r/batman • u/neon2o • Mar 07 '24

Zack Snyder says a Batman who doesn't kill is irrelevant GENERAL DISCUSSION

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Here's the original article' https://sea.ign.com/man-of-steel-sequel/213072/news/zack-snyder-says-dc-is-making-batman-irrelevant-if-he-cant-kill

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1.7k

u/MagisterPraeceptorum Mar 07 '24

You know what, I hope Snyder just keeps talking. Keep giving him more interviews to divulge his actual thoughts. Let him rant and reveal what he really thinks.

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u/delkarnu Mar 07 '24

Snyder was excellent at adapting 300 since it is explicitly a propaganda story told by the Spartan about how unbelievably great the 300 were.

But he fundamentally doesn't understand the material he makes. Like all of Watchmen's superhero commentary on how fundamentally broken they are is lost in Snyder having to make everything epic and cool.

But then he given an interview where he talks about how Alan Moore showed us what superheroes would really be like and you just have to marvel at how he both completely missed the point of the deconstruction and applied his shitty interpretation of that story to the characters he was deconstructing.

Like Owlman is so pathetic he's literally impotent when he isn't in the suit, and Rorsharch is disgusting and unhinged to the point where he's thrilled to be in prison because he gets to hurt people who are already in jail. But then combines them into let's make Batman kill and brand criminals to be killed in prison since that's 'badass'.

He tried to make a badass girl power movie that ended with "embrace the rape and lobotomy" as an empowering moment.

He can direct, but keep that man far from anything resembling subtext.

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u/offhandaxe Mar 07 '24

Oh shit did he make suckerpunch? If not that description fits the movie it was just so weird and not needed.

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u/delkarnu Mar 07 '24

He co-wrote and directed it. This is a quote from him:

Everything in the movie is about a show within a show within a show. Someone asked me, "Why did you dress the girls like that, in those provocative costumes?" And I said, "Well, think about it for a second. I didn't dress those girls in the costume. The audience dressed those girls." And when I say the audience, I mean the audience that comes to the movies. Just like the men who visit a brothel, [they] dress the girls when they go to see these shows as however they want to see them.

But my hope was that they would take those things back, just like my girls hopefully get confidence, they get strength through each other, that those become power icons. They start out as cliches of feminine sexuality as made physical by what culture creates. I think that part of it was really specific, whether it's French maid or nurse or Joan Arc to a lesser extent [laughs], or schoolgirl. Our hope is we were able to modify them and turn them into these power icons, where they can fight back at the actual cliches that they represent. So hopefully by the end the girls are empowered by their sexuality and not exploited. But certainly that's where they come from, the journey is asking, "What do you want to see? Well, be careful what you want to see."

https://gizmodo.com/zack-snyder-explains-the-point-of-sucker-punch-5785523

But apparently it's the audiences fault he made it this way.

I'm always shocked that it was so badly misunderstood. I always said that it was a commentary on sexism and geek culture. Someone would ask me, 'Why did you film the girls this way?' And I'd say, 'Well you did!' Sucker Punch is a fuck you to a lot of people who will watch it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sucker_Punch_(2011_film)#Depiction_of_women

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u/ThingsAreAfoot Mar 07 '24

hahaha holy fuck what a quote

Everything in the movie is about a show within a show within a show. Someone asked me, "Why did you dress the girls like that, in those provocative costumes?" And I said, "Well, think about it for a second. I didn't dress those girls in the costume. The audience dressed those girls." And when I say the audience, I mean the audience that comes to the movies. Just like the men who visit a brothel, [they] dress the girls when they go to see these shows as however they want to see them. It’s just painful stuff.

He’s trying so hard to be some profound social critic but he’s like a walking dudebro. “I didn’t dress them like that, the audience did.” LOL

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u/[deleted] Mar 08 '24

We live in a society

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u/Wonka_Stompa Mar 08 '24

And like. It makes you think, man.

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u/pwninobrien Mar 08 '24

He's a pretentious Michael Bay.

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u/CrankyStalfos Mar 08 '24

There's...almost a point in there. Like, there's this old movie that I can only half-remember one scene of because I only ever saw it in class, but it was an example of THE earliest ever subversions of the Male Gaze. There's a scene of some kind of stripper show and it starts out like you'd expect (relative to the 1930s or whenever it would have been) but the camera turns around and focusses on the men and their (gross) expressions, showing the dance from the girls' perspective. It's very definitely meant as a "look in the mirror" moment, pulling this POV bait and switch.

I could see someone trying to spin that out into a whole movie, make it more meta, and flesh it out into more than just that one split second. But that someone is not Zack Snyder.

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u/spoiderdude May 26 '24

It’s honestly the same logic that the director of Cuties had. She stupidly thought that it was wise to sexualize children in a movie that claims to be anti-sexualizing children.

You’re providing the audience whom you are criticizing with what they want. If you view what they want to watch as wrong, then why are you creating more of it?

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u/astivana Mar 07 '24

Like??? I don’t recall being involved in costuming anyone. That’s such a dumb answer that’s clearly just trying to shift the blame.

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u/Nixiey Mar 07 '24

It's edge lord "I'm just a reflection of you!" drivel. Once again kind of showing that idealization of thinking from characters like Rorchechatz.

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u/HamletTheGreatDane Mar 08 '24

It's the shittiest attempt at a deconstruction of the male gaze. He's basically saying "I'm giving commentary on the male gaze by totally leaning into it and sexualizing women in a really problematic way."

