviation from an established template, but the critical and financial response is much more predictable, with films being largely inoffensive while appealing to the broadest possible audience.
If there was a critical flaw with Dawn of Justice, it wasn't with the film itself but rather with Warner Bros' expectations - they assumed they could yield formulaic filmmaking success off an auteur driven spectacle, perhaps because of their prior success with Christopher Nolan's Dark Knight Trilogy. Batman v. Superman was marketed as a movie that everyone could go see when it was very much a film for a specific audience due to its interpretation of the characters, its dark tone, and the storytelling challenge it presents to the audience (more on that later). Warner Bros had inflated expectations for a product that was incapable of meeting them with the approach they chose to take.
2. Brand Allegiance and Entitled Criticism Culture
Like it or not, we humans have a terrible track record of being sympathetic toward other groups of people. We divide ourselves into categories based on our race, religion, country . . . and also among entertainment properties, whether it's betamax vs VHS, Apple vs Microsoft, or DC vs Marvel. Check any webpage comment section involving a debate between two properties and you'll see insults of the harshest variety being slung. Once someone commits to a brand, getting them to acknowledge that anything comparatively exists is like pulling teeth.
It doesn't take much for people to commit to a brand either, and like it or not, Marvel was the first to establish a shared cinematic universe. Their films have been successful both financially and critically, and to many they represent what interconnected comic book movies should be. As a result, there are no doubt a large number of moviegoers predisposed to disliking whatever DC's attempts at a cinematic universe might be for the simple reason that they're committed to the conventions and tone that Marvel established first.
We also live in a culture where - thanks largely to the Internet - everyone has an outlet to voice their opinion. Unfortunately, the go-to that people use to ensure their voice is heard is to make their opinion harsher, louder, and more controversial than the rest. I call this phenomenon "Entitled Criticism Culture" because there are many amateur film critics (not to mention several professional ones) who write harsh reviews with an air of unearned authority as if their opinion is the be-all-end-all. As a rule of thumb, I never take any review seriously that shits on a film with the same vernacular one would use to describe the Holocaust or a natural disaster. There were many reviewers that referred to Dawn of Justice as an "abomination" of filmmaking and an "insult" to DC fans, despite a fair number of fans having received it positively. This is not good, responsible criticism - this is being explicitly cruel for the sake of garnering page views.
All of this to say I feel a large chunk of the criticism levelled at Batman v. Superman had nothing to do with the actual quality of the film and more to do with the selfish and biased nature of people in general. And that's not to say people aren't entitled to dislike the film if it genuinely didn't appeal to them; it's just hard to take an opinion seriously when a review strays from subjective statements like "I didn't enjoy the film" to misguided objective statements like "this film is terrible." A critique is a personal opinion, not an omnipotent declaration - confusing the two only undermines your credibility as a reviewer.
3. Zack Snyder, Film Director
Zack Snyder's early films were great successes, in particular his 2004 remake of Dawn of the Dead and his 2006 adaption of Frank Miller's 300. Afterward he was entrusted with the monumental task of adapting Alan Moore's groundbreaking graphic novel Watchmen for the big screen, which he did a commendable job at (especially since many considered it an impossible task). And yet this was around the time that public perception of him started to turn. He became pegged as a director that valued style over substance, a monicker which reached its full-blown pitch with 2011's Sucker Punch.
The previews for Sucker Punch promised a wildly stylized action film about a group of young women fighting Nazi zombies, dragons, and killer robots. Almost immediately it was criticized and dismissed as pure exploitation, an unfortunate stigma which stuck well after the film's release. Critics assumed only teenage boys would find any value watching young women prance around being impossibly awesome, yet even that specific audience was deterred when presented with the film's real narrative about a group of young girls forced to struggle under the heel of a sexist patriarchal system. Ironically, the film was dismissed as pure objectification when it in fact carried a very feminist message. Zack Snyder's fatal error was requiring effort on the part of the audience to put that message together.
The themes and metaphors for patriarchy and feminist rebellion in Sucker Punch are not readily apparent or particularly obvious without some critical thought, and if one doesn't look for them then the film can easily be dismissed as pure exploitation. It requires active engagement and mindful analysis on the part of the viewer to truly appreciate, and Dawn of Justice is no different. The motivations and intentions of the characters are largely cerebral and there are a host of thematic parallels that aren't obvious at face-value. We are introduced to a very bitter Bruce Wayne/Batman (Ben Affleck) and left subtle hints to infer what pushed him to the point of moral bankruptcy at the film's start. Meanwhile, the villain's motivations aren't fuelled by revenge or a mad lust for power, but by a philosophical mistrust of anything more powerful than him. These concepts are more existential and require mindful attention and engagement on the audience's part and encourage multiple viewings; Snyder does not spoon-feed viewers, instead assuming an inherent degree of intelligence in their ability to thoughtfully analyze the elements he presents. Again, this was a gamble that Warner Bros took that inevitably wouldn't pay off with a large audience.
I feel because of the almost "hidden" intellectual nature of Snyder's films (a phrase I'm sure many would disagree with) and his obvious talent for stylized action, public opinion of him often sways into the "style over substance" category. His attachment to films brings with it unjustified eye-rolling and a taint which clouds viewers' bias, which is exactly what happened with 2013's Man of Steel when it was first announced he would direct a Superman film - public perception of the movie took a turn for the worst before it even came out.
It's kinda like how everyone used to love Nickelback but now everyone hates them, and yet no one can actually pin-point when or why public opinion suddenly turned.
4. The Pop Culture Handicap
There's a final handicap that DC has been operating under that I'm surprised I haven't seen more acknowledgement of. To understand it, let's dip back into human psychology and try to understand how the weight of expectation can cloud perspective.
