DC Animation Director Defends 'Batman v Superman' Martha Scene

>That's Jay Oliva, the acclaimed director of many of the DC Universe animated feature films and series, including Young Justice, Batman: Assault on Arkham, Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox, Justice League: War, Batman: The Dark Knight Returns 1 & 2. Oliva's work on the animated front has informed some of the DCEU projects like Suicide Squad and Justice League, and he's lent his talent to almost every DCEU films (except Suicide Squad) as a storyboard artist. So, when Oliva drops a line like "But what the hell do I know about Batman," it really needs to be understood in context, to fully appreciate the level of snark in the question.

>Oliva hasn't just bee a DC architect, he's also lent his talent to Marvel, directing the acclaimed Doctor Strange animated movie (2007), which clearly influenced the live-action version, as well as doing storyboards for Marvel films like Deadpool, Spider-Man: Homecoming and Thor: Ragnarok. That's all to say: he's about as "expert" as superohero expertise gets.

It's still stupid.

I did liked the concept of the scene, i just thought it was executed very poorly. I felt the audience was not part of the moment.

I feel like an equally effective line would have been like "Batman... they're going... to kill... my mom..." and then Batman should have regained composure and been like "OH SHIT this is why I became Batman in the first place, to protect people from losing their parents, or other senpai, etc." and then they'd work together.

>implying I'm gonna read any of that
Yeah, when there's a new animated feature that isn't about Batman, then I will consider your opinions valid.

>implying that decision is theirs to make
Don't care. Make a toon about Wonder Woman, or Aquaman, ANYBODY WHO ISNT BATMAN OR BATMAN RELATED. Enough.

To be fair, both sides are to blame. Snyder could've still kept his metaphorical shit yet also make Supes formulate his words better, something like "They're going to kill my mom, they're going to kill Martha". But it didn't help that the common audience is full of retarded normies who don't even know what symbolism is and take every single thing happening on the screen literally. I've legit seen people complain about the flashback because "bats shouldn't be able to lift a man in the air".

>It's completely unnatural and forced for Clark to say that.
>Bruce's reaction was totally logical given what Clark said.

How does the second take anything away from the argument in the first?

It might have been a good scene if it wasn’t as emphasized or dragged out as it was

Logical how? Yes, his father said Martha when his mother died but when is this shown as the basis of Bruce's ptsd in the movie? Or even that Bruce has some kind of ptsd?

There is nothing in the movie that shows how the death of Bruce's parents shaped him to become the Batman. It would have been an other origin story that nobody wanted.
And the name of his mother has never been shown to elicit anything into him in anything that the audience might know of Batman outside of the movie.

We end up with a movie where Batman is hell bent on killing Superman for 1h30 and just stops when he hears: "Save Marthaaaa!!"

"I thought it was pretty clear" is fucking awful for an artist to say, serious or not.

Yes, of course it's going to be "pretty clear" from your perspective, but that doesn't mean it will be from other people's perspectives. Getting more input and revising is a large part of making art work, especially when you have the means to do so; equivalently, not taking input yet acknowledging potential shortcomings/knowledge gaps in the audience is necessary when you have to move forward with a piece of art.

Shaming the audience for not understanding your POV misses the ENTIRE FUCKING POINT of why we make art.

The problem is that the scene became memetic for the wrong reason. The issue wasn't that Batman got triggered by the word "Martha". It was a bit contrived, but it wasn't that big of a deal. The big deal was that Clark said "Martha" in the first place. Who says their mother's name, ever? He should have said "Mom". That would have made way more sense. "Martha" makes the scene go from a little contrived to completely unbelievable. Nobody says their mother's name.

But of course people latched onto the "lol martha triggers batman" thing and the scene became notorious for the completely wrong reason. Like always. The masses have the force and subtlety of a typhoon.

No amount of damage Control will ever fix that scene and that awful movie

>They'll kill... My mom!
>Batman gets flashbacks to his own mom dying
There, now the scene has the same purpose except it no longer feels contrived.

That... That's actually better and makes more sense.
Man, I bet that would've turned it from a confusing, mess of a scene into something more.

Oh my god someone on twitter has a fucking opinion

What's amazing is all it would take for this to work is for a third party to swoop in and yell "No! Stop! We have to save Martha!" for Bats to then go "How do you know that name?" for that third party to say "Martha, his mother, the one who raised him" and then you have Batman look at himself understanding what he almost became and have him throw away that spear (rather than the third party) and the whole damn scene just improved three times over.

