Guilty Pleasures #46 - Justice League

Over the course of 10 years and over a dozen movies, it’s all been building up to this, this is… wait no, that was Avengers: Infinity War, let’s take a look at Justice League

DC comics do not have a good track record with movies. Since launching the DC Cinematic Universe, only one of their movies has a been a critical success. But most made money at the box office, here we’re looking at DC’s first bonafide flop. The movie was a bit of a mess behind the scenes thanks to Zack Snyder quitting the project and being replaced by Joss Whedon, who rewrote parts of the script and that entailed intensive reshoots.

For the record, I hold no ill will to Zack Snyder for his decision to step down. The loss of a loved one, especially under those circumstances, is a horrible thing to go through and I totally understand his decision to step aside. Then studio then mandated the film be under 2 hours long and wanted it released by the end of 2017 so executives could get their bonuses before the merger of WB and AT&T, this in spite of some hiccups in post-production.

The extent of the reshoots brought the budget up to $300m, making it one of the most expensive movies ever made. It made $657m at the box office; once marketing was factored in that lead to an estimated $60m loss for the studio. So, where did this movie go wrong? And did it deserve to fail?

We open with a kid wanting to ask Superman some questions… and… good lord, what’s wrong with his mouth? Henry Cavill had an arrangement for Filming Mission: Impossible - Fallout. He couldn’t shave his facial hair so they had to do so digitally and these effects look f*cking terrible, I can practically see the line where the effects started. This is probably something that could’ve been fixed given more time, but it needed to be rushed out the door.

Back to the present day, we see a robber getting stuff of a rooftop and running straight into Batman, who takes him down with relative ease and suspends him over the rooftop, using his fear to lure a parademon in. Honestly, not a bad opening as Batman grapples with the generic as all hell looking parademon. I know they were like this in the dream from Dawn of Justice but does every evil army have to look so similar? 

Batman tussles with the parademon, eventually trapping it in a net, unfortunately before Batman can find out anything from it is destroys itself. For reasons of plot convenience it leaves a pattern that’s similar to something they found in Luthor’s notes.

Batman ultimately decides to head North and assemble the League and leaves the thief on the rooftop, completely free. The jokes they could’ve done just write themselves and they did nothing! The credits roll as we the Superman memorial and everyone laying down flowers for him. I know hindsight is a terrible thing, but didn’t most people hate Superman in Dawn of Justice? 

Oh we also get re-introduced to Lois Lane and we get a subplot where Kent farm is being foreclosed by the bank. I always imagined John and Martha had lived there a good long time, even pre-Clark Kent, and they still owe money to the bank?

We also see petty crime on the rise, as a grocery store is busted up, with the cops barely able to hold them off. We cut to London, where a group of completely conspicuous armed robbers storm a museum, and there are school children there. Thankfully Wonder Woman is just standing on top of a statue for some reason and ready to help. 

Rather than being smart and making the group Intergang and giving them a connection to the Darkseid-related threat, we get ‘reactionary terrorists’ trying to send the world into the dark ages by blowing up 4 city blocks (not really a thing in the UK but whatever). Yeah, no, this would never work.

Wonder Woman bursts in, with 12 seconds to detonation and sends the bomb into the sky for it to detonate ‘harmlessly’ the lead terrorists decides to kill all the assembled hostages but Wonder Woman returns, blocking every single shot from his rapid-fire machine gun. Wonder Woman is awesome. Back to Bruce, who’s come to a small isolated fishing village and asks for Aquaman. Bruce is being very under-protective of his secret identity in this scene.

Aquaman is a bit of a dick, then Bruce decides to shave because I suspect we’re switching back to reshoots. He’d placed a tracer on Aquaman and its time for some exposition about the others. Barry Allen’s father is in jail for murdering his mother. He frequents the prison and that’s how they’ll trace him. They ID’d Cyborg as Victor Stone, in spite of his half-cyborg self, as for Wonder Woman, Alfred believes there’s some romantic attraction… Half-assed, out of nowhere romance, this is definitely Whedon’s part of the script.

