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lazorexplosion posted:To summarize, Lex knows Superman will turn up to save Lois but has a bunch of men right there right at the time and place where he knows Superman will turn up, men who will incriminate him if they talk and will incriminate even if they don't talk because he gave them traceable equipment for no reason, who will be captured if Superman does turn up, unless Superman turns up slightly too late, doesn't notice the men leaving on motorcycles and doesn't round up and capture them after saving Lois. Lex has the script I guess. This scene is contrived and intensely stupid, it's in an already overstuffed film and the script could easily have been re-written to take it out of the film, but there it is on the screen in all its time-wasting stupid glory. The film is bad. But when Dark Knight does it it's good
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Apr 18, 2016 19:10
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SuperMechagodzilla posted:Superman beat up the warlord, and the oppressive CIA-backed government used that as an opportunity to do some ethnic cleansing. Bruce Wayne - who was already afraid of Superman's power - now associates Superman with all the evils of the CIA. So he makes himself into a warlord to prevent his fantasy of a Super-Stalinist dictatorship from becoming real. I'm hoping that the longer cut makes this clearer. Lois decided to do an ill-advised expose on some genocidal warlord dude. Superman makes a rescue of Lois, Lex frames Superman, the African government's CIA-sponsored death squads move in, and Batman gets even angrier. Also, Superman bonking the Batmobile and saying "knock it off" is perfectly in-character with his extremely conflicted motivation at that moment. He just stepped in it in Africa by charging in and rescuing Lois, so he's playing it cool. "Stop it" is about as far as he is willing to go.
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Apr 18, 2016 19:11
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lex luthor isn't concerned with the petty legalise, he's trying to attain god-hood through a false sacrament: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s-MUzvASr8s see, there he is talking to the devil. but you wouldn't need this, you would just need to pay attention to all his insane ramblings about god, the devil, angels, demons, his father -- lex clearly doesn't care about incriminating himself -- even before they catch him and lock him away, he's already as much a prisoner of his own abuse and traumas as are the human trafficking survivors who are worried batman will eat them.
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Apr 18, 2016 19:14
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Also Lex is too white and too rich to be punished from status quo for merely being 'tied' to war crimes. cf: Erik Prince, Dick Cheney I mean, when your best tie to LexCorp is some fancy new bullets, at best Lex is like, Martin Newton VAGENDA OF MANOCIDE fucked around with this message at 19:17 on Apr 18, 2016 |
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Apr 18, 2016 19:14
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lazorexplosion posted:To summarize, Lex knows Superman will turn up to save Lois but has a bunch of men right there right at the time and place where he knows Superman will turn up First of all: those men were not there when Superman turned up. That's explicit in the movie. They left, and knew they could because Superman would be dedicated to rescuing Lois. Second, you obviously didn't pay attention to the part where Lois Lane got a bullet sample by pure, blind luck (from one lodging in her notebook) and that, even though Lex (and the CIA) were "implicated" through a casual link there was absolutely nothing she could do about it. Lex is just the kind of arrogant dweeb to say "use the cool bullets, guys, the US Government will cover for it." The third thing is that Lex knows that Superman doesn't intervene in human conflicts. He tries to remain apolitical, so he doesn't stop wars or break tanks or anything like that. He saves people from disasters. So there's no reason for him to fly after a group of dudes riding away on motos. Again, I hope they make that more explicit in the longer cut: that Superman was acting out of character by charging in and rescuing Lois.
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Apr 18, 2016 19:17
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BravestOfTheLamps posted:But when Dark Knight does it it's good Eyeroll. I do in fact criticize the contrived poo poo in that film, and many other people do. But at the very least, that films contrivances are required for moving plot and characterization along, so they're just a bit stupid. In BvS you could cut out the Africa scene, have the hearings be about the damage caused by the end of MoS and say, have Lois be investigating what happened to the Kryptonian ship leading her towards Lex. So it's stupid AND pointless, which makes it double stupid and then it's triple stupid because it's a stupid, pointless scene in a film with too many scenes.