>the hack that directed literally all of those dogshit New 52 DTVs defends Martha
What a surprise.

>"Martha, his mother, the one who raised him"

Fuck off Bendis

to be fair, "Why did you say that name?!?" dosn't help the trigger meme. It was just everything that could go wrong on that scene, did.

It's still a poorly made scene. By thise point everyone who isn't a complete fucking retard understands the point of the scene and what it's trying to do but that doesn't mean it works. It's still a poorly constructed scene that doesn't accomplish what it's trying to do, same thing as Superman killing Zod actually.

Fine "Martha, his mother" however you dice it up it makes way more sense for someone that isn't superman to break that down for him.

>Oliva's work on the animated front has informed some of the DCEU projects like Suicide Squad and Justice League, and he's lent his talent to almost every DCEU films (except Suicide Squad)
What?

I understand what they were going for ' oh shit this IS a man, and he has a momma, like I did' but it wasnt done right. People didn't scoff for no reason.

>"No! Stop! We have to save Martha!" for Bats to then go "How do you know that name?"
No, that still sounds fucking retarded.
>"Martha, his mother, the one who raised him"
Super-retarded.

Honestly everything about it was poorly done.
That slow motion close up of Thomas whispering "Martha" at the beginning was horrible and clearly stood out as only happening to set up the later scene.

>clearly set up scene
>but they still had to replay it when Bruce gets triggered, to make sure people didn't forget

What happened to just letting the idiot audience connect the dots on a second viewing instead of being spoonfed?

>including Young Justice
So hes shit then

>why did Superman say thing
>WELL BECAUSE BATMAN
that's not even an answer

Everyone knows WHY it happened, it just happened really awkwardly and poorly.

>You're killing Martha
Didn't sound natural.
Hell Save Martha would've even sounded better and made more sense.
Calling his mother Martha as if that's what he referred to her as sounded too impersonal.

he doesn't get what's wrong with the scene either. I really can't believe these people are working in the industry who have no sense of storytelling whatsoever.

SAY THAT TO ZOD'S SNAPPED NECK

Seriously though, should have just been "There gonna kill my mom" as other user's have said

>Why does Superman refer to his mom as Martha
>Martha triggers Bruce's PTSD

Yeah but.... it's so... silly. And contrived. Did Clark know?

Did he research and deduce that Batman is Bruce Wayne and that those words were the specific last words of Bruce's dad?

Even then, for a movie that takes itself so pretentiously serious, that scene was hilarious in a bad way

Everyone fucking knows what it means. The movie isn't deep. The whole scene was so fucking un subtle. Everyone made that connection, it was still dumb.

Except he killed 20 people that probably had mothers too.

not just any fucking opnion. THE WRONG FUCKING OPINION! *le gasp*

Tow the company line, but it was still a terrible scene. It was out-of-place but so much importance was put on it, so.. nah. You can't explain how it's "actually good". Too late for that.

if you have to explain why it was a good scene, then it probably isn't a good scene

I like how Jay Olivia perfectly explained Batman's trauma but didn't even both to explain why Superman would be calling his mother by her first name.

Yeah but they never cried and called for their momma as he twisted the batarang in their guts. Not in English, anyway.

Probably one of the moms was called Martha

>I felt the audience was not part of the moment, big guy?

FOR YOU, it was pretty clear

I think it's fine but just not the right idea when you are making a blockbuster Superhero movie. Most people are not going to see Batman v Superman and think it's going be an analysis on how these character work in a real world concept.

Having said that Whedon is better and saved JL.

>Flashpoint
>Assault on Arkham
>JL War
>YJ Movie

So he's the one that did the newest ones? I didn't care for them. TDKR was alright though.

I understand what they were going for with the Martha scene, but it was just poorly executed.

>Doesn't have a BTAS credit

Yea he doesn't know shit then.

> Young Justice, Batman: Assault on Arkham, Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox, Justice League: War, Batman: The Dark Knight Returns 1 & 2
> acclaimed

That still doesn't explain why a man would call his mom by her first name while choking to death

Possible way to make the Martha moment less stupid.

Superman fucks Batman up in their Island Brawl.

Lex has then in that area and convinces the Military to "Kill Two Birds with One Stone" And Nuke them with a Kyptonite laced rocket.

