BATMAN V SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE

THEIR WAR HERE

We then cut to a sandy blank screen where some simple words gently materialise, one line at a time…

Following from the previous scene, the Bruce Wayne motif plays very lightly on piano as the vocals fade out.

This is a powerful introduction that gets along a sense of the immensity of the significance of Superman’s existence. It is also a likely reference to a line from Watchmen: “The Superman is real and he is American.” This is also where the track The Tower Falls plays.

The screen fades into blue skies. Low-angle shot on a descending black Bell 429 GlobalRanger helicopter, the visible underside revealing the Wayne logo. Squadrons of fighter jets scream overhead, firing off missiles. Bruce Wayne exits the chopper before it even touches down on the oceanside helipad and breaks into a sprint.

Rising suspenseful drum beat.

Behind the Scene

“There was Ben jumping out of the helicopter a little early. He got in trouble for that. The safety guy was like, ‘Don’t jump out of the helicopter until it’s landed. It’s not cool to,’ and he was like, ‘Look, I gotta go save Metropolis!’”

Zack Snyder, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice Watch Party, 29 March 2020

Shoulder shot from Bruce as he stops to look up at Black Zero (the unmentioned name of Zod’s prison ship), pummelling the Earth with bursts of intensified gravity and a deep buzzing noise. Looking daunted but determined, Bruce ducks inside his solid black 2016 Jeep Renegade.

Burst of dramatic choir vocals over the apocalyptic imagery.

With a long shot of the scene facing the city, the helicopter takes off and flees while a fighter jet crashes into an elevated road.

Zod’s suspenseful theme from Man of Steel — identical save for a few notes — gets the action going.

On the ground, the Jeep’s confused driver watches Bruce screech away in the vehicle down the pier. The following scene was shot in Detroit, and for convenience in outlining the events, I will use the actual street names. (movie-locations.com)

Bruce emerges from the Cobo Parking Garage and speeds toward West Larned Street before making a sharp left into Washington Boulevard to avoid the plume of fire and debris a block away.

Up ahead, Black Zero’s gravity beam sends a cloud of dust towards Bruce’s vehicle, and he makes a sharp left down West Congress Street, heading North-East. Through the windshield, Bruce urgently prepares his phone and makes a frantic call.

Cut to Jack O’Dwyer (Hugh Maguire) inside the Wayne Financial Building, turning around as he raises his phone to his ear.

The intensity of Zod’s theme plummets for this moment, but slowly builds up again.

“Jack,” says Bruce on the other end.

“Bruce,” responds Jack.

Turning the wheel rapidly, Bruce says, “Jack, listen to me. I want you to get everyone out of the building, right now.” This immediately tells us that Bruce is heading for the Wayne Financial Building and intends to guarantee the safety of his employees. As he says this, we hear the ringing build-up of the World Engine.

Shoulder shot from Jack looking out the windows as Black Zero brings another wave of intensified gravity down on the city once again, and the employees in the building scream as a skyscraper crumbles in the distance. “You understand?” asks Bruce over the phone.

“My God,” mumbles Jack. Then some flying shrapnel hits the window, cracking the glass as he lowers the phone, turns, and barks at the employees, “Let’s go. Come on. Start moving, people. Let’s go.” He rushes through the panicking crowd while yelling, “The boss wants us out of the building, so let’s make it happen!”

On 9/11, the huge majority of employees in the towers did not evacuate right away. They took their time to phone loved ones, collect work, save data on computers, etc. At times like these, employees in a building do not really know what to do. They are confused, unsure whether to wait for orders, not sure what is even going on, afraid of making potentially bad decisions, etc. A lot of us prefer to assume that someone else is calling the shots and we should wait for their word. So, Bruce calling Jack to have the frozen employees evacuate is a detail that adds to the authenticity of the scenario.

Back Bruce, shouting into the phone, “Jack. Jack!” He lowers the phone in frustration without an answer and continues driving.

The Renegade is now travelling South-West from the far end of West Congress Street. Some cars collide ahead, blocking the path, and Bruce takes a sharp right down Griswold Street. He looks desperate, compressing his lips as he wrestles with the wheel.

Zod’s theme returns in full intensity again as the action continues.