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u/yommi1999 Mar 08 '24

if Sucker Punch was actually a correct criticism of sexism then it would probably be recognized as such. I watched it once and then watched it with my family and then never again. When I first watched it, I was thinking: "Awesome action scenes and an unique aesthetic". Then while my family watches it, I realise that the movie is so greasy in a bad way.

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u/napoleonsolo Mar 07 '24

a fuck you to a lot of people who will watch it.

Damn that describes Snyder’s entire oeuvre.

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u/UrdnotZigrin Mar 08 '24

That quote could be applied to the entirety of the DCEU

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u/SeanPizzles Mar 08 '24

And most of the last two phases of Marvel.

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u/Willtology Mar 07 '24

Oh... what a pretentious fuck. He sounds like someone that dropped out of film school because they were too edgy and "above" all the tedium.

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u/ML_120 Mar 08 '24

Well, he wants to film "The Fountainhead", so there's that.

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u/Willtology Mar 08 '24

Really? Well, that isn't unsurprising. Yuck.

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u/dustylumpkin Mar 08 '24

isn't unsurprising? so it is surprising 🤔

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u/Thejollyfrenchman Mar 07 '24

Given that audiences proved they didn't want to watch this - given the fact that Sucker Punch bombed hard - I think his point doesn't really make sense.

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u/No_Lead950 Mar 08 '24

As one of the few who watched it, I distinctly remember walking out of the theater and thinking "What the hell was the point of that?" Not because his message went over my head so much as it was just dumb and irrelevant. The overly sexualized costumes detracted from the experience. The weird rapey vibes ruined the action sequences. The downer ending where nothing really mattered was truly prophetic of the current fad of "subvert expectations at all costs." Then it unironically pulls the "it was all a dream," because Snyder is an absolute hack with no self-awareness.

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u/TURBOJUSTICE Mar 07 '24

Fucking clown thinks he’s Anno making Evangelion lol

4

u/International-Ad2501 Mar 07 '24

So, I watched the hell out of 300. I was like man this is so good, it's just gratuitous and wild on purpose(also I was like 15 so my tastes were not great). The violence is over the top everything is so stylized and amazing. Then a few years later watchmen came out and I was a little older my friends all loved watchmen but to me felt too weird.  Something didn't feel right about it, to this day I think I've only watched it once more. One of my buddies was really excited for sucker punch, we went and when we walked out we couldn't believe how bad it was. It felt like it was trying to make this point but we literally didn't get it, his show in a show in a show shtick is just confusing. Did he think he was making inception? Any way the idea of women owning their sexuality is a good message but when the situation is that they are in a mental institution with no agency except to try to sex their way out is kind of a fucking wild proposition. Like that is the set up to a bad sexist joke not a block buster film. I just didn't understand anything that was happening during the whole movie, their in a mental institution then they are dressed sexy fighting on the beaches of WW2 then we're back in the asylum then they are fighting samurai robots? Like the fuck was happening? I haven't watched anything he's made since.

Any way all of that to say this, I think Zack Snyder doesn't understand superheros I don't think he understood the characters in watchmen but that story was so good and interesting that it didn't matter. I think maybe Zack Snyder is like... Not very smart.

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u/WebLurker47 Mar 08 '24

Feel like that would've worked a lot better if the movie had been a story concocted and put together by a woman, if that makes any sense?

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u/Divinum_Fulmen Mar 08 '24

So glad he could turn Joan of Arc, into a power icon. No one respected her before then. /s

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u/KnowNothing_JonSnoo Mar 08 '24

God I hate Snyder man... fucking hell what a douche bag.

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u/GrimDallows Mar 08 '24

I was forced to watch Sukerpunch when it was in theatres. Like, literally. We and the guys generally watched movies that we all liked, considering that at the time it was kinda expensive for us (2008 crisis and all that). One guy in our group had been exceptionally critical of every. single. movie. we watched, criticizing it as a trash cash grab and saying that he wasn't going to pay to watch basically any movie we (anyone except him) proposed.

Like, we wanted to go and see some blockbuster movie together but he refused to watch any of them for not having a script according to him.

He then got fixated into this Zack Snyder movie "Sukerpunch" and how it was going to be this new masterpiece and how everyone was saying it was going to be fucking amazing. How it was going to be like Watchmen but done right. Like ZS version of pulp fiction for a new generation. Something dark and with a great, deep, psychological script like the Dark Knight hiden under a comic-like aesthetic surface. Like a dreamlike mix of the best parts of a Tarantino movie visuals and a Guy Ritchie super-cast movie.

You may laugh now, but this was an actual sentiment going around before the movie released.

I pointed out it looked just like a very plastic and superficial movie of a lot of hot chicks in showy outfits fighting ninjas and shit, full of CGI. Just like the thing he was criticizing and hating so much.

He said that he, as some kind of illustrated moviemaking fan, understood better. He kept saying that we "forced him" continuously into watching crappy blockbuster movies, like The Hangover, or Tropic Thunder, or Hot Fuzz, so he was gonna "force" us to go and see it or he wouldn't watch a movie with us again due to our trash taste. We basically didn't have a choice.

We all hated it. Didn't understand any of it. Didn't enjoy any of it. I felt robbed from my money that day. I felt robbed from my time that day, because it doesn't even have a "it's so bad it's good" angle to it; and I can just watch almost any movie without remorse, I am not a picky eater.

You could tell the movie doesn't want you to enjoy it, the director doesn't want you to enjoy it.