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Apr 18, 2016 19:20
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lazorexplosion posted:Eyeroll. Really dude? You wrote eyeroll? I mean Okay If that's what you want to do with your life
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Apr 18, 2016 19:23
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Burkion posted:Really dude? Lol guess what my eyes are doing right now.
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Apr 18, 2016 19:26
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lazorexplosion posted:Eyeroll. I do in fact criticize the contrived poo poo in that film, and many other people do. But at the very least, that films contrivances are required for moving plot and characterization along, so they're just a bit stupid. In BvS you could cut out the Africa scene, have the hearings be about the damage caused by the end of MoS and say, have Lois be investigating what happened to the Kryptonian ship leading her towards Lex. So it's stupid AND pointless, which makes it double stupid and then it's triple stupid because it's a stupid, pointless scene in a film with too many scenes. Also, Lex isn't afraid of being caught.
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Apr 18, 2016 19:26
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Megaman's Jockstrap posted:Also, Superman bonking the Batmobile and saying "knock it off" is perfectly in-character with his extremely conflicted motivation at that moment. He just stepped in it in Africa by charging in and rescuing Lois, so he's playing it cool. "Stop it" is about as far as he is willing to go. Exactly right. Everything that happens in the film is about the repercussions of the Africa scene, and i think people miss that because they're used to the Iron Man 1 style that's being explicitly commented on here. Remember how Tony Stark flies into Afghanistan to execute a dozen 'insurgents', and everyone just forgets about it? And it's never mentioned again in any film? Superman is dialing back his radical drone-smashing approach from the previous film because people are freaking out. Snyder's point is that Tony Stark does is not actually transgressive in any way. He's always working within the system, which is why nobody freaks out. "Nobody panics when things go 'according to plan,' even if the plan is horrifying! If, tomorrow, I tell the press that, like, a gang banger will get shot, or a truckload of soldiers will be blown up, nobody panics, because it's all 'part of the plan'." Iron Man and Snyder's Batman just kill 'gang-bangers', according to plan, so why is only one of them horrifying? SuperMechagodzilla fucked around with this message at 19:32 on Apr 18, 2016 |
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Apr 18, 2016 19:29
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BravestOfTheLamps posted:But when Dark Knight does it it's good People are far more willing to overlook narrative holes and contrivances when they feel the rest of the movie is good, yes. It's akin to an extension of suspension of disbelief that a film can earn or lose.
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Apr 18, 2016 19:32
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Megaman's Jockstrap posted:Also, Superman bonking the Batmobile and saying "knock it off" is perfectly in-character with his extremely conflicted motivation at that moment. He just stepped in it in Africa by charging in and rescuing Lois, so he's playing it cool. "Stop it" is about as far as he is willing to go. I totally get that, it's just that the ideological debate is subsequently ignored, and Superman sends Batman to do the exact same kinds of things (maim and kill criminals) to the exact same people (Lexcorp PMCs) that he was doing it to before Superman bonked the car.
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Apr 18, 2016 19:32
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Mazzagatti2Hotty posted:I totally get that, it's just that the ideological debate is subsequently ignored, and Superman sends Batman to do the exact same kinds of things (maim and kill criminals) to the exact same people (Lexcorp PMCs) that he was doing it to before Superman bonked the car. Repeating this does not make it true. Batman was originally killed PMCs in order to steal their weapons, unwittingly helping Lex in his plan to kill Jesus. (Reminder: Lex is the human embodiment of the capitalist system). At the end of the film, Batman kills PMCs in order to help Jesus save the life of a mere waitress.
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Apr 18, 2016 19:43
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SuperMechagodzilla posted:Repeating this does not make it true. Violence and murder are wrong, unless it's in service to me (White American Jesus), while certainly consistent with modern neoconservative Christian ideology, doesn't quite line up with the values Superman expressed earlier in the film.
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Apr 18, 2016 19:50
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Mazzagatti2Hotty posted:Violence and murder are wrong, unless it's in service to me (White American Jesus), while certainly consistent with modern neoconservative Christian ideology, doesn't quite line up with the values Superman expressed earlier in the film. Superman doesn't seem to think violence and killing are inherently wrong. Oh wait, wasn't that a chief complaint about MoS?