A stray missile hits the ground ahead, followed by another crashing fighter jet tearing a crevice along the building on the right before crashing down, heading right for the Renegade. The vehicle swerves to the left and we cut to the flames of the passing debris, quickly dispersing to reveal the Renegade speeding down an alleyway between 615 Griswold and the Penobscot Building.

Close-up on the vehicle’s front bumper to see the license plate, I4R 8J7. The car turns hard and hits a dumpster before driving down the turn, emerging into a parking lot where one can glimpse an aged Dr Pepper sign with their 1940s slogan “Good for life.” and 1940 was the year Batman and Superman first teamed up in comics.

Return of the drum beat, more subdued after narrowly avoiding death to make this moment a relief.

The speeding vehicle tears the open driver seat door off another car as Bruce heads through the parking lot back onto West Congress Street heading South-West, Black Zero up ahead once more. He is heading right towards the danger.

Looking focused, Bruce swerves to avoid an idle car in the road. Black Zero can be seen and heard pounding the Earth up ahead. Then the Renegade turns again North-West up Shelby Street. Bruce looks tense while performing his manoeuvre.

Top-down shot of Metropolis as the Kryptonian scout ship descends into the city, slicing through buildings like a hot knife through butter and causing the skyscrapers to topple around it. The Renegade dodges cars beneath the passing alien ship as destruction falls from above. Bruce tenses and turns the wheel, pulling the Renegade again onto the same junction from Congress to Shelby to escape the falling debris.

Dramatic choir vocals again when the scout ship cleaves through the city.

Bruce looks more relaxed suddenly, focused forward. Slowing, he brings the Jeep to a stop at the junction of Shelby and West Fort Street facing South-West, where a crowd of idle citizens are looking up at Black Zero, having clearly stopped terraforming for a few minutes now. Even fire-fighters are observing the ominous spaceship no longer pummelling the Earth. It is quiet.

Zod’s theme ceases. A few ominous, sustained, low string notes play while the crowd holds their collective breath.

Bruce steps out of the car, also looking up. We rotate around him to a shoulder shot on Black Zero when an Air Force cargo plane becomes visible from the right, connecting to Black Zero via arcs of electricity before colliding. A shockwave bursts out, and Bruce and the crowd shield their eyes. Screams abound and papers fly in the air.

Black Zero begins to cave in on itself, and the rubble from below is pulled into the new singularity. Bruce dashes forward, his only resort being to travel on foot to reach the Wayne Financial Building. We follow his turn down into Shelby Street again, and he sprints down Shelby through smoke and past a burning car while people flee in the other direction.

Zod’s theme returns on low strings, the drum beat soon returning.

Inside the office, Jack O’Dwyer heads to the window. The rest of the office seems to be empty, so we can assume he noticed the World Engine had stopped terraforming and curiosity got the better of him. Beyond the window, Superman crashes through a distant building, through the air towards us, and into the floor below Jack’s. The building shakes. Jack peers around fearfully, dust falling from the ceiling. We hear the whistle of another entity flying into the building, presumably Zod pressing his attack.

The suspense music relaxes and transitions into slow, solemn high strings the moment we realise what building this is.

Bruce runs from Griswold onto West Congress Street. A plume of smoke hangs by the façade of the Wayne Financial Building up ahead. He slows down and raises his phone, other concerned citizens standing quietly in the fog of smoke in the left background, also looking up. We hear an automated operator on the phone saying, “We’re sorry. All circuits are busy right now. Will you please try your call again later?” as Zod’s heat vision tears the building apart, perfectly matching the movements of Zod’s head in Man of Steel. At this same moment in that film, a sign can be seen in one shot that reads, “Keep calm and call Batman.” Technically, Jack has recently been on the phone with Batman in this scene, so this may be a callback too.

In the office, beams of fire swipe through the background behind Jack as he says a prayer: “Heavenly God, creator of Heaven and Earth, have mercy on my soul.” He says this as a god-like Kryptonian destroys the building, like a plea for mercy from his killer.

Back to Bruce as the building collapses ahead. Superman can be seen making his uncontrolled exit left. The opposite angle on the collapsing building can be seen in Man of Steel from down the street.

Bruce screams, “Jack!”

