So unless you missed the news, Zack Snyder and DC officially announced that they have found their Wonder Woman. Fast & Furious actress Gal Gadot won the coveted role as the Amazonian princess, beating out Olga Kurylenko and Elodie Yung, you can read the full story here. Now if you’re a DC fan, especially a Wonder Woman fan, this news is huge because this will mark the first big screen adaptation of Diana Prince as she joins Henry Cavill and Ben Affleck to make up DC’s “Holy Trinity”, but this news is equally important to general fans because it finally clears up one of the longest running rumors surrounding Batman vs. Superman. Gal Gadot‘s casting is the first solid news to come out of this project since Ben Affleck‘s casting back in September and confirms reports that the casting call that originally started as “Bruce Wayne’s love interest” is indeed Wonder Woman. However Wonder Woman’s arrival, as well as other rumors makes me wonder. What exactly is DC planning?
He could’ve been good.
What other rumors are there? Well for starters, Nightwing. Yes it was reported a month ago that Dick Grayson himself, the original Boy Wonder, would be making an appearance in the movie. This report also stated that Warner Bros. was eyeing Girls actor Andrew Driver to pick up the escrima sticks. However, shortly after this report Driver came out saying that he was not being approached for the role, but his wording didn’t necessarily deny the role’s existence. Rumors also stated that Grayson and Bruce Wayne would not have a close relationship, noting that they had not spoken to each other for many years. Since then there hasn’t been any further news on Dick Grayson’s return to Gotham.
Stephen Amell (left) as Oliver Queen, and Grant Gustin (right) as Barry Allen in Arrow.
Then it was reported that not only could Dick Grayson and Diana Prince be making an appearance on the big screen, but The Flash as well. Yes numerous reports stated that Barry Allen would make a small appearance in the movie, but in his alter ego. Not as The Flash. Some of these reports also mentioned that Grant Gustin, the actor who is currently portraying Barry on the CW series Arrow, and will have his own Flash series soon, would also portray Barry in Batman vs. Superman if he is well received during his time on Arrow. No other reports have come out to help confirm this bit of news, but within Variety‘s news article announcing Gal Gadot‘s casting, they mention that both Wonder Woman and Flash are “locks to make an appearance…” Hopefully Warner Bros. will come out soon to give us some concrete news, considering we are still waiting on Lex Luthor to be cast, and the film is said to begin principle photography next February. Variety also reported in the same article that the studio was looking to cast Zero Dark Thirty‘s Callan Mulvey as a villain, but there has not been any word on who exactly they want him to be.
Now if those two aren’t enough for you, here comes another nugget the rumor mill has spit out, Doomsday. Yes the unstoppable Kryptonian monster, one of the few to kill the man of steel himself, has been rumored to be in the film as well. The rumor first came up when Warner Bros. producer Daniel Alter, who is not attached to the film, posted on twitter a few days ago saying “Need to talk to some people tnite about #doomsday in #BatmanvsSuperman.” (you can see it here). This has since caused many fans, myself included, to go nuts with anticipation and wonder. If you don’t know, Doomsday is best known for his act of killing Superman in 1992’s Death of Superman, I highly recommend that you read it, especially if this rumor is in fact true. Reports as of Desember 9th state that Jason Momoa (Conan the Barbarian, Game of Thrones) has entered into negotiations with Warner Bros. to join the project. These reports have stated that he is being considered for one of the film’s villains, but nothing has come out indicating who that character may be. My first guess would be Doomsday, however I feel his stature and demeanor would be better served on other characters such as Lobo. Earlier this year, Momoa nearly landed the role of Drax The Destroyer in Marvel’s upcoming Guardians of the Galaxy. A role which was ultimately won by former WWE wrestler David Bautista.
C’mon. He’s Lobo.
Now, could these rumors be true?
Could we see these heroes band together against Doomsday and Lex Luthor?
Will we even see Lex Luthor?
Is this even Batman vs. Superman anymore?
In my opinion, no. It has been said many times that “Batman vs. Superman” is just a place-holder name at the moment and that we will find out the film’s true name as we get closer and closer to Summer 2015. That being said, this film is looking more and more like a Justice League film and honestly, Warner Bros. is jumping the gun.
I understand that DC and Warner Bros. has miles of ground to make up for as the Marvel Cinematic Universe continues to charge through the box office, but rushing through characters just to get them established and make a quick buck is not the way to go. I was very happy with Man of Steel, despite the whole “killing/destruction controversy” (Superman has killed before. Get over it.), and I’m glad that the studio is making a conscious effort to disassociate future projects from The Dark Knight trilogy, but piling all of these characters into one movie is not the way to go. Just look at the catastrophe that was Batman and Robin. Too many heroes, too many villains, all “established” and “resolved” within a two hour movie. It’s just not possible. You can’t introduce five new characters, steamroll through their backstory, and expect the audience to care about them when everything goes to hell.
But where do we go from here? You can keep Wonder Woman, and you can even have both Lex and Doomsday if you want, but leave it at that. Since Superman is already established, and Warner Bros. is not going to waste everyone’s time by going over Batman’s backstory for the fourth time, Snyder and his team can easily spend most of the beginning of the film establishing the film’s conflict and the subsequent villains. They can even dip into Wonder Woman’s origin, but they should keep it short and save the detaila for a later stand-alone film. Doing so will give the viewer only three new characters to keep track of, and still leave more than enough room to fully tell the film’s story. If we really are going to have Nightwing and Flash in there so that Warner Bros. can help set up the Justice League, that’s okay, but they should save all of that for the end of the film or pepper them into the film through small easter eggs, or the required after-credits scene that every modern superhero film needs. Man of Steel did a very good job of hiding DC easter eggs throughout the story.
If you’re going to do it, please make it right.
From there DC and Warner Bros. will have a very nice starting point to introduce other JLA characters, give already established characters their moment in the spotlight, and complete necessary reboots (*cough* Green Lantern *cough*). All I know is that until we get our first official trailers and clips, we won’t know anything about this film. I truly believe that Zack Snyder and David S. Goyer have a plan and that they know what they are doing, but nothing about this film will be set in stone until the film hits theaters. For now, there’s nothing else to do except wait for the next proverbial “bone” the studio decides to throw to us. Until then I, like many of you, will be counting the minutes until my butt is firmly in a movie theater seat on July 17th, 2015. In Snyder we trust.