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Apr 18, 2016 19:53
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A reminder that literal Biblical Jesus wasn't inherently opposed to violence either (specifically relating to people's faith).
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Apr 18, 2016 19:57
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thrawn527 posted:He's the one who has been sending Bruce the checks back with the red writing on it. He tells this to Superman, when he's saying what it took to convince Batman to fight. Ah makes sense, I didn't think of the checks.
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Apr 18, 2016 19:59
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Superman being okay with Batman murdering his way to rescuing his mom is the moment where Superman really finds his humanity. It's the first time he really knows what it means to be a victim and finally sees the value of Batman. That's also why Batman can come to terms with Superman, he sees that Supes isn't a god but a person. Could've handled it better than "WHY DID YOU SAY THAT NAME" but there ya go. SlipUp fucked around with this message at 20:09 on Apr 18, 2016 |
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Apr 18, 2016 20:07
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Mazzagatti2Hotty posted:Violence and murder are wrong, unless it's in service to me (White American Jesus), while certainly consistent with modern neoconservative Christian ideology, doesn't quite line up with the values Superman expressed earlier in the film. True, radical, love is inherently violent.
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Apr 18, 2016 20:15
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I knew it would come to this, people denouncing violence as problematic.
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Apr 18, 2016 20:19
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SuperMechagodzilla posted:There's a very important point being made, in the films, about unintentional death. Superman tackles one 'terrorist', in a very clear-cut case of justified use of force, and it leads (in an extremely roundabout way) to some kind of offscreen massacre of civilians. There's no way to avoid it unless he stayed there for years trying to sort out a conflict involving corporations, the CIA and multiple other factions. And if he does that, people are of course going to die elsewhere. SuperMechagodzilla posted:The first and most important point is about the inevitability of byproducts. Pa's comfort and affluence on the farm - his "hero's cake" - was earned at the expense of the people downstream. You can't eat without making GBS threads, and poo poo has to go somewhere. This is the same point as in Man Of Steel, where Metropolis (as in Fritz Lang's Metropolis) is shown to have been created through the exploitation of people in the third world, 'underneath'. The only way to prevent the next 9/11 is to take responsibility for your poo poo: stop the exploitative machine on the other side of the Earth. ungulateman posted:Think about how much enjoyment was brought into the world by Avengers: Age of Ultron via SMG's moviefights, despite the fact that he thinks the movie itself is trash.
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Apr 18, 2016 20:23
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Mazzagatti2Hotty posted:Violence and murder are wrong, unless it's in service to me (White American Jesus), while certainly consistent with modern neoconservative Christian ideology, doesn't quite line up with the values Superman expressed earlier in the film. I think you're getting him mixed up with, like, an entirely different character?
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Apr 18, 2016 20:27
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BravestOfTheLamps posted:I knew it would come to this, people denouncing violence as problematic. I'm not taking that position, I'm simply arguing that Superman's position in regards to Batman is poorly conveyed at best, and inconsistent or arguably supportive at worst. He's not telling Batman to stop being Jack Bauer, he's asking him to do it in the name of God, in defense of white women, to enforce the death penalty on the mentally ill, etc. Very Texan, when you think about it that way.
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Apr 18, 2016 20:31
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Mazzagatti2Hotty posted:I'm not taking that position, I'm simply arguing that Superman's position in regards to Batman is poorly conveyed at best, and inconsistent or arguably supportive at worst. Twisting the content of the movie to be "problematic" is dumb. "Man of Steel is about Superman fighting foreigners!"
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Apr 18, 2016 20:34
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Mazzagatti2Hotty posted:I'm not taking that position, I'm simply arguing that Superman's position in regards to Batman is poorly conveyed at best, and inconsistent or arguably supportive at worst. Well apparently the missing footage from the front half of the movie is Clark Kent getting more and more upset as he plumbs the trail of human wreckage that Batman leaves behind. Also, I'm gonna say it: launching Batman at the shitpiles who kidnapped his mom is an awesome thing for Superman to do. Enjoy your stay in traction, boys.