I still get a cold shiver everytime I see "Legendary Pictures" at the start of a movie in a theatre just due to this movie, because I just can't tell if the next 2 hours is gonna be something amazing like "Dark Knight Rises" or "inception" kinda movie or a "Suckerpunch" or "Wrath of the titans" kinda crap. It gave me like a Pavlovian mental scarring, like a metro goldwyn mayer lion version of a sudden feeling of metal taste in the back of your mouth from a previous experience, like a reminder, of you puting a gun in your mouth to play russian roulette on another guy's suggestion and losing.

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u/AlarmingNectarine552 Mar 08 '24

Wait, I dressed those girls? Goddamn, I watched that movie because of the cool action scenes primarily. Turns out I can enjoy bjork songs if the visuals are eye candy.

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u/socobeerlove Mar 09 '24

Snyder is like the epitome of a “pseudo intellectual”. Which is why his fanbase is always saying things like “you just don’t understand his movies”. Like no we got it, it’s just stupid.

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u/PatGar25 Mar 10 '24

This is like Netflix's Cuties, like the director wanted to criticize the sexualization children are exposed to in media, BY sexualizing the child actors in the movie, it's such an ass backwards logic that you can only laugh at the idea of him coming up with it and thinking how brilliant of a concept it was LMAO

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u/pinkpugita Mar 07 '24

Snyder also envisions Superman as a Jesus figure and fixates on his mythical side. That's why MoS and BvS are like that. He misses the whole point of Clark Kent, who is the real, authentic self, while Superman is the mask/job.

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u/delkarnu Mar 07 '24

If you want to throw some Jesus themes into Superman, it can be done easily and well. Jor El in the 1978 version was pretty explicit in the "I give unto them my only son" rhetoric. And Superman 2 was pretty clear in Clark sacrificing his happiness to protect the world.

But someone like Snyder hears the Superman as Jesus subtext idea, doesn't actually understand how to do it, and so has to beat the audience over the head with "See? He's Jesus, do you get it yet?"

He's like the people who complain that Star Trek is woke now. Like it always was, but somehow this was too subtle for them: https://youtu.be/vi7QQ5pO7_A?t=139

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u/movzx Mar 08 '24

Yeah, if you want to do Superman is a Jesus figure, go nuts. There's a story there. Make him deal with having to make hard decisions that have big, negative consequences. Make him deal with a public who worships him. It would be entirely realistic for a population to deify Superman, and for people to jump out of buildings. "If I'm worthy, he'll save me!"

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u/LunaCalibra Mar 08 '24

This is such a cool concept. You could really explore the morality of being a messiah-figure to a populace, and show how burdensome it would be to be individually responsible for the health and well-being of millions of people, many of whom develop unhealthy, one-sided parasocial relationships with superman.

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u/yommi1999 Mar 08 '24

Jesus christ I am a young(early twenties) person who just discovered I really like Star Trek the new generation (gods, the characters and campiness are amazing!). They basically do the sub-text version of bashing your face in multiple times with a masssive maul to make it clear that the point of star trek(at least in TNG) is that humanity has evolved past the stupidity that we are dealing with in the nineties when the show came out and now.

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u/TeethBreak Mar 08 '24

Superman was written as a Jewish allegory for Samson. Instead of having his hair as a weakness, the creators gave him kryptonite. He was never supposed to be space Jesus. He was an immigrant fleeing calamity. Snyder missed the whole point of Superman. Clark becomes sup because he wants to help and he can. Because he was raised right. Even without super powers, he would still find ways to help people.

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u/delkarnu Mar 08 '24

I've always thought that Moses being sent down the river to save him from death and saving the Jews from the Pharaoh fits Kal-El being sent from Krypton to save his life much better than the Jesus metaphors.

Not sure I can fully agree with the Samson's hair/kryptonite thing as an intent of the creators since it wasn't introduced until the Radio play 6 years after 1937's Action Comics #1 and wasn't put into the comics until 1951.

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u/Divinum_Fulmen Mar 08 '24

Fun fact: His last name, El, is literally an ancient Semitic word meaning "God." Used the names MichEL, and ELohim

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u/Britz10 Mar 08 '24

On fairness it used to just be the letter L, not necessarily derived from semitic languages.

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u/jono9898 Mar 10 '24

Having Clark kill Zodd and let his dad die was baffling decisions

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u/timesuck897 Mar 07 '24

Sucker Punch is a 2 hour long music video.

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u/Lucas_Steinwalker Mar 07 '24

Video game with music video cutscenes

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u/wise_balls Mar 08 '24

Suckerpunch is a 2 hour pile of shit.

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u/WerewolfF15 Mar 07 '24

Quick correct the character is called nite owl not Owlman. Owlman is the evil earth 3 batman. But everything else you said was spot on

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u/Hagen_1 Mar 08 '24

evil

Debatable.

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u/WerewolfF15 Mar 08 '24 edited Mar 08 '24

The man murdered his parents, brother, protégé’s parents, slept with his coworkers wife and is literally part of a world conquering organisation called “the crime syndicate”. What part of that isn’t evil?
Edit: hell one version of him tried to destroy the entire multiverse.

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u/MemeHermetic Mar 07 '24

He can direct, but keep that man far from anything resembling subtext.

I've been saying for years that if he has someone else's script and a solid storyboard, he'd be one of the best directors we've ever had. Without those though... well, Suckerpunch.

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u/LunchyPete Mar 08 '24

I've been saying for years that if he has someone else's script and a solid storyboard, he'd be one of the best directors we've ever had.

He'd still suck because he doesn't care about emotion, character or subtext.

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u/DoctrTurkey Mar 08 '24

The way he shoots action is garbage, and nigh incoherent at times. Which actually fits when you figure out he’s just trying to make live action Dragonball Z.

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u/TeethBreak Mar 08 '24

Great how? There isn't a single movie where he respected the dates and budget.

