Zack Snyder's Justice League | Review
What is a “director’s cut?” The most common and widely accepted interpretation of the term is a version of a film that is approved by the director. It’s the director’s true vision, without studio interference nor standard running times. These kinds of films are not usually released theatrically (think “Special” or “Extended” editions for home releases). But others believe the version of the film that makes it to theatrical release is, in actuality, the director’s cut because filmmaking is a collaborative process, and directors sign onto studio films with the understanding that they’re not the only decision-makers. Unless you’re someone like Christopher Nolan (The Dark Knight & Inception), who has carte blanche from Warner Bros. to do whatever he wants thanks to his unbroken string of box office hits, you’re going to have to compromise with the studio. Hey, it’s what you signed up for, and it’s just how things work in Hollywood!
I bring all of this up due to this week’s release of Zack Snyder’s Justice League, dubbed “The Snyder Cut.” It’s considered to be his director’s cut of the DC Comics film Justice League, originally released theatrically in 2017, which he ended up quitting mid-production and being replaced by Joss Whedon, director of Marvel’s first two Avengers films. Whedon ended up reshooting most of the film, so much so that cinematographer Fabian Wagner estimated that only 10% of the original footage shot during Snyder’s tenure was used in the final cut. The result was a Frankenstein’s monster-esque mess of a film from two competing visions, filled with tonal inconsistencies and underdeveloped characters. What should have been a monumental occasion—it was the first live-action film adaptation of DC’s superhero team, akin to Marvel’s The Avengers—ended up being a critical and box office bomb (compare the 91% positive reviews and $1.5 billion reception to The Avengers versus just 40% positive reviews and $657.9 million revenue for Justice League). Fans immediately demanded to see Zack Snyder’s version of the film and thus the #ReleaseTheSnyderCut movement was born.
But the big question at the time was, “Does the Snyder Cut even exist?” And even after watching Zack Snyder’s Justice League this weekend, the same question still remains.
There is no doubt that Zack Snyder’s Justice League is the director’s fully-realized vision. It’s a film that consists of all of Snyder’s originally-shot footage and none of Whedon’s (thank god that stupid Russian family is gone!). And Snyder had free creative control, without studio interference (except for one minor scene). But it’s also a film that features edited scenes and characters that wouldn’t have been in Snyder’s original theatrical release of the film, includes a whole new scene filmed just last year, and is twice as long as a typical film! What I’m saying is, Zack Snyder’s Justice League is not the same film we would have gotten from Zack Snyder’s theatrical cut of the film had he stuck with the production all the way through in 2017. Zack Snyder’s Justice League is not “The Snyder Cut.” We’ll probably never see the true Snyder Cut, but, to most fans, that probably won’t matter—Zack Snyder’s Justice League is superior to the 2017 version in almost every conceivable way.
As a DC fanboy who grew up watching Batman: The Animated Series, the Justice League animated series, and Justice League: Unlimited, I’m pretty biased when it comes to DC Comics characters. I’m a bigger fan of their heroes than I am of Marvel’s (though, it’s thanks to Marvel Studios’s success that I’m now fans of some of their heroes), so you can understand my excitement when the first live-action film adaptation of Justice League was announced. I saw the film with knowledge of its production issues and negative reception, and ended up convincing myself it was a good movie simply because it wasn’t as bad as I expected it to be. Fast forward to last December, when I rewatched it again and found myself bored and disappointed that this was the Justice League film we got. DC’s greatest heroes deserved better! Thankfully, we finally do have something better.
In Zack Snyder’s Justice League, the plot still follows the same skeleton of the theatrical version, with the heroes fending off against Steppenwolf and his army of Parademons, and the plot’s MacGuffins (the Mother Boxes) are still there. The biggest change is in the time spent dedicated to developing the characters, especially the newer heroes who hadn’t had a solo film prior to the 2017 film’s original release, namely Aquaman (Jason Momoa), Cyborg (Ray Fisher), and The Flash (Ezra Miller). Cyborg gained the most from this new cut, showing his origin story, complicated family relationship, and a full story arc. Snyder has always described Cyborg as “the heart” of the movie, and seeing the character fleshed-out this time around makes me believe the theatrical version was criminal for how they treated him. The Flash has a better introductory scene now, with a show-stopping speed force sequence involving a car crash. Aquaman fares just a little bit better than he did in 2017, but out of all of the new members of the League, he’s still the least developed and has the least screen time. But overall, there’s a lot more time spent building up the team and showing them working, failing, and succeeding together.
