Zack Snyder’s Justice League: They Did it For The Fans *SPOILERS*

Zack Snyder’s Justice League: They Did it For The Fans. *SPOILERS*

The year was 2017, Zack Snyder is filming a four hour epic of your favorite superheroes teaming up for the first time ever on the big screen. Sadly his daughter took her own life and he had to stop filming the movie. Warner Brothers wanted to finish the movie without Snyder and picked Avengers director Joss Whedon. For some reason Warner Brothers and Whedon took out around 70% of Snyder’s movie. What came out of it was a disappointing mess of a movie that left my Justice League movie hole still open. 

Around that time rumors were floating around about a different cut of the movie made by Snyder. #Snydercut ruled the internet almost becoming a meme. But as time went on we had to accept a bad Justice League movie. But our prayers were answered on August 22, 2020 during DC Fandom, an event focusing on all things DC and a debut trailer dropped and fans went wild. The song that played was “Hallelujah” by Leonard Cohen which is a great song choice, and the rest is history. I went into this movie saying to myself even if it’s bad, it’s a miracle it was even made and I need to praise Warner Bros for letting Snyder put his vision on film to show the world. One last point, SPOILERS ahead, even though this is a three and a half year old movie there are spoilers so keep that in mind. 

The Review

The story is still the same as the theatrical cut. Stepphenwolf tries to unite the three mother boxes to take over the planet and its up to Bruce Wayne to bring together the most powerful people on earth to save the world. In the theatrical cut Stepphenwolf was awful, he looked stupid and his motive was very unclear. But this time he looks cool and his motive is clear. His fight against the Amazons is incredible and is actually pretty good CGI. His whole thing is his lord Darkseid (we’ll get to him) exiled him until he conquers 50 worlds. In conclusion he is just so much better than the old Stepphenwolf. 

Now Darkseid, DC’s better version of Thanos. I was very excited for Darkseid’s introduction to film and he’s fine which isn’t Snyder’s fault. Warner Bros has said the Snyder cut isn’t cannon to what they’re doing. Snyder set up Darkseid so well for a sequel in this movie, which we’ll never get now which stinks. But the scenes he does have like in Cyborgs nightmare scene where he fires the Omega Beams is pretty awesome and at the end where he crushes Steppenwolf’s head is also pretty cool. 

Maybe the best fight scene involving Darkseid was the first time he came to earth. This fight was in the theatrical cut but way more love here. In this fight the Amazons, the Atlantians, the humans, and the Green Lantern Corps all come together to stop Darkseid. This fight is bloody and is so incredible. The gore in this scene is prefect showing the brutality of the fight, something we never saw in the theatrical cut. Sidenote I love the gore in this movie, it isn’t too much but it’s their making the heroes look way cooler. I’m just sad we probably won’t get this Darkseid again. 

Now going to the heroes, in the theatrical cut characters like The Flash, Cyborg, and Aquaman got zero respect in my opinion. The Flash gets a lot more setup for his solo movie coming up, but in my opinion I still am not a big fan of Ezra Miller’s performance of The Flash. 

I love the first two seasons of the television series The Flash which gives Barry Allen so much to work with and isn’t a one note character. Here Ezra Miller is the jokey character who’s jokes really aren’t that funny. But the scenes with him and his dad are very well done which get way more time then the theatrical cut. Cyborg in this movie rules and is easily the best of the heroes in the entire movie. His character gets way more to work with this time around. His backstory in the theatrical cut isn’t very clear making his character feel out of place. Now in the Snyder cut however his backstory is so sad and makes him the most intriguing character in the entire movie when in the theatrical cut he was probably the worst. Aquaman is fine, he’s better in this movie then in his own solo movie. 

There isn’t much I can say about his character, he’s just ok. Wonder Women is pretty much the same besides her first scene attacking the robbers. She is blocking bullets left and right and looking cool doing it. The scene with her talking to the kid who was inspired by her is a great addition to the movie and a baffling take away by Warner Bros. 

