Captain America: Civil War vs Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice

In less than two months we got a couple of hero vs hero superhero films. The first one released was Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. The second one was Captain America: Civil War. I wanted to take a look at both films and compare them, specially since Batman v Superman didn't succeed in the ways Civil War did. Both films are very similar not just because of the hero vs hero aspect of them. There's the fact that in both films the heroes have different ideologies, and they also get manipulated into fighting at one point. Civil War was fantastic in every single aspect, but Batman v Superman was a big letdown. I'd like to clarify that even though I was disappointed with BvS, I still enjoyed it. So let's look at both films and see why BvS got wrong what Civil War got right. There will be SPOILERS ahead.

BUILD UP
Batman v Superman is the second film in the DC Extended Universe. The first film we got was Man of Steel, and we never saw Batman during that film. BvS had to introduce us to that character, and set up the conflict between him and Superman. Civil War though is the thirteenth film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. We've seen Iron Man and Captain America together in The Avengers and in Avengers: Age of Ultron. Civil War didn't need to introduce either Iron Man or Captain America, plus during both Avengers films we see in various films that both characters think very differently and tend to have confrontations. Going into Civil War we already know that there tends to be tension between this two characters. In BvS there was no such pre-existing relationship. This is the smallest problem for BvS though. I do believe that even though Civil War had an advantage because of this, BvS could have made it work. A bigger problem is the fact that Batman and Superman barely get to interact with each other before their big fight.

INTERACTIONS                                                  Here comes one of the biggest problems Batman v Superman has. Batman and Superman only share two scenes together before their fight. The first scene is at a party held by Lex Luthor. In this scene Clark Kent and Bruce Wayne have an exchange in which they discuss why they believe Batman and Superman are dangerous. Clark finds Batman too violent, while Bruce finds Superman too powerful. The scene is fairly long, the problem here is the fact that since neither Bruce or Clark have revealed each others identity, the conversation isn't a complete exploration of their ideologies. Then there is a second scene. After a big action scene featuring the Batmobile, Superman intervenes and tears open the Batmobile. We finally have Batman and Superman face to face. What do we get? Superman just tells Batman that he should bury The Bat, to which Batman responds to Superman that he'll make him bleed. Superman flies off and the scene ends. This was the perfect scene for both of them to talk and actually discuss why they function the way they do.

 Civil War on the other hand has multiple scenes in which Tony and Steve discuss why they should or should not have supervision. There is also escalation to their interactions, each time the argument getting more heated. When the time the two of them fight there's a clear understanding as to why they're both fighting.

MANIPULATION                                                                                                        Both films feature a villain who ends up manipulating the heroes (to a certain extent) to fight. BvS has Lex Luthor, and Civil War has Baron Zemo. Let's start off with BvS. In BvS Lex Luthor manipulates Superman into fighting Batman. He tells Superman that he has captured his mother, and that she'll die in 60 minutes unless he kills Batman.

In Civil War we have Baron Zemo. He lures Cap, Bucky, and Tony to his lair. Here he shows them footage of Bucky killing Tonys' parents. Tony asks Cap if he knew, to which Cap responds that he did. This (obviously) leads to a big fight. So what's the difference between the two? In BvS, Superman fights Batman just to save his mother. He isn't fighting him because he finds his methods wrong. Civil War though has them fighting because of the different ideas each character has. Tony wants Bucky dead for killing his parents. Cap defends Bucky because he was under the control of H.Y.D.R.A. The way in which Zemo manipulates our heroes is much stronger than Lexs' method. Lex basically forces Superman to fight. Zemo though doesn't make them fight. He just shows some footage that he knows is going to cause a real fight.

EMOTION                                                                                                                         In Civil War there's emotion during the confrontation between Cap and Iron Man. Tony has just learned who killed his parents. He had a rough relationship with his parents, and never got to fix that due to them being killed. He has had to live with this pain for years, and it's all thanks to Bucky killing them. Plus Cap never told him the truth. On the other hand we have Cap, who defends Bucky due to him being brain-washed by HYDRA when this happened. He also believed he was doing the right thing for Tony by not telling him the truth. When they clash in the finale there's a lot of emotion, specially since you are seeing two friends fight each other.

BvS though had none of this. Batman fights Superman because he believes he is dangerous. Superman fights Batman because his mom is in danger. In reality Superman doesn't want to fight Batman. He even tries to explain the situation to Batman before the end up fighting. The result is something that doesn't have any emotion. They aren't friends, one of them doesn't even want to fight. It ends up being a fight that is very entertaining but empty at the same time.

RESOLUTION                                                                
The final problem BvS had was the way the fight ended. In Bvs we have the now infamous Martha scene. As Batman is about to kill Superman, Superman tells Batman to "save Martha". Martha happens to be the name of Batmans mother too. He instantly drops the kryptonite spear with which he was gonna kill Superman. Lois rushes into the room and tells Batman that Martha is the name of Clarks mother. That is it, the fight ends and they team up. I get why they did this. Batman realizes that Clark has people that care about him too. He sees the humanity in him. The problem is the scene is really short, so most people just think that they stopped fighting because their mothers had the same name.

In Civil War the fight ends after Cap destroys Tonys arc reactor with his shield. Cap picks up Bucky (who now only has one arm) and starts to leave. At this moment Tony reminds him that his shield was made by his father, and that he doesn't deserve it. Cap drops the shield and leaves. It's a pretty sad ending. Even though Cap sends Tony a letter at the end of the film telling him that he can count on him, you can still tell that the team is now broken, and that Tony still hasn't forgiven Cap. I get that BvS had to have a "happy ending" between Batman and Superman because they have to make Justice League. It was just way too fast, and poorly handled.

Civil War got a lot of what BvS got wrong by really fleshing out characters and giving everyone a believable reason to do what they're doing. Don't get me wrong though, BvS has a lot of great moments in it. The whole exploration of what Superman is or should be was fantastic, but when it came down to the main event (which was Batman v Superman) there was a lot to be desired. I still though the fight between them was great, but it never made me feel any kind of emotion other than "This is really cool". I hope DC learns from this and start to pay more attention to how they get their characters to interact with one another.