DCEU: Suicidal Insanity

[Heartofice]

I wouldn't have thought Wonder Woman had much of a following of fans below the age of at least 30 pre the movie. 

[HexMachina]

I don’t mean comic fans as such, more your average movie goer (like me!) I’d say the major recognisable DC names would be Superman, Batman, Robin and Wonder Woman. I mean the very name Wonder Woman was something I would always hear used growing up in reference to, say, a mother who appears to do 10000 jobs for her family. I’d say she was pretty iconic

[Heartofice]

I think there is a difference in that WW is more an iconic name that people might have heard of, but had little no actual knowledge of. They would have seen movies and cartoons of Batman and Superman, unless they had watched Justice League cartoons or the old 70's series I doubt they would have seen anything of her.

I would still consider her pretty fringe to most people.

[polishgenius]

She wans't as well-known as the very-best known characters but it's a stretch to call her fringe. Like,  anyone with a vague awareness of that kind of pop-culture will recognise her.

However, she could still fit into the same reasons that more genuinely fringe characters are successful is that she never really did have a super-iconic mythos, so people aren't tired of it or latched onto too many pre-concieved ideas.That could hinder as much as help- her supporting cast ain't great, especially outside of Thermyscera, and her rogue's gallery is laaaaaaaaaaaaaame which was already a problem in the first movie and now they've gone with Cheetah for the second one, a character who I just don't get as a WW nemesis- but I think it did help create a buzz for the first in that having abandoned the cheesy Linda Carter trappings people were curious where they were gonna go.

[Kalbear]

I think it's more that there are three total superheroes - Batman, Superman, and Spider-Man - which are incredibly well-known beyond any of the others. Even Wolverine isn't as well-known as those ones. That gives far less ability for creative interpretation simply because your built-in fanbase won't let you. You can't do Spider-Man without Peter Parker, without Aunt May. You can't do Superman without Clark Kent. You can't do Batman without billionaire playboy Bruce Wayne. 

But Wonder Woman? Other than her fake name, you can do almost anything. She needs her lasso, her bracelets, and almost nothing else is iconic. Where she comes from? What her powers are? Any of her mythology? All of that is pretty up in the air. 

And with Aquaman, you can virtually reinvent everything about him if you want. (and probably should). 

If anything, it's remarkable how much Marvel leaned on the actual characters and storylines that they did. Especially Cap, who could have been made far more gritty and serious than they did, and instead they captured really well the 'I can do this all day' vibe that is so iconic. 

[Jace, Extat]

1 hour ago, Let's Get Kraken said:

So Zack Snyder does this movie Sucker Punch, which advertised itself as an epic action-adventure film about a bunch of sexy, badass, Buffy the Vampire Slayer-esque heroines going on visually spectacular adventures. What audiences got instead was a meditation on the way that nerd culture sells itself as being so woke and progressive, but is really, in some ways, as exploitative as the patriarchal structures that it criticizes. The title was just the icing on the cake. Literally his sucker punch to the audience.

After this he made some statements about wanting to adapt Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead. Since I'm sure nobody on this forum would ever waste their breath mindlessly criticizing a politically controversial book without ever having read it, I'm sure I don't need to go over the plot of The Fountainhead. But I'll just restate that the point Rand was trying to make was that sometimes an artist would rather see a passion project destroyed than brought to fruition incomplete or poorly done. Put in a pin in that for  second.

So a few years later WB studios gives Snyder full creative control over their expanded superhero universe, and say what you want for the man's vision thereof (and I have), he did make a genuine attempt at doing something new with the material, something that was meant to challenge the audience's own sensibilities and lexical associations with these iconic characters. In a kind of sense the way that the studio interfered and micromanaged the project can be used as a case study of the way blockbuster culture in general has stifled individual creativity in Hollywood.

Anyway, despite the promise of full control, the studio hacks the film into something completely unrecognizable, and a project which would have been challenging for audiences even if done correctly, basically devolves into a dumpster fire. The critics rip Batman V. Superman into little bloody pieces, completely misunderstand the point Snyder was going for (which they can't be blamed for since the film flew right past that point regardless), and a bunch of the big name actors refuse to play ball with the media.

Then, in the wake of a personal tragedy that finally forces him to step down from the project, Snyder hand picks not only the top director of the rival franchise that BVS was trying to deconstruct, but the man whose most famous work, more than perhaps any other in recent memory, embodies the type of exploitative nerd culture that Snyder expressed such contempt for in Sucker Punch. One could almost say he blew up his own project in the most visually spectacular way possible when he finally realized it would never be what he wanted it to.