Then he runs onto the road and down West Congress Street at speed, straight for the erupting cloud of dust from the collapsing building while everyone else flees, a strikingly heroic image reminiscent of real heroes on 9/11 who risked their lives by charging into the smoke cloud to rescue the victims. This shot alone is a perfect encapsulation of the heart of Batman’s character and his role in this universe. Ultimately, the Dark Knight is a mortal man battling against the storm, overwhelmed and totally outgunned by threats infinitely greater than himself, yet still fighting on despite the unimaginable odds and achieving the impossible, as we will see throughout this expanding story.

The strings pick back up again with a grandiose, rising heavenly choir as Bruce charges.

Then he disappears inside the thick grey smog.

The music stops abruptly.

The screen is grey for several seconds, a ringing in our ears.

Then Bruce emerges from the haze, now on 1200 Sixth Street, Corktown. Interestingly, the ruins of the Wayne Financial Building are right outside the World Trade Centre Detroit. A horse without a rider emerges from the left, trotting aimlessly through the haze, imagery evocative of chaos and a loss of control. Horses are a common motif throughout the film. On Vero, Snyder discussed the horse motif with Revelation 6:8: “And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him.” Bruce peers around when a survivor shambles by, staring at him. Then we hear the creak of metal, and Bruce dashes off to help those in need.

The creaking metal transitions the music back with ambient, tragic strings to represent the devastation.

We track him further into the haze by a group of survivors before Bruce encounters a procession of children, holding hands while they are led to safety by their teacher (Stephanie Koenig), who says, “Buddy hands! Everybody show me! Good job! Hold on tight. Come on guys!” She looks afraid, yet still leads the children hastily. She is a hero too. The column of schoolchildren show fear or confusion on their faces while crying can be heard. “Hold on tight. Come on, guys!” the teacher calls further.

Bruce runs aside suddenly, grabbing a child collecting her teddy bear from the ground, and places her back in the column of children. Though small, this simple act of keeping the child from getting separated from her group does a good job of endearing Bruce to us further as a heroic character.

Then he hears someone calling, “Mister Wayne! Mister Wayne!” Bruce runs to one of his employees (Scoot McNairy), covered in dust and pinned to the ground by the legs beneath a steel beam. The man whimpers painfully, “I can’t feel my legs. I can’t feel my legs.”

“We need help over here!” calls Bruce, crouching beside the beam.

The man reaches for Bruce, pleading, “Help me. I can’t feel my legs!”

Bruce reassures him, “You’re going to be okay, you hear me?” He looks at his name tag.“Wallace? What do they call you, Wally? Huh?”

Wallace slowly relaxes and soon responds, “You’re the boss, boss.”

Bruce smiles reassuringly at his fearful employee. This brief exchange also tells us that Bruce is a great boss. He cares about the people who work for him and knows how to comfort the victims of a disaster, quickly endearing him to us further after demonstrating his courage in the face of cataclysm. Though Bruce plays a heavily antagonistic role in the film, this scene shows us that he is not an evil man. It also helps us understand the man he used to be.

Other survivors rush to help. They are heroes too. They take Wallace by the arms and Bruce exerts, lifting the beam with help from another survivor above Wallace’s legs as the others drag him free. “Oh, my God. I can’t feel my legs,” Wallace murmurs. “I can’t feel my legs!”

Then we hear the sound of heavy steel grinding, and Bruce looks up to see a little girl (Ripley Sobo, her character credited as Sage, a likely reference to Snyder’s daughter of the same name) standing beneath a cross-shaped steel beam, looking upwards in tears. The metal groans louder as dust falls around her.

Bruce dashes at the girl when the debris begins to collapse. Shoulder shot to see him go. Low-angle on Sage as tons of steel come down behind her. Shoulder shot from Bruce closing in, spreading his arms to grab her. Low-angle on the beam falling. Full shot of the scene as Bruce rushes from left to right, snatching the girl, and leaping clear of the debris before it slams down. BvS: By The Minute pointed out that Sage’s red blanket combined with Bruce’s blue clothes gives him the red and blue colour scheme and vague silhouette of Superman as he saves her.

Bruce, on his knees, puts the girl safely on the ground. He immediately comforts her, “It’s okay. You’re gonna be okay. You’re okay. All right? Huh? You know what? We’re going to find your mum. Where is she?”

