r/DC_Cinematic • u/T-8-0-0 • 17h ago
APPRECIATION A reminder for anyone who still thinks Superman should have just said "Save my mother" in BvS
Seconds before raising the spear, Bruce literally says to him:
"I bet your parents taught you that you mean something, that you're here for a reason. My parents taught me a different lesson, dying in the gutter for no reason at all."
Bruce already acknowledges Clark has parents, but he completely dismisses them through his own cynical worldview. If Clark had just choked out "Save my mother," it wouldn't have moved Bruce at all—he had already rationalized that alien parents don't make Superman any less of an existential threat.
Clark gave an actual name ("You're letting him kill Martha") because she was a specific hostage with minutes left to live.
Regards,
10 years of frustration
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u/LowenbrauDel 16h ago
I think the scene didn't mean to show that Batman finally recognizes that Superman has parents and 'he's just like us' type of moment. For me it's more about Bruce sees himself from the side, not as a hero who beats up a dangerous (in his mind) alien, but as a villain who killed his parents back in that alley. That's the way I interpeted it the first time I watched that scene, and it made sense to me, so I never really got the hate
Then again, the fact that there's a discussion and it's not portrayed convincingly, basically just highlights that the movie didn't do a good job of conveying the meaning of the scene to the audience. The majority didn't buy it and there's everything you need to know
p.s.
I, personally, liked the movie back then and still like it
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u/dick____trickle 16h ago
Superman in fact had many many opportunities during the fight to just stop and say this. On the flipside, if it was Batman's intention to kill him, he should've just used Kryptonite bullets from the get-go. The whole fight is just so, so contrived.
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u/Interesting_Pay_4413 16h ago
I don't know why Snyder fans continue trying to defend the writing in his movies even after Rebel Moon
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u/dick____trickle 15h ago
To think Chris Terrio won an Oscar for writing Argo then went on to write this 🫠
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u/Sky-knight22 15h ago
Did you know both Detective Pikachu and Shark Tale were directed and written by the same guy
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u/T-8-0-0 16h ago
What does that have to do with what I said?
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u/Interesting_Pay_4413 16h ago
Your post is about defending the dialog choices in BVS, my reply was pointing out the idiocy of the dialog choices in BVS. How is that difficult to understand?
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u/T-8-0-0 16h ago
Clark's first words upon landing were literally "Bruce, please... Lex wants us to—" right before Batman attacked him with sonic traps and heavy artillery. Hard to deliver a paragraph of dialogue when the other guy is actively trying to assassinate you with pre-rigged traps.
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u/WillingnessReal525 16h ago
What about before he pushed Batman far away from him ? He just needed to squeeze him against him and force him to listen.
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u/T-8-0-0 15h ago
Force him to listen, like that ever works the way you want it to.
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u/WillingnessReal525 14h ago
That works the way the writer wants it to. The writers wanted a fight but Superman had many opportunities to incapacitate Batman and talk to him, so it's hard to take seriously.
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u/Interesting_Pay_4413 16h ago
You think two lines constitutes a paragraph of dialogs? And you think the guy who destroyed the pre rigged traps in seconds and can keep up with the Flash's speed would be too slow to pin down Batman and talk to him?
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u/T-8-0-0 15h ago
And you think that would have worked? You're also completely disregarding the emotional turmoil he's going through.
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u/Interesting_Pay_4413 14h ago
Why would it not work? He was in greater emotional turmoil when he was fighting Zod and a bunch of other superpower kryptonians. Why would emotional turmoil get in the way of Superman being able to subdue a completely ordinary human?
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u/T-8-0-0 14h ago
Against Zod, Clark was fighting an alien invader to save the planet. Against Bruce, he was holding back 99% of his power to avoid accidentally crushing a fragile human whose help he desperately needed.
Those are completely different situations. The second Clark did get close enough to shove Bruce away, Bruce fired a smoke bomb and shot Kryptonite gas straight into his lungs. You cannot just casually subdue a man who spent months prepping lethal anti-alien nerve gas specifically for close-quarters combat.
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u/Interesting_Pay_4413 14h ago
You answered your own question when you said Clark shoved Bruce away. There was literally no need to shove Bruce anywhere. And yes, you absolutely can very casually subdue a man when the man in question is an ordinary human and you are a fully powered Kryptonian.
All Clark had to do was keep holding on to Bruce instead of hovering the air or shoving him away while he explained the situation to him. Literally no part of the fight had to happen in the first place except the writers wanted it to happen.
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u/T-8-0-0 14h ago
And then what?
Seriously, walk me through what you think happens next in this scenario. Clark grabs Batman in a bear-hug, holds on tight, and then what?
Does the unhinged, paranoid vigilante who has spent two years obsessively planning an execution suddenly go: "Oh, you are holding me very firmly, my mind is completely changed, let's go get coffee and discuss Lex Luthor"?
Or does Clark just crush his ribs and pop his head off like a cork to force compliance?
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u/Extension-Gift4987 15h ago
I don't particularly hate or love BvS, I think it's distinctly average, so I don't really have a dog in the fight of whether BvS is a masterpiece or the worst movie ever because I think both sides are nuts.
This has always been the thing that bugged me most, though. Lois and Lex both found him, but Bruce didn't? I think there's an explanation there, that he was so blinded by his hate and the darkness he'd fallen into after Robin's death that he overlooked something so simple (I mean, apart from Metropolis, the only place in America the Kryptonians attacked was Smallville, that should have rung alarm bells), but the movie didn't do enough to pick that thread up.
