For the past two and a half years, one of the most talked-about films in recent memory has been the DC Extended Universe’s 2017 outing, Justice
League… and not exactly for the best reasons. Simply put, the film that was
released to theaters was far from being the version of it that director Zack
Snyder had envisioned after he was forced to step away from the production due to
deeply tragic circumstances. And because of this, the film was yet another
critical flop for the DCEU at a time where they were struggling immensely to
match the utterly dominant success of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It also
ended up being a rather notorious financial flop as it was unable to break-even
on its hefty $300 million budget. But while the DCEU has since managed to move
on from this with more critically and financially successful outings, fans of
both the franchise and Zack Snyder immediately began pushing for the release of
his version of Justice League, with the hashtag #ReleasetheSnyderCut quickly
becoming a staple of modern fandom’s vernacular. Their efforts to get this
version of the film released ranged from letter-writing campaigns to earning
the full support of several key figures in the industry, including those who
worked on the film and, of course, Zack Snyder himself. And after all this
time, this fabled cut of the film will finally see the light of day as Snyder
recently announced that it will make its official debut on WarnerMedia’s new
streaming service, HBO Max, in 2021. However, as genuinely great as it is that
Snyder has finally been given the chance to showcase his version of Justice
League, today we’re going to delve a bit further into everything that led
to this exact moment. In doing so, not only will we reiterate exactly why the
DCEU has often struggled to match the quality of the MCU, but we’ll also be
addressing how a lot of this movement has been fueled by incredibly toxic fans
who have very much paved the way for this current age of toxic fandom.
First off, let’s start by going over Zack Snyder’s affiliation
with the DCEU, which officially began in 2013 with the Superman reboot Man
of Steel. For both DC and Warner Bros, this was their second major attempt
at a reboot of the Superman franchise after their previous attempt, 2006’s
Superman Returns, was both a critical and financial underperformer.
Luckily for them, this was right around the time that Christopher Nolan had
just completed working on his trilogy of Batman films, AKA the Dark Knight trilogy,
which were easily some of the most critically-acclaimed and financially successful
superhero films at the time. Because of this, Nolan was brought on to spearhead
Man of Steel’s production, which meant that while he wasn’t going to
direct it, he would still be heavily involved with it with the expectation that
it would match the overall atmosphere of the Dark Knight trilogy. Nolan
reteamed with his Dark Knight trilogy co-writer David S. Goyer to write
the film, and after considering filmmakers like Darren Aronofsky, Matt Reeves, and
Ben Affleck (who, of course, would factor into the franchise at a later date),
Zack Snyder was chosen to direct the film. At this point, Snyder was easily one
of the studio’s most prominent filmmakers with hits such as the 2007 adaptation
of Frank Miller’s 300 and his incredibly ambitious adaptation of the
seminal graphic novel Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons. Sure, he
had just come off a rather notorious critical and financial flop with 2011’s Sucker
Punch, based on his own original concept, but that didn’t stop Snyder in
the slightest from taking the helm on the next major incarnation of the Last
Son of Krypton.
Man of Steel was easily one of the most anticipated films
of 2013, and upon its release… it ended up being arguably the most polarizing
film of that year. Critics and audiences were truly split down the middle when
it came to their thoughts on the film, namely due to how Snyder (and, by
extension, Nolan and Goyer) delivered a radically different take on the title
character. For some folks, they were totally fine with this as they felt that
it was something that Superman needed for what was meant to be a more modernized
take on the character. For others, however, it was a bit too much, especially
due to things like the film’s utilization of destruction imagery that felt too similar
to 9/11 and the controversial moment where Superman kills the main antagonist,
General Zod, by snapping his neck despite his traditional ‘no-killing’ mandate
from the comics. Nevertheless, the film was a solid hit at the box-office and
grossed over $668 million worldwide, thus paving the way for Warner Bros to
immediately begin laying the groundwork for its own cinematic universe to rival
the MCU. While it was initially implied that the plan was to do at least one
more Superman-centric feature before getting into the whole ‘cinematic universe’
angle, that idea seemed to change when the first details of the film were revealed
at the 2013 San Diego Comic-Con. After having Harry Lennix (who played General
Swanwick in Man of Steel) set the mood by reciting a passage from the
iconic miniseries that was Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns, it
was instantly made clear that the next installment of the DC Extended Universe
would be a crossover between Batman and Superman. And since Christian Bale had
already completed his turn as Batman in Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy, this
new film would serve as the official debut of the DCEU’s interpretation of the
Dark Knight that would be heavily inspired by the grizzled and jaded version of
the character from Dark Knight Returns.
