Justice League (2017) Review

Time: 121 Minutes
Age Rating:
Cast
Ben Affleck as Bruce Wayne/Batman
Henry Cavill as Kal-El/Clark Kent/Superman
Amy Adams as Lois Lane
Gal Gadot as Diana Prince/Wonder Woman
Ezra Miller as Barry Allen/Flash
Jason Momoa as Arthur Curry/Aquaman
Ray Fisher as Victor Stone/Cyborg
Jeremy Irons as Alfred Pennyworth
Diane Lane as Martha Kent
Connie Nielsen as Hippolyta
J. K. Simmons as James Gordon
Ciarán Hinds as Steppenwolf
Director: Zack Snyder

Fueled by his restored faith in humanity and inspired by Superman’s (Henry Cavill) selfless act, Bruce Wayne (Ben Affleck) enlists newfound ally Diana Prince (Gal Gadot) to face an even greater threat. Together, Batman and Wonder Woman work quickly to recruit a team to stand against this newly awakened enemy. Despite the formation of an unprecedented league of heroes — Batman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman (Jason Momoa), Cyborg (Ray Fisher) and the Flash (Ezra Miller) – it may be too late to save the planet from an assault of catastrophic proportions.

Justice League was my most anticipated movie of 2017. While it’s proven to be very divisive, I really like the DCEU. I loved Batman v Superman, I loved Man of Steel, and I liked Wonder Woman (and Suicide Squad is a guilty pleasure at best). Naturally I was excited to see everything come together with this talented cast, director Zack Snyder and writer Chris Terrio. There were some bumps along the way, with the reshoots being filmed by Joss Whedon instead of Snyder, as he was dealing with a tragedy. Nonethless, I was still incredibly hyped to see the end result. So did Justice League live up to expectations? For the most part yes.

This movie is noticeable shorter than the other DCEU films, they are usually at least 2 hours and 20 minutes long. However Justice League is 2 hours long, even Suicide Squad is longer. Justice League really does need an extended/director’s cut (it seems that Warner Bros hasn’t learnt their lessons from Batman v Superman and has yet again ditched the superior version in favour of a shorter and lesser version for the theatrical release). It really needed a longer runtime, especially with the first act. There are a significant number of scenes in the trailer which are missing from the movie. I think what makes me look over some of the issues is that this movie is quite straightforward, that was the plan and I’m not upset about that. Even if there might’ve been some changes made, its clear from what Snyder and Terrio said even before the release of Batman v Superman, that Justice League would be lighter and more straightforward. It’s a simple save the world comic book movie, and I think that overall Justice League did that well enough. I also had a lot of fun with it, if you are a big DC fan there will be some stuff here that you will really love. There are also two credits scenes that I liked, particularly the second one, and I’m curious as to what this will mean for the future of the DCEU.

The cut scenes weren’t the only issue with Justice League. Most of the jokes worked, some of them didn’t. There are also some lines which don’t fit in, some of them were downright cringeworthy. There was particularly one line in the third act which really frustrated me, I have no idea if Joss Whedon wrote it or not, but either way that was one of the worst moments of the film. Something that needs addressing is Joss Whedon’s reshoots, there are at times you can tell when its his writing. Again with the dialogue, some of it didn’t work and I can tell that a lot of it is his dialogue. I know that it seems like I dislike this movie but its not the case. It was very entertaining and I loved seeing these characters together. Its just that the negatives really stand out.

The team dynamic was one of the best parts of the film, which is good because its one of the most important parts that the film needed to get right. Most of the characters get a good arc. Ben Affleck’s Batman has changed since the events of Batman v Superman, clearly affected by Superman’s sacrifice, he is filled with hope and this is a good continuation of his arc from Batman v Superman. Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman continues to be great, continuing on from Wonder Woman and Batman v Superman. The newcomers were all good as well. Ezra Miller’s Flash is a stand out and is the more comic relief out of the group. Ray Fisher’s Cyborg actually worked really well, I’d love to see his story continued in future movies. Jason Momoa’s Aquaman doesn’t stand out as much among the main cast but he was still really good, and I can’t wait for his solo film next year. In fact I can’t wait to see more of all of them. As for Henry Cavill’s Superman, I can’t go into too much depth in case I spoil anything. So I’ll do my best to keep it vague. I’m not quite sure what to make of this version of the character, it was quite different to the version we saw in Man of Steel and Batman v Superman and it was really jarring. I just hope Man of Steel 2 handles Superman a lot stronger. The supporting cast with Amy Adams, Jeremy Irons, Diane Lane, J.K. Simmons and others were pretty good. The main villain of the film is Steppenwolf, who is motion captured by Ciaran Hinds. I actually don’t think he’s that bad of a villain, he works as a physical threat against the Justice League. However he could’ve used just a little bit of backstory, it is possible that it was cut. The CGI on him for the most part was fine, but the effects on his face needed more work.

The action was filmed very well and stylistically. At times the visuals are downright beautiful. Most of the visual effects are good, but there are times where it did look off, at times it looked really bad. I’m not sure why this happened. Throughout the film at times you can clearly see that there are some reshoots, for example there are some moments when some out of place green screen is behind characters. There are also some scenes that don’t appear in the trailers but there are also different takes that were used for some unknown reason. After scoring Man of Steel and Batman v Superman Hans Zimmer decided not to do Justice League, and Junkie XL was booted off the film when Joss Whedon stepped in for the reshoots. Instead we got Danny Elfman filling in and while everyone was bagging on him, I was willing to give him a chance. After watching Justice League it made me want Danny Elfman to never get hired to score a film ever again. It was so forgettable and didn’t add anything. However, it’s not just that it feels generic, it straight up doesn’t fit with the movie. There are a lot of comic book movie scores which are forgettable but at least it fits in the movie. It makes a lot of the scenes feel underwhelming and deflates it. His score honestly took away a lot of the impact of the scenes. It would’ve worked for a Tim Burton Justice League but not with a Zack Snyder Justice League. There is one hint of Hans Zimmer’s score, but it only makes the rest of the score look inferior. Yes, its nice to hear hints of Reeve’s Superman theme and Tim Burton’s Batman theme but it’s not enough to make the score good. The score unfortunately took away some of the enjoyment of the scenes.

Overall this film does do what it set out to do. I had fun with it, the team dynamic is great, the actors are great, the action is entertaining, I really liked it. There are a lot of issues I had with it, I think that the cutting of the scenes, the reshoots done by Joss Whedon and the score by Danny Elfman (yes, it affected the film experience that much) are probably the stand outs. Although I have commented a lot about the issues, I must stress that I still consider Justice League to be good, I had a lot of fun with it and I recommend at least checking it out. It’s just that there are some aspects that could’ve been better, and I honestly think that Joss Whedon had a large part of some of the problems, the best parts of this movie are clearly Zack’s stuff. After Justice League, I wanna see more movies with these characters, and I think that is something that this film achieves at the very least.

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