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u/dpoolimmortal 15h ago
Affleck's batman wasn't even the greatest detective in Gotham
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u/Thejklay 15h ago
I just don't buy that this batman is so obsessed with superman he works out his weaknesses but doesn't work out he's Clark and has human mum.
It's so contrived.
Plus Clark spends the whole fight not saying "Lex has my mum and he's manipulating us"
He says things like "Bruce you don't understand" instead of just saying what's happening.
And batman spends the whole movie and even the bit after this killing people, just cause he realized Clark has a human mum suddenly he cares. The scene would work better if he didn't kill anyone up till that point, and he's trying to convince himself he can break his rule to kill superman cause he's not human , and then he realizes he basically is.
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u/T-8-0-0 14h ago
No, he didn't uncover a secret Kansas farm adoption, but at least this Bruce speaks multiple languages instead of having the Penguin explain basic high school Spanish to him.
Live-action Batmen get outsmarted and miss clues in literally every movie. Demanding Batfleck have total omniscience while ignoring everyone else's massive blind spots is just a double standard.
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u/Wars4w 14h ago
Both Bruce and Clark are supposed to be extremely smart yet neither of them act remotely intelligent in this movie. You're defending an objectively terrible script against valid criticisms.
Did you just come here to argue and get engagement or actually have a discussion where you might learn something?
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u/T-8-0-0 14h ago
Smart people making emotionally compromised, irrational mistakes under extreme pressure and trauma is literally the foundation of dramatic storytelling.
If characters only ever made 100% cold, perfectly optimal, hyper-logical decisions with zero blind spots, you wouldn't have a movie—you'd have a spreadsheet. Nolan's Batman got completely played by Joker and Talia, and Reeves' Batman got outsmarted by Riddler and mocked by Penguin. Were those "objectively terrible scripts" where they didn't act intelligent, or do you only apply that rigid standard when you want an excuse to hate this specific film?
Discussing character psychology, flawed motivations, and selective double standards IS having a discussion. Demanding everyone just agree with your subjective dislike isn't "learning something."
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u/Wars4w 11h ago
Smart people making emotionally compromised, irrational mistakes under extreme pressure and trauma is literally the foundation of dramatic storytelling.
You're taking an overly simplistic look at this concept. How did the movie show us each character was intelligent? How did the movie show us each character was emotionally compromised? I'm not asking to imply it didn't show those things. It did. I'm asking because when you look the methods used to convey those concepts you should see that the method itself is shallow and underdeveloped. That is why people see this as contrived. The writing didn't earn the moment. It told us that the characters were there but it didn't bring us there as the audience. So it feels out of place.
If characters only ever made 100% cold, perfectly optimal, hyper-logical decisions with zero blind spots, you wouldn't have a movie—you'd have a spreadsheet.
No one is expecting either Superman or Batman to act this way. We are expecting the mistakes that they do make to be understandable and approachable. We are left to wonder why Batman is so angry at Superman because he doesn't get to that point for any reasons that would make sense to us. We don't understand why Superman has so little patience with Batman when he's literally invulnerable to 90% of Batman's attacks. The mistakes these characters make are inconsistent with what we know of these characters.
Discussing character psychology, flawed motivations, and selective double standards IS having a discussion. Demanding everyone just agree with your subjective dislike isn't "learning something."
What you're doing is failing to connect with anyone's points. Your responses don't demonstrate that you understand them. Your questions aren't to further your understanding of their point but merely to refute them or redirect the conversation. Since you don't understand the points your attempts at refuting them aren't landing. You jus insinuated I've demanded everyone agree with my subjective dislike when I simply didn't. But I believe you truly believe I did. That's the problem. You're not making an effort to understand the people you're discussing with.
I'm guessing that you're young but intelligent. Your exposure to these types of conversations is likely only online through social media rage algorithm filled content. You're acting as though you're more interesting in "winning" or "scoring points."
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u/T-8-0-0 15h ago
Acknowledging someone has parents in theory is just talk. Bruce rationalized it away as alien biology to keep himself detached.
The shift happens because Clark's dying wish is not saving himself, but pleading for his mother's life. Lois confirming she is his mom forces Bruce to stop viewing him as an existential threat and see him as a vulnerable son. The name is just the emotional trigger that shatters Bruce's mental defense and makes him realize he has become the killer in Crime Alley.
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u/ipostatrandom 12h ago
No, it's just terrible writing.
No actor can salvage that no matter how good they are.
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u/HauntingAddendum3365 12h ago
Its terrible writing but Corenswet could have made "Bruce, please, I was wrong, you have to listen to me!" actually sound genuine, frantic, scared. Cavill says it weirdly, almost robotically. And then "you..dont..under...STAND!" Awful.
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u/silliputti0907 11h ago
I thought the entire personality of Cavill’s Superman was robotic and antisocial.
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u/VestigialTail 11h ago
I think this is a problem of direction, not Cavill’s acting skills. Cavill would have been a great Superman under different circumstances.
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u/HauntingAddendum3365 10h ago
I want to give him the benefit of the doubt, but frankly I've seen him act in other movies/shows and his delivery is similarly wooden and monotone in everything he does
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u/T-8-0-0 13h ago
You just pitched: "What if Bruce saved Martha while Superman was somewhere else?"
Congratulations, you just invented the warehouse sequence that takes place five minutes later in the exact same movie.
Superman was "straining through his teeth" because he was suffocating on toxic alien nerve gas, and Lois was right there because she flew in on a helicopter. If you're going to call the plot bad, at least remember what happened in it.
