Zack Snyder's Justice League (Review)

After the critical and box office failure of 2017's Justice League, many comic book fans foresaw a dark future for the DC Extended Universe (DCEU). If they could mess up one of the films that people have waited forever for, with the world's greatest superheroes being reduced to little more than jokes, what hope did we have for other projects? We've known for some time that the film met countless problems with production, with original director Zack Snyder leaving the project after disagreements with Warner Bros. (WB). Avengers: Age of Ultron director Joss Whedon was then brought into do rushed reshoots and salvage the film, only to come out with a mess of a film that brought little but disappointment to viewers. 

Fans have long demanded for the release of Snyder's original cut of this mega-film, lovingly dubbed the "Snyder Cut" and Snyder himself has teased this pet project of his for the longest time. Finally, after 4 long years we're getting it, with the officially named Zack Snyder's Justice League being released on streaming service HBO Max. A 4 hour-long monstrosity of a film, this is the so-called proper retelling of what could've been the greatest superhero film of all time, this time at the hands of the original DCEU worldbuilding director himself. Visionary director or talentless hack? This question will be answered by the end of this film, which chooses to alter key events in the DCEU and refocus on existing characters as well as introduce new ones. Let's dive in. 

REVIEW (SPOILER ALERT)

Introduction and background to the Snyder Cut: It's no surprise that the production of Justice League was bogged down by countless issues, primarily stemming from WB executives disagreeing with Zack Snyder's vision and direction, causing them to hire Joss Whedon over from Marvel Studios. Snyder and Whedon would continue to work together until Autumn Snyder, Zack's daughter, committed suicide in May 2017. Snyder would step away from the project, no longer wanting to fight for control with WB and the production went to hell. The final outcome was a strange mismatch of Whedon's reshoots and Snyder's original scenes, with very obvious differences, resulting in a less than stellar product which lost the studio a massive amount of money as well as the goodwill of many fans. 

Because of how poorly received Justice League was, WB decided to move away from Snyder's plan of a massive interconnected shared universe much like the MCU and instead focus on telling separate stories with separate franchises while still keeping all of them in the same universe, albeit with fewer connections. This started with 2018's Aquaman and the trend has yet to change. Disappointed fans would start a petition to release what they called the "Snyder Cut" and for a while this movement gained traction before ultimately falling flat on its face. Of course, with nothing short of magic and pixie dust, the project did get back on its feet and after release on HBO Max was confirmed, the next question was whether Snyder would put out a full 4 hour-long mega-film or release a 6-part miniseries. Well, we know what was the answer to that because man really sat through the longest movie I've ever seen in my life. 

It wasn't just fans who disliked Whedon's work, many cast members themselves have expressed dissatisfaction, with a scandal even coming to light when Ray Fisher (Cyborg) exposed the toxic work environment on Whedon's Justice League set. Many of the cast also showed support for the release of the Snyder Cut, including Ben Affleck (Batman), Gal Gadot (Wonder Woman) and Jason Momoa (Aquaman), which is why it's no small wonder that most of the directors in the DCEU don't consider Whedon's Justice League to be canon, with Wonder Woman franchise director Patty Jenkins specifically saying as such. Momoa has also gone on record saying that Aquaman takes place after the events of Zack Snyder's Justice League. That being said, although many of the DCEU's insiders believe the Snyder Cut to be canon, other works that were released after Josstice League don't support this idea and Snyder himself has also gone on record to say that his version is non-canon.

So if you want to understand the DCEU a little better, just take it as the Snyder Cut is just another alternate interpretation and isn't part of the shared universe, with every other DCEU film thus far still being canon. 

Snyder vs Whedon (production): In order to simplify things, I'll be referring to Zack Snyder's Justice League as the "Snyder Cut" and Whedon's theatrical release as "Josstice League", with the latter actually being a term coined by fans in derision. As I've mentioned atop, Josstice League was very much a hasty and poorly-done amalgamation of two parts, which resulted in scenes flowing very awkwardly. This is why it's important to note that the Snyder Cut has (obviously) incorporated none Whedon's reshoots, instead choosing to use Snyder's original scenes plus some new footage shot in more recent years. Got that? Then let's get into this segment properly.

The most obvious and immediate difference is the colour grading used for both films. While Josstice League chose to brighten everything in line with the film's lighter tone, the Snyder Cut sticks to the same formula that Man of Steel and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (henceforth referred to as BvS) followed, and that is making everything very dark and grainy. All the colours are generally dulled to the point where everything's bordering on being black-and-white, befitting the far darker tone that the Snyder Cut has gone with. This leads me to my next point, differences in tone. After the considerably gloomy atmosphere that Snyder's previous DCEU outings landed audiences in, Josstice League ended up forcing in a lot of humour and comedic moments, which ended up just being very awkward (more on this later). The Snyder Cut on the other hand limits its comedy, only keeping in very small scenes meant to elicit a slight chuckle from us. The Snyder Cut is very deliberately set up such that viewers feel the hopelessness that our heroes are in at many points in the film, which completely sets it apart from Josstice League. 

