We recently heard that Warner Brothers wanted more Batman in ‘Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice‘ and director Zack Snyder is opening up on why that is. The original rumor had the studio wanting more of Ben Affleck on screen as he was stealing every scene he was in. That isn’t the reason that Snyder gives and his actually makes a bit more sense than pandering to one actor completely overshadowing the performance of another.
In a recent interview over at The Daily Beast Snyder said that:
“Only in that because it’s a different Batman than the Batman that was in the Chris Nolan movies, so we have a little bit more explaining to do—and you just had a whole Superman movie. But I think only in that way, because you need to understand where Batman is with everything. And that’s more toward the beginning, but it evens back out as it goes on.”
While it could just be a polite way to avoid that Affleck has more onscreen chemistry than Cavill does, it really makes sense. We know who this Superman is and what his views are but we don’t know where Bruce Wayne is mentally at in this take on the DC Universe.
Batman won’t be the only focus and their screen time does apparently even out as mentioned above. He also goes into detail on how the two heroes compare to one another as:
“They’re actually opposite sides of the same coin. It’s interesting because Batman’s a man and Superman’s a god, if you think about it in those terms. So their relationship is very contentious. What Superman sees as Batman’s limits, Batman sees as Superman trying to control him, acting like an absolute dictator.”
The two are often brought up and analyzed in just such a way so it’ll be interesting to see it play out on the big screen. How does that put the two at odds though and how do they try to take each other on?
“What we went after was the humanity of each character. We tried to say, ‘What would Batman have to do to unravel Superman, and what would Superman have to do to unravel Batman?’ Their conflict is based on each others’ understanding of the other’s weakness. The fun of that is when you’re dealing with these mythological creatures — to make them human again, bring them back to earth. And to do that you have to know the rules before you can break them. They have to go all the way to the stratosphere before you can bring them back down.”
It’ll be interesting to see what each consider the other’s weaknesses compared to what they truly are and how far they will be willing to go to win. Obviously the two will have to come to terms with one another by the film’s end and I suspect that will happen once a real threat emerges.
What are your thoughts on the reason Snyder is giving for more on screen time for Batman in ‘Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice’? Share your thoughts below!
‘Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice’ is slated to open in theaters on March 25, 2016.