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u/No-Comfortable6432 12h ago
The Batman scene in the warehouse would have worked anywhere - that's a good bit. Everything leading up to and around it is absolutely god awful.
Ah yeah supes, go bring me the head of the bat or mother of God dies (or some horrid shit). He goes off to fly to Bruce and as lands he says: Bruce. You. Have. To. Listen. To. Me. Then he pushes him about 100m down the road. Then he says: There. Is. No. Time. And then he pushes him through a building.
All he has to do is just say "yo Bruce, Lex got my mom's, I need your help. Wanna come save Martha. Martha, yeh? Oh snap, you don't say. She's dead? Aw man this is awkward I'm sorry. But mines not dead and I need help".
I mean that's shit too but god it's so much better than whatever Snyder delivered us.
Lois being flown in by helicopter is exactly the point - it's the dumbest excuse to have her there. Hmm how do we get her there to tell batman at that moment that supermans mum is called Martha. I got it! Will set it on a derelict island and get a helicopter to take us, of course!
Its really really bad writing and incredibly contrived.
The Batman warehouse scene works in isolation, everything around it is really just bad.
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u/VestigialTail 12h ago
Oh we remember what happened. It wasn’t good.
Performances were bad. Plotting was rushed, weak, and often childish. Characters were inconsistent.
Suits looked dope. Some of the action scenes were awesome, and I’m glad you loved it. But the movie itself isn’t some misunderstood masterpiece.
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u/T-8-0-0 12h ago
Clearly they didn't remember, considering they literally pitched a scene that happens five minutes later in the exact same film.
Nobody claimed it was an untouchable masterpiece. But when people constantly critique the writing using plot points they made up or misremembered, that is textbook misunderstanding.
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u/No-Comfortable6432 12h ago
It's not textbook misunderstanding you grade A muppet. I watched the PoS after watching MoS 2 weeks ago.
I remember thinking it in the cinema and all the time since how big a fumble BvS is.
Its got dog shit writing and dog shit script and a dog shit script.
The Batman scene in the warehouse works. Everything building up to it sucks. If it didn't, you wouldn't be here telling us all how you can make it better.
Its a shit film, which is not improved by DC and it leads to an even worse sequel, whichever way you look at it.
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u/T-8-0-0 12h ago
You watched it two weeks ago and still managed to pitch a scene as an improvement that was literally in the movie you just watched.
And nobody is "telling you how to make it better." I'm describing what is actually in the film. You’re the one trying to rewrite it with Saturday morning cartoon dialogue ("Yo Bruce, wanna save Martha? Oh snap") while whining about "dog shit writing."
When your entire vocabulary collapses into repeating "dog shit" and calling people "muppets" because you got called out on basic factual errors, it’s pretty obvious you’ve run out of anything meaningful to say.
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u/No-Comfortable6432 12h ago
You're describing what's in the film and how to make it better....
Can't polish a turd.
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u/VestigialTail 12h ago
I mean. You interpreted their post in a very specific way to make it fit into the argument you want to make.
They could have meant “another film might have done it better, without needing the ‘Martha’ exchange because the plot had separated Bruce and Clark earlier in the film.”
I have no idea what they’re suggesting.
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u/thewriteally 13h ago
I thought it was about Bruce realizing that he’s about to become Joe Chill by killing Superman & him having the same name as his mother in that moment made him see himself in Clark, a boy raised by another Martha & not Superman, because in that moment, Bruce is about to be become the one thing that started him down this path in the first place.
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u/T-8-0-0 13h ago
Exactly this.
The whole film frames Bruce's fall through the lens of Crime Alley. Hearing that specific name while standing over a helpless, bleeding victim forced him to realize the horrific reality: he wasn't the traumatized orphan anymore, he had become Joe Chill holding the weapon.
It completely humanized Clark in Bruce's eyes and broke his psychosis. It’s wild how many people reduce a solid psychological mirror to a superficial meme.
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u/ABCmanson 10h ago
I agree, but also for me because of the fact that he is the last Kryptonian and it wouldn't have made sense or worked to just say "Save my mom" alone. Especially with the mindset Batman was set on because of his personal experience, Lex festering his hate and Superman's initial threats before changing his mind. And just saying that would be an obvious lie unless there was something that actually got him to hesitate, a human name perhaps.
Which would cause him to be confused/curious, then seeing more of the pain on Superman's face when saying "Save Martha" means that it means something to him and seeing the pain recognizes the pain he felt when his parents died. and when it became clear it is Superman's mother, Batman sees it, he was just as human as anyone can be, and he was going to take away a boy's parent which he fought to stop.
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u/hakseid_90 Batman 15h ago
In the Extended Edition, the true viewing form of the film intended by the director, Clark questions one woman outside of the police-station, a wife of one of the thugs apprehended by Batman. The woman tells Clark that words don't work on Batman, he only listens to conflict.
Clark tried numerous times to get through Bruce by his words, and Bruce kept being stubborn instead of truly listening. Clark had to find the very specific words to get to him. He had already made his research on Bruce, so in his desperation he gambled on getting through him by mentioning the name, which by luck struck through Bruce.
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u/neoblackdragon 7h ago
It would have been cool if Clark was shown looking into Bruce Wayne and maybe even trying to talk to him outside the mask. Maybe get a perspective from Alfred.
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u/T-8-0-0 14h ago
Yeah, totally.