Now Snyder is going to be adapting The Fountainhead. Life is funny sometimes.

Or he's a useless hack.

[Jace, Extat]

4 minutes ago, Let's Get Kraken said:

Not really sure why you quoted me here. My point was that Snyder's professional career has kind of paralleled a story he's been obsessed with for years, which he is now adapting. Which bit was this comment directed at?

There's no point to my comment. Because there's no point to Zach Snyder.

[Heartofice]

I'd guess that the vast majority of the audience has almost no knowledge of Wonder Woman before the movie arrived, outside of her name and what she looked like. If you asked them what her backstory was, her powers, who her enemies were or even love interest, I doubt you'd get much back. Yeah maybe that is a positive for DC as they get more freedom to do what they want with the character. 

I guess what I'm saying is that her character and backstory are probably well down the list of reasons the movie did well. Far more important was the buzz around the movie, what the movie represented and the positive media it garnered. 

I mean did anyone know anything about Aquaman before last year? Jason Momoa looking pretty has done more for that movie than any interest people have in the character of Aquaman. Nobody was calling out for an Aquaman movie. 

 

[Jace, Extat]

1 minute ago, Let's Get Kraken said:

Ah, my bad. I thought you expressing an original thought. Sorry about that.

Hey no problem.

I just don't have access to whatever emotional cache from which these Zack Snyder apologist thoughts originate. That's clearly my failing, please don't feel bad on my account.

[Heartofice]

Takes a brave person to defend Zach Snyder that strongly. 

[mormont]

The gist of your point, LGC, appears to be that what appears to most people to be Snyder being superficial as all hell is somehow some sort of subtle commentary. But you should really consider the alternative possibility that Snyder simply isn't very good at substance.

[Heartofice]

7 minutes ago, Let's Get Kraken said:

Lol, is that the "gist of my point"? 

Anyway, could one of you please point out where I said anything like that? I don't think I ever made a single comment about the substance of any of his films in relation to his directing style or anything like that. Unless you're referring to my thoughts on Sucker Punch, but I'm far from the first person to have made that observation that the film was a fairly passive aggressive swipe at nerd culture. 

I think the 'gist' of what your saying appears to simply give Snyder far more credit for his artistic thinking than he deserves. 

My take is that Snyder is a visual director, completely obsessed with 'moments' over character and storytelling. Batman vs Superman, Watchmen, 300 etc are all movies that revolve around specific 'moments', a cool scene that can be played in slow motion and seem iconic.

Whatever the behind the scenes issues with the movie, the movie is filled with many of Synder's general errors and peculiarities that I'm not sure you can lay the blame on studio hacks for. 

And this is from someone who actually really liked Man of Steel.

[mormont]

Well, you were also saying that Snyder 'did something new with the material', but I took it as read that part should be ignored, since in fact he seems mostly to have been trying to imitate classic comics he liked (but also that he apparently didn't understand what made them work).

You also appear to have consumed the Kool-Aid that says that the 'real' BvS was a masterpiece, but there's no point engaging with that, since you're talking about a hypothetical film that exists in your mind and it simply isn't possible for anyone to argue against that.

Taking those two things aside, the rest as I understand it is a hypothesis, based on a film that to be fair I haven't seen, saying that the end result of BvS was intentionally 'blown up' by Snyder in order to make a subtle commentary about nerd culture. But nothing I know about Snyder suggests he's capable of that kind of depth. I'm suggesting that the alternative interpretation is that Snyder simply picked a successor he thought was suitable, and that the mythical Snyder version of BvS would not have had any more substance, because Snyder doesn't really do substance.

[hauberk]

15 hours ago, Heartofice said:

I'd guess that the vast majority of the audience has almost no knowledge of Wonder Woman before the movie arrived, outside of her name and what she looked like. If you asked them what her backstory was, her powers, who her enemies were or even love interest, I doubt you'd get much back. Yeah maybe that is a positive for DC as they get more freedom to do what they want with the character. 

I guess what I'm saying is that her character and backstory are probably well down the list of reasons the movie did well. Far more important was the buzz around the movie, what the movie represented and the positive media it garnered. 

I mean did anyone know anything about Aquaman before last year? Jason Momoa looking pretty has done more for that movie than any interest people have in the character of Aquaman. Nobody was calling out for an Aquaman movie. 

 

I'd disagree.  Wonder Woman has a huge part of the DC animated universe on Cartoon Network.  My kids, 22 down to 15 know her very well.  While my family could be an outlier, simply because I'm a comic nerd, I would offer that I have multiple co-workers with WW coffee mugs and one, who is not at all a comic person, that has a 6 year old, not only dressing up as wonder woman, but also doing the deeper dive to Hawkwoman largely as a result of that same cartoon series. 

