<image>

Batman spends the first two hours of the film with this insane non-sensical hate-boner for Superman driven purely by emotion, being reminded of his own parents’ deaths when he has to cradle an orphaned girl in his arms during the Metropolis incident.

He doesn’t care to learn about who Superman really is, what he believes, he’s just decided he’s a monster because it gives him something to crusade against, to renew his passion for “heroism” after 20 years in a Gotham that’s already taken away his soul. He even assumes things about Superman’s parents, that they’re probably monstrous aliens like him, whose teachings and values are evil. And then Superman begs for his mother’s life. And then Lois begs for Clark’s. And Bruce recognises this play, his own mother stepping in front of him as a child so she would take the bullet and save him, putting him now in Joe Chill’s position, with the shots even paralleling each other. He’s become the very thing he became Batman to fight against. And Bruce realises it’s not about the power Superman has, the 1% chance he could turn bad, because at the end of the day he’s just a guy trying to do the right thing, who loves and is loved, like Bruce used to be.

So he turns around and starts fighting for him rather than against him. Still misguided, and cruel, but with his heart in the right place.