After a highly publicized casting search that included names
like Josh Brolin and Jon Hamm, Ben Affleck was officially cast as Bruce Wayne
AKA Batman. Admittedly, though, Affleck’s casting initially drew an intensely
negative response from fans, namely due to his disastrous previous role in a
superhero film when he played Marvel’s Daredevil in the 2003 film of the same
name. At the same time, though, Affleck was experiencing a major career
resurrection thanks to his work as a director on Gone Baby Gone, The
Town, and 2012’s Best Picture winner, Argo. Thus, the most exciting
aspect of Affleck’s casting was that it immediately led to him being given the
opportunity to direct the first solo outing for his version of the character. After
that, further announcements then revealed that Batman wasn’t going to be the
only new superhero appearing in the film. First, it was announced that the third
and final member of DC’s ‘Trinity’, Wonder Woman, would make her debut in the film
as well, which would also be the character’s first official appearance in a live-action
film. Gal Gadot was cast in the role and, like Affleck, experienced some harshly
negative blowback from fans when the initial news broke of her involvement. Soon
afterward, it was then revealed that The Flash (Ezra Miller), Aquaman (Jason
Momoa), and Cyborg (Ray Fisher) would all make cameos as well to build up hype
for their larger roles in the upcoming Justice League film which, of
course, Zack Snyder was also slated to direct. Thus, while a lot of the
build-up for the film was clearly impacted by the polarizing nature of Man
of Steel and how fans reacted to Snyder’s casting choices, Batman v
Superman: Dawn of Justice was still widely considered to be one of the most
highly anticipated films of 2016. At this point, it was now very much clear
that it was meant to be the official kick-starter for Warner Bros and DC’s own,
unique spin on a superhero-centric cinematic universe.
The film finally hit theaters on March 25th, 2016,
and if you thought that the reception towards Man of Steel was rough…
well, it was about to get a whole lot worse for DC and Warner Bros. Upon its
release, Batman v Superman was utterly savaged by critics who felt that the
story was incredibly convoluted and that the film itself was far too dour. Simply
put, this wasn’t even close to being the same kind of situation that Man of
Steel ended up in where there was a genuine 50/50 split between its fans
and its critics. When it came to Batman v Superman… most people hated
it. This also translated to its run at the box-office where, despite a $166
million opening weekend and a worldwide gross of over $873 million worldwide,
it was considered a financial disappointment since it didn’t reach the studio’s
projected total of $1 billion. By comparison, the MCU’s big ensemble picture of
that year, Captain America: Civil War, instantly outmatched BvS in
every conceivable way with a $179 million opening weekend, a worldwide gross of
over $1.1 billion, and perhaps most importantly, vastly superior reviews from critics
and audiences. However, when it comes to Dawn of Justice’s initial
release, it soon became known that some of its biggest shortcomings weren’t exactly
Zack Snyder’s fault when it was revealed that he was forced to cut around half
an hour of what was originally meant to be a three-hour film. It was reported
that the biggest reason for this decision was that the studio was uncertain about
the original cut’s box-office potential, especially since it would’ve garnered
an R rating instead of the more genre-friendly PG-13 rating. Luckily for
Snyder, he was able to make his version available to the public when the ‘Ultimate
Edition’ of the film was released on Blu-Ray and digital. And upon its release,
many agreed that while it may not have been enough to sway the film’s most
vocal critics, it was, at the very least, a far superior cut since many of the
sequences that were taken out resulted in the theatrical cut suffering from some
significant plot-holes.
