10 Reasons Batman V Superman's Ending Is The Stupidest Part Of The Film

10. It Repeats Superman Returns, But Over Three Movies

Warner Bros. were so desperate to do The Death Of Superman they forgot that they'd already done it; at the climax of Bryan Singer's under-appreciated franchise throwback, Brandon Routh's Superman sacrifices himself to stop Lex Luthor's latest property scam (destroying America and replacing it with a Kryptonite island). He straight up dies. His heart stops and the Daily Planet runs a story that says Superman has dead. But then, paying off the overt cross symbolism from earlier, he comes back to life, visits his son and flies into the clouds where the holy spirit of his father chatters away. Now that's a trinity. We've already had the Superman-as-Jesus arc on the big screen less than a decade ago and it was done in a much more impactful, evocative and sensitive way - all Batman V Superman is doing is stretching it into a three-part story, with the messiah, sacrifice and resurrection acts getting a movie apiece (I guess that's what Zack Snyder meant when he said the first two films and Justice League Part One were a trilogy) while managing to also reduce the sense of character. There's nothing wrong with doing something again (it looks like Batman's solo endeavour will repeat Arkham Knight and do Under The Red Hood), but when the only reason to include Superman's death was to finally adapt The Death Of Superman it feels particularly perfunctory.