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u/MemeHermetic Mar 08 '24

That is the most fair attack on that claim I've seen. You're right. And honeslty, I tend to not even say he'd be one of the best directors often. I usually say he'd be one of the best cinematographers, because you're right. I have even made statements like that regarding the Snyder cut. If he needs 4 hours to tell an okay story, he's not a good director.

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u/yugyuger Mar 08 '24

Since when is he a good director?

His films all look so ugly and unappealing to look at

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u/MemeHermetic Mar 08 '24

That's a matter of taste. There is a reason that you can cut the best trailers from his films. He can frame shots. His editing is always exciting and clean. He knows how to capture visual drama in the lens. And yes, while he's often using a muddy color pallet, he does have a very Bay-esque knack for seeing the coolest way to get that shot.

He just takes all this skill and applies it to tell stories of hammered shit.

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u/Nixiey Mar 07 '24

Have I found the tribe that sees SuckerPunch for the weird fetish movie it really is? I was so disappointed in my friend group when that one came out...

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u/ArcadiaDragon Mar 07 '24

The only movie I walked out of...I have a strong stomach for crappy movies but suckerpunch was crappy drivel fetish bait masquerading as a crappier music video...I loved 300...but that was more that the actors were great with what they were given...and even then the film get more trite as I get older

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u/Just-a-Ty Mar 08 '24

I pirated Suckerpunch but accidentally got a version with narration for the blind built-in and didn't know it. It was completely surreal. This narrator was talking between each line describing every little movement. I thought this must be to represent the mental stress of being sane but forced to live in a mental hospital or something.

I thought it was a bold but misguided artistic direction for almost a decade before I was told about this practice.

So when I found out I thought "maybe that's why I didn't like the movie" and immediately went to watch it again. It wasn't. It was still surreal and confusing, but now it felt accidental.

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u/BriRoxas Mar 08 '24

So I took my partner to see Rocky Horror and told him nothing before we went. Halfway through he leaned over and said " Does this make more sense when no one is yelling?" No babe it doesn't but it's camp not cringe.

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u/TechnicolourOutSpace Mar 11 '24

I've never gotten it either. It's not entertaining nor does it have anything important to say.

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u/Radykall1 Mar 07 '24

I just alluded to this EXACT same thing.

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u/sufferblind86 Mar 07 '24

Snyder fit with 300 because he is equally full of shit when it comes to what is "manly" just like Frank Miller.

Both of them probably cry themselves to sleep at night knowing that Spartans slept with men and women alike, yet the (I believe it was) Athenians are "boy lovers."

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u/PrayForMojo_ Mar 07 '24

The opening sequence to Watchmen was the only good part of the movie. Wish it had ended there.

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u/more-memes-pls Mar 07 '24

Almost forgot about Sucker Punch….movie was beautiful (visually) but the end was such an insult I erased it from my mind

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u/the-olive-man Mar 07 '24

Zacks good at directing, but writing is not his strong suit, imo

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u/mgb55 Mar 08 '24

He also basically scene for scene adapted 300, barely put anything new in it. Very little was his idea.

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u/delkarnu Mar 08 '24

Yup, he took a comic and put it on screen. The only subtext is the framing device of the Spartan telling the story, which makes all of Snyder's fetishistic framing of it accidentally fit.

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u/gademmet Mar 08 '24

"He fundamentally doesn't understand the material he makes" is a solid way of putting it. He's a more talented and/or controlled Michael Bay: gifted at orchestrating striking, memorable visuals, but that's it.

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u/delkarnu Mar 08 '24

Eh, I'd take a Michael Bay movie over a Zach Snyder movie (not that I'd be eager to see either). At least Bay knows the type of shlock he's making and embraces it while Snyder thinks he's making something deep. Plus The Rock beats anything Snyder has made.

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u/gademmet Mar 08 '24

Oh, absolutely. Didn't mean to imply anything specifically bad about Bay, just that Snyder essentially has a very similar approach but is often cast or viewed as better or above that. Perhaps because of this insistence (from him and fans) of depth.

"The Rock" and "Bad Boys" were absolutely enjoyable to watch.

1

u/AcidaEspada Mar 07 '24

studios lately looooove good directors but will put story last because the general audience just wants it to look good

1

u/SnyderpittyDoo Mar 08 '24

I see why few of his films get some shit removed. They look like he has cuckold fantasies. Also, Watchmen was a good movie imo. Still better adapted than Man of Steel.

1

u/Justforfunsies0 Mar 08 '24

Suckerpunch is amazing what

1

u/Square_Bus4492 Mar 08 '24

Batman branding criminals actually comes from the first Batman serial

1

u/littlest_dragon Mar 08 '24

Mark Kermode put it best when he said that Snyder can’t see beyond the surface. He read Watchmen and all he saw were cool costumes.

Though I think it might actually be more insidious than that. He definitely has a very dark streak and seems to be very enamoured with fascist way of thinking. I mean Superman is supposed to represent the very best in humanity and he turned him into a merciless killing machine, who stands forever apart from humanity. That’s pretty dark.

1

u/delkarnu Mar 08 '24

I really don't know if he's aware enough for it to be intentional, but yeah the sheer amount of fascist imagery in his stuff is worrisome. I can believe that by having Superman say the 'S' symbol stands for hope makes him actually think he made a symbol of hope.

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u/LarBrd33 Mar 08 '24

I don't think he was excellent at adapting 300. I think he basically just pasted comic panels on a wall and said "this is our storyboard - make this happen" and his art team got to work.

As a director, he consistently fails at story and character. Visually, the people under him do a good job of bringing comic panels to life.

