When Zack Snyder was hired to launch the DC Extended Universe with Man of Steel (2013), his mandate was clear: to create a fully-realized world that would eventually be populated by a roster of superheroes starting with their most famous, Superman (Henry Cavill). The filmmaker would provide the stylistic template for other directors to follow and with Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016), he introduced Batman (Ben Affleck) and Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot) (along with brief cameos by the Flash, Aquaman, and Cyborg) into the DCEU and one could sense he was building to something even bigger, not just a larger threat for our heroes to face but a bigger response.
Justice League (2017) would see
Batman recruit the Flash (Ezra Miller), Cyborg (Ray Fisher), Aquaman (Jason
Momoa), and Wonder Woman to stop an alien threat of unimaginable danger.
Anticipation was high for the movie and then towards the end of production
Snyder was confronted with terrible tragedy that forced him off the project.
Without missing a beat, the studio brought in Joss Whedon to do significant
work and complete it in time for its intended release date. This version
pleased few and was savaged by critics, underperforming at the box office.
That
should have been it. Rumors, however, persisted among Snyder’s dedicated
fanbase that a cut of his version existed and support for it began to gradually
gather traction over time until the studio finally took notice. They were
launching a new streaming app and not only needed content but a big and splashy
title that would garner a lot attention and, more importantly, subscribers. Negotiations
began with Snyder and he was given enough time and money to complete his
version of Justice League (2021), a
massive, four-hour epic that concludes his DCEU trilogy.
The movie
begins with an ending: Superman’s death that we saw at the climax of Batman v Superman only now seeing how
the literal aftershocks of his demise are felt all over the world by other
mighty beings such as himself. Fearing that Doomsday, the villain of that
movie, was only the beginning, Bruce Wayne seeks out other powerful titans with
little success, initially. People like Aquaman are content to protect their own
pockets of the world until, that is, a portal appears in Themyscira, and hordes
of aliens led by Steppenwolf (Ciaran Hinds) appear seeking the Mother Box, an
“indestructible living machine,” as Wonder Woman later puts it, that when
united with two others, can manipulate great power.
This is
only the tip of the iceberg for if Steppenwolf can unite the Mother Boxes and
summon his master, Darkseid (Ray Porter), this will unleash a destructive power
that universe has never seen. Only when it becomes personal do the heroes feel
compelled to band together and stop this overwhelming threat.
After the
Frankenstein-like pastiche that was Justice
League, this new version feels and looks much more consistent with Snyder’s
other DCEU movies, in particular, Batman
v Superman. Given the creative freedom he was reportedly given, he really
cuts loose as evident in the sequence were Wonder Woman recounts a story about how
Darkseid and his minions arrived on Earth thousands of years ago to conquer it
only to be repelled by an alliance of Gods, Amazons, Atlanteans, humans, and a
Green Lantern. This allows Snyder to do what he does best – show powerful
beings smiting each other in slow motion only on a much grander scale than he
has ever done before. Imagine the epic battle scenes from Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings films with
Snyder’s own 300 (2007). This battle
is Zack Snyder at his most Zack Snyder-ist with almighty gods having it out with
ancient aliens on a massive scale all to the strains of a vaguely operatic
score.
Snyder
certainly has a knack for staging action set pieces and where his trademark
slow motion/speed up technique is used most effectively is the introduction of
Barry Allen a.k.a. the Flash when he applies for a job only to save a woman
from a deadly car accident that he locked eyes with moments before all to the
strains “Songs of the Siren” (hauntingly covered by Rose Betts) that is
hypnotically and as visually arresting a sequence as anything in the
filmmaker’s canon.
Of
course, having this kind of creative freedom allows Snyder to indulge in his
some of his more indulgent tendencies that feel a tad out of place in a movie
like this, such as moments of ultraviolence when Wonder Woman takes out a group
of terrorists in a museum in London, England. She doesn’t just dispatch the
baddies, Snyder makes sure we hear them slam hard against walls with a
sickening thud and accompanying blood splatters. Wonder Woman straight up murders
these guys, literally exploding the ringleader at the end and then, without
missing a beat, turning around to a little girl and giving her some
aspirational pearl of wisdom. It’s not like she hasn’t killed people before in
other movies but it is the way they are depicted in Justice League, which is so disturbing.
Like a
lot of contemporary CGI villains, both Steppenwolf and Darkseid lack
personality and whose motives are the same old tired clichés we’ve seen a
million times before. Marvel broke the mold with Thanos in the Avengers movies, coming the closest to
almost making us forget he was a completely digital creation. The baddies in Justice League look exactly like they are
and, as a result, we don’t really feel that tangible threat or sense of danger
as we know these are purely digital beings. That being said, they aren’t really
that important to the story beyond being a catalyst to get the heroes together.
The most
significant change from the theatrical version is how Snyder’s version acts as a
backdoor origin story for Cyborg, placing him and his relationship with his
father (Joe Morton) at the movie’s emotional core. In Whedon’s version, his
character was relegated to almost an afterthought. In fact, he plays a pivotal
role in the movie’s climactic moment.
Snyder is
an impressive visual stylist and before Justice
League his movies often felt hampered by miscasting in pivotal roles and
uneven screenplays with clunky dialogue that sometimes failed to understand
their source material. This obscured his distinctive directorial vision. The
script for Justice League, written by
Chris Terrio, is the first one since James Gunn’s work on the 2004 Dawn of the Dead remake, that matches
Snyder’s visual prowess. With Justice
League, he wanted to make something grandiose and mythic – after all he’s
dealing with both ancient gods and contemporary beings with god-like powers –
and with the help of Terrio’s script he successfully achieved that goal.
DC didn’t
want to copy the look of Marvel Cinematic Universe movies and hiring Snyder
made sense as he brought an epic, operatic feel to his entries in the DCEU. His
movies are decidedly darker in tone and look, which divided comic book fans,
especially those of Superman who felt that Snyder went too far in reinventing
the character. Where the superheroes of the MCU are relatable to one degree or
another, Snyder’s superheroes are god-like Übermensches wrestling with living
among mortals and having to assume alter egos so that they aren’t persecuted by
a public at large that either doesn’t understand or fears them.
The
central thesis of Snyder’s DC movies has focused on the power that superheroes
like Superman wield: how they choose to use it as opposed to how they use it to
help the greatest number of people. In Justice
League, Batman makes the decision to activate the remaining Mother Box,
attempting to resurrect Superman thereby putting the entire planet at risk as
it will bring Steppenwolf and his army to them. Fortunately, the gamble pays
off but this strategy contains more than a whiff of Objectivism, Ayn Rand’s
philosophical system where the most significant moral purpose of human life is
to pursue happiness over everything else, even if it means disregarding the
needs of others. Batman takes it upon himself to assume that he knows what is
best for everyone and executes that plan consequences be damned.
If Batman v Superman posed the question,
should these super-powered being be held accountable for their actions then Justice League was a resounding no. They
are going to do whatever they think is right whether that aligns with the
greater good or not. It certainly provides a fascinating spin on the superhero
mythos and is one of the many things that makes Snyder’s DC movies stand out
from others in the genre. If Justice
League is to be his swan song for the studio and for the genre he certainly
has done so in spectacular fashion.
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