Imagine you're meeting someone for the first time. You know literally nothing about them, and then someone tells you the person you're about to meet is an asshole. What happens to your expectation of that person, regardless of whether they're actually an asshole or not? That comment suddenly informs everything you know about that person because you have no other reference point. You'll be cautiously looking for signs of asshole-ishness, even if they appear to be the nicest person in the world.
What does this have to do with Batman v. Superman? Although Marvel was the first to start a shared cinematic universe, Warner Bros had been releasing superhero movies for decades beforehand. Batman and Superman are arguably the most famous superheroes in the world; Batman had seven standalone films before Batman v. Superman, while Superman had five before Man of Steel. Whenever Warner Bros creates a new iteration of a character, they have decades of past expectations and history to overcome. Marvel, meanwhile, had a clean slate with almost all of their characters. Audiences knew almost nothing about Iron Man or Thor, which meant they were establishing expectations for the first time with each of their films. There was no previous bar to hit, unlike with DC and Warner Bros. Every film and casting announcement is inevitably compared to what came before (just look at the response Heath Ledger and Ben Affleck received) while no one could have cared that Robert Downey Jr. was cast as Iron Man because they had no reference for that character or the quality of the film they should expect.
Batman and Superman have a rich history in movies, TV, cartoons, comics, and video games, so much so that it's almost impossible for anyone - not just comic book fans - to not have a set definition of the characters before seeing Dawn of Justice, which leads to unfair and divided expectations. It's why some say the "true" Batman is quirky and colourful because the grew up watching Adam West, while others believe the "true" Batman is dark and gothic because of Tim Burton's 1989 film. Superman is no different, with his character having undergone multiple iterations across several mediums over the past century. Everyone has a preconceived notion of what the "best" version of a Batman/Superman movie is, so a film like Dawn of Justice is either going to satisfy those expectations (which you'll love) or challenge them (which you'll hate). It's why Superman can be criticized for being too perfect and unsympathetic in the comics, then lambasted for being too emotional and brooding in Man of Steel; it's why we can say superhero movies should be more serious like Nolan's trilogy, then criticize them for being joyless like Dawn of Justice.
Warner Bros literally had no way to present a version of their characters or create a film that would satisfy everyone's expectations, which is why they now have a film that a lot of people love and a lot more people hate. This is why the character of Wonder Woman (portrayed by Gal Gadot) is praised even by critics who disliked the film because this is most people's first introduction to the character; there is no previous expectation or popular definition for what a "good" portrayal of her should look like.
In Conclusion . . .
For example:
Both films feature a villain (Jesse Eisenberg as Lex Luthor and Daniel Brühl as Baron Zemo) who seeks to destroy the good guys (Superman and the Avengers) by turning one superhero (Batman and Iron Man) against another (Superman and Captain America). To accomplish this, they both bomb a political venue to divide public opinion against a superhero (Superman and the Winter Soldier) while using parent(s) as the final emotional trump card to instigate a fight between heroes.
And yet, Jesse Eisenberg's Lex Luthor was heavily criticized for being unclear with his intentions, despite flat-out saying he wants to destroy Superman because he doesn't believe a being with such power is capable of being as righteous as public perception insists. Baron Zemo, meanwhile, has been called one of the better and more sympathetic Marvel villains despite his motivations being nothing more than a simple revenge trope (his family was killed during the events of Avengers: Age of Ultron). Two villains with equally convoluted agendas, and yet one receives harsher criticism than the other.
Both films also feature a major fight between superheroes, and yet the circumstances in Dawn of Justice has been criticized despite requiring just as much suspension of disbelief as Civil War. In Batman v. Superman, Lex Luthor manipulates Bruce Wayne into trying to kill Superman while pushing Superman into the fight by threatening to kill his mother. The fight ends when Superman - broken and beaten - mentions his mother's name, "Martha," which also happens to be Bruce's deceased mother's name. Bruce has a moment of reflection, reliving the trauma of his parent's murder before realizing how close he's come to being the same sort of monster that destroyed his own life.
The film was criticized for the ease with which Batman and Superman begin fighting without Superman trying to reveal Lex's master plot, and the fight's end has been painfully simplified by many who insist Batman only stops because their mothers share the same name, ignoring the reflection Bruce undergoes to the memory of his parents' death.
Civil War, meanwhile, features a spectacular superhero brawl with almost a dozen characters. It is being heralded by critics as one of the most spectacular fight scenes in superhero history (which it rightfully is) and yet there is almost no mention about how equally unbelievable the circumstances are regarding the fight's beginning and end. The characters have all been teammates for several films and have overcome monumental challenges together, and yet they too are willing to fight one another with little provocation. The fight subsequently ends when War Machine (Don Cheadle) is injured . . . with everyone seemingly astonished that beating the shit out of each might lead to one of them getting seriously hurt.
I am by no means trying to criticize Captain America: Civil War in an attempt to elevate Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice. I am simply trying to point out the hypocritical nature by which one film's flaws are highly criticized while another film's similar flaws are praised and/or ignored. Warner Bros had a host of obstacles set before them, and while some of challenges were the result of the filmmaker and the studio, I find it impossible to ignore the unfair and severely harsh criticism it's received as a result. There is too much else at play to dismiss it (as many have) as simply a bad film.
And there are clearly a number of people who love it, like me. In an age when we have so much available to us, I find the rampant degree of entitled criticism disheartening when we should be thankful that we have such a variety of art available about our favourite characters, regardless of whether we personally love the current iteration. But what the fuck, right? It's always been easier for people to criticize than trying to understand the challenges inherent to the creative process.
So suck it, Internet. You can kiss my adorable Dawn of Justice loving ass.
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