14 DAY TRIAL // We’ve seen Batman in his costume, standing next to his Batmobile while working on his best sad face, so it’s now time to reintroduce ourselves to Superman. Warner Bros. has just released the first official photo of Henry Cavill in costume, in a promo shot for Zack Snyder’s upcoming “Batman V. Superman: Dawn of Justice.”
The full name of the movie might be a real mouthful still, but the sight of Cavill as Superman totally makes up for it. Click on the image above to see it in full: it totally beats that on-set photo that popped up online the other day, of Cavill as Clark Kent, newly-minted journalist for the Daily Planet.
Warners released this new photo to USA Today, along with a few quotes from director Zack Snyder. He describes the experience of shooting the movie in Detroit as “not an un-fun job,” talks about his excitement of revisiting the character of Superman with Cavill, who also starred in “Man of Steel,” and teases fans like only he can.
“You can talk all you want about other superhero movies, but it's Batman and Superman, let's just be honest. I don't know how you get bigger than that,” he says.
Truer words have never been spoken.
Other important stuff we’ve found out with the release of this first photo: Gal Gadot is yet to shoot scenes as Wonder Woman and is still at the gym getting ripped. There was a lot of controversy around the decision to cast her as the Amazon princess because she’s a model mostly – and obviously has the thin and frail figure of one.
Initially, Snyder didn’t want to put Batman in the movie because of Christopher Nolan’s “Dark Knight” trilogy. According to fans, these films represent the peak of Batman in film and the character should be left alone for a while. However, Snyder admits, there was no way he could make a Justice League movie without the Caped Crusader, so this is how Ben Affleck came into the picture.
He will be playing an older and more tired version of Batman.
“Dawn of Justice” will see Clark Kent start his job as reporter for the Daily Planet, which is how he will come in contact with Gotham City and Lex Luthor and Batman. Presumably in the photo above, that’s Gotham in the background.
As a side note, speaking of the photo, this falling rain / debris / fire theme in movie photos and posters has been used so many times it no longer carries the dramatic punch movie studios think it does. Warners should have known better.
One more important thing Snyder reveals to the mag: he admits he’s having some issues with developing the character of Superman, but he admits to the “fun of trying to figure out what to put in front of him that's difficult.”
Also, the director claims he doesn’t know exactly how the confrontation between Batman and Superman will happen and be treated on camera, but this is probably his delicate way of saying that he’s not about to spoil the big twist in the movie.
“Batman V. Superman: Dawn of Justice” opens in theaters in May 2016.