He’s six months out from release of “Batman V. Superman: Dawn Of Justice,” and has the two part “Justice League” shoot on the horizon, but Zack Snyder’s emerged from the editing room in the last 24 hours to promote a new Doritos “Crash The Super Bowl” contest, which this year gives the opportunity for the winner to find a job working with Snyder on a DC superhero movie of some kind.
And as is often the case with the outspoken Snyder, he’s got plenty to say. First up, playing to the home crowd while speaking to Australia’s News.Com.Au, Snyder praises George Miller’s “Mad Max: Fury Road,” saying that it’s “just a fucking great movie,” and that “no one would say that the best movie of the year isn’t ‘Fury Road.’”
As for recent reports that Miller might be directing a “Man Of Steel” sequel, which may or may not be happening, Snyder says that “we haven’t talked about it,” but that he “absolutely” wants him to do it, saying that “if I was to think he had any interest in them of course I’m happy to talk to him.”
Snyder also responded to Steven Spielberg’s recent comments that the superhero movie would eventually go the ‘way of the Western’ to Yahoo Movies, telling them “He might not be wrong. I think it puts more pressure on us, the filmmakers, to not just crank out superhero movies for the sake of it. To me, the one thing I love working in the DC universe is that Superman and Batman and Wonder Woman are American mythology. It’s not about making a superhero, it’s a mythological universe that we live in.”
Snyder expanded on those comments to The Daily Beast, throwing in something of a jab at a rival. “It goes to the mythological nature of the movies that we’re making. I feel like he’s right. But I feel like Batman and Superman are transcendent of superhero movies in a way, because they’re Batman and Superman. They’re not just, like, the flavor of the week ‘Ant-Man’ — not to be mean, but whatever it is. What is the next Blank-Man?” Burn (though he also says in the News.Com.Au interview that he hasn’t yet seen Peyton Reed’s movie). Snyder also responded further to Spielberg, saying, “There are still great Westerns.”
The director also responded to same recent rumors, saying he enjoys the speculation mill (“They’ll say something and I’ll say ‘Oh snap, they must have seen the script.’ And then they’ll say ‘And this happens!.’ And then I’ll go, They have no idea what they’re talking about,” he told Yahoo Movies), and shooting down some specific ones, like the “rumor that my son is playing Robin. It’s not true.”
In terms of recent reports that Warner Bros. want more Batman in their “Batman V. Superman,” Snyder says to The Daily Beast that there is an emphasis on Ben Affleck’s Bruce Wayne, “Only in that because it’s a different Batman than the Batman that was in the Chris Nolan movies, so we have a little bit more explaining to do — and you just had a whole Superman movie. But I think only in that way, because you need to understand where Batman is with everything. And that’s more toward the beginning, but it evens back out as it goes on.”
To the same site, Snyder also comments again on the approach to the characters (“It’s interesting because Batman’s a man and Superman’s a god, if you think about it in those terms… What Superman sees as Batman’s limits, Batman sees as Superman trying to control him, acting like an absolute dictator”), and sort-of confirms an age-old rumor that he was developing a “Star Wars” spin-off loosely based on “Seven Samurai” (“It’s possible. It was before the sale (of Lucasfilm to Disney), and they kind of have their own direction now, I think”).
Not yet responded to by Snyder — possibly because it only just broke — is a rumor from Heroic Hollywood that “Wonder Woman” has a split timeline, “Captain America”-style, with the first half taking place in World War I, and the second half in the modern day. We’ll start to find out the fruits of Snyder’s labors when “Batman V. Superman: Dawn Of Justice” hits on March 25th, 2016.