Despite this, however, the damage was already done. Batman
v Superman: Dawn of Justice was meant to be DC and Warner Bros’ answer to
what Marvel Studios had managed to accomplish with the Marvel Cinematic
Universe… and it ended up being one of the most despised blockbusters of recent
memory. As you might have guessed, this immediately began to impact future
installments of the franchise. The other big DCEU release of 2016, Suicide
Squad, ended up having a troubled production largely due to the studio’s
efforts to try and address many of the issues that critics had with Batman v
Superman. And yet, as a result, Suicide Squad yielded the exact same
results as BvS; it was commercially successful but critically panned.
Luckily for both DC and Warner Bros, they did end up having their first big hit
the following year with Wonder Woman. Not only did it manage to avoid
any of the issues that BvS and Suicide Squad endured during its
production, but it was easily the most well-received installment of the
franchise to date as it was widely touted for forgoing the overly grim
atmosphere of the franchise’s previous installments. And from the looks of it,
it seemed like this would also be the case with the DCEU’s other big 2017 release,
especially since this was going to be the biggest one of them all, Justice
League. Following all the intense criticism that stemmed from Batman v
Superman’s overly dour tone, it was widely reported that Justice League was
not going to end up the same way and would be far lighter in tone by comparison.
And while later reports noted that the film would have to undergo some major
reshoots after early test screenings didn’t go too well, everything seemed to
be going all right for the production. But then, of course, as we all know, it
all came crumbling down, and unfortunately, it all began with a devastating family
tragedy.
On March 12th, 2017, Snyder’s 20-year-old
daughter Autumn committed suicide. While Snyder did continue to work on Justice
League for the next two months, he and his wife Deborah (his long-time
producer) then proceeded to announce that they would be stepping away from the
production in the wake of the loss of their daughter. And so, Joss Whedon, who had
already been brought on to help work on script re-writes, was put in charge of both
the reshoots and post-production. Whedon, of course, was already quite familiar
with the superhero genre thanks to his work as the director of the first two Avengers
films, and before the film’s release, it was reported that Whedon would be
doing his best to maintain the vision that Snyder had for the film. But when
the film finally came out… it ended up telling a completely different story. Immediately
upon its release, both critics and audiences noted how the film was an absolute
mess in terms of its tone. And while it was initially reported that Whedon’s
additions to the film would be generally minor at best, it was very much clear
that he had re-shot much of the film and that only a few moments in it were
leftover from Snyder’s version, resulting in a complete hodge-podge of
clashing directorial visions. Thus, Justice League became yet another
critical flop for the DCEU, and even worse, this time it was also a financial
flop since it wasn’t able to break-even on its $300 million budget, which made it
one of the most expensive films of all-time. And because of its failure, the
entire franchise was put through a complete reshuffle. Key figures like Geoff
Johns and Jon Berg left the studio while plans for a Justice League sequel
were canceled in favor of solo films that didn’t rely on the shared universe
narrative. And in 2019, after he had already stepped down from directing the
next Batman film, Ben Affleck announced that he was officially stepping
down from the title role. Thus, Robert Pattinson will now take on the role of
Batman for director Matt Reeves in The Batman, which is set to hit
theaters on October 1st, 2021.
Now for the record, today’s post is not going to delve into
the specific details of the changes that Whedon made to Justice League and
the noteworthy scenes from Snyder’s version that were left out. Simply put,
that’s another post for another time. But to sum up everything that we’ve gone
through so far, I think it’s safe to say that of the three DC Extended Universe
films that Zack Snyder has directed, his first one, Man of Steel, was
the only entry where he wasn’t considerably hindered by studio interference.
