Justice for Synder? - A Reggie Review of Justice League

DC Comics have brought us great movie adaptation such as 'Joker' and 'The Dark Knight' Trilogy; and then there's some not so greats like 'Birds of Prey' and 'Justice League'. However, the latter was recently given a new opportunity to win over audiences worldwide with the original director, Zack Synder, returning and finishing what he started creating back in 2017. For those unaware; Synder left the production of JL, mid way through filming, following the death of his daughter and was thereafter replaced by director Josh Whedon. It was this sudden change in director that suggestively caused the issues audiences raised following its release later that year.

I'm going to assume that you've seen the original 2017 movie, however in case you haven't, the plot summery is as follows... following the death of Superman(Henry Cavill), Bruce Wayne aka Batman (Ben Affleck), decides its time he gathered a squad of metahumans to aid in defending humanity against any further attacks that may follow. Over the course of this 2 hour film he meets and convinces characters; Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot), Aqua Man (Jason Momoa), The Flash (Ezra Miller) and Cyborg (Ray Fisher) to join his gang and together they battle against their most recent villain, Steppenwolf (Voiced by Ciarán Hinds).

"I don't care how many demons he's fought in how many hells. He's never fought us. Not us united." - Bruce Wayne

Now in my opinion the reasons for the films initial downfall lie in the pacing, the characters and the overall theme of the film. The main focus for the protagonists development and story progression is focused around their reluctance and inability to 'work together'. I felt the constant reminder that 'Team work makes the dream work' was a childish and boring direction for the film especially when, in the final act, Superman returns and effectively does everything single-handedly anyway. The other issue is around how many of the cast have very little screen time and therefore next to no character development which, with the lack of origin film for most, left them looking useless and like filler. And although the new scenes aim to fix this issue, it doesn't change the fact that we know very little of these characters prior to this big event and have little investment in their collective success.

So 4 years later, Synder decided to return and re-shoot, re-direct and re-tell the story of 'Justice League'; the way he wanted to in the first place. His adaptation stretches the 2 hour long film into a 4 hour marathon, separated into 6 or so 'chapters' (why? I don't know), and see's him delve deeper into character development with new scenes (including flash backs to show character backstory) and the occasional extended scene (usually a slow-mo fight scene that goes on for far too long).

Synder however does exactly what he promised by giving us deeper backstories into two characters previously ignored, Cyborg and The Flash, and although i'll admit these additional scenes do indeed make the film 'better'... does it make it the film 'good'? In short, no. The same issues I had with the original release are still ever present and the pacing of the film now is far worse; with stretched out flashy action scenes and bland dialogue every other conversation.

My biggest gripe with the film is around the arrogance of the superheroes, especially when it comes to them using their abilities. The characters are very self aware that they are better than the humans they protect and ultimately act however they please. An example of this would be Wonder Woman's use of her bracelets. Early on in the film we see her fight a small gang of terrorists (who's sole plan is to blow up a building yet they chose to use a timer bomb?) and by using her super speed and impressive hand to hand combat see's her prevent the destruction only for her to use her bracelets at the very last minute, against one single person, and destroy half the building anyway?! Why did she do it? Because she can.

"Before what, Bruce? Kill me? You won't kill me. I'm your best friend. Besides, who's gonna give you a reach-around?" - The Joker

Synder also decides to display the film in a 4:3 format (which basically means you have big black bars on either side of your screen) and has decided to separate the film into 'Chapters' (which actually means nothing when it comes to story development) and although there's likely artistic reasoning for both these choices, for me they just felt pretentious and pointless. Overall I got the impression Synder had so much pressure to create something 'New' and 'Special' that he got lost in these choices combined with the same lazy script didn't know how else to make the end result appear 'different'.

The film is nearly DOUBLE the run time but I couldn't tell you where the majority of that time goes other than the flash back scenes (which were okay but generic and predictable) and the epilogue which was completely out of place and felt more like a post credit teaser for a dreaded sequel. So to sum up, the best way I could describe the film would be like when you step in dog shit; it stretches and forms something new-ish but its still just the same dog shit.

"Not impressed." - Superman

Reggie review - 4/10

Zack Snyder's JUSTICE LEAGUE Trailer - YouTube

Zack Snyder's Justice League - nowtv.com