Darkseid
In terms of the bad guys, Steppenwolf has a cooler, spikier design than the bland one we got before, and we see a little bit more of his backstory. He’s still a shitty villain, but still, his depiction here is better than the one we originally got. And I’m glad they got rid of the stupid “Parademons smell fear” aspect of the theatrical cut. New is the introduction of Darkseid, DC’s Big Bad, their Thanos. Darkseid doesn’t have much to do in this film besides looking threatening (like Thanos in all those post-credits scenes prior to Infinity War), especially since Steppenwolf is the main antagonist in the film, but it’s cool seeing him on film for the first time. He’s meant to be the main villain in Snyder’s Justice League sequels, but that probably won’t be happening anymore.
Like all of Snyder’s previous films, this one is beautiful to look at. The cinematography is gorgeous and the color grading fits his over-serious tone. The theatrical cut was an ugly mix of Snyder’s vision and a more light-hearted and colorful affair. But, like all of Snyder’s previous films, this one has a lot of stylized, slow-motion action that, to my surprise, actually works worse compared to the Whedon cut. Both the theatrical cut and this new cut feature many of the same action sequences, but they’re edited differently. For example, both Wonder Woman’s introductory sequence with the terrorists and the Amazon warriors’ fight with Steppenwolf on Themyscira are now longer, and they feature so many slow-mo shots that it actually ends up being less thrilling than Whedon’s version, which had a more propulsive pace. I’ve enjoyed Snyder’s stylized actions in the past, but those were films in which he had to adhere to studio and theatrical limits. This new cut shows us what his action films would look like when his temptations are not reigned in. And that is the fatal flaw of Zack Snyder’s Justice League.
The film can also be called “Zack Snyder, Unleashed.” It’s so overindulgent, overstuffed with plot, too self-serious (the film is split into six “chapters,” each with no apparent thematic differences), and too damn long! Its 242-minute running time does not result in the epic, operatic cinematic experience that Snyder was hoping for. The combination of excessive slow-mo action scenes, several prolonged scenes that provide minor context (no matter how unimportant they are, like the arrow ritual scene on Themyscira), and outright fan service (Superman’s black suit) results in a film that’s kind of a drag, too slow, boring, and joyless at times. Say what you will of the Whedon cut, but at least it was more excitingly paced and joyful.
Zack Snyder’s Justice League tries to be too much at once. It’s too many movies in one, busy setting characters that should have received their own solo films, building into a team-up movie, and introducing characters and plot points that are meant to set up future installments and won’t pay off till then (and the fact that this new cut of the film is not canon means we’ll never see that future anyway). But the blame can’t entirely be on Snyder’s shoulders. The fault is on the chaotic combination of Warner Bros. (the distributor for DC Films) and their rush to imitate Marvel Studios’s success, as well as Zack Snyder’s weakness as a storyteller.
When it was originally announced in 2014, a Justice League film seemed like a no-brainer. It would be the first live-action film depiction of DC Comics’s greatest heroes, including the Holy Trinity—Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman. Under any normal circumstances, Justice League would have been a box office blockbuster-guarantee. Alas, it was anything but. In fact, it felt like the film was doomed to fail from the moment it was announced.
The DC Extended Universe (DCEU) was birthed in 2013 with Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel, the umpteenth reboot of the most popular superhero of all, Superman. Like Marvel’s Iron Man, which was released in 2008, it was a good and fairly standalone feature that merely hinted at future installments, or even a shared cinematic universe. But unlike Marvel, which spent four years dedicating solo films to each of its heroes leading up to 2012’s team-up movie The Avengers, DC pushed out four films in the span of two years in an attempt to play catch-up. 2016 saw the release of Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, which not only introduced that universe’s Batman and Wonder Woman, but also cameos from the rest of the future Justice League members, Aquaman, Cyborg, and The Flash. That same year, the villain-centric Suicide Squad debuted, introducing The Joker, Harley Quinn, and a dozen other characters. 2017 featured the first live-action film adaptation of Wonder Woman, only the second solo superhero film in the DCEU, before leading into Justice League just five months later. It didn’t help that Snyder dropped out of Justice League mid-production and was replaced by Joss Whedon, and that the studio decided not to delay the film despite this production hurdle (all so its executives can cash in on their bonuses before the company’s merger with AT&T). “Rushed” is an understatement.
Director Zack Snyder (right) with Ben Affleck and Gal Gadot.