But because Man of Steel was so polarizing due to its radically
different take on Superman, I can imagine that Warner Bros began to show some
concern over the direction that the franchise was heading in, especially since
it wasn’t as financially successful as Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy despite
his direct involvement in it. Perhaps that is one of the reasons why Batman was
brought in for the next film to try and improve its box-office potential even if
it came at the cost of not doing a proper follow-up to Man of Steel.
But, of course, the biggest story that came out of Batman v Superman: Dawn of
Justice’s production was how Snyder was forced to cut out a full half-hour
of the film. It’s been rumored that another big reason why he had to do this
was that, supposedly, he didn’t have the same kind of directorial clout that
someone like James Cameron has to make a massive three-hour blockbuster. However,
this also meant that the sequences that were being cut were ones that were utterly
pivotal to the story, resulting in some incredibly egregious plot-holes. Thankfully,
this ended up being one of those cases where this occurred near the end of
production, effectively allowing Snyder to release his version of the film on
home video without the need for any extensive reworking of the theatrical cut. Unfortunately,
the same can’t be said for Justice League. His version of it was far
from finished when he stepped away from production and would’ve required a lot
of extra money to finish a film that was already sporting one of the largest
budgets in film history. With that in mind, it goes without saying that many of
the issues with Justice League are ones that can’t be attributed to
Snyder since he had nothing to do with the theatrical cut due to immensely
tragic circumstances that were far beyond his control.
However, if you’ll allow me to debunk one of the biggest
myths that has been perpetrated by the DCEU fandom, it’s the idea that all the
film’s problems were entirely Joss Whedon’s fault. Ever since the theatrical
cut’s release, Whedon has been the primary target of the #ReleasetheSnyderCut
faithful for ‘destroying’ Snyder’s vision with the new material that he shot.
However, what these folks tend to overlook is the fact that, in a scenario that
was obviously much different than what happened with Snyder, Whedon was also
heavily screwed over by the production. In his case, it primarily stemmed from the
fact that the two months of reshoots that he presided over began in July of
2017… just 4 months before the film’s November release date. And so, given all
the information that has revealed that Snyder’s contributions to the theatrical
cut only amounted to a few select scenes, this means that Whedon had to rework
almost all of what was set to be one of Warner Bros’ biggest tent-pole releases
in less than half a year. In other words, all those criticisms surrounding the
film’s mediocre visual effects suddenly make a lot more sense when you realize that
the VFX artists who worked on it had barely any time to finish them. Now to be
clear, everything that I just brought up here doesn’t mean that I’m ‘defending’
the changes that Joss Whedon made to the film. While I am a fan of much of
Whedon’s work from Firefly and its film adaptation Serenity to,
of course, his Avengers films, even I can agree that this is some of his
worst material when it comes to the snappy dialogue that he’s well-known for. But
at the end of the day, you can’t really blame the theatrical cut of Justice
League solely on him since it’s very much clear that time wasn’t on his
side.
Ultimately, the failure of Justice League was mainly the
result of Warner Bros not recognizing the fact that they were clearly rushing
it so that they could compete with the Avengers films that Marvel Studios
was making. They were so locked in on that November 2017 release date that it
didn’t even matter that the reshoots for it couldn’t happen until July of that year.
This, of course, spawned one of the biggest stories that surrounded these
reshoots; the fact that it occurred during the production of a different film, Mission
Impossible – Fallout, which Superman himself, Henry Cavill, was also starring
in. He also notably sported a mustache for that film, and Paramount (the studio
behind the Mission Impossible franchise) wasn’t keen on having Cavill
shave it off for the Justice League reshoots. Thus, Cavill had to keep
his facial hair for the reshoots, resulting in the most widely mocked visual
effects in the entire film… the CGI that had to be used to erase it off his
face. Clearly, Warner Bros should’ve just pushed the film back to 2018 so that Zack
and Deborah Snyder would have enough time to mourn the loss of their daughter
and properly return to the production. After all, that’s exactly what happened
with both of Snyder’s previous DCEU films so that he and his crew could have more
time to work on them. Man of Steel was originally set to come out at the
end of 2012 before it was pushed back to June 2013. And as for Batman v
Superman, it was originally meant to come out in July 2015 before being
pushed back nearly a full year and ultimately settling for its final March 2016
release date. Now admittedly, at the time of Justice League’s release,
2018 was shaping up to be an incredibly packed year for the superhero genre.