Technically, the plot of both cuts are the same. For comparison purposes we'll take Josstice League as the original product here. The Snyder Cut follows pretty much the same storyline as the theatrical release, albeit adding a lot of cut content and plot lines, and I mean A LOT. It's to the point that the Snyder Cut ended up being twice as long as Josstice League's fairly normal theatrical runtime of 2 hours. I'll elaborate more on my thoughts on this later but safe to say, the Snyder Cut has decided to expand way more on the DCEU's lore and mythos than Josstice League did, in line with Snyder's worldbuilding vision. 

Snyder vs Whedon (plot): Josstice League makes it fairly clear to us that Steppenwolf (played by Ciaran Hinds) is the biggest bad the DCEU has seen thus far, with him being the one that led Apokolips' (failed) invasion of Earth thousands of years ago, using the power of the three Mother Boxes. While it's mentioned that he's in service of Darkseid, the New God himself is never shown, with Steppenwolf's failure to conquer Earth causing him to fall out of favour with his master. As such, the events of Josstice League is purely for that villain to redeem himself. The Snyder Cut completely changes that by making Darkseid (played by Ray Porter) the one who tried to invade Earth in the past but was also ultimately defeated by the combined might of Earth's forces. Instead of trying to redeem himself for his failure to conquer Earth, Steppenwolf is now trying to make amends for an unknown reason, with Earth being just one of the 50000 planets that Steppenwolf has to conquer before Darkseid will take him back in. 

In both cuts, the League work to revive Superman in order to take down Steppenwolf but in the Snyder Cut, it's made very apparent that that's just the tip of the iceberg in terms of the problems they have to deal with. With Darkseid very clearly having a huge presence in the Snyder Cut, the League believe that Superman is their last chance to deter the most powerful threat that our planet has ever seen. Josstice League ends like you would expect a typical superhero film to end, with many fans calling it very similar to the MCU, good guys win, bad guys lose. Superman was for all intents and purposes the film's Mary Sue because the moment heh showed up, Steppenwolf went from this dangerous foe who was casually beating down the other League members into a wimp. Steppenwolf would ultimately get attacked and taken away by his own Parademons, with the strange reason that they can sense his fear, before all the bad guys teleport away through a Boom Tube. 

Josstice League very much left Steppenwolf's fate ambiguous but you can probably guess that whatever was waiting for him back on Apokolips wasn't pretty. The Snyder Cut on the other hand, actually makes it pretty clear to us that the heroes lost. You heard me right, at the film's climax the League fails to prevent the three Mother Boxes from synchronising, resulting in "the Unity" being formed and beginning the process of decimating the Earth. They've failed and the world is doomed, that is, until The Flash enters the Speed Force and runs back in time, reversing everything until right before the Unity forms, preventing the world-ending disaster from happening. It's because of Barry's last-minute save that the League are finally able to prevent Earth's destruction and this time actually kill Steppenwolf, sending his body and decapitated head flying through a portal to Apokolips, landing right in front of Darkseid and his army. 

If it wasn't clear enough by now, the Snyder Cut is playing up the importance of Darkseid as the DCEU's big bad, just like what Thanos was to the MCU (for lack of a better comparison). While Steppenwolf is still functionally the main villain of the film, it's very obvious that Darkseid was Snyder's final plan for the DCEU's foreseeable future. The Snyder Cut cements the formation of the Justice League as a foil to Apokolips' ruler whereas Josstice League pretty much just made the League for the sake of ensuring the team existed. 

We're now moving into territory that Josstice League never touched on. The film we got in theaters very much made it all about Superman, with the rest of the League practically being relegated to supporting characters, with the exception of Batman. The Snyder Cut has corrected this by effectively making Cyborg the most heavily focused-on character. Josstice League very very briefly skimmed over Cyborg's story and by the end of it, we really didn't know much about him at all. Snyder has given us so much more depth to the tragic hero that is Victor Stone, a promising football star whose dreams were crushed in a car accident and then whose hopes of a normal life were brutally taken by his father Silas' (played by Joe Morton) experimentations with a Mother Box in order to save his son. We followed Victor on his emotional roller coaster, initially thinking of himself as a monster who resents his father for what he's done to him, before finally accepting his status and preparing to become a hero. With Silas' sacrifice to aid the League, Victor unlocks his true potential and becomes the real hero of the day, separating the Mother Boxes and saving the Earth (of course, with some help from Superman and The Flash). 

