Thomas Roach on why too many characters in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice is a bad idea…
Cast your mind back to the announcement at Comic-Con 2013 that the Man of Steel sequel would feature Batman. This was an exciting prospect for fans as this would be the first time we would see the two iconic characters on the big screen together. This also was going to plant the seeds of the Justice League movie. However it was alter announced that Wonder Woman and Cyborg will also feature in the film as well as the possibility of Aquaman. The film eventually got the subtitle Dawn of Justice which highly suggests this film will be more of an origin story of the Justice League as opposed to a Batman v Superman movie.
Frankly the Justice League movie is being rushed and introducing too many characters in what will be the second film of the DC universe seems premature. I understand that Warner Bros. wants to replicate Marvel’s success by getting a team up film out as quickly as possible but that is not a good idea. The reason The Avengers worked so well is because we already had films to introduce Iron Man, Thor, Hulk and Captain America, as well as having Black Widow introduced in Iron Man 2 and Hawkeye having a brief cameo in Thor. By giving us time to get to know the characters we knew they were likeable and we cared about what happened to them.
Director Zack Synder did say that The Dark Knight Returns had some influence on Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and that can be seen from the teaser footage shown at Comic-Con this year. However with the introduction of all these other characters it will take us away from the intense relationship between Batman and Superman that is explored in Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns. Ideally this should have been a World’s Finest movie and not a prelude to Justice League.
Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice was due for release in 2015 but that was pushed back so a Justice League movie could reportedly come out after only a year’s wait for fans. However Warner Bros. should have kept Batman v Superman for a 2015 release and in 2016 maybe expanded with other characters. A Wonder Woman standalone movie? A new Batman film? This would have helped create a more fleshed out universe by the time Justice League came round in 2017.
It appears that DC and Warner Bros. feels that a team movie will guarantee success because Avengers turned out so well, but in my opinion that is very narrow minded of them. Even if Wonder Woman, Aquaman and Cyborg are all cameos I feel there will be too much development needed in the Justice League movie and we simply wont care about the characters. Wonder Woman does appear to have a bigger role in Batman v Superman but that will likely take time away from Batman and Superman. It would have been better if she just appeared at the end. Maybe she will… we just have to wait and see.
I would like to be proven wrong by the DC film series but from a spectators point of view it seems they are making a mistake by putting too many heroes in what was supposed to be a Batman and Superman movie. Do you think the film will have too many characters to develop? Would you rather Warner Bros. and DC took their time setting up Justice League? Let us know in the comments…
Thomas Roach
Originally published August 7, 2014. Updated January 18, 2020.
