*SPOILER WARNING*
If you’ve seen Batman v Superman this past weekend then, like me, you most likely had many more questions than answers about the future of the DC Universe. Ever since I saw the early showings Thursday night, something about the Knightmare Sequence was troubling me. I had to see it again, but now I’ve worked out all the flaws in my theory.
HERE IS YOUR SECOND SPOILER WARNING.
Let me start off by addressing the criticism that this particular sequence has gotten. I’ve seen many reviews saying that this really felt out of place, and that the
Flash’s reveal here seemed shoehorned. Now to the laymen, this might seem the case. Unfortunately, that became a reoccurring theme (
that you needed a strong prior index of DC knowledge going in). But have no fear, this sequence was perfectly placed in the movie. Hear me out, and I think you might agree.
In the Knightmare sequence, we see a war-torn environment not too far off from the world we see in such nuclear apocalyptic games such as
Fallout New Vegas or settings like the
Book of Eli: basically a big desert waste land with deteriorating buildings from what one can only assume is the remainder of Gotham or Metropolis. Right off the bat (pun intended), we see the Omega Symbol. This little tidbit didn’t come as too much of a surprise, because the still image was released before the movie’s debut. However, it comes to play a very important role in this theory. Next we see Batman, who at this point has become a hardened killer (because really what’s the point of a no kill rule when everybody’s already dead) come up to inspect a semi-truck load with who can only be assumed to be the Sons of Batman, or at the least background characters meant to mirror them. There’s a box in the back of the truck which opens up to reveal a glowing green light and the audience thinks “oh okay, it’s kryptonite” right around the time you realize it was all a set up. Cue the Sons of Superman coming in fighting alongside
Parademons from
Apokolips (oh yes, that is definitely what they are). They basically murder the Sons of Batman and capture Batman. The next part of the sequence is Batman being chained up, Superman personally executing the remaining Sons of Batman, and then murdering the Bat himself.
Cue one of the most important scenes for the Justice League and the foundation of this theory.A rift opens up in time and space in front of him in the Batcave, waking Bruce from the dream (of sorts), and the
Flash makes an appearance. “BRUCE!” he screams, halfway through the portal/halfway still in “LISTEN TO ME RIGHT NOW! IT’S LOIS! LOIS LANE! SHE’S THE KEY!”. Then his voice begins to falter. But still yelling he cries, “AM I TOO SOON? TOO SOON. YOU WERE RIGHT ABOUT HIM; YOU WERE ALWAYS RIGHT ABOUT HIM. FEAR HIM! FEAR HIM AND FIND US YOU HAVE TO FIND US BRUCE!”. Then with a loud crack as suddenly as he appeared, he vanishes into the portal, and Bruce wakes up at his desk for a second time.
Now the viewer is left stunned, not knowing how much of what Bruce just saw was real or a dream. I’m about to explain the theory, but there’s still some other parts of the movie that we need to briefly address. At one point during the
Doomsday fight,
WonderWoman said she has “fought monsters before”. If you read into
Thymescira,
the Island of the Amazons, it’s no secret they know all about the Gods of New Genesis (suffice to say for now that this means she’s in the know about a certain someone this theory revolves around). At the end of the movie,
Lex Luthor is trying to convey to Batman that something is in motion, and it is already too late for the world. He keeps talking about the announcement of Superman’s death, and how it has reached the other important beings in space now that there is no one left to protect Earth from whatever it is that’s coming. When
Cyborg is revealed in this film we see a
MotherBox form into his tech, bringing him alive. At this point you probably see where I’m going with this if you know about some iterations of the Justice Leagues formation, particularly in the Animated Films. But, here is the Knightmare Theory in full.
What we saw in Bruce’s Knightmare was NOT a dream sequence that symbolized his internal fear of what Superman will become if left unchecked; rather, Bruce Wayne himself mistakes the sequence for this at the time.
What were actually occurring were Bruce’s memories from a parallel timeline collapsing in on themselves, similar to the seizures the Flash experiences in the story
Flashpoint. The reason why Superman was fighting alongside Parademons, why we see an omega symbol burned into the earth, and why they showed us a MotherBox in cyborg's sequence was to foreshadow the coming of
Darksied. Darksied, for those who don’t follow the comics, is a demi-God ruler of a hellish planet (and I mean that very literally) whose power level frequently goes well above Superman's. His ultimate goal is to control the universe. To accomplish this he seeks out planets with life and invades them with devices called MotherBoxes, technology that among other things allows intergalactic travel instantaneously. He terraforms and/or destroys the planet, steals its resources for himself, captures every living thing, and organically changes it on a molecular scale into monsters called Parademons. Parademons serve and die for him. Then he uses parademons to invade the next planet. He also gains followers who he does not turn into monsters by using an Anti-Life Equation; something that works with a similar property to a magic possession spell, that when exposed to forces you to serve Darksied. If that doesn’t give you an idea of how bad news this guy is, let me just say that the only time the Justice League in comics have ever actually defeated him (instead of just sending him back to where he came from), it ripped apart time and space while collapsing reality in an event called
Final Crisis.
The coming of Darksied was actually what Bruce was seeing in the Knightmare sequence. The reason Superman was acting the way he was is because Darksied sees the Man of Steel as too strong of an asset to simply kill. Rather, he wants to use the Anti-Life equation to force Superman to work for him. This is what has happened in the Knightmare sequence.
Superman has either by choice or by force been made to work for Darksied.
When the Flash appears to Bruce, he is not warning Bruce about an out of control Superman; he is warning him about Darksied. He says Lois Lane is the key, which she hardly was in this movie, and that Bruce should “fear him”. One of the most critical pieces of evidence for this theory we receive is Flash asks if he’s “too soon”. He was. The death of Superman had not happened yet so Bruce would not understand the coming of Darksied. He mistakes it for Superman trying to rule earth. This is why at the end of the movie, Bruce explains to Diana (Wonderwoman) that he still wants to find the other Heroes, even if they’re not ready to be found. He states “has a feeling” that something else is still coming. Nice feeling Bruce, Flash screamed it at you.
Everything Lex Luthor says at the end of the movie correlates with this theory as well. Lex knows all too well about Darksied. This is why he was practically crying when he was talking to Batman about it. Lex had seen the data from the universe on the Kryptonion ship’s database, and had asked the computer to teach him about it. Lex goes on and on at the end about how news of the death of Superman had already been spread further than earth. He even mentions “he’s hungry” when he is warning Batman about what’s out there. Cyborg's scene showed that Motherboxes are already on earth and are operational. The symbolism of the painting in Lex Luthor’s home about the devils coming from the sky is not completely about Superman. It’s about Darksied’s invaders and lieutenants. When Lex realized he would not be able to control Doomsday, he had lost faith that humanity has any angels from the ground to fight for them.
So whenever I hear people criticizing the Knightmare sequence for seemingly being out of place, or the best one I’ve heard is it looks like an after credits scene, I agree with them. It’s like that on purpose. It’s why Flash was pointing out that he was too soon. The reason Bruce has his parallel memories collapse in on him at such a weird time is because of the Flash appearing to him at the wrong time. Flash was “too soon” and so were the memories.
Fear not though Junior Justice Members, the Batman seems to be on the case by the end of the movie. Wonderwoman is right behind him which is good, because our favorite heroes are going to need all the help they can get for what’s coming.
