ben affleck batman

BvS departed a little bit from the traditional Batman,” says Ben Affleck. “He started out with all this rage directed at Superman, because of his coworkers who had died in the fight Superman had with Zod.  He was holding on to a lot of anger, in a little bit of an irrational way.”

But after the infamous “Martha” battle, it seems the cinematic Bruce Wayne has come to his senses.  In discussing the Lightened Up Knight and the upcoming ‘Justice League’ movie Affleck enthusiastically declares:

“I think it’s a really cool story. Actually, it’s sort of a story about multilateralism. It’s not a bad theme to have!”

So Batman, who is usually considered a loner (army of sidekicks aside) has to get over that if he wants to assemble the Justice League to defend the Earth.

Affleck elaborated:

“He’s put in this position of having to reach out, find other people, convincing them to do something.  Part of the drama of the movie is the question of whether or not the team is going to come together. It’s very different from the tenor of the last movie.”

This Batman won’t be the snarling rage monster from ‘BvS’.

“This is a much more traditional Batman. He’s heroic. He does things in his own way, but he wants to save people, help people.  This is more in keeping with the canon of how Batman’s usually been portrayed, and how he’s portrayed vis a vis the Justice League in the comics.  This is more the Batman you would find if you opened up your average Batman comic book.”

Affleck also commented on the fact that Zack Snyder was forced to step away from the film after having directed almost the entire thing and Joss Whedon, a director with a much different style, stepping in to finish up the film.  Affleck admitted that this was “unorthodox” but said that “for the movie, the best person we could’ve possibly found was Joss.  We got really lucky that he stepped in.”

Affleck also dismissed claims that Whedon’s reshoots were to fix the film in any way, reiterating that every movie has reshoots after the editing process begins.

We’ll have to wait and see how this new Super Friendly Batman comes across as part of a team.  To be honest, while Affleck’s casting stirred up outrage in the fan community when it was announced, many people were impressed with his portrayal in the final film.  In fact, the acting in ‘BvS’ was overall pretty impressive (except for Jesse Eisenberg’s obnoxious Lex Luthor.)  It was the overly ambitious, overstuffed and convoluted script that sank that film.

Are you interested to see Affleck’s Batman interacting with the other superheroes?  How do you feel about a less dark, obsessed Caped Crusader?

‘Justice League’ directed by Zack Snyder with Joss Whedon starring Ben Affleck, Gal Gadot, Jason Momoa, Ezra Miller, Ray Fisher, Ciarán Hinds and Henry Cavill, with Amy Adams, Amber Heard, Jeremy Irons, Connie Nielsen, Robin Wright, Billy Crudup, Diane Lane, Willem Dafoe, Kiersey Clemons and J.K. Simmons will unite audiences on November 17, 2017.

Source: Entertainment Weekly