True to source?

There's a difference between "true to source" and "true to character. " I have been hearing a lot of people dismissing criticism against Dawn Of Justice by saying the movie was not true to source, but it was at least true to character.

What makes a character his unique self and not someone else?

Let's say I write a book featuring Antoine De  Saint-Exupery's The Little Prince.

In my story, the prince is a shallow, materialistic hedonist who does smack,  shack up with women,  and kills people on a whim.

Is that "a version" of The Little Prince,  or does the character share so little with the core concept of the creator's character as to be really nothing more than a pastiche character being passed off as the original?

There are core elements to a character that can't be removed without making him into a totally different character.  As Carol Channing once told us at a meeting,  every story has a backbone- similarly,  every character has a backbone that makes him or her who they are.

Superman without his optimism and faith in humanity is not really Superman.  Dawn of Justice gave us a man who looked live Superman but barely ever acted like him.  The true flaw of the cinematic universe so far is that it simply isn't true to character.