Barbara Young —
I’m not sure what popular opinion on this movie is, but I’m going to come out and say it. I was bored, overstimulated and unentertained for the majority of the film.
To me, the movie was a giant cluster you-know-what. There were too many elements for too many characters that audience members couldn’t follow along or care enough about every single thing that happened. I’m going to break this down by character instead of plot just so I can effectively complain about everything that was wrong with this film. Warning: Minor Spoilers
Lex Luthor
To me, the best part of Lex Luthor as a character is that, while most of his counterpart DC villains are just lunatics who want to watch the world burn, Lex Luthor is intelligent. He is a symbol for how evil corporations can be without the consumer noticing. He’s conniving and knows how to work an audience. He is the most intelligent villain, possibly, in the DC universe. This movie doesn’t care. This movie wanted Jesse Eisenberg. They basically made Luthor into a raving lunatic to mirror the Joker. It ruins the character in my opinion. It does not stay faithful to the original material in a way that hurts the overall plot and has anyone who has watched a TV show or read a comic wanting to bang their head against a desk. It’s a very distracting impulse, I assure you.
Superman
I actually like Henry Cavill’s portrayal of Superman. Superman is not an amazing character as far as personality goes, so just having someone that can portray him is fine. However, a major plot line of this film is that Superman is troubled due to being unsure of his position within the law. Fine, great. But this movie milks the emotional pull of this plot line to the point of the viewer just not caring anymore.
Wonder Woman
This Amazon could be from anywhere. We don’t know. We just know she was here 100 years ago and now she’s back because Lex Luthor dug up some dirt on her. Cool.
Seriously!? At least have her say she’s from Themyscira, or that she’s an Amazon, or mention Herra for crying out loud! There is no way Diana would ever introduce herself without that. It’s just a weird take on the character in my opinion. Yeah, she looks great and is a bad ass and isn’t some pasty white lady, so super kudos. But the writers need to kick their butts in gear.
Batman
Apparently Batman was only cool because he was in the dark all the time and the cinematographers knew how to make a fight scene look cool. This movie does neither of those things and I hated Ben Affleck’s Batman more than I thought was possible. He looked very awkward the entire time he was in costume. The fight scenes with him genuinely bored me and none of the tech or cool reveals got me excited. It was all just old hat and I wasn’t impressed.
Doomsday
Minor spoiler. I didn’t know Doomsday was the creature that was going to be sent after the group, but it was kind of cool to have that as a little Easter Egg (not really an Easter Egg but still). The character is well known for doing exactly what he does in this film, so it was nice of the writers to keep something accurate.
There is a lot more to talk about, but I’m going to keep it to the point. The movie might be fine if you’ve never read a comic or don’t care about the original material. However, I don’t have the ability to watch this movie without the knowledge I have, so it was just not fun. I do not think the movie would be amazing even if I didn’t know the characters were so off. The film has plot holes to make swiss cheese jealous.
Overall, it felt like a long, overly hyped super hero movie with no sense of humor that took itself more seriously than anyone entering the theater wanted. There were some interesting plot devices that may bode well for the future Justice League films, but we’ll see.