I Watch Movies: Zack Snyder's Justice League

Zack Snyder’s Justice League

This is an improvement on the theatrical cut of the film. Cyborg gets a full story, which makes Silas Stone, his father, into a full character and some of the background characters around Star Labs and the Kryptonian Starship are fleshed out. The Flash exchanges his quips for more background, including an overlong and exciting bullet time action scene with some good gags. And we get to see what Snyder et al intended with Superman. For all my problems with his take on the character, he now has one that extends across the three films he’s in. I don’t like it! But I know what it is!

There are three scenes with Darkseid, two pretty good, one quite bad. The 5,000 year ago backstory battle scene is still not good, and substituting Darkseid for Steppenwolf in that scene cheapens them both. If you have two giant CGI Space Bastards in a film you should try harder to differentiate them is what I’m saying. We lose the specificity of Steppenwolf’s failure; in return we get more of his desperation to be found worthy. I still don’t care about Steppenwolf but he emerges as an actual character, not just a big ogre who wants to destroy the world.

I was hoping for more of the Justice League hanging out, but it didn’t really happen. After they eventually get together they don’t have any major conflicts, nor do they have a lot to say to each other. They do work together better in the final fight sequence, each one taking over from the next, like a relay race rather than a football team, each taking over when another reaches their limit. And then Superman comes in and he’s the trump card.

(The city is abandoned now, the Justice League don’t need to rescue anyone. It’s a straight fight. They still don’t really have a reason to call themselves the Justice League.)

Does it need to be four hours long? No it doesn’t. No opportunity is missed to offer some slow motion and/or bullet time. This is often effective, yet we don’t need it every time, and we don’t need to linger an extra beat on each such shot. Also adding to the run time is a slow epilogue that includes an extended sequence taking us into the future and revealing more about the Batman, foreshadowing some sequels that most likely will never happen.

Watch This: For an overlong, superior version of the Justice League film
Don’t Watch This: Dudes in weird suits punching is no way to solve a problem