The tearful child points up behind him. Bruce turns to follow her gesture, and the camera pans up along her raised arm to reveal the eviscerated remains of the decapitated Wayne Financial Building, sparking and smoking.

Bruce closes his eyes in regret. Indeed, he knows exactly how she feels, so this affects him profoundly. He takes hold of the girl’s shoulder to comfort her.

Then we hear a sonic boom and the scream of an atmospheric re-entry. Then Bruce holds Sage protectively while she throws her arms around him, looking up over her shoulder in prominent contempt.

The sombre strings give way to the thundering rage of Batman Theme A, literally back with a vengeance, non-verbally telling us Bruce will pursue his — we can hear his feelings in the music.

Low-angle shot of the Metropolis skyline, where a shower of burning debris descends on the city. As the fireballs make contact, we cut to a closer shot of the debris flying through a skyscraper, whereupon we snap zoom on Superman and Zod tackling each other down from the heavens, impotently bringing destruction and debris upon the world. Samuel Otten pointed out that, while the cinematography in this film is more relaxed, the use of a snap zoom here on the battling Kryptonians is a fitting callback to the camera work in Man of Steel. Then another building passes between us and the two super-beings.

High-angle on Bruce cradling Sage. We pull up to reveal the wrecked Wayne Financial logo laying nearby, but now upside down. Its prominence here is unlikely coincidence. For the second time, Bruce’s world has turned upside down. On the ground, it also conveys the idea of something having collapsed, destroyed. Note it also resembles the Justice League logo. As we gain distance, Bruce becomes ever more miniscule — all he can do is protectively hold the motherless child, powerless once again. Bruce is out of his league here, a speck of dust beneath these two battling gods.

“He looks up in the sky and sees Superman, and it’s the moment, the inception of his rage towards Superman — that emotional, almost irrational sense of desperate anger and hatred.”

Ben Affleck, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice: The Art of the Film, 29 March 2016, p94

“Whether you call someone a hero or a monster is all relative to where the focus of your consciousness may be.”

Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth, 1988, p156

Cut to black.

The rage of Batman Theme A stops abruptly and all goes quiet.

SCENE OVERVIEW

After our introduction to young Bruce Wayne, we now meet adult Bruce during the climax of Man of Steel from a new perspective, putting us on the ground with the imperilled civilians. This 9/11-like event is the foundation of the anti-Superman sentiment that grows throughout the film, setting the stage for Batman’s conflict with Superman by further positioning him as small and powerless as god-like beings clash above him, exacerbating a series of traumas that began during childhood. Unable to save his friend and reunite a child with her mother, Bruce puts the blame on Superman. His introduction also displays his noble courage in the face of Armageddon to contrast his fall into villainy as a quest to save lives becomes a hate-fuelled rampage. This is also the start of Wallace Keefe’s fateful story, who will similarly henceforth despise Superman and play a major role in the villain’s plot. Finally, this scene tells us that the events of Man of Steel will be extremely relevant, which establishes this film firmly as the sequel and the next grand step in the story.

SCENE ANALYSIS

“After Man of Steel, I didn’t want to have this moment where you say, ‘Batman exists in this world, we forgot to tell you.’ We’re saying, ‘No, he’s been here the whole time.’”

Chris Terrio, Wall Street Journal, 11 March 2016

From down below, we can see the epic clash between gods from the point of view of the citizens on the ground, struggling to survive. It is a refreshing perspective that is not common in superhero movies, where we most often see civilians only as background objects to be saved, whereas BvS puts one of the two central protagonists in their position. While the world knows that Superman saved the planet, it is hard to feel the same when you are in Bruce’s shoes, and therein lies the redress of the grievances people had with Man of Steel and the catalyst for Batman’s arc in this film.

“What happens there is one of Bruce’s buildings gets destroyed and he’s trying to save all the people inside the building and he can’t. So he is this angry person who fears what Superman may do. Why are they just going to trust this super-powered alien? What if he does decide to turn against us?”

Henry Cavill, Total Film, 23 October 2015

“Yes, because suddenly, the world no longer makes sense: Batman must face superhumans, which had never happened to him. It’s a lot like what we’re going through right now, at least since 2001. The world is much scarier than we thought, anything can happen at any time. Banks can sink, buildings can explode… You feel less safe and Zack wanted to evoke this feeling.”

