If you were to pull a word cloud together of all the adjectives used to describe “Batman v Superman: Dawn Of Justice” this year, you’d likely find “dark” and “gritty” featured prominently. Zack Snyder’s film saw Superman turned into a pariah, and Batman into a ruthless vigilante, with the two snarling at each other until they realized their Moms had the same name. However, the director’s wife and producer Deborah Snyder thinks that people calling ‘Batman v Superman’ “dark” are missing the point a little bit.
In an interview with Forbes, Snyder makes the point that ‘Batman v Superman’ is simply following the path of classic, literary storytelling.
“…Zack really loves Joseph Campbell [author of ‘The Hero With A Thousand Faces‘] and the hero’s journey. And these characters are just so mythic, and their journeys– I always say they’re journeys are what we can relate to. Because we can’t relate to their powers, so what do you have? That’s the great thing about our Superman. He is more relatable,” she said. “Someone said, ‘It’s so dark,’ and I go, ‘Well, is it dark? He’s going through real problems that we go through as people every day.’ To me that’s not dark, that’s life. We’re complicated people. And we’re making him in that way more relatable.”
“So I don’t think that’s dark, I think that’s just who we are,” Snyder continued. “People are complex, we’re not strictly just the good Boy Scout trying to do good. He does want to do good, and I think all of the the things Superman represents are who he is, but he also stumbles along the way and learns from it. To me, that’s so much more interesting.”
Indeed, it’s an interesting concept, but I think there’s a fair argument to be made that Zack Snyder has never been great with character, and much of the nuance required to pull of portraying a flawed, humane Superman was lost in poor, one-dimensional, cluttered, and very noisy storytelling.
Thoughts? Did you find Superman relatable? Are Snyder’s comments indicative that DC Films are incapable of seeing the flaws in their own work? Let us know in the comments section. [via JoBlo]