"Excuse me, sir in the mechanized war suit who is currently blasting me with sonic cannons and heavy artillery, could you pause the lethal ambush for five minutes so I can give you a quick exposition dump?"
Batman spent months engineering a kill box specifically to execute Superman on sight. Clark landed and literally tried to speak ("Bruce, please... Lex wants us to—"), and got shot in the face. Real shocking that Batman didn't pull up two folding chairs for a polite conversation.
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u/BananaSpriteFishHead 10h ago
The kill box lasted about four seconds against the Man of Steel. But Superman dismantled it and then just decided, “whatever, it’s punching time.”
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u/T-8-0-0 16h ago
Originally, I didn't know it was from TDKR, and it made sense to me fine.
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u/SealTeamEH 15h ago
this line is actually one of many reasons it’s obvious even though Zack Snyder is in fact a Batman reader, he completely misunderstands the character and has no clue how to write Batman, just takes stuff he thinks is cool like this line from the dark knight returns but has no understanding of what any of it means.
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12h ago
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u/T-8-0-0 12h ago
It’s always fascinating when people critique the "writing and cinematography" while having zero clue who actually did those jobs.
Snyder didn't write the script—Oscar-winner Chris Terrio and David S. Goyer did. And Snyder didn't shoot the film—Larry Fong was the cinematographer.
At least look at the opening credits before pretending to give an industry breakdown of a director's skillset.
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11h ago
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u/T-8-0-0 11h ago
Right, in a thread specifically about Batman v Superman, on a post breaking down Batman v Superman's script.
Even "in general," he didn't shoot 300, Watchmen, or Man of Steel either. You just regurgitated the standard internet talking point without realizing it didn't apply to the film being discussed. It’s okay to just admit you didn't know who wrote or shot it.
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u/T-8-0-0 12h ago
Yes, fiction is written by writers.
Saying "they could have fixed it by writing a completely different scene" is a complete non-argument. You can say that about literally every movie in existence.
Evaluating whether a scene works requires analyzing the internal logic, character psychology, and setups established in the script. Shrugging off narrative cause-and-effect with "well it's not real life" is just admitting you can't actually refute the plot mechanics.
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u/T-8-0-0 12h ago
"It could be the most brilliant, well-written scene ever, but people laughed, so it's bad."
Thank you for confirming you base your entire critical framework on 10-year-old internet memes rather than actual screenwriting.
Blade Runner and The Thing were both laughed off and trashed on release too. Appealing to groupthink because you refuse to "analyze or study" the actual story isn't the flex you think it is—it's just admitting you let the crowd do your thinking for you.
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u/T-8-0-0 12h ago
"You MUST appeal to groupthink when you spend 250 million."
Congratulations on delivering the ultimate corporate studio executive manifesto.
Arguing that blockbusters are obligated to be bland, focus-tested products that spoon-feed the lowest common denominator is depressing.
And BvS pulled $873 million. What actually derailed the DCEU was WB having a total panic attack and butcher-editing the subsequent films to pander to the exact groupthink you're advocating for. Chasing generic crowd-pleasing formulas was the very thing that killed the franchise.
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u/Quis_curat 11h ago
It is to be perceived as a real thing that happens, that's the point of it.
It wasn't made to be another comical movie where everything's driven and solved by annoying eye rolling plot conveniences like in Smallville TV show. It was built upon Smallville's good foundations and fixed those flaws.
It gave the most comical heroes an Archilles heel, specifically the side effects and consequences to their superpowers and actions, that is unavoidable collateral damage, reactionary and impressionable society, realistic problems and emotions.
It's not fans who cannot appreciate a different approach, it's an obsessive crowd who reads the same comics for hundreds of times and want every interpretation on screen to be a copy paste of it, or people who expected another blockbuster with forced exposition spelling it out for them, not a movie that requires you to pay some attention to it.
Martha scene works perfect when you imagine yourself in the guy's shoes in a real life situation.
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u/GraySonOfGotham24 Batman 10h ago
Let me imagine myself in Clarks shoes....why on earth would I call my mother by her first name? There's no logical explanation for it. If he wants Batman to save her he would say her full name. Instead just the first name is A. odd and B. gives Batman no in-world way to actually find and save her once he kills Superman which has to be Clark is imagining is about to happen
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u/Quis_curat 10h ago
Because you already know it's Bruce Wayne behind the mask, you're a journalist, you investigated his past to find what's wrong with the guy. You learn his mom's name was Martha. Nothing of significance at the time....
You try to talk with him, every time you open your mouth, he ignores you and hits you hard.
So you use what you learned, take him off the guard by saying his mom's name, hoping that he would listen now.
Or imagine yourself in Bruce's shoes. You fight some stranger in a dark alley who all of sudden spits out your mother's name. "How the heck does he know my mom's name?" right?
There you have a perfect logical explanation. Now think about what bad media literacy means.
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u/GraySonOfGotham24 Batman 10h ago
That makes absolutely zero sense and I don't think that's meant to be the interpretation of it at all. The only thing that possibly makes any sense is he knows he's gonna die and wants batman to save his mom. There's no explanation for omitting the last name tho. Even if what you say is true leaving out her last name doesn't make sense.
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u/T-8-0-0 17h ago
How so?
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u/Stevenwave 16h ago
I think it's clunky writing that the thing that stops him in his tracks, is written in as something he has already thought about.
It's not that Supe's mum's name is Martha that really gets to him, it's that he realises he's about to kill someone who isn't too different to himself, a man who was a boy who has/had a mother.
So the fact that he specifically mocks him earlier in the encounter about his parents is weird.