I was very disappointed by Batman’s character who wasn’t given a bunch to work with in the theatrical cut and is given pretty much the same to work with in the Snyder cut besides the Joker conversation which I’ll get too. Lastly we have Superman who is pretty amazing as always. The black suit on him looks so clean and is another baffling takeaway. Probably the coolest moment in the entire movie is when Cyborg is stopping the mother boxes from coming together. Stepphenwolf is about to attack him, Stepphenwolf is swinging his axe but before he can hit him Superman blocks the swing and starts beating him to a pulp bringing out that gore I was talking about earlier. 

He breaks his armor and rips his horn off, oh my gosh its so cool. One of the biggest reveals of the movie I didn’t know about is the inclusion of Martian Manhunter. First of all, big fan. He’s one of the Justice League OG’s. He’s a super alien shapeshifter. He gets revealed by taking the form of Superman’s mom comforting Lois Lane while she mourns for Clark’s death from the events of Batman v Superman. 

Then he shows up again at the end telling Bruce Wayne Darkseid is coming and he wants to join the team. The most cheesy line occurs when he says “My friends call me… Martian Manhunter”. It feels so off to me. I would have had Bruce know who he was instead of having him say that dumb line. Also at the end we get a scene with Jesse Eisenburgs Lex Luthor which I’m so done with that character and Deathstroke. Deathstroke is one of the coolest DC characters with one of the coolest costumes around. I just want to say how cool Deathstroke looks in this movie, it’s so clean the orange and the black pop so well. 

Again, it would be so disappointing if we don’t get a sequel to this movie because Snyder sets up a part two so well. Imagine a Batman Deathstroke fight, the Dark Knight versus a man who can predict your next move, it would be amazing. Now finally the scene with the most buzz around it, the nightmare scene with Jared Leto’s Joker. Some context first I hated his performance in Suicide Squad because it felt like a bad Heath Ledger impression with penguin noises for a laugh and a little trip to hot topic. 

So when I found out that he’s getting another shot, I was skeptical. Then we say the pictures, he looked scary and that black and white picture made him look like Michael Myers from Rob Zombies Halloween remake. The jail look, the long hair and the emotionless face. Leto brought me back in. Throughout the movie I was expecting an hour long nightmare sequence with this Joker and a couple of other characters. But thank god we only got five minutes because it is so unnecessary. 

Maybe I wasn’t a fan because we have the worst Joker and one of the worst Batman’s talking about Robin being dead and mourning over his parents. It felt so much like an afterthought just to add to an already long runtime. I want to talk about that because four hours is a long time to be watching a movie. For me it felt like a two and a half hour long movie. The pacing is mostly perfect besides some moments. 

The Verdict 

This seems to be my longest article yet just because there’s so much to talk about. Casual viewers won’t like this movie at all and will probably find it boring. Zack Snyder didn’t make a four hour long movie for casual viewers, he did it for the true fans who believed in him. Even though I had some problems with the film, I can’t not respect Snyder and Warner Brothers for giving us fans what we’ve been clamoring for. People like Henry Cavill who plays Superman have gone out of his way to say congratulations to Snyder for going through what he went through. 

This couldn’t have been easy for him, but he did it for us. Not just Cavill, Matt Reeves who is directing the new Batman movie is so happy for him. The Russo Brothers, the makers of Avengers Endgame are happy for his vision coming true. 

But the one that meant the most to me was Ray Fisher who plays Cyborg. I want to read his exact tweet because it’s amazing. “This is for those who fought. This is for those who believed. This belongs to each and every one of you. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. Now let’s break the internet.” What I’m trying to say is no matter how this movie came out I was still going to support it and respect it. So thank god we have an incredible Justice League movie thanks to Zack Snyder and Warner Brothers. I’m going to give Zack Snyder’s Justice League 4.5/5 panthers. Please watch this movie, this is a once in a blue moon film that is special and extremely rare. 

No studio would entrust a director to remake a movie that already flopped. But they did it because they cared for the fans and you have to respect that.