Take A Gander At The Newest Batmobile

A series of low-res phone images hit the web a few days ago giving us our first decent look at Batfleck's new whip in Zack Snyder's upcoming Batman v Superman: Dawn Of Justice.  That's what happens when you leave the thing parked and unattended on the streets of Detroit.  But Snyder's no dummy and figured, "Well if the cat's out of the bag, we might as well make the cat look like fucking alien warship."  Thus we get the official image above.

I'll admit, I'm not a huge fan of this particular image.  Something about the perspective seems a little off, mostly because the wheelbase seems to be about a mile across.  Perhaps we'll learn that those shafts and pistons up front are there to separate the wheels from the chassis of the car, presumably to give those center machine guns a wider lateral target range.  Still, from the image above this thing looks an awful lot like Nolan's Tumbler.

The spy photos actually give a better view of the Batmobile in that it actually looks like a car.  I also dig the kind of gull-wing doors that open up and look like the points of the bat cowl.  That's exactly my kind of stupid and almost gives me hope that this thing might not be all gloom and doom.  Almost.

Podcast Episode 15: GODZILLA Is Amazing. The Humans, Not So Much

I really want to see Godzilla again this week.  In listening to this podcast and reading a few reviews, I suspect that we may have been a little unduly harsh on the film and that it might play much better now that I know what to expect.

In our fifteenth episode, Bart (my resident Kaiju Guru) and I might focus largely on the stuff that doesn't work in this new iteration of the character, but rest assured that there's still a lot that does work, and it works like gangbusters.  The biggest oversight of this podcast is that we fail to mention the absolutely breathtaking direction by Gareth Edwards.  He absolutely kills it, so that even in a scene like the Honolulu landfall where I care very little about the humans scurrying to and fro, the action is staged so perfectly that I'm still riveted to the screen.  Anyone who's seen Edwards' first film Monsters shouldn't be surprised that he holds back on the Kaiju mayhem for as long as humanly possible, but when he finally does let loose...HOLY FUCK.  I defy you to watch the last 20 minutes of Godzilla without cheering.

The movie had the second best opening of the year so far (trailing only Captain America: The Winter Soldier) so of course Warner Bros has already greenlit a sequel.  This can only be good news as Edwards, assuming he returns, can ditch all the deathly dull humans and double down on the King Of The Monsters.  If this movie's worst sin is that it leaves me wanting MORE Godzilla, that's a sin I can live with.

Bart and I also mull over the first peek of Ben Affleck as Batman, the deaths of H.R. Giger and Malik Bendjelloul, and the future of the X-Men as Channing Tatum steps into the spicy Cajun shoes of Gambit and Bryan Singer's Days Of Future Past potentially hits the reset button on the entire franchise over Memorial Day Weekend.

Behold The Batfleck!

By now I think we've all kind of vaguely grown somewhat almost comfortable with the idea of Ben Affleck taking over the cape and cowl as Batman in Zack Snyder's rapidly expanding cinematic take on the DC universe.  But the question remained as to what exactly that cape and cowl would look like.  Now we have our answer and it's...actually pretty damn great.

First off, I love that it's a black and white photo, even though that obscures some of the details and makes it difficult to discern precise color values.  Is the suit all black?  Is there some grey in there?  Hard to tell.  There does seem to be some distinction between the body of the suit and the gloves/cowl, but that could be more a matter of texture than color.  Personally I'd love to see a classic grey and black suit (I was never really a fan of the blue) but that might just be too much to hope for.  The cape appears to be more leather than fabric and I'm a big fan of the shorter points atop the cowl.

That textured look seems to largely fall in line with Henry Cavill's suit from Man Of Steel, as does the logo on the chest.  Just the other day I was mulling over the distinct differences between the Burton and Nolan bat symbols and thought, "I wonder which way Snyder will decide to go?"  Affleck is sporting the "fat bat" insignia best known from Frank Miller's excellent Dark Knight Returns.  That's hardly a surprise, considering that Snyder introduced the project at ComicCon by having Harry Lennix read a passage from Miller's novel, so I expect that version of the character will play a very significant influence on this latest incarnation, even if the story bears little to no resemblance.  But this new logo, which I totally love, is a smart and simple way to instantly differentiate Batfleck from all who've come before him.  I just hope it pops from the suit a little more than it does here.  My wife didn't even notice it the first time she looked at the picture.

And let's not overlook that Batmobile!  The giant wheels are a clear holdover from the Tumbler, but I'm very happy to see something that looks more like a car than a tank.  It's utilitarian AND sporty!  But will it shoot flames out the back?  Only time will tell.

This is how you introduce a character.  It's different enough from previous Batmen to feel exciting without doing something completely bonkers like the supposed mechanical exo-skeleton that George Miller wanted to feature in his ill-fated Justice League movie.  I have a sneaking suspicion that this Batman is going to be far less concerned with "real-world practicality" than he is with "having cool shit that looks awesome on screen."  But that's Zack Snyder for you.