For the uninitiated: This is a new weekly feature on the blog wherein I, I’m Jeffrey Rex, discuss all things DC. This is a test-run, however. Meaning that if this goes well, it’ll be a permanent fixture on I’m Jeffrey Rex in 2015, like Marvelous Monday is right now.
This week’s topic is fairly straight forward. Today my focus is on the Warner Bros. Production to be released in about 13 months – Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. I’m going to give you my thoughts on the first real precursor to the massive Justice League-film to be released in 2017. I have some thoughts on the development of the film, the release patterns, the announced characters and whatnot. So, this week I ask myself and my readers – Will Dawn of Justice work?When it comes to Man of Steel I’m sort of a flip-flopper. I used to praise it, but then I realized that was make-believe. Which doesn’t mean that I hate it, I just realized that I overrated it in my original review. It had a lot of mistakes, but you cannot deny how beautiful it was, and even though Kal-El perhaps was too dark in tone – I liked the idea of a shared universe for DC.
Warner Bros. didn’t think twice about the future of the Cavill-led shared universe – in its month of release they announced that Goyer and Snyder would be back to create Man of Steel 2. That quickly changed, though – in the following month they announced that Batman would be in the sequel – and about 10 months later its title was revealed.
The film, supposedly inspired by The Dark Knight Returns, opens on the 25th of March 2016 and stars Henry Cavill, Ben Affleck, Gal Gadot and Jesse Eisenberg. The three additions to Cavill-led universe have all been criticized online – and this is when people start doubting the production and future film. This isn’t exactly a new thing, though, people were upset about Heath Ledger playing the Joker, and I’ve been told people disliked Michael Keaton as Batman prior to him appearing as the Caped Crusader. But… For the sake of discussion and argument, let’s look at the reasons why people dislike the casting news.
Arguably the biggest casting news for Dawn of Justice was Ben Affleck as Batman – I emphasize his hero-self due to the fact that no one can say Ben Affleck can’t play Bruce Wayne. People said that Affleck was too tall for Batman (thinking that Superman has to be taller than the World’s Greatest Detective) – some argued that his Boston accent would be too thick for Wayne (Hey guys, actors act – and they learn new accents all the time) – but basically people were upset that the protagonist from one of the most disliked superhero films was getting another shot. Daredevil had a lot of problems, but don’t blame Affleck for them all. Oh by the way, can we please have Casey Affleck as The Riddler (or the Riddlah if you go with the Bostonian acting style)? This isn’t to say that I wasn’t worried at all, but I was calmed down quickly – and turned.
Jesse Eisenberg was also deemed a problem by the internet. Too young, too tiny, too Facebook, not commanding respect. Well, I might agree that he is too young. He doesn’t seem as old as Affleck or Cavill. But one thing you need to remember is that he basically played a young Luthor in The Social Network, so… He’s got it covered. You don’t get to kryptonite without making a few enemies.
Oh right. There’s another problem. There are too many characters in this film. Jena Malone’s supposedly playing the female Robin, Ray Fisher and Jason Momoa’s characters are also to appear.. Look if you want Luthor to be the commonground enemy, AND you want the versus-title, then you have to cut out the rest of the JLA…
One thing we know for sure is that it will not be a box office disaster – why? Well, when you have the two most well-known superheroes of all-time in a ‘versus’ film, then you’re going to make a lot of money regardless of how good it is.
So no. It won’t be a disaster. Will it work? Yes, it will be succesful enough for DC/Warner Bros. to go all-in on the shared universe.
But what do you think? Do you have a topic you’d like to see covered in Detective Comics Saturday? Do you want more DC content like this? Sound off in the comments.
I’m Jeffrey Rex
I'm Jeffrey Rex 