The MCU had the next Avengers film, Infinity War, along
with Black Panther and Ant-Man and the Wasp, the X-Men franchise
was set to release its next main installment, Dark Phoenix, along with the
sequel to Deadpool and a spin-off, The New Mutants, Sony had the Spider-Man
spin-off Venom and even the DCEU had its next big release, Aquaman.
And yet, not long into 2018, both Dark Phoenix and The New Mutants
were pushed back (Dark Phoenix to 2019, New Mutants… well, we’ll
get to that one another time). So yeah… there really wasn’t any kind of excuse
at this point as to why Warner Bros didn’t just delay Justice League back
a year.
But at the end of the day, these disastrous results were
exactly what Warner Bros and DC needed so that they could finally realize that
they were foolishly rushing the development of the DC Extended Universe. Instead
of efficiently building up the franchise with solo installments that both properly
introduced us to its main protagonists and gradually expanded the universe like
the MCU did, they decided to just skip ahead to Justice League after
only a few films. Thus, when Justice League came out, Batman, Wonder
Woman and Superman were the only members of the titular group to have had
major roles in previous installments while the Flash, Aquaman, and Cyborg were
basically making their official franchise debuts with almost little to no
buildup. Sure, they had all previously appeared in Batman v Superman and
Flash had also made an appearance in Suicide Squad, but only as minor (and
nearly inconsequential) cameos. In other words, to reiterate a point that I
made a few months back in my Top 12 Films of 2019 list when I ranked Shazam at
the #7 spot, it was like if Marvel had decided to do the first Avengers film
right after Iron Man 2, completely ignoring Thor and Captain America’s
first solo features. If that was the case, then the only instances that would’ve
hinted at their future appearances would’ve been the prototype of Cap’s shield
seen in Tony Stark’s basement and the post-credits scene of Iron Man 2 where
Agent Coulson arrives at the crash site of Thor’s hammer, Mjolnir. Thankfully, though,
Marvel Studios was smart enough to not do that. Unfortunately,
you can’t really say the same for the DCEU since, apparently, they didn’t want
to be bogged down by what they perceived to be the increasingly routine nature
of traditional superhero origin stories.
But to reiterate a different point that I made in that Top
12 Films of 2019 list, I’d argue that another problem for the DCEU early on was
that it tried a bit too hard to ‘not be Marvel’. And for the record, when I say
“not be Marvel”, that’s primarily in reference to the long-standing stigma
against the MCU films that claims that they’re nothing more than kid-friendly
comedies, especially in the wake of Marvel being purchased by Disney in 2009. Now
sure, it’s true that MCU films are usually light-hearted affairs that are often
dominated by the comedic banter between characters, but if there’s one point
that I’ve hopefully gotten across the most these past few years, it’s that they’re
much more than just silly comedies. In fact, in the years since this mindset
started becoming more common within the DCEU fandom, I believe that films like
the culturally relevant Black Panther and the emotionally charged duology
of Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame have been more
than enough proof against the claim that the MCU is ‘just for kids’. Nevertheless,
it’s truly astounding how much the hardcore side of the DCEU fandom utterly despises
the light-hearted style of the MCU films, almost as if they believe that dark
and gritty narratives are the only worthy routes that a superhero film should
take instead of being the fun and entertaining blockbusters that they normally
are. As you might have guessed, this is one of the biggest reasons why the
hardcore DCEU faithful usually prefer Zack Snyder’s DCEU films instead of some
of the franchise’s more critically successful outings. In fact, even Snyder has
distanced himself from the more light-hearted installments of the superhero
genre by stating that it simply isn’t the kind of material that he prefers. And
so, with all this in mind, I think it’s safe to say that the time has finally
come for me to say something that I know damn well will outright infuriate the
#ReleasetheSnyderCut faithful… and yet is very much something that needs to be
said at this point. To be clear, what I’m about to say is not meant to be a personal
dig against Snyder, especially given the circumstances behind his departure
from Justice League. But at the end of the day… Zack Snyder probably
wasn’t the best choice to be the director who was meant to spearhead the genesis
and future of DC’s brand-new cinematic universe.