Ben Affleck, Premiere, 4 March 2016

“I could say it was the straw that broke — it wasn’t a straw, really, it was a big hammer that broke the camel’s back in terms of his emotional resilience. And even though he’s trying to do the right thing, he’s doing it in very, very dark ways.”

Charles Roven, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice: The Art of the Film, 22 March 2016, p94

“We were writing this movie before Man of Steel came out. Batman’s point of view is more about the destruction of Metropolis. To me, the killing of Zod is not as big a deal as the destruction of Metropolis. It’s important that these movies have consequences. In Batman v Superman I wanted to show how Bruce Wayne feels when reduced to a sideline-sitter. Batman is frightened by his impotence in the face of that.”

Zack Snyder, Wired, 23 March 2016

“We felt an interesting way of beginning this story was to examine Superman from another perspective, Batman’s perspective. Bruce doesn’t know who Superman is; all he knows is what the public knows. He blames him for the lives lost in Metropolis, lives that he felt responsible for. His hatred has been building up inside, and now, all this time later, he’s finding reinforcement of those feelings in the media.”

Zack Snyder, Movie Central, 1 April 2016, p6

“‘Look at all this destruction! If these guys have it their way, humans have no place in that world. We’re all collateral damage in that case, all the humans, you know? Because these two guys are just fucking around fighting and we’re just ants on the ground, watching it go down, and we’ve just got to figure out, what’s our answer to that?’ That’s Bruce’s point of view. Like, ‘You guys are all just saying, “Ah, well, let’s just shut up and let them do their thing.”‘ Like, ‘I’m having a hard time fighting thugs in an alley, let alone like this guy! This is insanity! The scale! No one seems to care that the scale is way worse, and yet, somehow, this is the good guy.’ That’s what Bruce thinks.”

Zack Snyder, DC Cinematic Cast, 13 September 2024, 34:16

There is much 9/11 imagery here. Falling buildings, clouds of dust, fleeing civilians, and selfless heroes running into the carnage all generate a familiar environment. Both the 11 September 2001 attacks and Zod’s attack on Metropolis changed the world. Similarly, both events motivated a new age of fear and prejudice.

Speaking of which, the destruction in this scene lines up surprisingly effectively with Man of Steel. Several people have already edited both films over each other on YouTube. The idea of having each film begin during the end of the last will carry over to Zack Snyder’s Justice League, overlapping the stories of each film to emphasis the importance of each prior chapter going into the next.

“I guess, for me, it was just because the stories are so intertwined, it’s just important to catch you up on what’s happening specifically in the moment you just left, you know? I think by backtracking a teeny bit, or overlapping, it allows the continuity of the story to… continue, and I think that’s the main reason. In BvS, this movie, there’s a really cyclical nature to the film — starts with a casket, ends with a casket — it’s very much a circular affair, but it does lead into Justice League, and it does come from Superman, so that was also really important to me.”

Zack Snyder, Full Circle, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice commentary, 29 April 2023

The first music track in this scene is The Tower Falls. Aside from the reintroduction of General Zod’s theme to musically connect the sequence to the events of Man of Steel while Bruce speeds through Metropolis, there is actually not much in the way of recurring musical material in this track, serving mostly as a backdrop to accentuate the feeling of panic in Metropolis, followed by tragedy and hopelessness as the tower collapses.

The second track is Wreckage, providing sombre string ambience over the ruins of the Wayne Financial Building as Bruce helps the passing schoolchildren, saves Wallace Vernon Keefe from the metal beam that broke his legs, saves a young girl from being crushed by falling debris, and assures her they will find her mother before Batman Theme A wraps up the sequence on the falling Kryptonians. Both tracks combined correspond to Their War Here in the released score.