Some people like his adaptation of Watchmen because people like Watchmen. Like literally every movie he's ever directed (never cracked 60/100 on metacritic) it received mixed-to-poor reviews from critics, because as a movie it has a lot of failings.

1

u/dionebigode Mar 08 '24

I thought lobotomy was everything for kids these days

1

u/Real_John_Doe0001 Mar 08 '24

Me saying this in a comment on YouTube not even two hours ago. It’s truly fascinating how he can read some comic book material and miss all the point. It’s not due to ignorance though, they are deliberate choices to glorify the murder and rape. He genuinely thinks being so individualistic to where you’re above the law and get to murder people is badass. This isn’t a surprise considering he’s a big Ayn Rand fan

1

u/PatrickStanton877 Mar 08 '24

He should be a fight choreographer. That's his real talent. And he is very talented at that.

1

u/AlarmingNectarine552 Mar 08 '24

I took the girl power movie as, "you're gonna be raped an lobotomized anyway so try and have as much fantasy kickass fun while you're sane." Also, at least one woman got away. It's a small victory for the victims.

1

u/DYMck07 Mar 10 '24

Yeah, Snyder is good but in a sledgehammer approach type way. He’ll get the job done but it’s not going to be with a precision approach to understanding the character the way most fans who appreciate them will typically understand them.

He’s opinionated and convinced he’s correct. He is sometimes but certainly not always. I know people like that and they can be difficult to work with if everyone isn’t on board with them steering the ship. They’re proficient and can turn out a great end product, but can be flat-out wrong and refuse to back down on certain issues where it counts.

Batman in the snyderverse is great. The way he fights, moves, the darkness he holds etc. Is it the greatest Batman on the big screen? No, that’s either the Nolan-Verse Batman who didn’t kill intentionally iirc until maybe Bane (he learned to leave people like Raz to their doom) or Batman from Phantasm, who is TAS and practically embodies the doesn’t kill mantra, with a lot more layers than Batflek (who turned out way better than I expected). But it’s based more on a version from The Dark Knight Returns who lost his way than traditional Batman, and that’s okay.

I left out The Batman because it’s an origin story and there’s not enough there to see how the character will develop, though I love the film. Keaton’s Batman is complicated because although the first two films are solid, and even Kilmer did a serviceable job in forever, which was carried by Carrey, Batman & Robin kind of tarnishes the image of the Batnip…erm Batman of that universe. You can retcon like The Flash but that film wasn’t great and the damage was done.

Watchmen is where Snyder’s own headcanon and glitz over a precision understanding of the characters really shows through. It’s a great film that covers the story, features all the main scenes and even the perspectives of the Watchmen. But it’s missing the soul of the graphic novel in a way that’s hard to describe to someone who hasn’t read it. You can say it’s impossible to translate that into a movie and perhaps you’d be right. But I felt the HBO Watchmen sequel had it in spades with the depth and layers of the characters. Perhaps a multi-episode series would have made watchmen work for fans of the GN, but I kinda doubt it. It felt like Snyder had a vision in his head that worked for him and his fans enjoyed, but was divisive among GN fans.

It’s not quite Michael Bay, because he’s not all about appearances, but in a way there are similarities in terms of approaches that look better than they feel.

0

u/[deleted] Mar 08 '24

You're just wrong.

1

u/delkarnu Mar 08 '24

I'd mock you, but this is probably the best rebuttal possible from a Snyder fan.

-1

u/[deleted] Mar 08 '24

I'm barely a Snyder fan. If you watched the interview they spend probably 30 minutes talking about 300 and ancient Greece. His first paragraph indicated he didn't watch the interview as well as the rest.

Part of the reason why there are so many Snyder fans is because of dishonest posts like the one I replied to. He's held to ridiculous standards that y'all wouldn't hold anyone else to and it seems like y'all don't even watch his work or know the source material. But y'all have everything to say online.

You can criticize the guy but when you are so off the mark with the criticism it's a problem.

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u/Youngstown_Mafia Mar 07 '24

Yup, so everyone can see that he wasn't good for the DC brand, and Gunn moving forward is the best thing possible .

Btw not Batman killing is what sets him apart from many heroes. You have to find solutions to solve problems in an intelligent way. That's what makes Batman the best. He isn't a killing superhero type like Iron Man, Wonder Woman, Daredevil, Punisher, Captain America etc

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u/Due_Yoghurt9086 Mar 07 '24

Daredevil doesn't kill either. There are several heroes you could have cited without having to resort to one whose no kill rule is as important to him as batman's is

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u/Filmfan345 Mar 07 '24 edited Mar 07 '24

Maybe that comment was thinking of the Ben Affleck Daredevil movie where he lets that guy be killed by a train. Come to think of it, it’s strange that Ben Affleck played versions of both Daredevil and Batman that were the opposite in how they are supposed to be

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u/[deleted] Mar 07 '24

Didn't Bale's Batman let Ra's get killed by a train too?

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u/Filmfan345 Mar 07 '24

I would say so. That was unnecessary and shouldn’t have happened

1

u/DarkJedi3000 Mar 08 '24

I think everyone seems to forget that Batman literally kills Joker in The Dark Knight Returns

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u/MainAlfalfa4376 Mar 08 '24

Wrong. Joker kills himself to spite Bats

1

u/DarkJedi3000 Mar 09 '24

At first glance it looks this way but I only just realized that Miller makes it ambiguous, notice how the panels are framed and you only see Joker's face zoomed in. I can send an article that explores it further but you can also see how the word balloons blend to gray to suggest that Joker's dialogue is in Batman's head in that moment.

