One of the local TV stations has been showing one DC animated movie every week, and this week it was Superman: Doomsday. I’ve been enjoying all of the previous ones I’ve seen but this one in particular was too stupid for my suspension of disbelief:
Doomsday can’t fly. Or if he can, the movie makes it look like he can’t. Superman can get Doomsday off the ground, and his finishing blow relied upon that fact. So why not just get him off the ground and juggle him, where Superman has the advantage? Or why not strand Doomsday in space - even if he’s not dead, he’s not going to be killing anyone if he’s stuck in orbit, flying to Jupiter or drifting out into deep space.
Both Superman and his clone (Bizarro?) want to protect Metropolis. They fight a battle over who will protect Metropolis. Why do neither of them suggest moving their battle to somewhere other than Metropolis? Shouldn’t both of them be happy to not smash any more skyscrapers?
And related to both:
If you are going to pull Doomsday back out of space for your finishing move, why aim for Metropolis? Surely there’s some mountain somewhere you could smash him into, instead of wiping out half a dozen city blocks?
I agree with most of your criticisms, Superman: Doomsday was really weak, and the fact that he fought both Doomsday and Dark Superman (the clone) in Metropolis just…wasn’t good. Lex killing Mercy was also a bad choice (she’s one of a handful of characters I simply can’t see Lex killing).
However, your title is wrong - Doomsday is not part of the DCAU, it’s the first DC Universe Animated Original Movie*, none of which are based in the DCAU. (Crisis on Two Earths started as a concept for a DCAU Justice League movie, to link JL to JLU, but the final product isn’t connected.)
They’re mostly not in continuity with each other, either. The two Superman/Batman films are, obviously the two halves of Dark Knight Returns are, and arguably Justice League: War and JL: Flashpoint Paradox are, based on the Parademons being used in the stinger of the latter. Batman: Gotham Knight is apparently set in the Nolanverse, but you’d never notice it.
‘Original’ is used loosely - most are based on comic book arcs…Doomsday is based on the Death of Superman crossover, and suffers significantly from being compacted into a 90 minute movie.
For what it’s worth it seems they are starting to have some kind of continuity. Flashpoint led into War and War has a teaser for the next one.
Also if you want dumb, look no further than Superman: Braniac Attacks. It looks like Superman TAS; it sounds like Superman TAS but man it is not Superman TAS.