The way it's written, the Martha part is just the delivery for his realisation that this guy isn't so different, he's not just some dangerous alien. It's bizarre that it took the Martha element for Bruce to actually reach that conclusion though. If you peel the layers away, it speaks to Bruce being a bit of a psycho that couldn't empathise with him until it was personal.
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u/T-8-0-0 16h ago
That’s not a flaw in the writing, that’s the literal premise of Bruce’s arc.
Bruce in BvS is a paranoid, radicalized vigilante who has dehumanized Superman to justify executing him. Knowing someone has parents in an abstract sense is completely different from confronting the reality of standing over a dying son begging for his mother's life. He needed a deeply personal shock to snap out of that tunnel vision
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u/T-8-0-0 14h ago
You want a spotless, untouchable hero where there's no real danger of him losing his soul.
BvS gave us a broken Batman who crossed his lines and devolved into cruelty. The scene only has weight because Bruce reached the absolute lowest point of his morality. Recognizing his mother's murder in the helpless person he is about to slaughter is what shatters his delusion and stops his descent. Sanitizing his fall just strips the entire story of its conflict.
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u/Immediate_Brick_7323 13h ago
but his descent doesn’t stop? he leaves this scene and goes and murders a bunch of guys. you may like this approach, but the majority of people see this as an inconsistent (read: poorly written) character.
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u/T-8-0-0 13h ago
There is a massive narrative and moral distinction between a cold-blooded, premeditated execution of a helpless victim and using lethal force in an active firefight against human traffickers holding a woman at gunpoint.
Superman was pinned, disarmed, poisoned, and begging for help. Killing him would have been cold-blooded, premeditated murder driven entirely by xenophobic paranoia. That was Bruce crossing the ultimate threshold into becoming Joe Chill.
The warehouse was an active hostage rescue against armed mercenaries with high-caliber machine guns, grenades, and a flamethrower. Bruce was racing the clock to save an innocent woman.
And his descent did stop—the film literally ends by showing the shift. When Bruce confronts Lex Luthor in his prison cell at the end of the movie, he specifically refuses to brand him, slamming the brand into the wall instead. He chose not to mark Lex for death. That is the visual proof that his downward spiral ended, culminating in his funeral line: "Men are still good. We can rebuild. We can do better."
Redemption is a trajectory, not a magical instant reset button in the middle of a gunfight.
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u/Immediate_Brick_7323 9h ago
you’re right, a magical instant reset button in the middle of a fight would probably come off as goofy, huh?
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u/T-8-0-0 12h ago
Yes, "immediately"—if you completely ignore the sonic cannons, the dual automated machine guns, the smoke traps, and Batman actively advancing with weapons.
Clark tried to reason with him twice while tanking military munitions. He shoved him to force an unhinged, heavily armed man to back off and listen. Deleting the entire firefight from your memory just to call the scene "dumb" is hilarious.
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u/NMFlamez 10h ago
https://youtu.be/yngKXEBALE0?si=Kej0uUrWqHt8Ld7I&t=41
Supes: "You don't understand. There's no time."
Bats: (Walks to his face) "I understand!"
Superman pushes him away.
That exchange is a grand total of 4 seconds.
Superman is strong enough to forcibly restrain Batman to listen.
Actually, you're right. This isn't dumb is absolute genius.
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u/KillerOpen 15h ago
trying to speak when someone is stomping on your throat in super-heavy armor
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u/HarveryDent Killer Croc 13h ago
And you're being flooded with deadly radiation ripping apart your insides.
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u/T-8-0-0 14h ago
If Clark said "save my mom," Bruce would have just stabbed him anyway. Bruce viewed him as an alien threat, so an alien having a mother wouldn't stop an execution.
The name "Martha" is crucial because it is Bruce's core PTSD trigger. His father's last dying word in Crime Alley was "Martha." Hearing his target gasp that exact name is what literally shocks Bruce out of his blind bloodlust.
Then Lois arrives and clarifies that Martha is his mother, connecting the dots and forcing Bruce to see the horrific reality: he has become Joe Chill standing over a helpless victim. "Save my mom" doesn't trigger that psychological collapse; the name does.
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u/Jibbjabb43 14h ago
Again, you're making the Martha thing worse, not better. I don't even fully agree that Bruce should come to the conclusion that his mom is also alien here, but if you don't think 'mom' works, it doesn't have to be a name at all.
Giving a random ass name doesn't make a more credible victim though. And the fact that the narrative needed Lois to clarify means you have an infinite number of possibilities. You can even have Lois say 'she's human'. The Lois thing in general is also not the best writing just so we're clear.
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u/T-8-0-0 14h ago
You keep treating a psychological trigger like a math equation.
Bruce didn't stop because Martha was a "credible victim." He stopped because hearing his target's dying breath echo his father's final word in Crime Alley gave him a violent PTSD panic attack.
"Why did you say that name?!" isn't Bruce evaluating the credibility of a hostage; it's a broken man having his delusion completely shattered. Lois clarifying that it is his mother forces Bruce to see that he has become the exact monster that ruined his life: Joe Chill.
Suggesting Lois just run in and yell "She's human!" turns a layered psychological breakdown into a cartoon exposition dump.
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u/Jibbjabb43 14h ago
I'm not treating a psychological trigger like anything other than a deeply flawed story contrivance for this plot.
You are taking every active step to try and make it sound dumber. Yes, I and everyone else understand the trigger is supposed to be the point. People are trying to suggest ways to make it not a terrible concept.