Alright, so let’s talk about their interpretation of the Flash. In the original Flash origin story, Henry Allen died in prison but it’s since been retconned that Barry originally started being a police detective to prove his innocence, and that’s something that’s been adapted into both versions we’ve seen in film of late. 

This one doesn’t give the Barry the safety net of Iris and her father raising him. It’s clear he’s become much more self-reliant, working multiple dead-end jobs using his powers to fund his police academy training. It is important that Ezra’s Miller’s Flash was distinct from Grant Gustin’s, and I feel this does the job. As for which I actually prefer, I actually lean more towards this version, strange as it may sound. I found Gustin’s version tiresome after a while, making the same mistakes over and over, which is a problem that infected the entire Arrowverse now I think about it. Although you might argue that's just because I've seen much more of Gustin. 

But to the point, when he signs in, one of the guards activates a device that I guess alerts Bruce. This feels like another time Bruce is not being very private with his secret identity.  Still, I do like the character arc this scene is trying to convey. Meanwhile, Silas Stone is among the new team at the crashed Kryptonian ship, we’re informed that his son was ‘killed’ by a guy I'm calling 'random janitor of exposition'.

Turns out he’s alive, because I mentioned him being Cyborg about a paragraph ago. His father’s looking for something he calls a change engine, Cyborg can locate it but won’t. He’s hearing alien languages in his head and his mechanical body is evolving, with him developing flight capability only last night. Random janitor of exposition is killed off-screen.

We cut to Themyscira in what I highly doubt wasn’t a re-shoot. Hippolyta and the Amazons guard one of the ‘mother boxes’ it activates and Steppenwolf comes in via boom tube. I’ll get this out of the way, Steppenwolf is one of the most generic villains I have ever seen, his voice is generic, his plan is generic and of all the new gods, why did we have to get the least interesting one? OK, now I have that off my chest, let’s get a badass confrontation between the CGI Amazons and the CGI Parademons.

Hippolyta grabs the motherbox and takes it out of the temple, collapsing it behind her, she sends it away but Steppenwolf is fast and quickly catches up with them. Steppenwolf leaves Hippolyta, when the Amazon reinforcements arrive, he has the motherbox. Hippolyta says they need to light the ancient warning fires, whilst Humanity may not understand it, Diana will. They light the flame in the most practical of manners, using a flaming arrow. But Diana does indeed get the message

Now time for a scene between Lois and Martha, this shows that Lois has not entirely recovered emotionally after Clark’s death and isn’t writing big stories at the moment. Cyborg hears Alfred say his name and quickly finds footage that outs Bruce as Batman. Do I even have to say it a third time. 

So time for some exposition and I’m going to shorten this as much as possible. The 3 mcguffins join together to form another mcguffin that can transform planets into Apokolips (they never mention that name on-screen btw) Steppenwolf tried once before and was held back by a union between the tribes of men, Gods and Green Lantern? The mother boxes were separated, one kept by the amazons, another the Atlanteans and the other buried in secret. Bruce is going after Barry and Diana is entrusted to seek out Cyborg, who we see has been watching.

Bruce finds Barry’s hidden man-cave and immediately reveals his secret identity to… why do you even bother? So after an ad for Mercedes, we cut back to Diana, who’s interacting with Cyborg via computer, she’s literally talking to the screen and he’s making text responses. Diana reveals she knew he was watching and that convinces her to agree to meet him. So Wonder Woman says about her shutting herself off after the death of Steve Trevor in a bit of continuity that both flies in the face of the ending of Wonder Woman, and will be hard to write around when we have a sequel set in the 80s. Victor leaves as we cut back to the ocean.

Aquaman rescues a fisherman, who starts babbling about monsters from the sky. He drinks some whiskey and heads back to Atlantis where Steppenwolf is beginning his attack on the second motherbox. The Atlanteans, Mera in particular put up a fight before Aquaman arrives. Unfortunately, even his intervention isn’t enough and Steppenwolf gets away. Now we need to drone on about Aquaman’s origin story. Look, this isn’t necessary here, we can get to world building Atlantis in his solo movie, move on!

