Zack Snyder's Justice League - Worth The Wait?

it's hard to think of a cinematic universe that's had a tougher road than dc on film and truly there's no better example of this than justice league a deeply troubled movie whose director had already fallen out of favor with the studio before they even started shooting the thing and when a family tragedy forced him to buy out of the project they seized the opportunity to reshape the entire movie into something completely different unfortunately they lacked the time resources and a director whose creative vision was actually compatible with snyder's and the result was a [ __ ] disaster so nightmarish it actually took me two entire videos to thoroughly destroy the thing but still the hope persisted that someday somehow we might see zack snyder's original vision brought to life for years we were told it didn't exist then we were told it would cost too much to finish then it was never going to get released anyway so stop asking for it but it's amazing what a string of failed movies a major corporate buy over and the launch of a new streaming service can do for you and now here we are after years of fan campaigns denials misinformation revelations expectations and constipation the fabled snyder cut is finally upon us all four hours of it seriously watching this movie was like climbing mount everest i felt like i had to make camp for the night and try for the epilogue in the morning anyway that's enough bitching from me you're here because you want to know if the snyder cut is actually any good is it the fabled holy grail of comic book movies that will write the wrongs of the theatrical version redeem the unfairly maligned snyder verse and get the struggling dc franchise back on track or is it a bloated overwrought vanity project created to pander to fans and generate interest in yet another fledgling streaming service or is it just some weird little creative aberration brought about through a unique set of circumstances that will probably never be repeated weirdly i think it's a bit of all three in narrative terms the snyder cut is a huge improvement over its predecessor although let's be honest that's not exactly a high benchmark the script provides much needed context sets up an explanation to so many of the ridiculous events that just seem to come out of nowhere weaving a story that finally makes a bit of sense it gives characters actual backstories personalities and discernible arcs that logically contribute to the narrative and it constructs a finale that while far from perfect is still a massive improvement over the rushed overblown and desperately improvised cgi nightmare we got before and [ __ ] man even henry cavill gets to look like henry cavill again instead of you know in short it's a far superior movie overall that solves a lot of the problems created by the disastrous weed and cuts unfortunately it also happens to create some entirely new problems all of its own but don't worry i'll get into that later now i'm aware that the snyder cat and the man who created it is a pretty divisive subject and no matter which way i come down on this one people are probably gonna get pissed at me really though all i can do is focus on the movie and do my best to give you what i consider to be a fair and balanced review so that's exactly what i'm gonna do now normally i would kick things off with an in-depth plot summary but to be honest i don't really need one here because it's the same basic story as the weeding cats the death of superman in the previous movie has awoken three ancient weapons known as mother boxes which were abandoned on earth thousands of years ago by an alien entity known as darkseid during a failed attempt to conquer the planets and ever since then he's been searching for them because apparently he forgot what planet he left them on what now they're active again and their presence soon draws the attention of steppenwolf one of darkseid's minions looking to win the approval of his master steppenwolf's goal is to recover all three boxes and unite them into some kind of ultimate weapon that will destroy the entire world fair enough in the meantime bruce and diana are working to recruit other superhumans into the fledgling justice league to oppose him unfortunately there are no match for him on their own and before long he's managed to get his hands on two of the boxes that's when they realise their only chances to use the third one to bring superman back to life before steppenwolf destroys the planets like you say the plot isn't all that different from the weeding cut the big difference however is in the execution the weed and cat came across as rushed chaotic and borderline incoherent at times introducing characters and major plot events with practically no build-up or explanation and relying on the most flimsy excuses and coincidences to make most of it happen the result was that you never really cared about any of it because it was impossible to get invested in and seeing how the snyder cut makes use of its four-hour run time it's easy to see how brutal the cuts actually were so much was lost that was desperately needed particularly when it comes to establishing the movie's characters cyborg actually has a backstory now a personality of sorts and even a character arc that makes sense given what he's been through his relationship with his father is more complex now and it pays off in the finale when the script forces him to confront his conflicted nature likewise with the flash who felt like the most pointless character since hawkeye in the wedding cut his only special ability already taken by superman and wonder woman but now shock horror he actually gets to do things especially near the end and because the script isn't desperately trying to make him funny every two minutes he's a whole lot more likable than before don't get me wrong he doesn't have the charm or charisma of peter parker and ezra miller could definitely use a cup of cam the [ __ ] down at times but overall he's much less irritating and abrasive than before aquaman's personal history and character motivation also gets more fleshed out here so it doesn't feel quite so [ __ ] jarring when atlantis gets introduced he's still not exactly a complex personality but at least the movie gives us something to grapple with that being said there's no getting around the fact that this movie is still trying to do the work of three solo films introducing major new characters that really should have had their own adventures first it's an unhappy compromise that betrays how eager the studio were to get their own version of the avengers up and running but hey it's proof that you can do a hell of a lot more with four hours than you can do with two ben affleck's bruce wayne was probably the best thing to come