Now to be clear, I’m not saying that I think Snyder is a
terrible director. He’s certainly proven himself to be one of the best visually-driven filmmakers in the business and that is very much apparent in every film
that he’s made. And yet, as great as he is as a visual director, he’s been less
successful when it comes to story and characters. Some would say that his
adaptation of Watchmen is the exception to this, but despite Snyder’s
considerable efforts to stay faithful to Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ seminal graphic
novel, many have argued that this was more from a visual perspective rather
than a narrative one. But to go back to what I just mentioned earlier about Snyder’s
preferences when it comes to superhero narratives, if he wants to do superhero
films that are more like Watchmen, then that’s totally fine. He’s
completely within his rights as a filmmaker to do those kinds of films. However,
I also feel that this kind of nihilistic philosophy applies better to the
likes of niche properties like 300 and Watchmen rather than mainstream
characters like Batman and Superman that have appealed to audiences of all ages.
This is especially the case with children because, despite what some members of
the DCEU fandom may claim, comic-book superheroes are usually marketed towards
the younger demographic. Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, by
way of Snyder’s intended 3-hour cut, is not even close to being geared towards
kids. Instead, it’s a dark, dour, and incredibly violent R-rated flick that sees
the title characters act in generally unheroic ways. And it all culminates with
one of the most idealistic heroes of the entire genre, Superman, dying in an
incredibly gruesome manner just so they could pay homage to the infamous storyline
from the comics in which he dies after an intense battle with Doomsday. Simply
put, that probably wasn’t the best idea for a major studio tentpole release
that was being marketed to the widest audience possible.
By comparison, other installments of the DCEU have done a
far better job when it comes to developing these characters rather than just being
a case of style over substance. Snyder may have been the one who brought Wonder
Woman to the screen in Batman v Superman, but it was Patty Jenkins who
made her a genuine icon and quite arguably the MVP of the franchise by way of her
solo film. And while Snyder may have also set the stage for Aquaman’s franchise
debut, it was James Wan who took Jason Momoa’s potentially controversial take on
the character and turned him into the full-blown charismatic star of what ended
up becoming the DCEU’s highest-grossing installment to date. In fact, I’d argue
that the best DCEU film to date is one that Snyder had absolutely nothing to do
with, Shazam. Some may refer to Shazam as the closest that the
DCEU has ever gotten to replicating the MCU aesthetic, because aside from some incredibly
dark moments that feel like they came straight out of a horror film, it’s
easily the DCEU’s most light-hearted entry to date. But as I’ve said plenty of
times by now, there’s a lot more to this than just colorful visuals and a plethora
of jokes, as Shazam also fully succeeds at giving its title character a
proper and emotionally cathartic character arc that’s perfectly synced with all
the fun superhero escapades that he partakes in. Suffice it to say, this is
something that you never really got out of the DCEU films that Snyder directed,
and the one character who was hurt by this the most was Superman, thus resulting
in his sacrifice at the end of Batman v Superman feeling incredibly hollow.
