Release the George Miller Cut of Justice League 😤 🙌

(FYI this shot was done better by Whedon in the first 10 minutes of Avengers: Age of Ultron)

About 3 years too late but here are my thoughts on Zack Snyder’s Justice League…

The Snyder cut sure looks pretty at times, and does have some pretty great action throughout. Also, I actually dug Tom Holkenberg’s score, who I’m usually hit or miss on score-wise (it took me several rewatches to appreciate his score for Godzilla vs Kong after the amazing work done on King of the Monsters by Bear McCreery, it wasn’t until Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire that Holkenberg really delivered a great 80s synthwave score that stood out again McCreery’s more epic, classical composition).

That said, I don’t like Wonder Woman running around cutting off heads, or Superman STILL being predestined to turn evil and destroy the world despite the now-pointless time travel/weird ass dream scene with The Flash in Batman v. Superman (like seriously why was that even there if nothing got changed and the Knightmare timeline still happens). Ezra Miller is more tolerable here as well as in their own movie, but I still don’t like their casting as Barry Allen (even before they became a menace to society). Momoquaman is fine. Always is, generally. I did really like Batfleck being all hopeful and chummy with other heroes. Old Ben clearly had a better time here than in BvS, but his best turn as the character was his brief bit in the flash (even then he was outshone once Michael Keaton rolled back in to take all of us to school).

Like I said, it’s pretty, but a masterclass in self indulgent filmmaking excess. Snyder truly needs a scissor-happy editor in a way worse than George Lucas and Peter Jackson combined. The 30 second CG floating sesame seed shot is like something a Deadpool movie would do to MOCK Snyder’s overuse of slow motion, but it was being fully serious. Then there’s that uncomfortably long scene of the Icelandic villagers’ throaty Aquaman ballad. We get it, Snyder. They’re modern day gods of the new mythology. Jack Kirby did it way better. 

Speaking of Jack Kirby: Snyder managed to take a world of characters as imaginative and vibrant as Darkseid and the Fourth World Saga…and completely drain it of all life. Instead he gave us Darkseid as a dull, murky CG black blob and turned all of his disciples in generic cg aliens in spikey grey armor. 

But my fave DC character is Superman and he is still done hella dirty by Snyder here. Whedon, for all faults as a person and a writer, wrote a way better Superman (and cyborg) in his cut of the movie. That opening scene where he’s interviewed by the kids is A+ perfect Superman and the only time Cavill actually felt like a true Superman. I don’t care if his face was a CG monstrosity 😤 

Gal Gadot is generally serviceable as Wonder Woman when she’s not using her god blast powers to carelessly destroy a building she just just spent 5 minutes trying to save…or chopping off heads. Sorry, I prefer the Patty Jenkins take on Diana as a compassionate beacon of truth and love…not bloodthirsty Lady version of Thor (and I mean Thor from the first half of his first movie. Ya know. Before he learned that life has value and to stop committing war crimes).

Don’t even get me started on the hilariously pointless scenes of Martian Manhunter that were obviously tagged on in last minute reshoots after Warner Brothers got bullied into throwing a few more million dollars at Snyder to shut his cult of fans up. Why did Martian Manhunter become Martha (MARTHAAA) and visit Lois randomly? So. God damn. Pointless. And I will reiterate. I HATE the Knightmare subplot. We don’t need superhero mad max (and if we did, Deadpool & Wolverine just did it way better).

Finally, in the Snyder Cut, Cyborg never says Booyah. But he does say “fuck the world” or some similar, nihilistic nonsense. 0 stars, you stole fizzy lifting drinks therefore you get NOTHING. GOOD DAY SIR.

P.S.

George Miller came very close to making a Justice League movie in the early 2000s. It was called Justice League: Mortal and had Megan Gale as Wonder Woman, pre-cannibal scandal Armie Hammer as Batman and I think Adam Brody was The Flash. It was deemed too expensive to make… I wish we lived in the brighter timeline where this movie got made and the Snyderverse never happened 😢