[Disclaimer: This editorial will feature spoilers for both the theatrical and extended cut of Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. You have been warned.]
Let me just start by saying I feel terribly sorry Zack Snyder. Zack Snyder made a good movie and it was inherently ruined in the editing room.
The Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice Ultimate Cut (I know, it’s a mouthful) was announced just weeks before the theatrical release of the film and was said to have an additional 30 minutes when it released later in the summer. I personally was kind of confused as to why they’d come out and announce this before the movie was even released. Now it’s obvious as to why they did this. They knew the theatrical cut wasn’t very good and had to say something to let people know that there is something in the future that will probably be better. Obviously you can’t come out and say “Hey, listen so we are about to release a pretty terrible movie, but don’t worry you can get a better version of it in 3 months!”.
It’s no one’s fault that the theatrical cut sucked, really. Well, you could say it’s the editor’s fault, but they just worked with what they were given and were told. They couldn’t make it longer than 150 minutes because that limits the amount of times you can show the movie at a theater in one day and some people really don’t like long movies.
Alright, now that’s out of the way let’s get into my thoughts on the Ultimate Cut of Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. I really disliked Batman v Superman upon my first viewing back on March 25th. I left the theater angry and my father just kind of looked at me a bit confused at what he just witnessed. It was a trainwreck and that’s widely agreed on, even though there is a vocal minority that say they think the movie is good. I just get upset when I see someone say they like the theatrical cut of this film, there are so many issues with it and there are few people that wanted to like this movie as much as I did. I have waited almost my whole life to see these two comic giants duke it out on screen together, let alone just have their names on the same movie poster. This has been a dream, and it was pretty much squashed on release. I can safely say that the Ultimate Cut of the former abomination that is Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice makes this film so much more enjoyable. Even at its 182 minute runtime, I was hooked. I enjoyed this version so much more, there was way less eye rolling, I actually understood what was happening, and I really liked the characters.
Right from the start of the theatrical cut of Batman v Superman, the movie was a mess. Superman is framed for murdering a bunch of families in Africa, but in the context of the theatrical cut all you see is a bunch of soldiers get shot and Superman has never even touched a gun, so, it shouldn’t take a genius to figure out he didn’t do it. This plot line makes so much more sense in the Ultimate Cut and is actually really interesting. Right from the start of this movie, Lex Luthor knows Superman is Clark Kent. While it’s not made super clear right off the bat, it’s made apparent later on. Lois Lane is lured into a story about a terrorist group in Africa and she meets up with a CIA agent posing as the one and only Jimmy Olsen. Even though this is a CIA agent who you’d think would be a bit hardened, he still has the traits of Jimmy Olsen. The nervous nature, awkward yet funny comments, etc. His cameo is brief and it ends with him taking a bullet between the eyes, but it’s still a nice nod to the character even if though he got a bullet put through his brain.
We then see the scene we see in the theatrical cut with Lois being taken hostage, but the scene is quite a bit more violent. There aren’t limbs flying off or heads exploding, but you can see splashes of blood hit the wall or bullet holes piercing someone’s body and seeing spurts of blood come out. I actually said out loud “Oh damn!”. I really wasn’t expecting it to be more violent than the already brutal theatrical cut, it doesn’t stop with just blood, however, but we will come back to that later. Before Superman arrives, we see a new scene that shows Lex Luthor’s men piling up dead bodies and lighting them ablaze to make it look like Superman used his heat vision to kill these men. The men then light parts of the village on fire to give the effect of Superman being destructive and careless with his heat vision and then they evacuate the village before Superman bursts onto the scene. After Superman flies off with Lois’ hostage taker like we see in the theatrical version, Lois walks outside and sees the carnage that unfolded while she was inside. Bodies litter the ground, fire surrounds the village, and civilians are in distress letting out screams and cries. It’s actually a fairly disturbing and sad scene to watch.
The Africa scene was obviously part of Lex Luthor’s plan in the theatrical cut, but it was sort of confusing as we don’t see Lex’s goons burning the bodies, nor get an explanation as to what his motivations for framing Superman is. We don’t really understand his hatred for Superman. In the Ultimate Cut it is so much clearer as to what is actually happening in Luthor’s plan. I won’t dive too much deeper into it for sake of spoiling the whole thing, but trust me, I absolutely had no idea what his plan was on my first viewing of the film and now after getting some much needed context I completely understand what his plan was.
The pacing of the theatrical cut was so incredibly fast and not in a good way. You had no time to comprehend some of the craziness that just unfolded before you and the transitions between scenes felt strange and as if things were missing. With the Ultimate Cut, that feeling of rushed nonsense is no longer there. The film gives plot lines time to breathe and it doesn’t jump between 4 different plot lines within 5 minutes. I wasn’t constantly thinking to myself “What the hell is going on? Can we slow down for just a few minutes?” like I was when I saw the film in theaters.
