Justice League came and failed to conquer the box office as many fans had hoped, but that doesn’t mean it’s a terrible movie. If this film was released in its current state back in 2003, we’d probably be giving it five stars with divine praises, but unfortunately for Warner Bros., it’s 2017, and we won’t accept this type of madness.
You see, Justice League was supposed to be the best superhero movie of 2017, and this sentiment has everything to do with the DC Comics heroes coming together as a team for the first time on the big screen. With such quality characters, it should have been impossible for WB and Zack Snyder to fail, but they did anyway.
Many folks looked at the problem with the movie and chose to lay blame on the director, the studio, or both. However, I’ve decided to put the blame on the decisions taken years before the release of Justice League. Seriously, the issue began at the very moment Warner Bros. agreed to quick launch the universe rather than to develop solo projects before-hand.
Man of Steel was a good start
If we look at Man of Steel, it was a decent movie, and still, for me at least, the best film in the DC Cinematic Universe. The story was down to Earth, well, in terms of how Clark Kent felt as an alien living on another planet.
We were never given a movie before that dug deep into the mind of Superman and how hard it is for him to adapt to a world where he believes he’s the only one capable of doing imaginary things. I believe Zack Snyder sold this idea of Superman struggling to find his place in the world very well.
The main problem with Man of Steel, however, was the weird editing, pacing, and Henry Cavil’s acting in some parts. For the most part, then, the film worked. The film proved that a superhero movie doesn’t need to have quirky jokes to work. Once the story, the characters, and the directing are top notch, a superhero movie with a dark tone (not too dark) can work.
Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, came too early
Superman’s story continued in Batman v Superman, and he’s still brooding. Now then, some fans had a problem with this, but I don’t. I actually enjoyed the idea of mixing fantasy with a sense of realism; therefore, I wasn’t expecting Clark Kent to settle down so comfortably now that he’s flying around Metropolis.
People will hate him for who he is, but as he continues to save people from danger, they would come to love him.
For some strange reason, Zack Snyder and the executives at Warner Bros. have forgotten the type of character the Man of Steel is, and they also forgot about a statement Jor-El made in the first movie.
“You will give the people an ideal to strive towards. They will race behind you; they will stumble, they will fall. But in time, they will join you in the sun.”
That quote alone should have been one of the key aspects behind the continuation of Clark’s story, but instead, some wise guy believed that DC fans needed a movie with Superman and Batman butting heads early on.
Batman v Superman could have worked if the story overall made sense enough. Furthermore, the tone was too dark, the holes in the plot stood out, and the CGI characters were underwhelming. And then we have a crazy Lex Luthor Jr. who came off as a cocaine addict rather than a man of smarts.
Then came Justice League as we know it
I’m skipping Suicide Squad and Wonder Woman because in all fairness, Justice League is more of a direct continuation of Batman v Superman than anything else.
The story continues as Warner Bros. continue to feel the pressure from BvS failure in the eyes of critics and regular moviegoers alike. Critics wanted a film with a softened tone, one that screams comedy and hope, and that’s precisely what WB attempted to deliver.
In the process, Justice League felt disjointed from BvS, a real Frankenstein of a film. The movie failed to take into consideration several events that happened in BvS. Not once did Bruce Wayne reveal to the team that he had a dream of the future where the Earth became another version of Apokolips, and Superman was its leader.
Despite having this vivid dream, he never once questioned the idea of bringing the Man of Steel back to life. And what about the rising dirt above Superman’s grave? Well, it meant nothing at all because Clark was dead, completely dead.
It was nothing like the 1992 comic, The Death of Superman, where our favorite hero wasn’t actually dead, but recovering in the Fortress of Solitude.
The madness doesn’t end there because the revival of Superman was quite odd. He returned to the world of the living with full strength. One would think that after being dead for such a long time, his body would require a decent amount of time in the yellow sun for him to regain his full power.
But no sir, he was up and running from the beginning, and that bothered me a bit.
Superman is all smiles
We’ve been given a brooding and confused Superman throughout Man of Steel, and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, but yet Justice League’s Superman was all smiles after regaining his senses. That’s good to see Clark smile a lot. it’s good to see him accepting himself as a hero, but doesn’t it feel underwhelming?
From Man of Steel to BvS, a happy Clark Kent is the ultimate payoff in his story, but the amount of changes that were done to the story completely derailed the entire thing. Everything happens so fast in Justice League to the point where it doesn’t matter.At the end of the day, the DECU has a good actor as Superman, but his story spanning three films has ended like a mosquito splattered on the wall.
Such a shame.