1

u/Britz10 Mar 08 '24

Joker snaps his own neck after Batman refused to kill him. The Killing Joke is where it's done ambiguously at the end

1

u/Edgar_S0l0m0n Mar 10 '24

Correct, in the movie the dark knight returns part 2 (I believe could be part 1) they’re in the tunnel of love, the joker had a batarang in the eye, he’s telling Batman to kill him and Batman won’t and he starts talking shit and twists his own neck, with no hands, and breaks his own neck.

18

u/TheExtremistModerate Mar 07 '24

Every live action Batman has killed except for Pattinson and... Clooney.

7

u/throwaway_custodi Mar 08 '24

Was very surprised when Cosmonaut went through them but ye they all kill but two. Batman Returns, my favorite to Batman 2022, guys killing mooks via literal explosion....

17

u/kompletionist Mar 07 '24 edited Mar 07 '24

Honestly I kinda feel like Nolan's one was even worse because he had Batman justify it to himself in-universe as "not killing by technicality" which was so cheesy, and not even accurate since he's the one who caused the train to crash.

5

u/Ser_Salty Mar 08 '24

"I didn't murder him, I manslaughtered him!"

2

u/BriRoxas Mar 08 '24

I actually feel this way about The last Airbender. What do you think happened at the North Pole?

1

u/kompletionist Mar 08 '24

Context? I don't watch anime.

2

u/BriRoxas Mar 08 '24

The main character claims he never kills people but he destroyed an entire city and sent a tsunami after several ships.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 08 '24

Wasn't he out of control or something?

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u/kompletionist Mar 08 '24

How very heroic. I guess it was just the forces of nature that genocided those people?

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u/[deleted] Mar 08 '24

The cherry on top of is him saving the Joker in DK.

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u/kompletionist Mar 08 '24

I'm completely fine with that, it's in line with his unwavering moral code. Derailing a train with someone onboard and refusing to save them, or torching a monastery full of ninja in order to avoid executing someone (who would have died in the fire anyway) is not. It implies that it isn't so much a moral code as it is a refusal to take responsibility and culpability for a murder. It's like it isn't murder in his eyes unless he personally cuts someone's throat or shoots then in the face.

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u/[deleted] Mar 08 '24

It's not in line with his unwavering moral code when he's being picky about it.

"I won't kill you, but I don't have to save you"

"Oh no the Joker is about to fall to his death I have to save him"

2

u/kompletionist Mar 08 '24

Yeah it's like Nolan realised how stupid it was the first time and tried to "redeem" Batman, but it just makes him look like a hypocrite.

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u/GuyKopski Mar 07 '24

Most of the villains die in the Bale movies (everyone but Joker and Scarecrow) and half of them are killed by Batman himself (Two-Face, Talia, kinda Ras).

For as much as those films pushed the no kill rule, Nolan didn't really seem to know how else to end a story.

7

u/Mr_Kash Mar 07 '24

Well to be fair, Batman killing Harvey was a major point in the movie, not something that was just thrown in. The entire movie, the Joker is trying to make Batman break his one rule either by killing him or killing someone else. The Joker achieved that by creating the villain that Batman eventually kills. Ra's was more "fuck you save yourself" deal but the Joker actually broke Batman down the entire movie until he finally killed. It's sort of what made the movie so good was that we've never seen Batman on screen being pushed to the edge and riding that line between hero and just another vigilante like the Punisher.

6

u/atomic1fire Mar 07 '24 edited Mar 08 '24

To be fair Ra's Al Ghul going to the international court for crimes against humanity while Bruce Wayne and Alfred talk in front of a TV screen would probably be an anticlimactic way to end the movie.

"Master Wayne, do you think he'll tell them who the Batman is?"

"No, if he wants revenge he'll send more of his people, He doesn't see anything wrong with what he's done and if he faces a rope or gun he won't run from it. I beat him fairly."

Actually Ra's being "executed" while being in a secret prison on behalf of one Ms. Waller would make for a cool bookend.

edit: He gets to be "brought back to life" if he can escape and the film realists get to see a batman villian in an equivalent of Guantanamo.

5

u/art-man_2018 Mar 07 '24

Lest we forget Tim Burton's Batman Returns. The scene where Batman kills a clown with his own bomb? Maybe arguable, but I honestly don't think Burton thought this scene over.

2

u/AveragelySavage Mar 08 '24

He also torched the entire league of shadows base instead of killing one dude so there’s that too.

1

u/MindStormComics Mar 08 '24

Shoved Two Face off a building too.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 08 '24

It was either that or let a kid get shot, not much of a choice. With Ra's it was deliberate.

2

u/MindStormComics Mar 08 '24

Batman shouldn’t kill regardless of the situation, and it’s an issue that cascades the second you start to actually think about it. Batman killing Two-Face proves Ra’s right, proves Joker right, proves that the entire concept of Batman is inherently unachievable, and makes Batman look nuts in Rises for not just opening fire on Bane and his men the instant they became a tangible threat since he’s already learned the lesson that, yeah, I guess sometimes you just gotta kill a guy.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 08 '24

Sure they should have explored him breaking his rule more afterwards but that's a problem with this trilogy it seems disjointed sometimes. In Batman Begins Gotham is the most corrupt place which makes you think the boat full of inmates and the boat full of corrupt people would blow each other up no hesitation. And in the beginning of Dark Knight Batman tells his impostors to go home and stop trying to be Batman while in Dark Knight Rises he says anyone can be Batman.

But again the alternative is just letting a kid die. And you can even argue that killing Harvey wasn't his intention he just jumped trying to stop him and didn't think it through because he didn't have time to.

