A superhero quoting a war-mongering Vice President. A hilarious, evil dance routine. And
perhaps the worst Batman moment of all time. Here are a few times that DC's movies made us cringe.
It's probably fair to say that Gal Gadot is not exactly recognized as
one of her generation's masters of the theatrical arts. Some might argue that's okay — after all,
her iteration of Wonder Woman relies on physicality and charisma much
more than suspending the audience's disbelief. Indeed, when she does come
off as a little disconnected, that actually helps her project a sense of otherworldliness.
But every once in a while, Gadot delivers some good ol'-fashioned bad acting. Her infamous
overwrought reprimand of a rampaging Superman in both the 2017 and the 2021
versions of Justice League serves as a case in point. Of course, Wonder Woman's decision
to call Superman by his Kryptonian birth name at this point seems odd in itself,
seeing as how basically nobody from Earth calls him that. But the real shocker here is Gadot's
line read. Both Justice League movies include different takes of Wonder Woman's warning…
"Kal-El, no!" "Kal-El, no!"
...and neither of them are good. This might suggest that the writers ought to share some
of the blame for this particular blunder — but let's face it: Gadot is hardly helping.
Martha and Martha
This is a scene that'll be talked about for decades,
but not for the reasons DC once hoped. In 2016's Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice,
Batman is about to impale Superman on a kryptonite spear. And then...
"You're letting him... kill Martha!"
"Him" refers to Lex Luthor, who has taken Martha Kent hostage. Martha as an abstract
concept provides a basis for thoughtful analysis of gender in Zack Snyder's DCEU films. That said,
even though her kidnapping provides Superman's motivation at this point,
Martha barely seems like she's in this movie at all. Until...
"Save… Martha!"
This cosmic coincidence forces Batman to hesitate,
allowing enough time for Lois Lane to show up and explain Luthor's evil plot. And sure,
in some parallel universe, there may exist a version of this scene that isn't cringeworthy.
After all, the idea does make sense — it's just a shame the execution leaves so much to be desired.
When Vice President Dick Cheney left office in 2009,
his administration's approval rating had sunk into the low 20s. So should a beloved hero like Batman
parrot such a hugely divisive — and retired — politician? Dawn of Justice seems to think so.
"He has the power to wipe out the entire human race and if we believe there is even
a one percent chance that he is our enemy, we have to take it as an absolute certainty."
Somebody clearly thought this quote was so apt that they even included it in the film's
trailer. But folks who remember post-9/11 American politics might notice that Batman
borrowed an infamous Cheney quote there, partly verbatim. In 2003, the ex-veep had said:
"If there's a one percent chance that Pakistani scientists are helping al-Qaeda build or develop
a nuclear weapon, we have to treat it as a certainty in terms of our response."
This argument was used by Cheney in 2003 as justification for the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
Here, Batman v Superman puts a widely disliked man's words about a wildly unpopular war
in the mouth of one of the most popular heroes in all of fiction.
Whatever the intent for the purpose of the story, it feels like a serious misfire.
Though it's never stated outright, it's very heavily implied that, in Batman v Superman, Lex
Luthor pees in a jar and leaves it on a podium as a final "Screw You!" to Senator June Finch. This
happens just moments before a suicide bomber kills her along with an entire courtroom of people.
Doesn't this seem a little juvenile and crass, even for Jesse Eisenberg's bizarre take on Luthor?
Based on his mannerisms and background,
this version of Luthor scans like a combination of Eisenberg's performance in The Social Network
and a mediocre screenwriter who once made a YouTube fan film about Superman.
Even still, you can't help but wonder if the movie version of Mark Zuckerberg would have
come up with a more elegant and sophisticated way to mess with Senator Finch's brain before
blasting her to smithereens. He did invent Facebook, after all.
The version of Jonathan Kent portrayed by Kevin Costner in Man of Steel is a man who loves farming
and hates rescuing people when they're in trouble. This makes him a somewhat
nontraditional interpretation of Clark Kent's foundational male role model who, in other takes
on the Superman myth, tends to gently push Clark in a more pro-saving people direction.
No ifs, ands, or buts about it. The moment when famously invincible Clark Kent stands by and
watches his adopted dad run into a raging tornado to rescue the family dog — only to
predictably die — horribly is very cringy. Obviously, Superman could rescue his Pa and
the pooch very quickly and with minimal effort, but instead, he just stands there… and does this:
*Clark screams*
And if you think that's bad, wait until you hear Superman's
cry of exhausted anguish immediately after offing Zod at the end of the movie.
*Clark screams*
But hey, maybe this is just how Superman reacts to bad stuff. Missed the bus?
*Clark screams*
Colors ran in the wash?
*Clark screams*
Out of milk?
*Clark screams*
Poor old Clark Kent just can't catch a break.
Barbara Minerva is one of the most glaring missed opportunities in Wonder Woman 1984. There've been
a few different versions of Cheetah in the comics, but the baseline of Barbara can be summarized
as the answer to the question: "What if Indiana Jones was an evil flesh-eating jungle cat?"
But instead of a physical and mental match for an immortal Amazon Princess,
Wonder Woman 1984 coughs up an awkward nerd who loses her mind when she gets powers,
in the mold of some of Joel Schumacher's Batman villains. When Barbara and Diana meet,
Barbara's deeply envious of Diana because… something to do with her self-esteem. Even though
Barbara is also a conventionally attractive woman with a fancy archaeology career that
presumably pays very handsomely indeed. Still, at least she looks good in her Cheetah form.
