(A little backstory)
From the very beginning, DC's Batman v Superman was a very controversial movie. After the mixed critical and audience response along with it not making as much in the box office as much as they wanted to, Warner Bros decided it was time to bring out the big guns in the sequel to 2013's Man of Steel, that 'big gun' being Batman, DC's only superhero who's relatively new movies were both critically acclaimed and commercially successful in Nolan's Dark Knight trilogy. Man of Steel director Zack Snyder was slated to direct a script which was written by David S Goyer and later by Academy Award winner Chris Terrio. Things were looking great for the first few months. The first teaser and the leaked and then officially released ComicCon trailer were both met with positive response. The fans started to like Ben Affleck, who's casting as batman was initially met with negative reception. Fast forward to December 2015, when the second trailer for the movie was released, which some fans described as "I felt like I watched the entire movie in the trailer." The reason behind it was the presence of Doomsday, which was supposed to be the big surprise in the movie, not the trailer. The trailer met with negative reception. In response to this, just weeks before the movie released, Warner Bros. released many TV commercials and a final trailer which helped counter the negative reaction the previous trailer met. And finally, in March, the movie hit theaters which I will talk about in the next part.
My mini-review of the theatrical release
In short, it wasn't great. Actually, disappointing is the one word that can describe our opinion on how the movie was. Don't get me wrong, it isn't a terrible superhero movie (like the 2011 Green Lantern). I don't know if it was because I (along with many others around the world) had kept such astronomically high expectations or if the movie was genuinely not a great film. The fact that it loosely adapted 'The Dark Knight Returns' and the 'Death of Superman' comic books caused the movie to be overstuffed. On the positive note, I'd call this silver screen interpretation of Batman the best (beating out both Bale & Keaton) & it was one of the best looking superhero movies I've seen in a long time. I can't stress how much I enjoy Snyder's visual direction style, right from the introduction credits (which was complimented by Hans Zimmer & Junkie XL's flawless background score music) to the fight scenes. But there in also lies the flaw in the movie, which like Man of Steel, has a very gritty tone which doesn't go well with Superman & Wonder Woman. The movie was also extremely incoherent which led to the "Ultimate Edition" being released.
Here comes my BvS:DoJ Ultimate edition review
As stated above, the movie was very incoherent, which is because of many scenes deleted from the theatrical cut, which would have added more to the (already bloated and complicated) story which were cut from the theatrical release. Scenes which are in some ways pivotal to the story (like a scene which involves Lex Luthor in the Kryptonian ship learning about the mother boxes and the New Gods which explains what he told batman when the latter paid him a visit in jail.)
So to sum it all up....
If you didn't like the theatrical cut of the movie at all, this won't change that and if you loved the movie, this just adds 30mins worth of goodness for you to enjoy. If you're in the middle, I'd recommend you to check it out.
I really hope Snyder learnt his lesson (this time the hard way) that not every scene needs to have style over substance, since he's also currently directing next years Justice League.
