Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice Ultimate Edition Review (Spoilers)
By Bobby Doherty @thehorndogg

The Batman v Superman digital release is now available and the crew of DC on CW was lucky to get a preview screening of the director’s cut. Zack Snyder’s version of the movie was a significantly better cut of the film and because of this, we left the theater asking ourselves if Warner Brothers had made a crucial error by not releasing this version of BvS the first time. I believe that this version of the film would been received far better by critical masses than the original.

SPOILERS START BELOW

Now I am going to only go through the spoilers that helped the plot along and believe me, they aided in setting a very different tone to the movie.

The first major scene that was cut was durning Lois Lane’s trip to Africa. There is a scene that shows that the CIA is monitoring the situation from afar, they try to blow up the camp but Superman stops the missiles. We also get a scene where the CIA arrive later by horse to investigate the scene.

Remember the witness from Africa who testifies against Superman to the senate? She had much more of a story arc then shown in the original release. We find out she was an actress hired by Lex as part of the bigger plan to make Superman look bad. She starts to feel guilty about lying to the senate committee and goes back to Senator Finch to tell her about Lex just before the Senate bombing. Lex then sends his henchmen to kill her and she dies when one of them pushes her in front of a train.

Now one of the biggest complaints from the original was that Clark/Superman didn’t have much to do in this film and it was mainly a Batman film with Superman in it. Well the new cut was much more balanced between the two characters and it looks like they chose to cut all the character development for Clark. Clark spends time investigating the prisoner who was branded by Batman earlier in the film. While investigating Clark learns that the man was murdered in prison (Another piece of Lex’s plan to put Superman against Batman). Clark runs into the man’s wife/baby mama (not sure which) and she explains to Clark that he was a father and not a bad person that he didn’t deserve the brand or to die for a mistake. This is the motivation for him to attempt to stop Batman in the first time they encounter each other.

In a scene that I was surprised hit the cutting room floor was after the Senate bombing. Superman is attempting to save people from the rubble. After looking around at all innocent people that are hurt because of him he flies away because of the guilt. It was a good Superman scene that both showed his heroic nature and his humanity.

One of the biggest rumors going around durning the filming was who is Jena Malone going to play in the movie? Is she Barbara Gordon? Is she Carrie Kelley? Guess what the internet was wrong, weird. Well, she is playing Jenet Klyburn, a scientist that is very helpful to Lois Lane, the over plot, and flow of the movie. She is key to figuring out the mystery metal in the bullet and helping Lois figure out that Lex is framing Superman for Africa. Jena’s character also learns that it is same metal that from the wheelchair that Lex provided to senate bomber and that the wheelchair was lead lined. Which is why Superman couldn’t figure out that there was a bomb in the room. All huge plot points that were not in the original.

Finally the ending, this is where we get the capture of Lex and the set up for Justice League with the Steppenwolf scene that has been floating around the internet for a couple of weeks. Then the other major scene that was added was durning the jail scene and we learn that Batman has set it up for Lex to be transferred to Arkham Asylum and that Batman has some friends there still waiting for Lex’s arrival.

Now why was it rated R? There were a few more violent moments in the extended fight scenes. The prison shank scene was pretty dark. But honestly its no worse then anything you see on The Walking Dead and not as over the top with language or violence as a Tarantino film.