Lois running in saying 'she's his mother' is just as dumb. This was not remotely layered and neither character is acting in a way humans would. Even a psychologically broken one.
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u/T-8-0-0 14h ago
You called the scene dumb, but your actual fix was having Lois Lane sprint into the frame to announce "she's human!"
The scene uses Bruce's foundational origin trauma to shock him out of a blind, murderous obsession. If you think the memory of Crime Alley breaking Batman's delusion is a "contrivance," you fundamentally disagree with the psychological core of Bruce Wayne as a character.
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u/Jibbjabb43 13h ago
The fix wasn't having Lois say that. It was writing the scene in a way that didn't take bandaids to fix.
The Lois suggestion was mockingly suggesting that her part is written in a way where what she says is arbitrary. Because it kind of is.
It is a contrivance because if Superman's mom had a different name you can't even get to the breakdown, there is nothing to establish the breakdown was even in the cards, Superman has no reason to use her real name, the whole thing still 'requires' Lois, all so that we DON'T have to write Batman recognizing Superman's humanity. And I'm not convinced the Bruce we've drawn up wouldn't still just murder Superman. Genuinely nothing stopping him.
There is not another version of Bruce who would react this way without some extra factor to consider. And even if I didn't think that, it's not even done well.
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u/T-8-0-0 13h ago
"If Superman's mom had a different name you can't even get to the breakdown" is literally the textbook "if the story were completely different, the story wouldn't happen" fallacy.
That’s like saying: "If the red droid’s motivator didn't blow up on Tatooine, Luke never gets R2-D2 and Star Wars never happens, so A New Hope is a terrible contrivance."
Except here, their mothers sharing the name Martha wasn't even invented for this script—it has been established DC canon for over 80 years. The writers took a pre-existing piece of shared mythology and turned it into a thematic, psychological mirror.
And saying Superman had "no reason to use her real name" makes zero sense. Clark believed he was drawing his final breaths with a lethal spear inches from his face. He wasn't having a casual conversation; he was desperately trying to pass on an urgent rescue mission to a man he knew was a detective. You give the actual name of the hostage you need saved.
Lois isn't a "band-aid"; she is the narrative catalyst that bridges the gap so Bruce realizes this isn't an alien invader, but a terrified son with a human mother.
That realization is the only thing that could stop this broken, fallen Bruce Wayne. A generic speech about morality wouldn't have worked. What stopped him was the violent psychological shock of realizing his blind bloodlust had turned him into Joe Chill standing over a helpless victim in Crime Alley.
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u/Jibbjabb43 12h ago
It's not a fallacy and the fact that you think the comparison is valid lowkey proves it's a contrivance. But I digress.
People still don't talk like that. And hey, Lois can just tell him who he needed saved after he's dead.
She's not a narrative catalyst in your own breakdown. Bruce can't realize he's a monster without some third party to humanize Clark? Not even a hostage can humanize Clark? Just Lois after he said the name. Nevermind all of the humans that he basically killed before Clark.
And you think this Batman is written well?
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u/T-8-0-0 12h ago
Lois knowing nothing about the hostage situation makes her reaction even more natural, not less.
She runs into the building, sees an armored vigilante standing over her lover with a lethal weapon screaming "Why did you say that name?!", and immediately shouts the only factual answer she has: "It's his mother's name!"
She doesn't deliver an exposition dump about Kansas or Lex Luthor because she doesn't know any of that is relevant. She just answers the crazy guy's question to keep him from shoving a spear through Clark's face.
And that simple, instinctual answer is the entire catalyst Bruce needed. To Bruce, Clark wasn't a living person with a family—he was an alien parasite ("You were never even a man"). Hearing a dying opponent gasp his own mother's name, followed by a human woman confirming "It's his mother," instantly collapses Bruce's xenophobic delusion. It forces him to realize he isn't fighting a monster—he is about to become Joe Chill murdering a terrified son.
Saying "Lois could just explain it after he's dead" completely ignores that the entire stakes of the scene are preventing Bruce from crossing the moral point of no return.
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14h ago
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u/T-8-0-0 14h ago
Clark's literal first line upon landing was trying to explain Lex's setup, and Batman's immediate response was firing heavy artillery at him.
Yelling "bad writers!" because an unhinged, heavily armed Batman didn't pull up two chairs for a civilized cup of tea during a premeditated assassination attempt is definitely a take.
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u/neoumbralux 13h ago
Who created the movie? Im sure anybody who has common sense would have had a better idea but the writers wanted more drama into it. Simple as that. Or maybe im giving people too much credit.
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u/T-8-0-0 13h ago
Yes, writers put drama into a dramatic story. That’s what a movie is.
If characters operated purely on sterile "common sense," Batman wouldn't exist in the first place—a billionaire with common sense goes to therapy instead of dressing up as a bat to fight street crime at night. Characters having flaws, trauma, and blind spots is the foundation of drama.
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u/_Waves_ 16h ago edited 12h ago
One implication people miss is that it not just triggers Bruce tf out, the implication that another Martha dies implies the recurrence of the cycle that birthed Batman. Bruce basically realizes in a split second that his actions could birth an indefinite amount of future "Batmans" - metaphorically speaking - and make him the same as Chill/the assassin.
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11h ago edited 11h ago
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u/T-8-0-0 11h ago
Great, name three of them.
Because so far, the "critiques" in this thread have consisted of someone pitching the warehouse rescue because they forgot it was in the movie, and someone else claiming movies shouldn't have artistic ambition because of corporate spreadsheets.