The DCEU’s entire development history (save for Man of Steel) has been reactionary—to its detriment. The rush into Justice League (and thus, packing Batman v Superman with so many characters for future installments) was in reaction to Marvel’s groundbreaking and industry-transforming success with The Avengers. The final theatrical cut of Justice League was in reaction to the negative critical reception and box office disappointment of Batman v Superman. Before becoming the film’s replacement director, Whedon was hired to spruce up the Justice League script and make it more light-hearted due to the criticisms that Batman v Superman was too serious and joyless. And then-Warner Bros. CEO Kevin Tsujihara mandated the film to be under two hours, also a reaction to the criticisms that the previous films were too long.
But another major problem was allowing Zack Snyder (300 & Watchmen), a filmmaker who isn’t exactly known for nuanced storytelling, to dictate the DCEU’s tone and path forward from Man of Steel. Snyder’s films are known for being beautiful and cinematic, yes, but also bombastic and poorly told. He’s all about what looks cool rather than what makes sense. Upon Man of Steel’s debut, I, like many other, loved it simply due to the fact that it was more exciting than the previous reboot of the character, 2006’s Superman Returns, directed by Bryan Singer (X-Men). Upon rewatching the film last December for the first time since its release in theatres, Man of Steel didn’t really hold up that well. I still love the look and tone of the film, especially Hans Zimmer’s operatic score, but literally two-thirds of the film is action sequences, leaving Clark Kent/Superman to be an underdeveloped character. During development on the Man of Steel follow-up, Snyder thought it’d be cool to include Batman as the antagonist (because why not?), resulting in Batman v Superman, a “sequel” in which Superman is a technically a co-lead, but in which the story focuses so much on introducing Batman that, once again, Clark Kent/Superman is an underdeveloped character. And he fucking dies in that film. Seriously, they killed off one of the franchise’s most prominent characters after just 1.5 films before leading into the big team-up movie. But it was all part of the plan—a multi-film story arc, according to Snyder.
Zack Snyder envisioned a five-part epic saga that would have consisted of Man of Steel, Batman v Superman, and a trilogy of Justice League films that would have brought Superman back to life, introduce a cliffhanger in which the League loses and Superman turns bad, The Flash going back in time to warn Batman to save Lois and prevent Superman from breaking bad, and a climactic battle between the franchise’s big bad, Darkseid, and the world’s greatest warriors, including the Atlanteans, Amazons, Green Lantern Corps, newly formed Justice League, and human armies of the world. Oh, and Batman would’ve fallen in love with Lois Lane upon Superman’s death, before going on to die correcting his mistakes and preventing Superman from going bad, and ending with Superman and Lois having a son named after Bruce, who ends up becoming the next Batman. Yeah, I’m pretty glad Snyder’s vision didn’t come to fruition because this all sounds terrible.
While it’s not entirely Snyder’s fault for rushing into Justice League (it was Warner Bros.’s decision), he was still one of the key creative decision-makers in the DCEU, resulting in a franchise that was gorgeous, yes, but thematically hollow and joyless. Just look at the difference in Aquaman, Shazam!, and Wonder Woman 1984—films Snyder had little to no creative input over—compared to Snyder’s Man of Steel, Batman v Superman, and Justice League. It’s like night and day! The newer films were more hopeful, colorful, and joyful, less serious, and standalone affairs. More importantly, each was directed by filmmakers not named Zack Snyder (James Wan, David F. Sandberg, and Patty Jenkins, respectively).
But here we are. After four long years, Zack Snyder has finally been able to show the world his pure, unadulterated vision of the Justice League, one that, judging by the positive critical reviews and fan reception, is leagues better than the theatrical cut, even if it suffers from fatal flaws stemming from Snyder’s filmic weaknesses. At least the film is a singular vision! I do fear what this means for the future, though, in the wake of the success of the #ReleaseTheSnyderCut movement, and other recent examples, like Sonic the Hedgehog’s film redesign. I’m confident the next movement will be to restore Snyder’s version of the DCEU—the toxic fans are not going to stop with the Snyder Cut. It’s a terrible precedent to set for films to succumb to the demands of toxic fandoms, ones that cyberbully and dox stakeholders. But Zack Snyder’s Justice League also works as a form of therapy for the director, who left the original production due to the suicide of his daughter (the film is dedicated to her, and the closing credits features her favorite song). If Snyder’s endeavor to release this new version of Justice League provided him any type of solace, then maybe it was worth it.
Three out of four Kents.
‘Zack Snyder’s Justice League’ is streaming exclusively on HBO Max.
