Blaine: “Justice League" is what “Batman vs Superman” should have been………..a superhero movie!!!
Plot (Spoiler Alert)
Batman is planning to put a team together to save the planet from an alien invasion. He already has Wonder Woman on his side, now it’s time to get the others, Aquaman, Flash and Cyborg.
Blaine: Warner Bros. was upset that “Batman vs Superman” became a failure and they blamed it on Zack Snyder. Snyder thought there was nothing wrong with the way he made “Batman vs Superman” and he couldn’t have imagined it any other way. The studio was thinking about firing him from directing “Justice League”. He wasn’t fired, but a lot of things needed to be changed to the “Justice League” script. Warner Bros. needed to think about what the fans wanted and not what Zack Snyder wanted. Zack Snyder had big plans for “Justice League”. For one, “Justice League” would be a two parter. Snyder lost most of his freedom to do whatever. Zack Snyder is a lousy filmmaker who thinks things way too far in a 9/11ish way. He’s also not as clever as other filmmakers like Christopher Nolan, George Miller, Patty Jenkins, or Bryan Singer.
Zack Snyder dropped out of “Justice League” while it was in post-production because his daughter committed suicide and Joss Whedon, the director of “Avengers” and “Avengers: Age of Ultron”, took over to finish the project. Joss made a lot of changes to “Justice League” after he took over. He was going to be doing things his way and not Zack Snyder’s way. Joss wrote some new scenes and did some re-shoots to help make the movie better.
In “Batman vs Superman”, Bruce Wayne/Batman was pissed off at Superman for all the damage he caused, which killed the lives of so many. Superman was not fond Batman either. He thought of Batman as a monster who brought fear in not just the criminals, but the victims as well. Batman and Superman rumbled a bit, but then they realized that the real threat was Lex Luther. They put their differences aside and worked as a team. Wonder Woman joined them, although you didn’t see much of her in “Batman vs Superman”. She was mysterious in that movie, although we all know who Wonder Woman is, but Bruce Wayne didn’t. He was trying to figure out who she is. While digging up classified information, Bruce managed to find things out about not just Wonder Woman, but other interesting figures as well. Anyway, Lex Luther created a monster, who is in the comics, called Doomsday. Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman fought Doomsday and Superman sacrificed his life to put a kryptonian spear through Doomsday. Superman’s life ended that night and Batman made a promise that he would protect this world like Superman would, but Batman knew he wasn't going to be able to do it alone. He decided that he was going to round up a team of people with special abilities, which leads to “Justice League”.
Zack Snyder was messing with both Batman and Superman’s ways. Making them more clumsy and threatening, then being the crime fighters and savers they really should be. Like Superman would be crashing through buildings, causing them to collapse and killing the people inside. It’s like 9/11. Batman puts serious injuries on the criminals, but killing them isn’t something he does. Killing is usually not Batman’s thing because that would make him not different from the criminals. Ben Affleck and Henry Cavill, the guys who play the characters, admitted that Zack Snyder’s way on this comic book franchise was too much. They both promised fans that they would be seeing a more traditional Batman and Superman in “Justice League”. They also said that Joss Whedon saved “Justice League” from what it was originally going to be.
Wonder Woman got her first ever movie during the summer of 2017 and actress Gal Gadot did a wonderful performance of the character. Gal showed that Wonder Woman is a very carrying woman who will stop at nothing until innocent lives are safe. Wonder Woman is all about protecting innocent lives and that’s what you see in Wonder Woman’s first scene in “Justice League”. Bad guys are holding hostages in a building and they have a bomb. Wonder Woman shows up and the bad guys aim their guns at the hostages, but as long as Wonder Woman is around, no bullets will hit an innocent life. Wonder Woman also works fast. She saves the hostages, gets rid of the bomb and takes out the bad guys. Gal Gadot continued to show how carrying of a hero Wonder Woman is.
I doubt Zack Snyder would show Wonder Woman being the hero. Maybe a mighty warrior, but he’s all about Superheroes causing damage. Zack Snyder is blind about seeing what a hero is all about, saving lives.
Fighting crime isn’t all Wonder Woman is doing. She’s helping Bruce find the people with special abilities. A new threat is coming their way and it’s not from this world. Superman was strong enough to keep alien invaders away from Earth, but now that he is gone nothing will stop invaders from trying to destroy the planet. Earth isn’t totally helpless. There’s an island of women that are very skilled fighters and capable of defending themselves. There’s also people under the sea with advanced technology.