And it’s a shame, really, because Henry Cavill has very much proven himself to
be an incredibly charismatic actor thanks to films like The Man from UNCLE and
Mission Impossible – Fallout. Thus, given the recent news that revealed
that Cavill is set to return to the franchise after quite a few years where it
was rumored that he was done playing Superman, I hope that he’ll have better
material to work with going forward. Because, really, it’s saying something when
his best performance in the role… was in Justice League. Yes, despite
all the wonky CGI to remove his mustache and the fact that it contrasted
heavily with how the character was portrayed in both Man of Steel and Batman
v Superman, it is still the closest that Henry Cavill has ever gotten to matching
Christopher Reeve’s iconic interpretation of the character.
And so, given everything that I’ve gone through in today’s
post, I must admit that the announcement that Zack Snyder’s Justice League will
finally see the light of day is one that has left me with mixed feelings
overall, and as you might have guessed, this largely has to do with the whole
#ReleasetheSnyderCut movement. Now before I continue, let me just point out
that I’m well aware that what I’m about to discuss doesn’t represent the
entirety of those who were involved in the campaign for the release of Snyder’s
version of the film. I know that a lot of people who participated in it simply did
so because they wanted to see this version of the film released publicly,
especially given all the tragic circumstances that led to Snyder’s departure
from the production. On that note, quite arguably the best result to come from
this campaign was that over $150,000 was raised for the American Foundation for
Suicide Prevention. Unfortunately, as has usually been the case these past few years
with incidents that are attributed to internet fandom, the more vocal and incredibly
toxic members of the community have ultimately been the ones who have ended up
dominating the discussion. Before the announcement that the film was finally
going to get released, they attacked anyone who dared to suggest that the idea
of releasing Snyder’s version of the film seemed impossible at the time given
the status that it was in when he left the production. Many of them have also harassed
Warner Bros. employees to the point where the former President of DC Entertainment,
Diane Nelson, had to delete her Twitter account. But perhaps the biggest thing
to note about this entire movement was how utterly persistent it was at times
to the point where that hashtag was being pushed even when talking about things
that had nothing to do with Justice League. Thus, as much as some will
say that folks like this only represent a small part of the community, I do
think that we’re at a point now where crap like this needs to be better addressed.
Because at the end of the day, even the actions of a select number of ‘fans’ (a
term that, as you might have guessed, I use very loosely here) has the
potential to make us all look bad simply by association.
And as I’ve said plenty of times over the past few years, the
hardcore faction of the DCEU fandom has become one of the most toxic internet
groups in recent memory. If you were to ask me why, I’d say that it’s largely
because of how they are fully devoted to what Zack Snyder had envisioned for
the franchise. Thus, when anyone dares to come along and suggest that his DCEU
films were far from perfect, his fans will come out of the woodwork, get incredibly
infuriated about it, and try to pass off the utterly bogus conspiracy that
critics of Snyder’s films were paid off by Disney and Marvel to make the MCU
look better by comparison. Heck, even when the DC Extended Universe had a
genuine hit on its hands, these folks still somehow managed to find something
to be upset about. When Wonder Woman became the DCEU’s first critically
acclaimed hit, a lot of Snyder fans tried to pin it all on him since he had a story
credit instead of, you know, director Patty Jenkins. When Aquaman came
out, the hardcore DCEU fandom attacked anyone who had predicted that the film
wasn’t going to be a box-office hit and, as you might have guessed, lashed out
at anyone who gave it a negative review. And don’t even get me started on how furious
they were when Birds of Prey came out earlier this year rather than the
films that they wanted like a sequel to Man of Steel or the Snyder Cut. But,
of course, the biggest stunt that they’ve pulled (apart from their negative influence
on the whole #ReleasetheSnyderCut situation, of course…) was when they tried to
shut down Rotten Tomatoes in 2016 after Batman v Superman and Suicide
Squad were both savaged by critics. Simply put, these folks haven’t
responded well to the idea that the DC Extended Universe has worked a lot
better when it isn’t going with the grim aesthetic that Snyder had established during
the franchise’s early days.