[Jace, Extat]

8 hours ago, Let's Get Kraken said:

What an insightful observation. I have never heard that about him before. 

'Original' is not synonymous with 'good', which seems to be a cornerstone of your personality these past dozen or so posts.

'Good' is 'good'.

'Zack Snyder' is 'bad'.

'Ayn Rand' is 'irrelevant'.

Just because you think you're the first person to promote a niche idea does not invalidate general consensus when it has been arrived at through objective AND subjective analysis of existing data.

You're free to believe in Zack Snyder's unseen depths as hard as you want. But you can check that 'super serious objectivity with NEW thoughts' shit at the thread portal if you don't want mildly derisive confusion as a response. 

[polishgenius]

I mean, I think Snyder largely fails when he attempts to instill depth- Sucker Punch was a hot mess on all levels and while Watchmen wasn't a terrible film the changes he made fundamentally misunderstood a large part of the point both on the meta level ("I triggered it twenty minutes ago" is not the same as "I did it twenty minutes ago") and in-universe-plot level (

Having Doc Manhattan do it would

NOT cause all nations to band together with America, ffs.

) - but you're not wrong that he's deeper than Bay and that he attempted to do something worthwhile and clever with the DCU. Heck, I still like Man of Steel, even though later developments make it pretty clear that as well as trying to make bold statements, Snyder's lack of understanding of the DC mythos was in evidence even back then.

On the other hand I don't think a lack of depth in and of itself is the killer. Bay sucks because he sucks, not because he's got no depth. James Wan also has no depth in his blockbusters, but to date he's class.

[Jace, Extat]

1 minute ago, Let's Get Kraken said:

Ok reading back over all this I realize that I came off like an overly-sensitive, pedantic little prick.

Still not wrong tho.

Tbh Im getting annoyed about being billed as defending BvS (or calling it a "masterpiece" apparently), because I really did think the movie was a hot fucking mass, and that Snyder is pretty ham-handed about narrative. But you're also doing him a disservice to write him off as a half-smart Michael Bay, good at visuals but nothing below the surface.

300 is a good example. The graphic novel was basically one giant recruiting ad for the US military. The Snyder version, yeah it had that, but it also had some Starship Troopers levels of deconstruction that goes largely uncommented on. The way the Spartans idealize an antiquated version of masculinity, going so far as to turn down a reasonable peace offer because bowing to Xerxes would make them look "totally gay", while seemingly oblivious of the overwhelmingly homoerotic nature of their own alpha-praising culture. 

Also, I like the Star Wars prequels. Bring it. 

Damn, I had a whole post ready to go deconstructing the course of this conversation to add a little twist of the knife.

But since you're being cool I'll stop.

I like 300 very much, and I really enjoyed the Watchmen movie. Snyder is great at setting up a scene and knowing how to film. But I cannot, I repeat that I CANNOT, accept that there's anything genuinely intelligent to his films. Sucker Punch is a pretty good point of reference for this. You posit that he's making a point about objectification and toxicity from nerds.

I can accept that.

But then I'm going to be forced to point out that because he is incapable of analysis deeper than the most superficial imaginable (I'd say a competent Michael Bay who isn't inherently a douchebag asshole), he bungled it horribly and served only to raise questions about his own judgement. This is where the movie is perfect for this discussion, because it's ostensibly about women fighting back against being taken advantage of and kicking some ass. But their ass kickery happens exclusively in the realm of fantasy and impacts nothing in the film's universe. I don't have the Give-A-Fuckitude to list all the ways in which the superficial message is horribly undermined, so I'll go with the obvious choice.

Our hero gets lobotomized to live in her fantasy permanently (or something). If you're trying to make a point about how someone or a group of people are marginalized, you probably shouldn't have the protagonist lose all agency and then just end the movie.

And please don't tell me that 'you didn't get it' or 'the audience is supposed to do the work'. That's lazy, and while I think you're operating under some delusions I don't think you're lazy. If you have a message for your film you either make it translatable to the audience or you failed. Starship Troopers is a great example of when a movie gets panned because people are fucking dumb sometimes, but because it's crafted intelligently the moment you inform a moron what the movie is their eyes light up with understanding. Sucker Punch is the antithesis of this, as the moment you even try to assign a motivation to the film anyone who isn't already looking for a reason to like it or Snyder is going to do exactly what we did over the last two pages.

