Crushing disappointment

Rating: 4/10 (5 April 2016)

Three long years we have waited for this film. Finally a movie that pits some of the most iconic superheros of all time against each other. Since its announce three years back, the hype has been real. Then the trailers happened, and everyone realized what kind of film this could be. Especially when the second trailer they released spoiled literally the entire movie. But that is a two minute teaser. It can't capture everything this two and half hour movie has to offer right? Well, for the most part, it unfortunately does. If for some reason you haven't seen this infamous trailer count yourself lucky, as many of us where not so lucky.But that's just a trailer, I won't hold terrible marketing against the film as a whole, that's just something to think on. However, 'Dawn of Justice' may not be the movie you think it is. It isn't really a Batman vs Superman kind of movie, it's actually more of a 'Man of Steel' sequel.
It majorly follows the man of steel as he is being put on trial for rigidity wrecking metropolis in the previous film. While that is happening Batman is whining and moping around, angry at Superman for destroying one of his buildings. A building that was chalk full of people that ended up losing their lives in this crap storm.
Going into this movie there was a few things that I knew for sure that I would like. And all of which I ended up loving just as I thought I would. The biggest one was the action. Just like '300' and 'Watchmen' 'Dawn of Justice' is an absolute beauty to look at. Zack Snyder is one of the best in the business as integrating stylish choreography with exquisite VFX. Even if the effects get to be a bit heavy handed at times, there is no denying how great this film looks.
Another thing that I liked about this movie was the idea of consequences. So many superhero movies these days leave large scale destruction in their wake with little to no repercussions. So, the idea of Superman being rejected because of how much damage he caused, despite the countless lives he saved, was an idea that I was way on board with. It seems that another film this year has kind of the same idea. Marvels 'Civil War' seems to be operating very similarly to this movie.
But the one thing that is apparently separating these two movies is that both parties in 'Civil War' stand by ideals that we can get behind. The major problem with 'Dawn of Justice' is that it doesn't offer this. Superman is the only real good guy between the two. "Well Rendan, Batman is a good guy too." Not in this movie he's not. The best part about Batman and his villains is his refusal to kill people, even villains. And the villains are constantly trying to make him do it, to sink to their level.
But in 'Dawn of Justice' he is a murderous lunatic that probably deserves more to be locked up than Lex Luthor does. He kills countless people and brands others. The movie takes his best quality, his moral dilemma, and throws it out the window. In doing this it becomes impossible to route for him in this movie. He is ultimately the villain, until he suddenly has a change of heart for virtually no reason.
It's actually difficult to talk about this movie because of how nonsensical it is. So much of the film is spent trying to set up other movies that it forgets basic storytelling. Very few scenes make sense and even fewer feel like they actually belong. It jumps aimlessly from scene to scene with so little flow that each scene almost feels like it is restarting the movie.
Characters do dumb things, people know stuff that they definitely shouldn't, and the action in the first half is completely non existent. And no, the dream sequences don't count. Why? Because they don't even matter to anything. Who cares if Batman kills a bunch of people, it isn't even happening. How can the film makers expect you care about what is happening if all of it is a characters head?
There is many other positives and negatives that this film had like the great performances or the fact that the music is virtually ripped straight from 'Man of Steel' but these points where the most blaring. I wanted to like this movie, I really did. I loved the concept behind it, it had some excellent action scenes and set pieces but it was ultimately forgettable. The script is incredibly lazy, forcing in sequel set up where ever it could and in the process, it forgot to just be a good singular movie.