BEHIND THE SCENE

“If you start to get into sound design early on, it becomes part of the cut. You build up moments and transitions with sound as a key player. For instance, in BvS there’s the moment in the beginning of the film where Wayne Tower falls down. Bruce Wayne runs into the cloud of dust which fills the screen and then we dissolve to another completely white frame, which is a time cut, dust again starts to dissipate, and then we reveal Bruce walking in a daze. A riderless horse walks by, eerie, followed by a few dazed survivors. Sonically, we found a musical crescendo that climaxes when the cloud of dust hits Bruce, accompanied by a very round and boomy impact, which rings out… leaving nothing at all save a high-pitched, tinnitus sound. Everything else is a vacuum. Then, we slowly brought back some elements: the sound of the horse’s breath, its hooves. Then I found an eerie Tibetan Horn, actually a human thigh bone being blown, that is heard in the distance, only with a little growing wind. And then as the camera gets closer to Bruce, we slowly bring back reality sounds, creaks and groans, and finally the production track of someone shouting ‘Mr. Wayne! Mr. Wayne!’ which turns out to be Wallace Keefe trapped beneath the rubble. This motivates Bruce to react, and as he leaves the frame, the energy picks up with reality sounds and music with tension and pulsing rhythm. So this shape, which involves picture, sound design, and music, began with our first cut and remains in final cut pretty much the same way.”

David Brenner, ProVideo Coalition, 10 April 2016

The rubble sequence was filmed at the junction of Abott and Sixth Street, Corktown, Detroit, Michigan. Construction of the Corktown set occurred throughout July 2014, and was documented by Bananadoc in photos posted on the 4th, 5th, 7th, 11th, 12th, 18th, and 27th. Dan Newman explored the Corktown construction site in videos here and here, plus the routes used for the speeding sequence. Art director Lorin Flemming designed the set, and you can find detailed photos of the structure and conceptualisation at her website.

Filming occurred on the 4th and 5th of August. Bananadoc posted photos of the shoot. Extras waiting for filming were also spotted. Samuel Otten captured this video and this video. Dan Newman documented the filming in unlisted videos here, here. Set costumer Kate Abraham posted this photo of her co-workers near the set on the 5th.

The speeding sequence was filmed all throughout downtown Detroit, Michigan. Shooting was done on the 6th to the 9th of August. Locals snapped photos of Zack Snyder and a Thomas Wayne painting, West Congress street and Griswold street, road closures, West Fort and Shelby Street, West Congress and Shelby Street, and Shelby Street. Bananadoc posted several photos. Dan Newman documented the shoot in unlisted videos here, here, here, here, and here. Locals got footage of the Jeep Renegade speeding through the parking lot, Affleck running the corner of Shelby and Congress, and running the corner of Congress and Griswold. The shoot was covered by Detroit Free Press on the 6th and 7th. The 2016 Jeep Renegade was product placement for the limited “Dawn of Justice” Special Edition of the Jeep model.

Deleted Footage

Someone shot this video of the Jeep Renegade turning back from a dead end at the junction of West Fort and Griswold Street, which was clearly deleted from the final film.

On the 8th, Zack Snyder called into Detroit radio station 97.1 The Ticket to defend Aquaman. On the 18th, Larry Fong published this video of stuntman Albert Valladares performing a flip near the set. Photos of one of Ben Affleck’s stunt doubles during this time produced the short-lived hashtag #ThatsNotBenAffleck.

Bruce’s arrival via helicopter was shot at North Breakwater Access, just South of Navy Pier, and was filmed on 10 November 2014. Devin Torkelsen recorded this video of the aerial shoot, Katie Knipp got this video of Ben Affleck running from the helicopter, and @showbizshelly shot this video of the car speeding down the pier. ABC 7 Chicago got this photo of Affleck in the helicopter. While filming this sequence, base camp was set up under North Stetson Avenue. Director of photography Larry Fong took this stunning photo of the Chicago bay over Lake Michigan in the evening and this humorous photo of set photographer Clay Enos.

Possibly Deleted Footage

@filming_chicago got photos of Metropolis police cruisers parked along the Chicago Riverwalk where the pier to North Breakwater Access connects to the mainland, indicating there was likely additional footage of Bruce’s car passing by these police vehicles.

Based on physical evidence and quotes, the Wayne Financial Building was shot in a retrofitted office space at 2000 Centerpoint Parkway, Pontiac, in the late Michigan Motion Picture Studios, a former General Motors building just across the street from the location used for LexCorp. It is the same building used for the Daily Planet interior. The location was sold to Williams International in 2017, when the studio held a garage sale for props.