Meanwhile we cut to a family in a Russian village. The son is working on a radio and we soon see the village being swarmed by Parademons. Steppenwolf babbles on about his plan but they still have a box to find. He briefly mentions Darkseid, but without the gravitas that name deserves. So, now we cut to GCPD, dealing with a spate of kidnappings by Parademons, people describe them looking kinda like Batman (which explains the crappy design) though Commissioner Jim Gordon (JK Simmons) isn’t convinced. Oh, and Silas is kidnapped by parademons, Cyborg finds out about it soon after

The Bat signal is lit and Batman arrives to greet it, with Wonder Woman and the Flash backing him up, there’s an old Metropolis project where a lot of the kidnappings converge on, so the Parademons may be keeping them there, alive. Steppenwolf is interrogating the prisoners, they all beg but Steppenwolf just kills them, this is enough to put the fear of god into Barry, who’s never really been in a fight. Batman, providing honestly some half-decent advice, tells Barry to think only of saving the hostages, whilst the others deal with the battle, which he does fairly successfully.

Cyborg sees that Steppenwolf is now interrogating his father and decides to engage. Steppenwolf takes on Wonder Woman, meanwhile Batman comes armed with his Spider-tank Batmobile Javelin thing. It lasts about as long as you’d expect, Steppenwolf floods the tunnel and escapes, with the League only getting out because Aquaman arrives conveniently in time to help them.

Cyborg realises he knows where the motherbox is and Bruce decides it would be a great idea to try and resurrect Superman with it. Normally Batman is the voice of reason in the Justice League when it comes to bad ideas like this. And it comes down to his regret over the Death of Superman and his role in that. Every argument he makes doesn’t feel like something Batman should be saying, but because of the way the universe was set up, he’s the only one who can make that argument.

Cyborg agrees, having run some scenarios in his head and the Flash is kinda in agreement, Wonder Woman and Aquaman are against, fair enough scenario. But I suspect they forget the obvious argument, by bringing the motherbox into the open, YOU’RE LEADING STEPPENWOLF RIGHT TO IT! So Flash and Cyborg have an awkward conversation that isn’t funny and isn’t really that informative. Wonder Woman arrives to help as the League sneak aboard the Kryptonian ship, oh and Aquaman has joined them too.

You remember the rebirth chamber from Dawn of Justice, they’re using that again. This is what happens when the Fortress of Solitude isn’t in continuity. The computer was damaged by Lex so the Flash has to conduct an electrical current by running. I really don’t get why this suddenly became one of the Flash’s powers, but I guess it’s useful. The Flash’s run effects are a bit weird, I hate to say bad but yeah.

So it works and Superman bursts through the ceiling, destroying his monument, with the mother box landing on top of a car. Superman seems a bit off and it’s making Cyborg’s armour go haywire, it fires a shot and Superman fires heat vision at him. Aquaman and Wonder Woman try to restrain him but he’s clearly stronger than both of them combined. Honestly, a Wonder Woman Superman fight should be interesting, but it doesn’t really go anywhere. Neither does the Superman/Flash fight that follows. We get a reprisal of the ‘do you bleed’ line when Superman faces Batman. But before Batman is killed his contingency plan comes into effect, Lois Lane.

They fly off together and at that moment, Steppenwolf steals the motherbox. Superman takes Lois back to the old house and his personality takes a very sudden shift, and it’s probably for the better. He’s more light hearted, smiles and is… HOPEFUL! Just a pity his smile is CG

So, since Steppenwolf has the last motherbox, they need to find him, there should be an energy surge that Wonder Woman coaxes Cyborg into tracking. Batman asks Aquaman to check the currents for any anomalies and Flash to check the internet, after he’s eaten. Wonder Woman notices that Batman is badly bruised and has a dislocated shoulder. She isn’t happy to lead because she feels this mess is her fault, something that really isn’t her fault, but that’s another story.