out of batman vs superman for me but he was also the worst aspect of the wedding cut as i mentioned in my review he was brought back for extensive reshoots probably against his will and he looked tired overweight and disinterested in the new footage the script didn't seem to know what to do with him either and most of the time he just seemed to be hanging around in the background shooting parademons and looking bored as [ __ ] now he's actually allowed to kick a bit of ass again he's resourceful and driven to atone for his mistakes he uses technology to his advantage and his physical appearance actually stays consistent throughout the movie for a change and think [ __ ] the script doesn't try to make him the butt of some crappy jokes superman's resurrection plays out more or less like before and for the life of me i don't know why they didn't save it for the finale but either way he's given more time to get re-established as a character here slowly recovering his memories and sense of self and damn that black suit looks cool as [ __ ] man probably one of the biggest changes to this film is the antagonist the original movie made steppenwolf basically a free agent doing his own thing because he just loves conquering planets i guess not exactly complex motivation but whatever the new version has a bit more going on he's a servant of darkseid who's basically thanos 2.0 here and the script seems to imply that he [ __ ] up at some point and is trying to redeem himself by destroying worlds for his master it's just a shame it never actually explains what he did anyway getting the mother boxes is a handy way to conquer the planet but he's also learned that earth is host to an ancient secret that will allow darkseid to control all life in the universe definitely getting those thanos vibes again but the result of all this is that he's presented as kind of a stepping stone for the justice league on their path to a far bigger threat i mean i guess it's the necessary evil to establish a big bad for the dc universe but the problem with the heavy focused on dark side is that the main antagonist ends up getting overshadowed in his own movie again it's the symptom of trying to do too much with a single film instead of providing smaller less intrusive glimpses across multiple movies i hate to keep referencing the mcu here but when it comes to building up big overarching stories with lots of characters they basically set the benchmark for how to do it i said at the start that while the snyder cut fixes a lot of problems it also introduces a few of its own for a start the dialogue is nowhere near as slick and efficient as whedon's version a lot of the time it comes across as clunky and obvious taking forever to tell us stuff that we already know and drawing out scenes more than they need to be there's also a fair amount of sloppy editing that definitely could have been tightened up and some really inappropriate sound choices like one scene where the league are literally just walking up a flight of stairs and there's this weird heavy metal track playing in the background like this is supposed to be some crazy high impact action scene it's just a flight of stairs mate cam the [ __ ] down neither of these things needed to be in the film and damn i swear you could cut out about 20 minutes if you took out all the endless slow motion there's also a whole bunch of other random [ __ ] that gets thrown in just because they could like martian manhunter showing up at the end to announce that he's apparently a thing now or the post-apocalyptic flash forwards to a nightmare future or the references to time travel and multiverses that will almost certainly be used to integrate this movie into the rest of the series if it somehow becomes a major hit the snyder cut is an interesting insight into what directors will actually produce if they're no longer constrained by runtime concerns or studio pressure and i think in schneider's case that's particularly relevant this is a man who functions best when he's allowed to tell stories at his own pace unfortunately for most of us that pace happens to be extremely slow which creates real problems when a studio steps in at the 11th hour and tries to cut it down with brutal edits it's a bit like the extended cut of batman vs superman which actually overcame a lot of the flaws of the original at the cost of a bloated run time in a very slow pace fans loved it because it gave them more of what they enjoyed but detractors hated it because all it did was amplify their existing gripes and i think whether or not you enjoy the snyder cut will depend mostly on whether you actually like zack snyder movies because i'm going to be honest here everything zack snyder-ish about it is turned up to 11. it's big and extravagant and narratively rich taking its time to tell a complex story but it's also trying to juggle a hell of a lot of different elements and inevitably it drops the ball at times but overall i have to say i was pleasantly surprised by how much the snyder cut improves on its predecessor i mean i kind of assumed it would i just didn't know how much it kept me interested and engaged for most of its run time the characters were much better developed and the ending actually got me kind of excited about where the series might go next it could have been better for sure but it could have been a hell of a lot worse too and like a lot of people i can't help but wonder where the dc universe might go from here whether it's the highs of joker and wonder woman or the lows of well pretty much everything else it's a franchise that's never quite managed to find its feet stumbling over itself in a desperate rush to catch up with marvel unable to get the best out of its great actors and characters and wasting huge amounts of time and money by constantly changing course in the hopes of finding a favorable wind rather than just picking a coherent artistic vision and sticking with it and part of me wishes they'd had a bit more faith and less interference in the snyder verse allowing the man to do his [ __ ] job and tell the story that he wanted to tell rather than trying to turn out an inferior clone of the mcu i don't know if it would have radically changed anything but if the snyder cut is anything to go by i do believe that there's potential here but if nothing else i'm glad that snyder finally got to realize his creative vision only time will tell whether it was worth it anyway that's all i've got for today go away now

Channel: The Critical Drinker

Views: 980,514

Rating: 4.9059796 out of 5

Keywords: Batman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman, The Flash, Cyborg, Ben Affleck, Gal Gadot, Bruce Wayne, Steppenwolf, review, Darkseid

Id: UHS17wRP4aI

Length: 12min 39sec (759 seconds)

Published: Sat Mar 20 2021