Zack Snyder Reveals Christopher Nolan's Role In The [SPOILER] Of [SPOILER] In BATMAN v SUPERMAN
Batman v Superman director Zack Snyder reveals Christopher Nolan's role in the movie's shocking ending and talks in great detail about both that and what lies in store for Justice League.
Fans are so wrapped up in bickering about Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice's critical and commercial response that no one seems to be discussing the fact that the movie featured the freaking Death of Superman! While we all know he'll return in Justice League, his demise at the hands of Doomsday was still very powerful and a moment sure to be remembered for a long time to come. Talking to Collider recently, director Zack Snyder revealed that he initially talked to executive producer Christopher Nolan about his decision to take the Man of Steel out of the equation. "It was pretty early, and [Christopher] Nolan and I had long conversation about it, a really great, sort of philosophical conversation about it. He was really cool because he played an amazing devil’s advocate about why not to do it, and then in the end was like, ‘No you’re right, it’s better to do it.’" So Nolan was initially sceptical of the idea, but what about Warner Bros.? "The studio was like, ‘What?’ And I’m like, ‘Yeah but, how about I called the movie Dawn of Justice?’, and they’re like ‘Okay, okay, I like what you’re doing, I see what you’re doing.’"
In the video above, Snyder talks more about his reasoning behind killing off Superman, including the fact that he considered having the hero live, but taken out of the equation in some way in order to allow Batman to assemble the Justice League. Going back to why he decided Superman had to die though, the director added: "I thought for the evolution of Superman’s character, there’s a crucible that he has to go through to really embrace his humanity or find what is the ultimate thing about being human? The ultimate thing you face is your mortality, and that’s a thing that I think is really cool about this."
Batman v Superman ends with the hero's return teased as the dirt on his coffin starts to rise, but why include that moment rather than letting moviegoers remain under the impression that the Man of Steel is a goner? "I’m gonna say this: the second you do the first part of it, the death and resurrection are the same thing in a weird way. You have to know. The reason I wanted to do it the way we did it is because I don’t want the audience completely off the hook with it. They still have to go like, ‘What the [frick]? Are you kidding me?’. There’s a way to signal towards a more definitive resurrection concept, but I didn’t wanna do that because I want that to be real for them when they see it, I want the experience to be real and then the sort of need to be real later on. Suffice it to say there is a plan, but that’s gonna be—you need to wait and see." What do you guys think?