With Zack Snyder’s MAN OF STEEL sequel currently in pre-production, the director has been discussing just why Batman was added to the mix this time out.

Speaking to Forbes, Snyder said, “After MAN OF STEEL finished and we started talking about what would be in the next movie, I started subtly mentioning that it would be cool if he faced Batman. In the first meeting, it was like, ‘Maybe Batman?’ Maybe at the end of the second movie, some Kryptonite gets delivered to Bruce Wayne’s house or something. Like in a cryptic way, that’s the first time we see him. But then, once you say it out loud, right? You’re in a story meeting talking about, like, who should Superman fight if he fought this giant alien threat, Zod, who was basically his equal physically, from his planet, fighting on our turf… you know, who to fight next? The problem is, once you say it out loud, then it’s kind of hard to go back, right? Once you say, ‘What about Batman?’ then you realise, ‘Okay, that’s a cool idea. What else?’ I mean, what do you say after that?”

On how the whole match-up will look, Snyder added, “The thing also that’s really fascinating for me is that, even just in the tests we’ve been doing, the costumes, right? You basically have Batman and Superman — and this is without Ben and Henry in the costumes, but just like the stand-ins, just testing to see what the costumes look like. And you have them standing there and they’re standing in the same shot — and then we have Wonder Woman, you know, all three of them in the same shot. Even just for a test, you really have to go, ‘Wow, that’s crazy!’ Not only is it the first time that I’m seeing them, it’s the first time they’ve ever existed together on screen in a movie. And that’s kind of a huge deal…..unfortunately, I don’t even know the timeline. Because the movie takes place so far from now, it’s hard to know exactly. That all gets tied to marketing and strategies for the movie. It’s not just a free-for-all, which I’d love it to be. Because I take a picture of the suit with my camera– I’m actually staring at one right now in my office, and it’s just massive on my wall in my office and it’s epic, let me tell you – and I’m like, ‘God, I want to send this to the Internet immediately.’ But I know I’m not allowed to!”

And there was us sceptical types thinking that Batman was merely shoehorned into the sequel after MAN OF STEEL didn’t hit the heavy box office numbers that Warner Brothers was hoping for. Snyder’s sequel features Henry Cavill as Superman, Ben Affleck as Batman, Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman, Jesse Eisenberg as Lex Luthor, Amy Adams as Lois Lane, Jeremy Irons as Alfred Pennyworth, Laurence Fishburne as Perry White, Diane Lane as Martha Kent, and unknown roles for Holly Huner, Tao Okamoto and Callan Mulvey.

The still untitled MAN OF STEEL sequel is currently set for a 6th May, 2016 release.

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