Spoilers!
Perhaps I’m late to the Batman V. Superman lovefest that occurred in the reviews for the movie. Wait, there wasn’t a love fest?! Wait, the movie only got a 27% on Rotten Tomatoes?! Wait, the movie made $900,000,000 and no one seems to like it? Everyone hates it? What’s wrong with it? Well, there are two sequences that are fairly universally panned which everyone seems to get wrong, and these are the scenes I most often see appealed to by BvS haters. In this post I will show that everyone gets these two sequences wrong.
The Martha Scene
“Save…Martha…” Batman finds out that he and Superman’s mom’s have the same name, and Batman and Superman instantly become friends. That’s how this scene works. So stupid, right?! Wrong! This scene comes after Batman has come to think that Superman is an alien that cares very little for human life. For Batman, Superman seems to be an amoral creature who caused the equivalent of 12 9/11’s, blew up congress, perhaps indiscriminately killed a bunch of people in Africa, and could do much worse at any moment. Superman is an alien with no connection or care for humanity. Batman says as much in the fight over and over.
But Superman starts telling Batman he should save Martha. This leads Batman to get even angrier. Batman has seen 20 years of Jokers and Two-faces playing cruel tricks on him and emotionally manipulating him by appeal to his loved ones and their life or death. This is when Lois Lane comes in and informs Batman that Martha is Superman’s mother. This piece of information, along with it’s being shouted by Lois Lane, gives Batman all the information he needs to put together that he was wrong. Lois Lane, the sole survivor of the attack Superman supposedly perpetrated in Africa, is deeply in love with Superman. He thus puts together that his conception of the Africa case was wrong, and that Superman has at least one person that he cares for or loves. Second, he finds out that Superman was willing to lay down his life so long as Batman saved Superman’s human mother. Superman has a human mother who he loves just as much as any other human loves his/her mother! Batman has put together that he has deeply misinterpreted the situation with Superman (and probably that Lex Luthor is to some extent behind it) all from the facts he becomes privy to in the end of the fight scene. He then realizes that he’s been blind with rage and ignoring the clues all along that Superman is not such a bad guy. This is when he drops his spear. Their having the same mother only caused Batman to pause to figure out Superman’s evil plan, but then Lois Lane’s barging in saves the day and gets Batman to wise up.
For a beautiful youtube video that actually takes the “mother’s have the same name” thing to be a very touching and beautiful moment but which also holds the popular misinterpretation while getting the emotional force of the scene down beautifully, follow this link.
That Floating Dirt Doesn’t Mean Superman’s Alive!
This really annoyed me. Everyone was all up in arms that they took away Superman’s death with the floating dirt. But, and I’ll keep this one brief, when have you ever seen dirt float over a coffin when the person inside in fact turns out to be alive. Dirt floating says nothing about the individual inside the coffin. It says everything about an individual outside the coffin exerting some force pulling on the coffin. All the floating dirt in the end of the movie indicated was that someone is stealing Superman’s body. And yes, everyone knows that Superman is going to come back, but this scene did not in any way indicate that Superman is currently alive in the casket which we are zooming in on. Superman is still dead at the end of the Batman V Superman movie.
The movie has its flaws, but it is beautiful and I was moved by the Martha scene. Now, you can hate BvS, but don’t hate it for the wrong reasons. If you’d like to talk about it, leave a comment.
Come back every Monday, Wednesday and Friday for new post!
Peace be with you.
-JS
The Thoughts of Jonathan Sonantis 