Another character who Snyder focused on more was The Flash (played by Ezra Miller). Many fans had a huge problem with Josstice League basically turning Barry Allen into this awkward and almost incompetent hero with lots of strange forced humour moments, so it's nice to see Snyder elevate the character a bit by getting rid of the weird humour and instead choosing to explore Barry's backstory with a little more depth, and having him showcase his powers better. I mentioned that Cyborg was integral to saving Earth but in truth, The Flash might be just as important here because he's the one who reverses time when the League initially fails. It was super cool to get our first proper look at the Speed Force in the DCEU and a small glimpse into the future (no pun intended, although I'll elaborate more on this later), so this was a good move on Snyder's part. 

Snyder Cut (ending and epilogue): This topic deserves a whole segment for itself because there's a good amount to cover. Somewhere in the middle of the film, Darkseid graces Steppenwolf with his presence (through some molten metal screen thing), with the latter revealing that a powerful weapon known as the Anti-Life Equation exists on Earth. If you know anything about comics, hearing this term should've rung all the alarm bells for you because the Anti-Life Equation is one of the most dangerous things in existence in the DC multiverses, a mathematical formula that allows the user to dominate the will of any sentient being by instilling the notion that life, hope and freedom are all pointless. This is why Darkseid has made it his ultimate goal to attain the Equation, which would give him enough power to control the entire multiverse. Despite Steppenwolf's failure and eventual death at the hands of the League, Darkseid isn't perturbed at all and instead chooses to rally Apokolips' armada first before invading once more, all to acquire the Anti-Life Equation. 

This directly ties into something very important in the Snyder Cut, Superman's revival. Did it help the heroes in the short term? Of course, the strongest superhero on Earth was absolutely necessary to defeat Steppenwolf but what's going to happen in future? Before the revival process begins, Cyborg has a vision of an apocalyptic future known as Knightmare not unlike the one Batman saw in BvS, a future where Wonder Woman and Aquaman have been killed by Darkseid (with the latter actually being killed by the villain's Omega Beams), and a future where Superman has lost Lois Lane. We see a broken man of steel cradling his lover's corpse, only to find Darkseid resting his hand on the hero's shoulder. Next thing we know, Superman has changed sides and is assisting in the decimation of Earth, killing countless heroes (including a brief Easter egg of the Green Lantern Kilowog). 

By the end of the main story, we're left with hopeful vibes that this Knightmare might not come to pass but sadly, we get another vision, this time from Batman's perspective. In that future, heroes and villains alike have to band together to stay alive, with Batman, Cyborg and The Flash joined by Mera (Amber Heard), Deathstroke (Joe Manganiello) and The Joker (Jared Leto). A conversation between Batman and The Joker confirms once again that the clown prince of crime did indeed murder one of the Robins, with Batman retorting by revealing that a now dead Harley Quinn had told him to kill The Joker slowly. Before we get anything more, Superman appears, fully prepared to destroy this motley team of survivors. It's important to note that Barry is decked out in the same costume that we saw in Batman's dream in BvS because right after this he'll run back in time and warn Bruce that "Lois is the key", in a bid to prevent Lois' death and Superman's brainwashing. Of course, we found out in that previous film that The Flash was "too soon" because at that point, Bruce had no idea what was going on yet.

Of course, this Knightmare sequence is yet another of Bruce's premonitions and after he jolts awake, he gets visited by none other than J'onn J'onzz aka Martian Manhunter. The Manhunter had appeared in a previous scene, where he shapeshifted into Martha Kent and visited Lois to snap her out of her gloomy daze, before shapeshifting to General Swanwick (played by Harry Lennix), who we know from Man of Steel and BvS. Swanwick's true identity as Martian Manhunter was a fan favourite theory that was eventually confirmed by Snyder and Lennix reprises his role. J'onn arrives to tell Bruce that he'll aid him in future before flying off. Clearly lots were being set up by the end of the Snyder Cut but whether we'll see them come to pass is another thing (more on this later). 

Pros: It's safe to say that the Snyder Cut is better than Josstice League. A more well-rounded story, characters that were far more well-developed and overall, the film didn't feel like a one-and-done affair like the theatrical release was. I want to take the time to praise Ray Fisher's and Ezra Miller's performances especially. Because their characters got much more focus in the Snyder Cut, the actors had a lot more room to, well, act properly and give us good performances. Being arguably two of the most important heroes in this film, I'm very glad that we got to see far better characterisation. I will also say that Ben Affleck's Batman was far better portrayed here than in Josstice League. You could tell that in Whedon's reshoots, Affleck seemed like he wanted to be anywhere else but there, and after Josstice League, he basically left the role of the dark knight. All this resulted in Batman's role in the theatrical release being very strange and not like Batman. He seemed so obsessed with bringing back Superman for the sake of it rather than actually providing a good reason for it. 