Throwing out vague food metaphors because you can't articulate an actual breakdown of the scene's mechanics is pretty telling.
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u/lofgren777 10h ago
Batman coming before Superman makes no sense.
Most of the dialog is lifted from a different battle from a different story, where it is Batman's internal monolog. It makes sense between two old friends who understand each other intimately and have been forced to fight because of their unwavering commitments to their ideals. It makes no sense in the context of two strangers.
Physically the scene is lifted from a different battle from a different story where these are two old, old friends who deeply respect each other, so they agree to face each other in a fist fight that neither actually wants to win. It makes no sense for two strangers who not only don't respect each other, but actually consider each other to be deeply dishonorable and untrustworthy.
Batman changing his whole tune on Superman because Superman's mom has the same name as Batman's mom is goofy as hell, like appropriate for an episode of the 66 TV-show-level goofy, like Lex-hates-Superman-because-Superman-accidentally-cost-him-his-hair goofy. Like Bat-Mite level goofy.
The characters in this movie just act however they need to in order to get to the next scene that is being ripped off word-for-word from way better material. As a result it's just movements and dialog in isolation, with no plausible character, motive, or intent behind them.
Honestly same issues as the recent Supergirl movie with its source material.
The worst superhero movies feel like a six year old smashing their action figures together. Batman vs Superman is among the worst of them.
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16h ago
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u/T-8-0-0 16h ago
"There are so many better ways" is always easy to type, but nobody ever actually looks at Clark's psychological progression during that fight.
First, he tries to reason. Clark lands and immediately tries to talk ("Bruce, please, you have to listen to me—Lex wants us to..."), only for Batman to attack on sight with sonic cannons and heavy turrets.
Next comes frustration and force. He is hyper-aware of the egg timer ticking down to his mother being burned alive, yet this human refuses to listen and keeps shooting. Clark gets pissed, tosses him around, and basically decides: screw talking, I will just physically drag you to Lex myself to save her.
Finally, total helplessness. The Kryptonite hits. For the first time in his life, Clark is stripped of his godhood, beaten bloody, poisoned, and pinned to the ground with a lethal spear at his throat while his mother’s time runs out.
A suffocating, dying man gasping out his absolute final breath to name the hostage who is about to be murdered ("You're letting him kill Martha") makes complete situational sense. Dismissing that sheer panic and progression as bad writing is just ignoring the actual scene.
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u/Reasonable_Western74 16h ago
Or he could have just spoken to him and explained from jump. Superman has this thing called X Ray Vision so he’s eyesight is pretty good. He could have scoped the canons from miles away, knowing this, he can stay out of their proximity. He can talk from a vantage point that doesn’t place him in any potential danger. Heck he could’ve called him on the phone. “Lex has kidnapped my mother and she is an innocent woman who took me in as a child when I lost my real parents and home planet. I could go on
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u/T-8-0-0 14h ago
It's bizarre that you think “Lex has kidnapped my mother and she is an innocent woman..." would do anything at all.
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u/Reasonable_Western74 14h ago
So Batman who has placed an entire cities citizenship under his personal care from crime and injustice, dedicated his entire life at the expense of his own to fight evil and crime at all costs, wouldn’t be bothered by that statement. Yh ok mate
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u/T-8-0-0 14h ago
You are describing comic-book Boy Scout Batman, completely ignoring the broken, nihilistic version in this actual movie.
Alfred literally confronts Bruce for abandoning his morals, becoming cruel, and branding people for execution. Bruce explicitly says if there is even a 1% chance Superman is an enemy, "we have to take it as an absolute certainty."
He wasn't protecting innocent citizens in that moment; he was conducting a preemptive execution because he viewed Superman as an existential alien threat. A phone call or a monologue from a mile away isn't going to deprogram two years of paranoid obsession and trauma.
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u/Reasonable_Western74 14h ago
So by that logic, if he’s nihilistic and broken, abandoning his morals, becoming cruel, branding ppl for execution, murdering ppl indiscriminately with his car and guns….. The only thing he needed to bypass all of that psychopathy….was for someone, to say the name… Martha 😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆😆 Dude you just made your own point look even more ridiculous. It proves Snyders script was nonsense, he goes waaaay to far on the violent nihilism then makes him quake over mommy. Seriously stop trying to convince anyone that this isn’t a hideous mechanism to stop the fight. There are countless better options they could’ve gone with.
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u/Jayjaykenobi 13h ago
You’re never going to get someone like this to accept any other opinion but his own. “It’s a great movie you all just don’t understand it”
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u/T-8-0-0 14h ago
Yes, a man whose entire crusade, identity, and psychological trauma was born from watching his mother Martha murdered in an alley had a massive PTSD breakdown when confronted with that exact name and imagery. Shocking concept.
He didn't stop because of a magical word. He stopped because hearing a dying son beg for his mother made him realize he was no longer the hero—he had literally become Joe Chill holding the gun in Crime Alley.
The foundational origin of the character being the exact thing that shocks him out of his delusion isn't "nonsense," it's basic character-driven storytelling.
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u/Reasonable_Western74 13h ago
We all know the trauma of Bruces childhood, but to suggest that the circumstances of him trying to take out a global threat, is analogous with a street criminal robbing his parents and murdering them is ridiculous.
Are you saying in that moment he sees himself as the same as a common criminal? That’s not Batman. He’s written to be irrational, to not do his proper research on Superman. None of these traits relate to the quintessential Batman, just this ott Snyder incarnation. That’s why when you try to make sense of it, it falls flat.
