‘Evil does not sleep…’
Let’s untangle some webs before we begin. Are we allowed to mention webs in the DCEU? Or is that just an MCU thing? It doesn’t matter. So… this is Zack Snyder’s Justice League, released in 2021 to fix the mess that was the first Justice League movie directed by *checks notes* Zack Snyder. Hmm. It feels like that movie was also Zack Snyder’s Justice League, but apparently it wasn’t. Where does that put this entry in the DCEU timeline? Nobody knows. Does it matter? Probably not. Am I hungry? Yes. That last one is unrelated…
Batman (Ben Affleck) must assemble a team of metahumans to protect the world from Steppenwolf (Ciaran Hinds). And so, the Dark Knight brings in the Flash (Ezra Miller), Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot), Aquaman (Jason Momoa), Cyborg (Ray Fisher) and, of course, the big lad. Kal-El himself. Superman (Henry Cavill). There is also some stuff about three mystical boxes, but it’s not really important. What’s important are loud noises and fighting and flashing lights and Wonder Woman’s hair gently blowing in the wind.
Is this movie better than the original release? I don’t know because I never saw it. This iteration definitely does have some stuff going for it, however. Despite his many flaws, Snyder does have a knack for visual flair. Yes, he relies too much on slow motion and musical cues, but there are moments here that really do pop. Not anything that takes place underwater, or any scenes that involve the Flash waltzing about in super slow motion, but there are fight scenes here that rival anything from the MCU. The cast do a good job in delivering some truly uninspired dialogue that ranges from tired action movie cliché to laborious exposition, and overall, the plot does feel cohesive and uncomplicated, which is probably the least anyone can ask when you are given the chance to remake a movie that has already been released, reviewed and dissected a million times online. If it didn’t make sense this time that would just have been embarrassing.
Perhaps the largest compliment I can pay Zack Snyder’s Justice League is that even at four hours long, I was never bored. Not really. That’s quite the achievement for a director whose previous output has been spotty at best, but again, not many filmmakers are given the opportunity to go back and fix bad movies. Having said that, the ending here suffers from indecision. Are we setting up a sequel or not? Apparently not with Snyder. Or Affleck. With the latter set to don the cape for the last time in next year’s upcoming standalone Flash movie and the former already distancing himself from the whole project. Robert Pattinson’s iteration of the Caped Crusader is also due out in 2022, but has no connection to the DCEU. Or to 2019’s The Joker. And this is why the whole DC clusterfuck has been allowed to happen. Where Marvel had a meticulous plan for their intellectual property, DC has been a disorganised mess throughout. Leading to a cinematic universe that hasn’t produced a single genuinely great film (although this film is probably as close as they have ever come to that).
Overall, the Snyder cut of Justice League definitely justifies its existence, and by all accounts it is a huge improvement on what came before, but in the grand scheme of things, nobody will remember this movie in 10 years time when Batman is being rebooted for the 8th time.