The general consensus on the two versions of Justice League is that Zack Snyder's revamped
version of the movie released in 2021 is a step up from the 2017 theatrical cut.
But that doesn't mean the so-called Snyder Cut is totally free of cringeworthy moments.
Take, for instance, the whole deal with Martha Kent and Lois Lane. After "Ma"
Kent finishes telling Lois Lane that she can't grieve over Superman's death forever,
Martha leaves the apartment, then suddenly transforms into
J'onn J'onzz — also known as the Martian Manhunter. J'onzz, in his DCEU debut,
then transforms again into General Calvin Swanwick, who you may remember from Man of Steel.
Martian Manhunter never interacts directly with any Justice League members until
well after the major events of the film have wrapped up. He comes across as totally unconnected
to the plot and feels shoehorned in for the purpose of showing the audience yet another
familiar intellectual property. Furthermore, he raises some befuddling questions the film
never addresses. For one, was Harry Lennix, who plays General Swanwick, playing J'onn
J'onzz all the way back in Man of Steel? Or did J'onn replace that guy at some point?
That's not the only problem with this scene, either. Setting aside whether you accept the
idea that Lois would completely fall apart after Superman's demise, the kind of serious, clinical
depression she is suffering from isn't the sort of thing that gets resolved by a pep talk from your
almost-mother-in-law. All in all? A decent scene for fanservice, but not so much for anything else.
In one of the most talked-about additions to Justice League's 2021 Snyder Cut, the film's
plot flashes forward to a potential future; one in which Batman and a cohort of costumed pals wander
through a Mad Max-style wasteland. It soon becomes clear that this gang includes the Joker, played by
Jared Leto reprising his Suicide Squad role. A subsequent conversation between Batman and The
Joker dumps the exposition of their relationship — basically, Batman can never kill the Joker because
they complete each other, or something. It's the usual song and dance. But then Joker says this:
"You won't kill me, I'm your best friend. Besides, who's gonna give you a reach-around?"
Oh boy, that's right! This ain't your grandpa's Joker! This one is dark and scary and… kinda
homophobic, too? Eat your heart out, Zach Galifianakis. And sure, some folks like the Joker
stuff in Zack Snyder's Justice League — all power to them. But you'd also be forgiven for thinking
it plays like a 13-year-old read The Killing Joke, saw The Dark Knight, and then decided to
write a Batman-Joker scene that was the edgiest thing to ever have an edgy night in edge-ville.
Of course, the scene also makes basically no sense and adds nothing to the larger
context of the movie, but it is, at least, noteworthy for its vindication of Joel
Schumacher — who is no longer responsible for the worst Batman moment of all time.
Thanks to the runaway success of James Gunn's 2021 The Suicide Squad,
the David-Ayer directed original Suicide Squad is likely to fade away into obscurity.
Still, we'll always have the memories — like these early promotional stills for the film that set
Jared Leto up to fail miserably as a successor to Heath Ledger's turn as the Clown Prince of Crime.
Before you realized what you were looking at, you might have been forgiven for wondering why Ayer
had chosen to promote his Suicide Squad movie with that guy who got kicked out of the mall for taking
his shirt off in Spencer's. Or maybe you wondered why Jared Leto had started a metalcore band.
But then the horrible truth dawned: Oh, man. That's supposed to be the Joker.
It wasn't a great moment.
Here's a fun fact for you: belly dancing is not intimidating. If you've ever been to a
belly dancing demonstration, you'll notice that the performers in no way intend to frighten the
audience. So when the minds behind Suicide Squad needed something for Enchantress to
do to indicate that some evil-as-heck magic was taking place, why did they land on this?
It's clear that somebody at Warner Bros. thought audiences would react
better to a runway model dancing in her underwear rather than, say,
anything that actually made sense. But this is Suicide Squad's main antagonist — someone who
is supposed to be a big bad reality-destroying supervillain. Shouldn't she be doing anything
more disturbing than shaking her hips to some medium-quality CG effects?
Honestly, Enchantress' whole deal in Suicide Squad feels like somebody in charge was
working overtime to appeal to the teenage male segment of the audience… which
would explain what they did to Harley Quinn, too.
Thanks to the advancement of science and technology, it is more-or-less common
amongst human beings to carry around what is essentially a computer in their pockets. Amazing,
right? And yet, Hollywood still seems unable to edit one mustache off one guy in one movie.
*Clark screams*
Back in 2017, a tragic family emergency forced original director Zack Snyder to
leave the production of what became the theatrical cut of Justice League.
The now-notorious Joss Whedon took over from there, to basically nobody's satisfaction. By
the time the Whedon-helmed reshoots began, however, Henry Cavill had grown a mustache
for his part in Mission: Impossible — Fallout. This meant that the Justice
League special effects team had to digitally erase Cavill's facial hair in post-production.
By the time Justice League hit theaters, the extensive reshoots and digital edits had been
widely reported in the media, so it's hard hard to say if anyone would have noticed the change if
they weren't looking for it. Sadly, it happened to be the case that everybody was, in fact,
looking for a digitally altered upper lip that came straight out of Bizzaro World. As a result,
everybody did notice it — and the ensuing laughter could be heard all around the world.
Check out one of our newest videos right here! Plus, even more Looper videos about the DCEU
are coming soon. Subscribe to our YouTube channel and hit the bell so you don't miss a single one.