Born one year apart in separate runs of DC Comics, Batman and Superman have leapt off the page to become cultural touchstones across the globe, embraced by generations of fans through decades of social and political change. One orphaned by crime, the other by a dying planet; one shaped by his thirst for vengeance, the other by the values of his human family.
Their legends have fuelled adaptations in every new medium under the sun, including landmark graphic novels and more than a dozen movies between them. But never have these two seminal superheroes faced off against each other on the big screen … until now.
Black vs blue. Day vs night. Man vs god. The stage was set for their epic face-off in Zack Snyder’s earlier foray into the DC Universe, Man of Steel, when Superman tears through Metropolis like a ballistic missile to defeat the alien enemy, General Zod, in an airborne battle that destroys Wayne Tower — and everyone inside it. In Batman v Superman (BvS), we’ll see that moment again, but this time through the eyes of Bruce Wayne as he runs into the billowing clouds of dust to search for survivors.
BROODING BATMAN vs CONFIDENT SUPERMAN
Eighteen months hence, the scars are healing in Metropolis but not in the heart of the dark vigilante stalking the mean streets of nearby Gotham City. This Batman has a score to settle, and both behind the mask and in the persona of Bruce Wayne, the character being brought to life in the film by Ben Affleck is older and far less idealistic than any we’ve seen thus far on screen. He’s facing off against a Superman who, while not as seasoned, has grown more confident in his powers and his place on this planet than the reluctant hero of Man of Steel, and after delivering the goods in that film, Henry Cavill is now fully owning both the role of the hero and his human identity, Clark Kent.
Around them, Snyder has assembled a heavy-hitting cast of all-stars, including Man of Steel alums Amy Adams as Daily Planet ace and Clark’s live-in love, Lois Lane; Laurence Fishburne as their boss at the Daily Planet, Perry White; and Diane Lane as Clark’s steadfast mother, Martha Kent.
And, of course, we’ll see Jeremy Irons as Wayne family butler Alfred Pennyworth, who now possesses a Special Forces background that adds a new dimension to his eternal role as father figure and moral compass to Bruce Wayne. Holly Hunter joins the cast in the role of Senator Finch, who spearheads Congressional hearings to determine if Superman is mankind’s saviour or greatest threat.
It goes without saying where Lex Luthor falls in that equation and from what we’ve seen of Jesse Eisenberg in the role, this film gives Superman a formidable adversary for the 21st century. We’ll also get our first glimpse of Gal Gadot as the enigmatic Diana Prince, aka Wonder Woman, in the lead-up to the cornerstone DC legend’s first-ever standalone feature film, out next year.
To comic book fans — and Snyder, whose college thesis explored the mythological importance of superheroes, counts himself among them — Batman versus Superman is the Holy Grail of superhero showdowns. But to do it justice means orchestrating the collision of not just these seminal characters but the worlds and mythologies that come with them into one sprawling cinematic universe.
Well, what if Batman was the bad guy?
The epic story he’s telling with this film emerged as a provocative idea while he and producers Charles Roven and Deborah Snyder were brainstorming during production on Man of Steel. “We were talking about what could be Superman’s challenge for the next movie,” the director recalls. “[In Man of Steel], a giant spaceship comes from space and tries to terraform the earth. How do you raise the emotional stakes higher than the destruction of the planet? At one point I asked, ‘Well, what if Batman was the bad guy?’ And once you say that out loud, there’s no going back.”
With his 2013 blockbuster, Snyder was already plunging us into an environment that was real and recognisable, but heightened to allow the existence of the Last Son of Krypton … so why not widen the lens to reveal the Bat of Gotham? “Did we think that Batman existed in that universe? Yes!” he says. “But the timetable for bringing them together hadn’t been established.”
“As the audience, you think, ‘How the hell are they going to fight?’” Snyder laughs. “And I agree! They can’t fight. But if you can line up the superhero chess moves just right, clearly you can figure it out. That’s the fun part — figuring out not only how but why they fight.”
A PHILOSOPHICAL WAR... between two sides of the same coin
At its core is what Charles Roven calls a “philosophical war” between Batman and Superman, who are essentially two sides of the same coin. In Snyder’s view, their monumental clash is “an easy fire to stoke.” In contrast to Batman’s 20 years hunting down the worst of Gotham’s worst, Superman, he details, “has a much more straightforward view of right and wrong. He can take the moral high ground because he hasn’t gone through the process of losing his innocence, as Batman has. He still believes in the system, and, as you can imagine, doesn’t look kindly on someone he believes is acting as judge, jury and executioner in a vigilante position.”
The central challenge of BvS, and Man of Steel before it, is taking these mythical heroes off the page, rendering them as living, breathing human characters, and dropping them into a culture not unlike our own.
With a roster of acclaimed directors joining this band of filmmakers to bring a whole slate of DC films to the big screen over the next few years, Snyder can’t hide his excitement over the prospect of further exploring the universe he’s creating here. “Just to see Batman and Superman together is a weird and awesome experience for me,” the director confesses. “The nice thing about this process is that no one mandated this thing. None of it was forced. It was a very organic evolution. Once we had Batman, we knew we could at least hint that Wonder Woman was out there, and once you throw Wonder Woman into the mix, then it really starts to get cool.”