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Apr 18, 2016 20:38
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Mazzagatti2Hotty posted:I'm not taking that position, I'm simply arguing that Superman's position in regards to Batman is poorly conveyed at best, and inconsistent or arguably supportive at worst. However, in a more accurate way, everything you have written is false.
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Apr 18, 2016 20:40
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SlipUp posted:Could've handled it better than "WHY DID YOU SAY THAT NAME" but there ya go. This is the thing that sells the whole thing for me. The problem is that Superman says "Martha" and not "Mom", but what makes it good is that Batman doesn't just go "huh" and suddenly realize, "hey, this guy is just like me!" He just loses his poo poo. He is wrong, and can't handle being wrong. It's much more basic than the perpetrator and victim both being human, it's about the pride of having your stupid opinion challenged. HUNDU THE BEAST GOD fucked around with this message at 20:43 on Apr 18, 2016 |
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Apr 18, 2016 20:40
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Halloween Jack posted:Geeks have hang-ups about a Batman who kills, of course, but this seems to go beyond that. That is, these tedious demands for tedious explanations of every time he does and doesn't use lethal force. Like there's something about the superhero genre that requires characters never ever use lethal force, or do it as a matter of course like the Punisher. My gut tells me that people wouldn't nitpick like this after watching a movie about a vigilante who doesn't have a costume or a codename. It really just depends on how the character has been presented. For many of them having a no-kill rule is a longstanding and important justification for their vigilantism, while for others (like the Punisher) applying lethal force is their entire raison d'etre. People didn't respond super well to "mercy bullets" in the past, and wouldn't respond well to it now either. But there are certainly many superheroes who toe the line- Captain America is a prominent and obvious example of a hero who tries not to use lethal force if he can avoid it, but doesn't get broken up if he or anyone else needs to kill some Nazis. Likewise the necessity of using lethal force is a recurring theme in the X-Men, where different characters have taken divergent and non-binary approaches to using lethal force. And people generally don't have issues with this because the expectations for those characters have been set a certain way. Batman and Superman fall into the category of heroes who under normal circumstances have hard and fast no-kill rules, and it is a point of characterization that for Batman this principle is a pathological obsession. LGD fucked around with this message at 20:52 on Apr 18, 2016 |
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Apr 18, 2016 20:42
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Megaman's Jockstrap posted:Well apparently the missing footage from the front half of the movie is Clark Kent getting more and more upset as he plumbs the trail of human wreckage that Batman leaves behind.
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Apr 18, 2016 20:43
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Equeen posted:I've heard that too, but can you link to the article that talked about the deleted scenes? I can't find the exact article, but we know the following scenes were filmed: Clark talking to someone at a Gotham vs Metropolis football game (the first thing to be filmed in October 2013 actually) Clark working on an article on his laptop late at night Clark down at the docks, interviewing people Clark at the prison, interviewing a criminal An "extremely intense" sequence of a guy being beaten to death in prison for having a Batman brand And the general choppy nature and the fact that Clark says "I've seen it, Mr. Wayne. Good people living in fear" when he hasn't actually seen anything. HUNDU THE BEAST GOD posted:This is the thing that sells the whole thing for me. The problem is that Superman says "Martha" and not "Mom", but what makes it good is that Batman doesn't just go "huh" and suddenly realize, "hey, this guy is just like me!" That is one of those scenes that is very close to being good with a few tweaks. I know it's fanfiction but I can't help myself: I wish Superman had been writing out "Save Martha Kent" in the dirt but had only got through "Save Martha |" (the beginning of the "K" but could also be the beginning of a "W"). That would make Batman pause and when Batman flips him over and yells "WHAT?!??" like normal and Superman can only gag out "Martha K-k-k..." (on account of his throat being crushed) in a really awful, gurgling, sympathetic way. Then you get the flashback and yadda yadda yadda. It just didn't land with people and I think part of the problem is that Superman wasn't pathetic enough. Part of that fight is about Batman establishing total and complete dominance over Superman to assuage his feelings of impotence and I'm not sure they hit that note in the right way. Megaman's Jockstrap fucked around with this message at 21:44 on Apr 18, 2016 |
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Apr 18, 2016 21:22
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Since Luthor sends Kent the pictures of the dead guy in prison and gives his speech about using the checks/letters to push Wayne over the edge, is anyone else assuming that Luthor had the guy killed in prison to play up his own narrative, rather than it being "prison justice" over the Bat Brand?
