As you probably well know, starting today, Batman is v.-ing Superman. If you’ve turned to just about any critic, you’re likely to find a very negative response to the conflict — so negative as to have made Ben Affleck made a very sad face that’s been exploding the internet today. (The Verge, in their write-up of the face, hilariously took more interest in Affleck’s face’s performance of that face than in his performance in the actual film). Flavorwire’s own Jason Bailey called the movie “relentlessly stupid, sluggishly executed, tedious claptrap.”
And when Vulture decided instead to turn to celebrities re: the question Zack Snyder’s Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice‘s title evokes — who would win the fight? — even some of their answers seemed like critiques of the film’s very existence. Michael Shannon, beyond his bounty of deadpan, understated, sullen and beleaguered characters in indie dramas, also played Zod in Snyder’s Man of Steel; when Vulture asked him the question, he first voiced his apathy, then got caught up in his own eventual dark fantasy of an answer. He said:
I’m so utterly unconcerned with the outcome of that fight. So profoundly, utterly unconcerned. I can’t even come up with a fake answer. I guess I have to root for Superman because he killed me, so I would hope that he would continue his killing spree and become like a serial killer Superman. That’s a new take on Superman. We’d all be in a heap of trouble if Superman was a serial killer. He could just wipe us all out. But then he’d be lonely.
When Vulture responded, “Isn’t he already lonely?” Shannon’s retort was, simply, “Well, we’re all lonely.”
Alan Cumming’s response also ranked among the best of them: “You know, I don’t really care. I wish they’d both injure themselves and shut up.”