I suppose I bring all this up in preface to my... eventual... point, because I sometimes sense that the latest round of DC hero films have perhaps fallen victim to that sort of "binary camp" mode of thinking. And since Marvel Studios movies debuted the fleshed-out reality of a connected cinematic universe, and Zack Snyder's efforts with the DC Universe have been hurrying up to close the gap, they've been the subject of unusual criticism and scrutiny, by the basis of comparison. I'd say this is as true of Warner Bros. studio management as it is of the audience, but that's just conjecture.

I'm happily putting some of the acrimony towards the DC Cinematic Universe at the foot of comic book fandom rivalry. There are some fans of Marvel that want nothing more for the DC comic films to fail miserably, but I would posit that to be a fairly small number. Larger in number would be the more stringent fans of comics in general, who feel that deviation from the original material is a violation of trust that must be met with disdain. To these fans, Marvel Studios' approach, characters, and creative lineage, is more faithful to the original source. Though Marvel movies do catch their share of heat for any deviation, to be sure--see Sean O'Connell's article on CinemaBlend: Iron Man 3 Ruined The Mandarin, And Real Fans Should Be Pissed, and the director's Uproxx interview from earlier this year on the subject: Shane Black On The Nice Guys, Mel Gibson, And Why A Female Iron Man 3 Villains Gender Changed.

A brave, interesting, and relevant diversion from the source material that

pleased me greatly and apparently pissed everyone else off greatly

will be a recurring theme of this article.