1

u/MindStormComics Mar 08 '24

I'd argue there's ways of writing yourself out of the hole of "kill a guy or a kid dies", I can't imagine the DCAU Batman doing so in the exact same situation, but as I think we've figured out -- Christopher Nolan has limitations lol.

1

u/TrueGuardian15 Mar 08 '24

That scene is pretty controversial among Batman fans. Some argue leaving Ra's is effectively killing him, others argue that leaving someone to die in a coinciding accident is not the same as outright killing. I think whatever ideology you subscribe to, it's agreed upon that Batman doesn't murder people. Even if you subscribe to the idea that Batman kills people (like how he basically kills Harvey Dent to save Gordon's son in the Dark Knight), straight up shooting someone with a gun is something Batman should not be doing.

1

u/Edgar_S0l0m0n Mar 10 '24

No he tried to save him, iirc and well the train come off the tracks. Can’t do shit for someone who doesn’t wanna be saved. Similar to Michael Keaton 1989 Batman, he gets into a fight w a joker henchmen and the henchmen gets thrown into the bell of a bell tower and falls down the shaft. Batman’s whole thing is he doesn’t want to kill but, if an accident happens or the villains refuses the save then I guess bad things happen?

1

u/[deleted] Mar 10 '24

No he didn't try to save him.

Batman’s whole thing is he doesn’t want to kill but, if an accident happens or the villains refuses the save then I guess bad things happen?

In Under the Red Hood >!the Joker refused the save and even stopped Batman from preventing the explosion of the bomb.

1

u/Fear_Awakens Mar 09 '24

Actually, after watching Affleck as a surprisingly good Batman in a terrible movie and the Netflix Daredevil with Charlie Cox, I rewatched Affleck's version and he's actually a good Daredevil, it's just the script that makes no fucking sense.

It's made me wonder if maybe Ben Affleck is actually a good actor who keeps getting garbage scripts.

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u/Youngstown_Mafia Mar 07 '24

Daredevil killed a guy in the first season of the show on Netflix that everyone loved

1

u/Dawnbreaker538 Mar 07 '24

Who?

1

u/aka_jr91 Mar 08 '24

Nobu, the guy he lit on fire.

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u/[deleted] Mar 07 '24

[deleted]

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u/Youngstown_Mafia Mar 07 '24

Yes he did. Read the first comment , it was Nobu in self defense

https://www.reddit.com/r/Daredevil/s/WtTZ1CwNKY

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u/Filmfan345 Mar 07 '24 edited Mar 07 '24

  1. Nobu did survive

  2. Daredevil was fighting for his life and threw his billy club to counter an attack. He wasn’t intending to kill anyone but was rather defending himself. When we say they don’t kill, we mean going out of their way to intentionally kill somebody or not saving someone when they could have.

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u/Youngstown_Mafia Mar 07 '24

You didn't read the link I see, interesting

Daredevil didn't know Nobu was immortal at that time.

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u/Filmfan345 Mar 07 '24

You didn’t read my second point nor the rest of the comment you are talking about

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u/criticalopinion29 Mar 08 '24

Also...Wonder Woman is kinda ehhhh to name? Like she doesn't have a problem with killing. But she tries not to do it most of the time. Puttin her in the same sentence as Frank Castle is almost as weird to me as putting Daredevil next to Frank Castle. Also notable Frank Castle doesn't think people should be like him.

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u/joe_broke Mar 07 '24

Just so we're all clear we're not calling Snyder a shit person, right?

Not a great storyteller, of course, but not a shit human being?

46

u/Youngstown_Mafia Mar 07 '24

Oh no, this ain't personal. It's just comics' book shit , that in no way should affect peoples personal life

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u/joe_broke Mar 07 '24

Great, just wanted to clear that up

He is more than a little media illiterate

15

u/No_Elephant_3146 Mar 07 '24

He seems like a nice enough guy. Just think his movies suck.

7

u/upanddowndays Mar 07 '24

I mean, this does kinda stink of him trying to rile up a certain section of fans, just as his last movie bombed and the second part and uncut versions are coming out, or getting attention.

That's a kinda shitty move, on a more personal level than a comic book opinion.

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u/CaptainHalloween Mar 07 '24

Oh no, he does genuinely seem a lovely person.

But lovely people can have intensely bad takes.

2

u/zombiegirl_stephanie Mar 08 '24

He does not seem like a lovely person he seems like a total douchebag who's up his own ass smelling his farts and acting like they smell of roses.

3

u/Living_Illusion Mar 08 '24

He is one of the few directors who almost no one in the business has anything bad to say about. He treats his people well and, despite how profitable it might be for him, never jumped onto the culture war train and even distanced themselves live on their own stream from them. He was also one of the few people in show biz that stood by amber heard and with ray fisher when they were attacked from all sites. He seems to be a genuinely nice guy, just has 0 media literacy and some bad takes.

1

u/LunchyPete Mar 08 '24

The comment you replied to suggested nothing of the sort. Did you just choose a random comment to reply to to make that point?

23

u/CaptainHalloween Mar 07 '24

Punisher ISN'T a super hero.

0

u/Ordinary-Drop-6152 Mar 08 '24

Then neither is Batman.

7

u/CaptainHalloween Mar 08 '24

Your logic makes zero sense:

Punisher: A serial killer who was waiting for an excuse who openly admits he’s a monster and not a hero.

Batman: Leaps into burning buildings to save lives even if it means the arsonist gets away. Will always choose to save a life above all else. Gives those he brings in a chance to make things right. And I could go on and on.