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Apr 18, 2016 21:37
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I don't get why people with the bat-brand are being killed in prison.
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Apr 18, 2016 21:39
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Megaman's Jockstrap posted:Part of that fight is about Batman establishing total and complete dominance over Superman to assuage his feelings of impotence and I'm not sure they hit that note in the right way. They absolutely did, there's a reason why it pulls in the Roy Batty v. Deckard fight from Blade Runner. It's meant to be not quite right.
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Apr 18, 2016 21:43
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Megaman's Jockstrap posted:I can't find the exact article, but we know the following scenes were filmed: Oh cool, they cut out lot of Clark Kent scenes...  Thanks anyway, though. OneThousandMonkeys posted:I don't get why people with the bat-brand are being killed in prison.
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Apr 18, 2016 21:44
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I would just like to note, with regards to (movie universe) people thinking Superman killed a bunch of dudes in Africa despite not actually killing anyone (or killing one dude whatever that's not the point of this post), that there is a significant minority of the United States that believes that Hillary Clinton, a current presidential candidate, is responsible for multiple deaths in Benghazi, despite the fact that every single time people actually investigate, the conclusion is "she had nothing to do with this you nerds quit it". And that group of nerds includes multiple congresspeople. I completely believe that people who were already opposed to Superman's presence would think that he was responsible for those deaths, and if those people were in a position of power (*coughHollyHuntercough*), they might try to manipulate public opinion to make the general population think he was responsible. I totally think the Superman Committee is at least partially a reference to the Benghazi committee, especially post-African Terrorists. I mean think about it: If a bomb blew up during that long-rear end interview/interrogation with her and she was the only one who survived, don't you think a whole bunch of people would have thought "holy poo poo she blew everyone up to keep her secret." Of course they would. I'm not entirely sure how comfortable I am with an extended Hillary/Superman metaphor, but it works soooooo
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Apr 18, 2016 21:46
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OneThousandMonkeys posted:I don't get why people with the bat-brand are being killed in prison.
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Apr 18, 2016 21:46
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K. Waste posted:You're leaving out the most important part: Where the trafficking survivors are so petrified by "the devil" that they don't want to leave their prison. Hey guy, glad to see you're back
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Apr 18, 2016 21:49
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HUNDU THE BEAST GOD posted:They absolutely did, there's a reason why it pulls in the Roy Batty v. Deckard fight from Blade Runner. It's meant to be not quite right. Well, I think the fundamentals are strong and I like what they were trying to do. It didn't really work for me, although I don't think it was as terrible as it was being made out to be. The core of the criticisms of the Martha moment seem to be that it was too abrupt, almost like a safe word. And I believe that it's because of Superman's unnatural phrasing and the fact that he still looks like he has some fight left in him. My take is that the audience should feel like Batman is about to kill a complete newborn to really drive home the oddness of the situation and make the audience feel like even Batman knows he's transgressing (and also a visual callback to "goodbye my son, all my hopes and dreams travel with you" - an infant that is almost snuffed out by the darkness). But I'm arguing my own fanfiction and that means I am loving up. Carry on. Megaman's Jockstrap fucked around with this message at 22:01 on Apr 18, 2016 |
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Apr 18, 2016 21:50
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Megaman's Jockstrap posted:I can't find the exact article, but we know the following scenes were filmed: That's cool, more Clark is something I definitely wanted to see.
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Apr 18, 2016 22:14
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I like the Martha scene, it's great how Batman gets flustered.
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Apr 18, 2016 22:18
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