Kevin Smith Explains Everything That’s Wrong With ‘Batman V Superman’

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Besides oversized jorts, there’s nothing Kevin Smith loves more than telling his Superman story. Basically, producer Jon Peters asked him to write a Man of Steel movie script, with three conditions: Superman can’t fly, Superman can’t wear his famous suit, and Superman needs to fight a giant spider in the third act. It’s probably Smith’s voicemail at this point. Unfortunately (?), Superman Lives, starring Nicolas Cage as Superman and Jack Nicholson as Lex Luthor, never got made, and Smith wasn’t even asked to submit a Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice draft. “No major studio would let a guy like me near their franchises,” he wrote. Smith has some thoughts on the film, though.

“It’s been 72 hours since I’ve seen it and I don’t know what the moral of the Batman v Superman movie is other than, maybe, maybe, if you stretch it real thin, ‘Hey kids, don’t judge a book by its cover.’ Honestly, what was the moral of that story? Everyone was shitty to everybody and in the end Batman was like, ‘I failed him in life.’ It’s like, f–k yeah, you did! You tried to end his life!” (Via)

That’s Smith on the Hollywood Babble-On podcast, where he previously stated that the person who cut the Ghostbusters trailer needs to be “scolded.” The Clerks director praised his buddy Ben Affleck’s performance, but disagreed with how the Dark Knight was characterized in the “mopey, dopey film.” “That didn’t seem like Batman,” he said, “Certainly not the world’s greatest detective. More like Bat-Trump… Batman’s never like, ‘If there’s a one percent chance sh*t could go wrong, let’s f*king stab people.” (Batman yelling “let’s f*cking stab people” sounds like a better movie than one where Mark Zuckerberg leaves a jar of piss on Holly Hunter’s desk.) Smith continued:

Remember before when we were talking about Flash, and that is has heart, humor, and spectacle? [Batman v Superman], I felt like, didn’t really have a heart. It was certainly f*cking humorless. There was nothing funny going on in that world whatsoever, but it had lots of spectacle. Like you can’t take that away from [Zack] Snyder. Boy, he knows how to compose a frame and how to setup a shot. Beautiful visual stylist. But you need more than just pictures. You need the characterization and these characters seemed off character, particularly Superman. (Via)

Also, giant spiders. Where were the giant spiders? Hear the full podcast here:

(Via the Wrap)

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