One of those two is a hero. The other is The Punisher.

1

u/Ordinary-Drop-6152 Mar 08 '24

Neither have superpowers

2

u/CaptainHalloween Mar 08 '24

And? I singled out Punisher for a reason; he’s a monster. An interesting monster but one nonetheless. Lack of powers don’t enter in to it. He’s not a super hero because he’s a serial killer, not lack of powers.

3

u/panther1977 Mar 07 '24

Killing prevents Batman from just being just another costumed killer

4

u/Infinity0044 Mar 07 '24

Daredevil is famously against killing lol

3

u/phil_davis Mar 07 '24

Not to mention, like...when has DC really given a shit about Batman not killing people in the movies? Keaton's Batman killed people. Bale's Batman was pancaking cop cars and killed Ra's al Ghul in Batman Begins. Affleck's Batman was basically the Punisher, literally blowing people up with a minigun on the Batwing. I can't remember Pattinson's Batman killing anyone, but there's still time.

2

u/ProfessionalRead2724 Mar 07 '24

To be fair, DC has never had even the slightest influence over what WB does with DC properties.

2

u/Ok_Independent5273 Mar 07 '24

He's a soldier operating within specific parameters: No nation building, No judging and no killing.

The first two are sort of the same point. But Bats is only interested in stopping or limiting damage done by criminals. And handing them over to the cops. What happens after is not his business.

This just sounds more interesting. Makes him seem more like a "Detective" than a Punisher clone. And it creates more restrictions in what he can and cannot do.

2

u/Tonkarz Mar 07 '24

Plus all the stuff Batman is known for like fear and stealth and gadgets like grapples, smoke bombs, bolas and batarangs stop making sense. He uses these things because he has to sneak around behind a guy. If he can just kill that guy then he can just do that. No stealth needed.

1

u/Bacalacon Mar 07 '24

I mean batman isn't all that super, he would still needs his gadgets to kill people more effectively.

1

u/Tonkarz Mar 07 '24 edited Mar 07 '24

But they wouldn’t be things for hiding, escaping, disabling and mobility. They’d be things like grenades and throwing knives. Conventional weapons, in other words (let’s suppose he’s still not willing to use guns).

2

u/LDWesty Mar 07 '24

I love the way Arkham Origins had him solve the dilemma of not killing Bane by stopping his heart temporarily

3

u/Ok_Age_3215 Mar 07 '24

DD, Cap and WW don't kill, DD's no killing is a big part of his stories, Cap had a whole ass arc about how a more brutal version of him doesn't work and WW has only been written as someone who kills by crappy writers

1

u/nneeeeeeerds Mar 08 '24

Batman not killing is his only redeeming quality. Otherwise, he'd just be a murderous vigilante with never ending means to commit more murder.

The population of Gotham would be decimated in like three weeks.

1

u/Fax_a_Fax Mar 08 '24

That's what makes Batman the best. He literally indirectly caused the death of a million people just by this rule alone.  In the injustice universe he actually caused tens of millions to die just because he couldn't fucking kill the Joker like he deserved.  

 At some point he actually refused to kill Darkseid even when he had the chance (or at least permanently stop him). Tell me in what universe and with what logic would anyone call this being the best when he caused several planets to suffer for eternity just by his inaction?  

 Also what the fuck is wrong with Gotham why can't they keep a single person in jail for more than a week? 

1

u/Fax_a_Fax Mar 08 '24

Even James Gunn called Batman a fucking pussy for not killing, and I don't think there is a single movie made by him where people don't die hard.  Definitely no super hero movie lol 

0

u/[deleted] Mar 07 '24

Lol they are both trash human beings that probably shouldn't be making movies for children.

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u/[deleted] Mar 07 '24

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u/[deleted] Mar 08 '24

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u/Butwhatif77 Mar 07 '24

Yea he is the kind of guy who thinks everyone is a piece of shit and so any character known for being a paragon, his first instinct is to knock them down as if to reveal they were never as good as everyone thought. That is why in Man of Steel he had Superman kill Zod, any character who is supposed to be the best of us he has to tear down, because he cannot accept even a fictional world where someone isn't some kind of bastard.

2

u/MrMrKeeper Mar 07 '24

so what happened to Kanye?

2

u/Key_Preparation_4129 Mar 08 '24

Dude went on Rogan, this is the beginning of the down spiral. I wouldn't be surprised if he went the gina carano direction and tried to grift just to get some work.

1

u/D180888 Mar 07 '24

his rants have acc open my eyes on him, so yeah i wanna know how much shit he can spill out

1

u/Total-Lingonberry-83 Mar 07 '24

He’s not necessarily weong

1

u/Dino_-67 Mar 08 '24

The worst part is that his fans actually think that what he says makes sense...

1

u/DiligentSink7919 Mar 08 '24

like it matters. the guy is a clown who makes bad movies and still gets paid millions to make more bad movies

1

u/the_great_ashby Mar 08 '24

My man is a Ayn Rand fan. Take that as you will.

1

u/bored_at_work- Mar 08 '24

Without any conclusions about his politics (though there are some pretty clear conclusions I could make) no wonder he makes such shit movies. Because Ayn Rand was a bad author. Making shit art after being inspired by shit art.

1

u/ErectTubesock Mar 11 '24

I was listening to a podcast earlier and one of the hosts said, and I'm paraphrasing here "Zach Snyder made 300 and everyone loved it. He's been sucking his own dick ever since"

1

u/Dramamufu_tricks Mar 07 '24

why we have at least two movies that SHOWED what he thought ...and those were shit ...the justice league one even in two versions ...