Superman picks up on the Rocket and Grabs Bruce and gets them out of there.

Bruce awakens on the Kent Family Farm all bandaged up in Clark's old room. He looks at all the mementos of a child who lived on a farm and grew up to be a man and comes to understand a bit more who Superman/Clark is.

Bruce hears something in the house and tries to sneak out but his injures give him away and Clark catches him sneaking.

Clark fills a cup with Coffee and leaves it on one side of the table while he goes to sit on the opposite side. Bruce warily makes his way to the table and sits down. Doesn't touch the cup.

Here we get the moment where they bond. Bruce while dancing around the actual event gives some information as to why he does what he does and why he's Batman.

Clark being Clark is a lot more open and just tells him stories about Pa and the Farm and what he learned that made him want to help people in the best way possible.

Here we get Clark clutching his head. Lex is tapping into his super hearing and telling him he's got his mother.

He threatens to kill her if he doesn't bring the Batman to him.

Clark tells Bruce what he just heard.

Bruce looks contemplative for a moment then pounds down the cup of coffee

>Saved Justice League

>Bloated the cost
>Still flopped
Otay

BASED Oliva. Tell these low iq pricks how it truly is bro.

Reminder that clark

1 knew bruce was batman

2 probably could have figured out bruces moms name from a quick google

Company employee wants to keep their job and so defends company.
Film at eleven.

Young Justice got revived for a third season due to massive demand and it's the most known DC cartoon among casuals besides the DCAU, but okay.

>we
Back to drawing furry porn in your Grandmothers basement, degenerate.

Who cares what some post-DCAU animation guy thinks?

>hack who makes bad shit defends hackery

Fucking wow.

when I saw the movie I didn't think much of the Martha scene. It made sense to me.
it wasn't till later that I noticed that everyone online hated it.
I guess I get their view point but it worked for me in the movie.
plus on a metaphorical level it was a nice "deep down we are all brothers" sorta thing but without being super heavy handed.

Batfags don't understand Superman.

Killing all those people with guns didn't trigger his ptsd but MARTHA did. What a genius.

And then Superman reveals that Ma Kent is his mother, and he thought he was going to be dead an not be able to protect her from the fallout. But hey, maybe expecting Sup Forums to get that as asking too much.

That is true, calling mothers by their first name is a trope reserved exclusively for massive assholes who have zero respect for their mom. Superman clearly cares for his mom, and is very open about it, so calling her Martha is confusing and contrived. It's something that FEELS scripted and unnatural.

His work sucks, of course he defends the Martha scene

>without being super heavy handed

>Superman has to specifically say Martha
>flashback to Thomas saying it so you would remember something that happened an hour ago in the movie
>Lois lane just conveniently jumps in to say "its his mothers name!" just to clarify it even more
> batman just drops his plan to kill superman after killing maybe 20 guys because the God like alien had a earth mom with the same name that he couldn't figure out while Lex somehow did

>an hour ago
it felt like five, to be fair

>> batman just drops his plan to kill superman after killing maybe 20 guys because the God like alien had a earth mom with the same name that he couldn't figure out while Lex somehow did
Batman being a hypocrite who turns a blind eye to shit when someone he likes or cares about is doing it is a well established trait.

Yes we know that, that's why it's fucking stupid.

It wasn't Clark, you retard, it was Superman. Martha Kent isn't Superman's mom, dummy.

How would you make the Martha thing work? It's like if Franklin were to run up to The Thing whulr shouting "Uncle Ben" and out of nowhere Spider-Man gets triggered.

Also fuck this twitter drama.

Chip, is that you

>the acclaimed Doctor Strange animated movie (2007)

Is this the one where his sister gives him the fuck me eyes?

Most of those movies are shit.

>Feature film
Not the series, user.

>There is nothing in the movie that shows how the death of Bruce's parents shaped him to become the Batman.

Except, you know, the whole opening dream sequence...

Batman made it clear he thought Superman's parents weren't human, from when he says "I bet your parents tought you were special." This implies he thinks Superman's parents are at least partly responsible for Superman being a detatched from humanity (at least thats how Batman views him). So Superman begged Batman to save a human by name because he knew Batman still wanted to protect innocent humans after he killed Superman.


If Superman had said "save my mom" Batman would think "I made it pretty clear earlier I dont give a shit about your alien parents you fucking alien" and murder him. At the very least the name Martha gives him something to go after/look for.


You guys would make terrible detectives.