One common complaint of Batman v Superman was that it felt like Superman/Clark Kent was barely in the movie. He was used in such a way that it made him look just like a terrible character. Anytime you saw him he was moping around or in the midst of some chaos that would make him look more like a villain than a hero to the people. Personally, I liked this idea of having looked at as exactly what he is. An alien with powers unknown that could potentially wipe out the planet of all humans within a matter of minutes. We always see him shown off as the role model, the peacekeeper, a hero with no flaws. It was a nice change for the character. Regardless, it wasn’t particularly well executed in the film. We got very few scenes with the man underneath the suit. It was really hard to emotionally tap into Clark Kent or Superman or relate to him in any way. Luckily, we get so much more Clark Kent in the Ultimate Cut and it’s exactly what the Clark Kent of this universe should be. A man under the stress of maintaining peace in the world while dealing with his own personal issues such as keeping a healthy relationship with Lois Lane and digging into the crime fighter that is stripping criminals of their rights and brutally torturing them.
In the Ultimate Cut we get numerous scenes that show off Clark’s human side. In the theatrical cut, he seemed so two dimensional but in reality they just took out like almost all of his good scenes and opted to use a bizarre scene with the ghost of Kevin Costner who talks about rivers and dead farm animals for like five minutes. Clark initially heads over to Gotham to investigate the African woman who testified against him in a hearing about the Africa incident. Obviously, he knows he didn’t actually murder anyone so he goes to track her down to see why she lied. While on his quest for answers, he gets sidetracked by learning about The Dark Knight. A homeless man tells Clark he should leave Gotham before it turns dark because that’s when Batman comes out to hunt his prey. Clark becomes intrigued by this crime fighter and decides to set focus on the brutal vigilante. We see a series of scenes throughout the course of the film that show Clark’s journalistic integrity that he clearly got from his mistress, Lois Lane. It’s awesome to see Clark adapt to go around acting like a journalist and digging through leads in order to find out more information about Batman and the crime system.
One of the final things I will touch on is Bruce Wayne/Batman and his iconic butler, Alfred Pennyworth. One thing that was almost unanimously agreed upon by people who saw Batman v Superman, regardless if they loved it or hated it, was Ben Affleck as Batman was the best part of the movie. His performance was great, but some were put off by the actual depiction of the iconic comic book character who has been around for over 75 years. The Batman seen in the film straight up murders people in this movie, and there is no denying it when you literally see Batman throw a crate at a man and it hits him so hard he stumbles back and cracks his head open so badly that a massive splatter of blood hits the wall. Without a doubt, the man is dead and his brain is slowly dripping out of the back of his open head wound. He’s pretty brutal and this left people shocked at how Batman could break his one and only rule; no killing.
As I mentioned previously, he is even more brutal in the Ultimate Cut. There is a moment in the warehouse fight scene where Batman breaks a man’s arm and then fights other people using the man’s broken arm. It’s pretty incredible. He’s clearly unhinged, and the Ultimate Cut stresses that. He has nightmares all the time, he is taking exorbitant amounts of medication, and even mixing it with his alcohol addiction. He’s broken and he stays level headed when he’s Bruce Wayne, but once he dons the cowl, all bets are off. He lets out all his rage and hatred on criminals and even gives them death sentences with his obsessive branding. Once he takes down a criminal and brands them, they get sent to prison and the brand is basically a message to other prisoners that says “This man is the worst of the worst. Finish him off.”. Batman is the only thing from keeping him from going over the edge completely and going insane as Bruce Wayne.
The other thing that keeps Bruce from breaking down is Alfred. I wasn’t overly fond of Alfred the first time, I thought he was OK, but I felt his jokes were very forced at times. Upon viewing the new version of the film, I grew way more fond of him. His jokes were still misses, but his emotional connection to Bruce and want to keep him in check was very present. The two share a connection and it’s clear Alfred isn’t just a butler, he’s Bruce’s only friend. Bruce even makes Alfred coffee when Alfred arrives at Wayne Manor, it’s something so small, but such a great touch when showing their relationship has escalated beyond servant to master. They constantly poke fun at each other and compliment each other. It’s a great touch in the film that establishes a great bond that I can’t wait to see expand in the future films.
Overall, is Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice Ultimate Cut a much better film? Yes. Does it fix all the issues? No. There are still plot holes and nitpicks to be found, especially in the third act, but that is to be expected in any film. The plot holes are incredibly limited to this point and the Ultimate Cut corrects a lot of small issues like Superman not being able to see the bomb in the courthouse. The bomb turned out to be lined with led, which makes it pretty much invisible because Superman can not see through led. The film is much tolerable and I recommend this version of the film to anyone who disliked the original version as you will more than likely walk away with a very different opinion after watching the Ultimate Cut. However, let this be a lesson to Zack Snyder. As much as I appreciated the detail and depth in the story, you can’t take that much time to flesh out a film in a theatrical release. You must get to the point while delivering a sensible story. Just get Justice League right on the first try with the theatrical release so we don’t have to go through this whole ordeal all over again.
There are a load of scenes I didn't talk about, so I highly recommend picking the Ultimate Cut up. There are loads of easter eggs, awesome scenes with new characters, and much more. You can get the film pretty much on any digital platform right now or you can wait for the DVD/Blu-Ray release on July 19th.