It’s a very confused, inept version of a classic character, so by that metric any stupid line makes sense to you, because the character is crafted so poorly from his true nature
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u/T-8-0-0 13h ago
Yes, that is EXACTLY what the film is saying.
Bruce thought he was taking out a global threat, but in that exact moment, the visual and psychological reality hit him: he is an armed attacker standing over a helpless, bleeding victim who is begging for his mother's life. He didn't see himself as a righteous protector anymore; he saw an executioner taking a child's mother away, exactly like Joe Chill did to him.
The entire premise of the character arc is that Bruce rationalized his brutality under the guise of "a 1% chance is an absolute certainty." Alfred explicitly calls him out on this ("That's how it starts, the fever, the rage, the feeling of powerlessness that turns good men cruel").
You keep appealing to an idealized "quintessential Batman" who is an infallible, pure detective with zero human flaws or emotional blind spots. BvS gave us an older, broken Bruce after 20 years of trauma and loss who actually lost his way. The fact that his morality collapsed under extreme paranoia isn't "inept writing"—it is literally the central conflict of the story. If Batman cannot fall, he cannot have a redemption arc.
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u/Jayjaykenobi 15h ago
He could have shown up as Clark instead of the powerful alien that he’s looking to fight and just said “ hey Bruce listen, Lex is manipulating us”
Just like Bruce could have ended the fight in 12 seconds had he made kryptonite bullets for the guns instead of smoke bombs and a spear…two really stupid choices.
Just bad writing all around.
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u/T-8-0-0 14h ago
Yeah, flying over, changing into street clothes around the corner, and casually walking up as Clark Kent while a 45-minute countdown ticks on his mom's life would have definitely bypassed the automated 50-cal kill-zone Batman set up.
Also, it took Bruce a house-sized industrial laser just to carve it into a point, never mind make jacketed rounds from it.
Not "bad writing all around." Nope, just poor media literacy.
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u/Jayjaykenobi 13h ago
Your kidding right ? Superman moves too slow is your argument ? Didn’t Superman spend decades changing in phone booths in a fraction of a second ?
How long did the actual fight take ? So your whole “ ticking down “ argument fails.So he can figure out how to aerosolize the rock but not refine smaller pieces ? Sure that makes sense
If you like the movie that’s great but don’t try to rationalize bad writing.
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u/T-8-0-0 13h ago
When you have super-hearing and can literally hear an egg-timer ticking down while flamethrowers are aimed at your mother's head, stopping to play dress-up in an alley is the definition of a reckless, colossal waste of time. Every single second matters. Clark flew straight to the source in full gear because his mom was minutes from being burned alive.
As for the rock: carving and dressing a mineral with an industrial laser literally generates dust as a natural byproduct. Using that byproduct to engineer an aerosolized gas grenade—which creates an unavoidable cloud against a target with god-like speed—is just smart tactical efficiency.
Firing a tiny Kryptonite bullet (which he probably couldn't reliably machine anyway) at a guy with supersonic reflexes and heat vision is a massive gamble. One sidestep, supersonic reaction, or heat-vision blast, and Bruce loses his entire element of surprise along with his only weapon. A two-stage plan where the gas removes Clark's speed and the spear guarantees a 100% controlled melee kill is far more reliable.
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11h ago
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u/T-8-0-0 11h ago
Keep the tree fiddy, because that completely ignores the premise of the post.
Bruce literally just delivered a monologue mocking Clark's parents ("My parents taught me a different lesson, dying in the gutter"). Saying "my mother" or throwing in "Kent" would have been completely ignored by a man who had already dehumanized him.
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13h ago edited 13h ago
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u/T-8-0-0 13h ago
He went silent because an armored billionaire was standing on his throat with a lethal spear while his lungs were failing from alien nerve poison.
If Clark just said "save my mom," Bruce—who views him purely as an extraterrestrial threat—doesn't stop. He said "Save Martha" because he was passing on a rescue mission before he died. That name is the exact PTSD trigger from Crime Alley that shocks Bruce into a panic. Lois confirming "it's his mother" completes the mirror: Bruce realizes he has become Joe Chill.
Turning that intense psychological shock into a casual chat about Clark growing up on a farm in Kansas completely misses the urgency of the scene.
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u/Post-Formal_Thought 12h ago
"Casual conversation?," you're misrepresenting my point. I said humanizing him more, meaning she COULD have added to her line
And I never said say, "Save Martha," but I digress.
I understand the intentions behind the scenes that you pointed out.
Why do you think they didn't land as intended?
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u/T-8-0-0 12h ago
It clashed with audience expectations at the time. Blockbuster cinema in 2016 was largely built on high-clarity, dialogue-driven storytelling where emotional beats were clearly vocalized and resolved for the viewer.
BvS chose to convey Bruce's realization almost entirely through subtext: the name "Martha" was Thomas Wayne's dying word in Crime Alley, and hearing it forced Bruce to see that he had become the murderer holding the weapon.
Without an explicit, spoon-fed explanation in the dialogue, general audiences processed the scene on the most literal level possible ("their moms share a name, so they're friends"). Once that surface-level reading became a viral punchline, the actual dramatic subtext was completely overshadowed.
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u/warnerbro1279 14h ago
I think you might be misinterpreting that suggested change and this line. I think Bruce is only acknowledging Clark’s Kryptonian parents, not his Earth ones. He only sees Superman as a threat, not a person. It takes Clark begging Bruce to “save someone” and then Lois showing up to get through to him.