Superman and Lois share a scene, and I swear they have more chemistry in this scene than they ever had in Man of Steel or Batman v Superman. Marth arrives, Lois having called her earlier and again, the two share more love in 2 seconds than Man of Steel or Batman v Superman

So, Steppenwolf combines the motherbox and the sky turns red, because it was the only way to get colour out of Snyder’s footage. They’ve tracked Steppenwolf to Russia and they have only hours, thanks to Cyborg, they can get there fast enough. Aquaman admits his fears before its revealed he’s sitting on the lasso of truth. The family is still holding down as the League arrive. Batman uses the jet and destroys some stuff, then deploys the Batmobile broadcasting a signal to get the parademons to follow him.

The family see the approaching CGI and flee, the Batmobile’s weapons are disabled but Wonder Woman and rest of the League help him out. They arrive at the tower, Wonder Woman and Aquman fighting Steppenwolf, Cyborg trying to separate the mother-boxes whilst the others cover him. Alfred tells Batman about the family, he sends the Flash to help them.

Just as things are beginning to look hopeless, a figure of hope arrives, Superman gives a few blows then gets the lowdown from Batman before hearing the situation with the family and flying off to help. I don’t have a lot to say. Superman saves an entire building, makes a change. Then quickly comes back to show up to basically become a giant dues ex-machina. I know Superman is a powerhouse and all but seriously? They separate the boxes and finish off Steppenwolf, getting his own Parademons try and finish him off. And yes, he says every f*cking cliché in the book during this fight.

The League stand atop a building dramatically and watch as the vines bloom wonderful flowers and give new life to the barren lands. So, that subplot with the house, it’s resolved because Bruce bought the Bank, which means Martha now has to pay him to have the house. He also provides a recommendation for Barry to get into the Central City police force, something which he happily shows his father. Lois returns to work and Bruce returns to the mansion and decides to make it the new Justice League HQ, that is a really bad idea! Lois closes us out with some narration from Lois.

In the credits we see Luthor escape prison and meet up with Deathstroke, hoping to form a little team of his own. Sadly this means we’ll likely be seeing more of Eisenberg’s Lex Luthor. We also get a cute little preview of a Flash/Superman race. That was nice.

So, is Justice League good? No, sadly there are a lot of problems. From an acting standpoint there are a few where it’s clear they’re not giving their all, Ben Affleck in particular. The CGI is sub-par given the budget, and that hurts some of the action scenes, particularly the end fight. Cyborg’s CG doesn’t look great either.

Regarding the script it tries to do far too much. They probably should have integrated Flash, Cyborg and Aquaman into the team faster and made their character arcs a more natural part of the plot. I admire the attempt to give them all arcs but the movie came off quite scatter-brained, particularly in the first half before the League started to come together. 

Batman and Wonder Woman had more direct issues when it comes to their character arcs, with some of it seeming to contradict the direction their arcs were heading in the last movie or in their solo ones, shows a lack of the careful planning that made the Marvel Universe what it is today.

I’ve already said my piece on Steppenwolf, he was always one of Darkseid’s grunts, he doesn’t have a lot of clout as a main villain. Of course, establishing the New Gods and all their lore would’ve taken time this movie didn’t have. But a villain like Kalibak, an over-eager but powerful threat, might’ve been more interesting as a main villain, maybe with Steppenwolf in a supporting role providing and leading his troops.

Justice League is not well paced, because of the scatter-brained first half. That said it wasn’t depressing in the way Dawn of Justice was, Superman smiled, even if it was his creepy CGI mouth. I’m glad that for whatever other wasted potential, the rebirth of Superman actually gave him a more tolerable personality.

Justice League is not perfect, but it feels like a change in direction from Man of Steel and Dawn of Justice that’s welcomed, although there are clear clashes between the director’s visions for the project. The sub-par effects and inconsistent characterisation is enough for me to understand the hate of it, but I can see the positives and I hope this serves as a permanent shift, even though it was DC’s least successful DCCU movie to date.

Rating -34%