In the Snyder Cut, you can visibly see Affleck care a little more. Granted a good portion of the film was filmed before Whedon's reshoots but still Batman's characterisation is so much better, where he wants to work towards the greater good of humanity, leading to his decision to resurrect Superman. When an actor cares a little bit more, you get a character that you feel something about and that was definitely the case with these three aforementioned members of the League. It's a shame that we probably won't get something like this in the DCEU's future though (more on this later). 

For the few scenes we saw him in, Darkseid was also a pretty cool part of the film. This marks the dark New God's first live-action appearance and he's truly menacing. Granted, he's not as bulky as the comic iteration and yes he doesn't use a battle-axe in the comics but I can overlook all that because Ray Porter delivered the gravitas and charisma you would expect from the greatest villain to grace the DCEU. I was also very happy to see my favourite DC superhero Martian Manhunter finally appear on the big screen. We've seen live-action TV versions in Smallville or Supergirl before but there's just something different about finally seeing him in a film. We've known for a while that Martian Manhunter has been part of Snyder's plans so this wasn't really a surprise but it's still great. Both of these character introductions are part of Snyder's massive worldbuilding vision which when put in a film with a normal theatrical runtime would end up being too forced in but because of the Snyder Cut's long runtime, the worldbuilding felt fine here. 

Lastly, while I didn't pay too close attention to the soundtrack, I must say that I was very happy to hear the return of Wonder Woman's awesome theme. If you want to read a more elaborate version of my thoughts on this soundtrack, please look at my Wonder Woman 1984 review but I'm glad we got to hear it once more. 

Cons: I won't deny the Snyder Cut was better than Josstice League and it was clearly a project made with love but it wasn't perfect, far from it. There were discussions about whether the Snyder Cut would be released as one long film or as a multi-part miniseries and of course the former was decided on. While I won't deny that the 4 hour runtime aided Snyder's worldbuilding vision by making everything feel less cramped, I felt that the long runtime was possibly my biggest problem with the film. 

I can appreciate that the Snyder Cut is shot beautifully as is the case with Snyder's grandiose cinematographic style but there's just so many unnecessary scenes that were put in. For starters, while I did think that the opening scene showing Superman's death was somewhat important because it showed that the Kryptonian's death was a big enough event to trigger the Mother Boxes but at the same time, it was extended for so long and the whole scene just felt very drawn out. That opening could've easily been cut in half and we would've still understood or gotten its full effect. Other scenes like the Icelandic women singing a folk song when Aquaman returns to Atlantis after bringing them a bountiful catch or when the Amazons go through the ritual of lighting the Arrow of Artemis are so unbelievably pointless, and let's not forget to mention the insane amount of slow motion that Snyder has jam-packed into this film. I can overlook scenes with The Flash because it makes sense then but you don't need slow motion to make a scene cool. If anything, the one-take Knightmare fight sequence with Batman in BvS was freaking awesome and that was shot in real time. 

I understand what Snyder was going for with the long runtime, he's a "visionary director" and has a lot of ideas he wants to put in his products. But if including all these elements is making it any harder for your viewer to enjoy your film, then that's a problem. From what I understand, the jury seems to be out on this topic because some people thought the runtime didn't take away from the film while others just couldn't handle it. I'm leaning a little bit more towards the latter, although I was able to finish the film in one sitting. 

The second problem I had was the colour grading and this is also a problem I had with BvS. Like I mentioned up top, everything's just so dark and gloomy, bordering on being black-and-white. Again, it fits the dark tone of the Snyder Cut but it's just too much, there were scenes where I couldn't really make out what was going on because it was just so dark. That's why I was quite happy that once Superman was revived, everything became a lot brighter, maybe as an allegory to how the man of steel is bringing hope and thus light back into our world. Either way I honestly don't have too many complaints outside of this for this film. 

