Why I Love Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice - Critical Reception (Toronto Sun)

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For more Reading Reviews with Rebecca, check out her analysis on the Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice review from The Wrap:➡kzbin.info/www/bejne/bH3RaoFvptNrZrM

[@sd71000]

It's so weird. This sounds like a mostly good review, but the majority of the article has nothing to do with the headline. It's as if this person had 20 minutes to write the review and just got it out of the way so he could get on with other stuff. The studio really made judgment calls about their franchise based on these lackluster reviews? Lackluster in the quality of the written reviews, I mean to say. I wonder if this review was labeled as Rotten, despite it being largely favorable. I'd rather not try to sort through the hundreds of reviews to find it, but I did anyway. Sure enough, this review is labeled as "Rotten", despite all that. Even scrolling through several of them to find that, I noticed just how many complained about the runtime, considered it "bloated" or "disjointed", or said it wasn't "fun". (That same year, 'Captain America: Civil War' was 2 hours and 27 minutes, but no one complained about that runtime.) Oh, and the favorite phrase many used was that the movie "beat the audience into submission", despite the majority of the action being saved for the last hour or so of the film. You would think Batman and Superman spent two hours bludgeoning each other. Are we sure these are people who have watched other movies, movies way, way darker than BvS? This is the bar we're striving to meet? I guess I imagined film critics to be a lot smarter than this. It's not that they hate a movie I happen to love; it's just that if you're going to hate a film so vociferously, at least write a competent discussion about why. "I hate it because it's bad" is the level of critique we're talking about, apparently. Still, I'm sure there are better written reviews out there. I just don't know how much better. "I don't like him because he looks like Robocop in one scene"? Okay... From what I can tell, a lot of critics simply don't remember the plot anyway, and it shows. I think a lot of people excoriated the movie they got because it wasn't the movie they wanted. The argument was, it's not what I want, therefore I will refuse to see anything good in it. Or, Zack Snyder made it, therefore it's bad, because he doesn't know how to direct movies. I sometimes wonder, if we had the exact same script, and Christopher Nolan directed it, would it have gotten the same reviews? Tonally, it's not even that far off from the serious, dramatic nature of Nolan's Batman films. There aren't a bunch of bright colors in those, and they aren't a non-stop laugh fest, excepting the Joker's sense of humor. Which was pretty dark, we might add. I've sometimes wondered, if The Dark Knight Trilogy hadn't come out when it did, in 2008-2012, could it have been made? Would it have been as highly regarded had it come out in 2016? I may be off base there, given the relative success of The Batman. (Also a strange and noteworthy point--The Batman was three hours long, and yet there were a lot less complaints about the runtime, though I did see some out there who thought it was "boring". It was also terribly dark for the majority of the film, both visually and thematically--disturbing murders, implied prostitution and even outright drug use on screen--except that the ending is pretty uplifting. Again, darkness is fine, as long as Zack Snyder isn't directing.) I think it exposes a lot of the problems of listening to film critics instead of making up one's own mind about a movie. So many of these talking points showed up on Twitter, and still do, but I guess that's how it is. I get that it's not for everyone. I just don't buy that it's because of some sort of innate problem in the storytelling. Well, anyway, another good video, there. It's easy to think this is some kind of echo chamber for people who liked the movie, but you've made some very good, logical points, if you ask me.

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I can’t say for sure, but it does seem like the studio took the criticisms from these reviews and reworked Justice League to accommodate them. Just about everything they hated about BvS showed up in Josstice League. More jokes. More Marvel-like approach. That all comes from these reviews. The runtime thing is so stupid to me, especially, when (to your point), the MCU has long runtimes and even some of the greatest films ever made are long! The runtime only matters in a review, IMO, if the pacing is pad. Pacing can be a legitimate critique because it can be a reflection of the editing. But a runtime in and of itself? No, that’s not a criticism that matters much. I would like to think film critics are smarter than this, too, and maybe some are? Just, unfortunately, not the ones I read for this project. I often wonder if BvS was the EXACT SAME FILM, but had “Directed by The Russo Brothers” or “Directed by James Gunn” or “Directed by Matt Reeves”…would the reaction be different. Christopher Nolan might have been different, too, but given their dislike for serious comic book films at this point in history, I don’t even think they’d like the Dark Knight Trilogy anymore. The MCU had fully taken over the general public’s view of what a movie about comic book characters should look like. I think the Dark Knight Trilogy was lightning in a bottle for the time. It was playing out right as the MCU was getting started. I never read a review or watch a video or listen to a podcast until I have seen films for myself. I want to have my own experience and thoughts about it. I would encourage everyone to approach films like that. Perspective is everything!

[@Shaazz28]

I love what you are doing❤ but please move on and make Analysis on snydercut or Man of steel please