But now this brings us to what has easily been the most
concerning aspect of the announcement for Zack Snyder’s Justice
League… the fact that it could potentially pave the way for more instances in
the future where overly entitled fans aggressively demand changes to films when
they don’t turn out exactly the way they wanted. In fact, I’d argue that, when
it comes to films that have left some sort of impact on the film industry, Justice
League has been one of the most prevalent examples in recent memory of a
film that has left a negative impact because of how it has emboldened
certain online crowds to endlessly vent about what could have been. Nowadays,
whenever a deleted scene for a film is released, some folks will act like they
were ‘robbed’ of a sequence that, 9 times out of 10, was cut for a legitimate
reason (e.g. the deleted scene in Avengers: Endgame where the Avengers
all take a knee to mourn Tony Stark right after he dies). And it’s all thanks
to the film that, until Snyder’s version comes out next year, boasted one of
the vastest and eclectic collections of sequences that were ultimately left
on the cutting room floor. Sure enough, there have already been quite a few noteworthy
examples recently of fans demanding alternate cuts. Staying in the DCEU for a
moment, some have been pushing for the version of Suicide
Squad that director David Ayer had originally developed before it was
heavily compromised by studio interference. A few weeks after Star Wars: The
Rise of Skywalker came out, rumors started floating around that director
J.J. Abrams was forced to make some critical changes to the film in the wake of
the polarizing reactions to The Last Jedi, resulting in the #ReleasetheJJCut
hashtag becoming a thing. And finally, literally just a few days after I
started writing this post, the next big fan campaign emerged when Star Wars fans
started to push for director George Lucas’ original 4-hour cut of Episode
III – Revenge of the Sith.
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| The toxic attitudes of modern film fan culture were directly parodied in 'Batman's Back Man', the fifth episode of the second season of the hit DC Universe animated series 'Harley Quinn' |
Simply put, I wouldn’t be surprised if this isn’t the last
time that we’ll be seeing fans getting this worked up over a film’s mythical
alternate cut. And so, in conclusion, I will reiterate what I’ve said before in
that when it comes to the announcement that Zack Snyder’s Justice League will
finally get released, I am happy for Zack Snyder… and Zack Snyder only (and, by
extension, everyone who had worked on the film before the reshoots). Despite
my current feelings towards his DCEU films, I’m glad that he was able to find
closure on a project that he never got the chance to finish. And yet, I simply
can’t say the same for the DCEU fandom because as much as I know that many people
who participated in this movement did so out of genuine appreciation for Snyder’s
work, said movement was tainted by some utterly toxic jackasses who haven’t
been able to fathom the possibility that his takes on these classic characters were
inherently flawed. Plus, to be perfectly blunt, folks… I just got so damn tired
of hearing about this film all the frigging time for the past two and a half
years, especially whenever it threatened to overshadow the instances where the
DCEU managed to achieve some genuine success. Now, to be clear, this doesn’t
mean that I was ever against the notion of its release. Once it debuts on HBO
Max next year, I assure you that I’ll watch it and will then give you a proper review/discussion
post on it. However, this doesn’t excuse the fact that everything that surrounded
its release is ultimately yet another example of the increasing sense of entitlement
that is thoroughly plaguing modern fandom. We now live in an era where, for
some inexplicable reason, some believe that the best way to express their
disappointment over a film or TV show is to vehemently lash out at the
filmmakers and studios who worked on them as if the fact that they didn’t live
up to their oddly specific set of expectations is the equivalent of some kind
of criminal offense. And yet, this is exactly the kind of deplorable behavior
that I’m thoroughly against as a film critic because I believe that it’s a
blatant sign of disrespect coming from people who think that they know better than
those who work in the industry even though incidents like this very much prove otherwise.
That concludes this
extensive discussion on the history behind Zack Snyder’s version of Justice
League. Since this single post ultimately proved to be nearly as long as either
of the lengthy write-ups that I did for Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker and
Avengers: Endgame in my Top 12 Films of 2019 list from a few months
back, I’d like to thank all of you for sticking it out with me when it comes to
this incredibly daunting beast of an editorial.