My son thinks I am Batman. Literally
It is then that we see the man himself, or rather his alter ego. As Bruce Wayne, this is a different Ben Affleck than we’ve seen before. With grey streaks in his hair and a touch of stubble, he looks like a man who has seen his share of combat. There’s a determination in those steely eyes and a grit to the character that will certainly feel at home to fans of Frank Miller’s seminal comic The Dark Knight Returns, which Snyder calls an inspiration but not the source for the original story driving BvS.
Following a brief exchange between Snyder and cinematographer Larry Fong, cameras roll and the scene unfolds over a series of takes. Watching from a monitor in “video village,” we see Affleck staring down that famous costume. Suddenly, Affleck disappears... in his place, a dark and damaged hero emerges. The camera comes in tight to Batman’s mask and it’s astonishing just how much power there is in that image.
As the crew breaks to reset, Affleck tells us that the number of talented actors who have worn the cape and cowl made the prospect somewhat daunting. “The audience has this larger-than-life expectation and everyone has their own sense of what Batman is, so you have to just be willing to take a risk and try to do something. I think the important thing for me and for Zack was that we were confident we were doing something that was really different from what had been done before but that still falls within the generally accepted idea of what Batman is. The suit was so well-made and cool-looking that it became part of the allure for me.”
Even though we don’t get to see the suit in action today, it’s not hard to picture the physically imposing figure the 6’4” actor must cut in it. Through months of rigorous training, Affleck even put on an extra 25 pounds of muscle for the role, but as gruelling as that was, it did have an upside. “My son (Samuel) thinks I am Batman,” he laughs. “Literally.”
In an all-out, to-the-death fight, who would win? Clearly Superman
When Henry Cavill comes into range, it’s clear from the figure he carves in the iconic blue and red suit that the actor has not only kept his chiselled form in between films but even put on some extra muscle... he’s absolutely shredded. At the moment, the 6’1” British actor is being pummelled by the wind and rain machines that flank him from all sides. We know this is a piece of one of the film’s epic fight scenes, but other than the fact that Superman is using his ocular laser beams, we’ll have to wait till the finished film to see who — or what — is getting vapourised. As we watch the actor in close-up on the monitor, the intensity and power emanating from his eyes is Superman at his most intimidating.
In person — once he’s had a chance to dry off — Cavill is so charming and disarmingly attractive that it’s difficult to imagine this is the same person we just watched dealing out serious damage in take after take. And while he won’t say exactly what we just witnessed, there’s a glimmer in his eye that tells us it’s not what we might expect.
Though this is Cavill’s second time embodying the character, he says the journey he first embarked on in Man of Steel is far from over. “Clark knows he’s an alien on this planet, but it’s the only home he has and he’s sacrificed his own culture and race to save it,” he reasons. “He’s this incredibly powerful being, yet at no time does he use it for his own gain, which is remarkable. And once he takes the leap as Superman, he’s out there in the world for people to judge, and not all their views are positive. He’s just trying to do the right thing by everyone, trying to ignore the slings and arrows, but we see how deeply they affect him in this film.”
Nonetheless, his desperate actions to take down Zod have prompted a simmering backlash and jarred a few powerful enemies to the surface, Batman among them. But on that score, the feeling’s mutual. As battle lines are drawn, Cavill hints that the outcome might not be as obvious as we might think. “In an all-out, to-the-death fight, who would win? Clearly Superman,” he posits. “But that’s not Superman. He doesn’t agree with Batman’s idea of justice at any cost. He doesn’t want to stoop to Batman’s level. When confronted, he wants to solve the problem as cleanly as possible.”
It’s an interesting dynamic and Cavill is giddy about facing off against Affleck’s grizzled Dark Knight in this film. “I love playing Superman, but I also really love the character of Batman and it’s exhilarating for me as an actor to be there for his introduction,” he smiles. “Batman and Superman appearing together is movie history, and I’m really excited to see how the audience reacts to what we’ve done.”
DC’s greatest fighter
Or what they’ll do next. As the title makes clear, this is the dawn of the Justice League and though we pepper the actor with questions about it, Cavill is circumspect, electing to let the audience discover it for themselves.
The crew needs Cavill back on set, but there are so many things left to discuss. Lex Luthor. The other pins falling into place that will set the Justice League in motion… But one superhero we can confirm in this film is Wonder Woman. Gal Gadot is not on set today so we don’t get to see the Amazonian warrior in action, but we are able to view an exquisitely sculpted model of Gadot in full Wonder Woman regalia side-by-side with the film’s two central Titans. All three of these performers look the part, and in costume they capture the larger-than-life element that makes these stories so transcendent.
As physically chiselled as you’d expect DC’s greatest fighter to be, all 5’10” of Gal Gadot cuts a striking figure. Reimagined to imbue her colours with a more earthy tone, Wonder Woman’s costume hints about her origins while fusing naturalistic practicality with the character’s seminal look from the page.
We catch Jeremy Irons — the film’s Alfred Pennyworth — for just a few moments in between scenes and seize the moment to find out what it feels like behind the wheel of Batman’s sleek machine. “I was driving it in a very large, empty studio with walls all the way around, so I couldn’t do quite what I wanted with it — which I felt it was capable of,” Irons confesses with a knowing nod.
Snyder’s response? “It doesn’t even have a licence plate! That’d be a great headline: ‘Jeremy Irons gets arrested in the Batmobile!’” With a wave, Snyder disappears back to the Batcave to resume his quest to immerse audiences in this exciting new evolution of the DC Universe.
It’s a good time to be a DC fan.
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