Since Zack has the hard part of film making down (do interesting things on the screen), I am left with no choice but to infer that while he may recognize things like power imbalances and societal injustice he lacks the capacity to identify the causes and potential solutions. Or even to communicate them halfway clearly.

Or in other words.

He's a useless hack.

[mormont]

16 hours ago, Let's Get Kraken said:

I have no idea what the fuck any of this bit means.

My mistake - I referenced BvS when I should have said Justice League. Apologies.

Quote

Not what I said at all. I think the last line of that post actually made it kind of clear that I was commenting on the way life can imitate art beyond any control that we have.

OK, so this wasn't clear: the implication I took from your post was that Snyder blew up JL on purpose by selecting Whedon. If what you're saying is that this wasn't on purpose, that's different.

Quote

Forgive me if I'm not blown away by the depths of knowledge implied in this statement. I mean, you just said you haven't seen the movie that I was basing a lot of my point on. Do you actually know anything about Zach Snyder, or are you just parroting the popular wisdom that's bandied about and repeated on every movie podcast? 

I've seen Dawn Of The Dead, 300, and Watchmen. I haven't seen any of his subsequent films because after those three, I'd reached the conclusion that I didn't want to watch any more. All three had the same flaws: focus on style over substance, little depth, poor character work, and in the first and last cases a poor understanding of the source material. Since what we're discussing is his work as a director, I'm not sure I need to know more. But YMMV.

[Jace, Extat]

26 minutes ago, Let's Get Kraken said:

EDIT: Whoops, thought I'd posted this the other day.

Imma go in reverse order here.

Not trying to be a dick, but I don't know why I should take your opinions about a specific film seriously when you have not seen the film under discussion. I mean, I've watched a lot of bullshit just so I could properly explain how and why it's bullshit later. Not saying you have to do that just to have an opinion, but it is odd that the opinion you've formed is strong enough that your initial reaction to my giving Snyder perhaps more credit than he is due, is to claim I claimed anything he did was a "masterpiece" and that I "drank the koolaid" about BvS.

There are certain shows, figures, books, etc. that seem to pull very strong and simultaneously very shallow opinions from large groups of fans. Or maybe anti-fans is a better word, idk. Kinda like Twilight in the early 2010s, or Justin Bieber at any given damn point. This shit is all a mile wide and one inch deep. I was that way over those Eragon books for a long time. Of course, I did actually read those...

I'm not being cool, I just took the few seconds to make the requisite criticism of Snyder's skills as a director that would get us past the "Snyder bad" phase of the conversation. And look, it worked!

This, to me, is a contradiction. You're talking about scene composition like it's formulaic and there's no artistry to it. I agree that his characters lack depth, but there is a lot of ground between "useless hack" and an otherwise talented director who needs some creative handlers for depth of character and narrative structure. And I would also argue that if we're talking about Sucker Punch, the lack of depth is deliberate. I men, they're named things like "Sweet Pea" and "Baby Doll"...

Well, actually I said that Sucker Punch was about how many of the staples of nerd culture (comics, video games, anime, etc.) claim to empower women, but are really just escapist fantasies that let them forget about their problems for a little bit.

A lot of this is only true in the context of an empowerment fantasy. I would argue that the whole point of Sucker Punch is to spit on the idea of an empowerment fantasy. I don't think he was trying to make a point about people being marginalized, so much as he was giving the middle finger to all of the "truefans" who declared a fatwa on him after he made Watchmen. He was basically saying that their obsession with comics and fantasy stories does nothing real to make their lives or the world around them any better, and if they're going to retreat into fantasy worlds, then the least they could do is clear the way for those who do have the will to act to step up (again we see shades of Snyder's career-long obsession with The Fountainhead).

It was essentially one massive spite project. It was mean-spirited, and wrong-headed, and vitriolic, and as much of a mess as you'd imagine a movie made entirely to say "fuck you" to a person's critics would be. But it did come from a genuine place, not one meant to pander to an audience (which is more than I can say for some of the "competition").

I never said it was a masterpiece, but there is something there beyond pretty visuals.

You got 2 pages out of this bit. Can we just call it a thread and stop with this word play that would make Al Yankovic blush?

 

ETA: I mean. Just. C'mon, man. You won this one. You honestly did. I eased up. I don't know if that's ever happened before. I normally don't stop until mormont sends me back into timeout where I belong. That's yours, that victory. Nobody can ever take that away. 

"Jace stopped." I just stopped. Fuck, I got conciliatory. Good luck finding someone else who can claim such a decisive win. 

I want you to take this moral and emotional satisfaction and do great things. We're all counting on you now.

[Bastard of Boston]

Harley Quinn/Birds of Prey tease.