The future of the DCEU: While the Snyder Cut isn't officially considered as part of the DCEU's canon, the general populace has received it well, with many people wanting Snyder's vision to come to fruition. That said, will it change anything about the direction the DCEU is headed? Unfortunately I highly doubt so. As we know one of the huge gripes that a good number of people had with BvS was Snyder's excessive focus on worldbuilding and unfortunately I can't disagree. Personally I feel that they shouldn't have gone with the Death of Superman storyline so quickly, even if it was meant to be a direct set-up for Justice League. Snyder had such a grandiose vision for the DCEU that I felt that BvS' theatrical run simply couldn't contain all the plot elements, which then ended up translating to Josstice League being a whole mess as well (even if that film didn't have as much worldbuilding). I did mention up top that the Snyder Cut kind of solves this problem because of its insane runtime, which evened out the worldbuilding. 

Looking at the trend for DCEU films post-Josstice League, the failure of what should've been one of the greatest superhero/comic book films of all time ended up completely changing the DCEU's direction, with the studio deciding to instead focus on standalone films and standalone franchises that while still exist in the same universe, are now all very unconnected stories. We saw this with the films that've already been released post-Josstice League like Aquaman and Shazam!, and based off upcoming DCEU films like The Suicide Squad or Black Adam, these films are all either standalone sequels to a previous film or an entirely self-contained story. With the exception of The Flash, which is most likely going to adapt the Flashpoint storyline, none of the aforementioned films have a conceivable impact on one another and the DCEU at large. The DCEU also has an entire slate of planned and announced films, we have stuff like Blackhawk, Hourman and even an untitled Superman film that won't even revolve around Henry Cavill's version of Kal-El, with us instead focusing on an African-American Superman. If it isn't clear enough by now, WB has no plans on moving forward with Snyder's version of the DCEU. 

Now that the Snyder Cut has been met with general critical acclaim, could this change in the near future? Could we be seeing Justice League sequels or anything of the like? Well, I don't think so. See at this point, I highly doubt WB is going to change gears once again and go the route of a super-interconnected shared universe because frankly, I think they have a good thing going on here with standalone franchises within the DCEU. I could watch Shazam! Fury of the Gods and not have to worry about Aquaman 2 for example because they're totally separate from each other. Similarly, stuff that haven't been given official release dates like Harley Quinn vs. the Joker and Lobo are most likely not going to be linked, so viewers don't have to watch everything to get a good idea of what's going on. This direction is great and will keep viewers invested in the DCEU, just to watch the products that catch their fancy. This is the antithesis to the MCU, which focuses heavily on interconnectedness, especially with the inception of the Disney+ series (if you want to hear my thoughts on that in greater detail, please head to my WandaVision posts). 

This is kind of a shame because the Snyder Cut gave us so many Easter eggs and possibilities, and developed some of these characters well, especially Cyborg. I'm not worried about Ezra Miller's future as Barry Allen because his film has already been greenlit (even though it's been stuck in developmental hell for who knows how long) but odds are, we're probably never going to see Ray Fisher's Cyborg ever again. In case y'all didn't know, Fisher is considered a whistleblower in the industry, exposing the toxic work environment on Josstice League's set. While that might be a moral thing to do, no industry looks at whistleblowers favourably and Fisher has functionally destroyed his career in the film industry. We've already seen the fallout from this, with a planned Cyborg film completely falling through and while initially reprising his role in The Flash, Cyborg would get written out of that film as well, partially because Fisher has refused to return to DC Films if Walter Hamada (a film executive) is involved but partially because of the actor's newfound whistleblower status. I'm not going to open the Hamada can of worms so do your own research if you wish. Bottom line, even with Cyborg's far better characterisation and development in the Snyder Cut, we probably won't see him ever again. 

I'm also pretty bummed out that we probably won't see Ray Porter's Darkseid or Harry Lennix's Martian Manhunter return. We get these two awesome characters set up in the Snyder Cut but the chances of them even reappearing again are close to zero. Unless they decide to bring Darkseid in for future films or Martian Manhunter for Supergirl or something, I don't think we're going to see them again. The Snyder Cut might be gaining traction but I don't think it's enough to convince the studio to switch gears again. If they do the worldbuilding route, I can almost guarantee you it's going to go back to the mess that was BvS, especially with normal theatrical runtimes. Unless everything is 4 hours long, which is extremely unrealistic, we're not getting Snyder's vision for the foreseeable future. Sorry guys. 

Final thoughts: The Snyder Cut will undoubtedly go down in history as one of the greatest comic book adaptation projects of all time, proof that with enough passion from the filming crew and cast, as well as enough fan support, we can accomplish wonders. Do I think it's the greatest film of all time? Definitely not, I have pretty mixed feelings about it. Like I said earlier, even with the improved worldbuilding, there's just so many unnecessary elements included that really take away from the film. That said, I applaud Zack Snyder's conviction and his vision, even if I don't necessarily agree with it, as well as the cast's performances and that's enough for me to give Zack Snyder's Justice League an 8/10. Thanks for reading.