Joss Whedon thought it would be a good idea to have the song “Everybody Knows” by Sigrid go with the opening credits to “Justice League” because Superman is gone and it’s showing that other planets besides Earth know that. Wouldn’t be my choice of music to start off the film. Would have gone with a score instead.
The main characters of the Justice League team are the characters that are in this film, but there’s one character they left out and that’s Green Lantern. Green Lantern already had his feature debut six years earlier and it was a huge disaster. I don’t know why they couldn’t just re-introduce the character for “Justice League”. I mean Superman and Batman have been re-invented several times over the decades through movies. It’s not that big of a deal that Green Lantern was left out of “Justice League” because the movie is still great. It is mentioned that the ones who fought against evil centuries ago were Lanterns.
Zack Snyder is not the best director in my book, but it’s because of him the DC Universe is expanding in the world of cinema. He shouldn’t be in charge of how things go in those movies though. He’ll just have things chaotic.
Zack Snyder had it figured out who should play these iconic characters. Ben Affleck never auditioned for the role of Batman when Zack Snyder was thinking about the future of DC, the part was just offered to Ben. Zack Snyder is also the guy who helped Gal Gadot’s career by giving her the role any actress would want to play. Gal almost gave up acting until she was hired to play Wonder Woman.
The characters, Aquaman, Flash and Cyborg, had cameo appearances in “Batman vs Superman”. Wonder Woman would look at the footage Bruce sent her through her lap top. I thought we were going to see more of those characters in “Batman vs Superman”, but Snyder was saving them for “Justice League”. There was already enough going on in “Batman vs Superman” that it was hard to find room for Aquaman, Flash and Cyborg.
Jason Momoa is Native Hawaiian and his people are really big on the stuff Aquaman represents, so Jason was 100% in when Zack Snyder offered him the part of Aquaman. Ezra Miller devoted himself to learn everything there is to know about the Flash once he was hired to portray the character. He took the job seriously. Ray Fisher has never acted in a film before because he’s more of a stage actor. Snyder must have seen one of Ray’s shows and that’s how he got hired to play Cyborg, the half man, half machine character.
Aquaman is grumpy because something bad must have happened to his mother and Atlantis is to blame for it. We don’t know why though because it isn’t fully explained in the movie. Bruce Wayne has had things rough too in life. His parents were murdered right in front of him. Bruce Wayne goes to Aquaman to tell him about joining this team he wants to put together. Aquaman wants nothing to do with it at first, but then he has to deal with a situation that is similar to what the League is dealing with. So he ends up joining after all, which is good. No hero should be left out.
A lot of the scenes they already shot had to be cut out of the movie. One of them was Aquaman’s backstory and it would show why he’s in a bad mood. Jason Momoa was pissed that those scenes didn’t get into the final cut of the film. Eventually, we will learn what Aquaman’s problem is somewhere in the future.
Another scene they cut out was Cyborg’s origin story. His real name is Victor Stone and he started off as a football player, then got in a serious accident, which destroyed 95% of his whole body. His father, Silas Stone, was trying to figure out a way to save his son's life. In “Batman vs Superman” it showed there was nothing left of Victor Stone. Silas was also studying on a mysterious box that had been discovered and it gave Victor new life.
Everyday there’s a new enhancement for Cyborg, a new gadget to work with. He’s afraid to go out to the public eye though, but his father doesn’t think anything is wrong with him. Silas doesn’t care if his son is half machine now, all that matters is his son is still alive. The League is looking for Cyborg, but he ends up finding them first. Like Aquaman, Victor wants nothing to do with the League neither, until invaders kidnap his father.
Cyborg was concerned about turning into a monster, but now his mind is focussed on saving the life of someone he loves and by joining the League, Cyborg realizes what he has doesn’t make it a curse, it can be used to protect people. He also doesn’t have to worry about turning into a monster anymore. Cyborg is starting to feel positive about himself. He can become something else, something better, a hero.
One of the things Joss Whedon has a talent for is being funny and he gave “Justice League” something that “Batman vs Superman” didn’t have which is humor. Zack Snyder thinks things too seriously.
The Flash usually is the comedic character of the team. Ezra shows Flash is full of life and is very excited in exploring new things. Flash is also taking his hero skills to the next level. He tells Batman that he normally just pushes people out of the way, whether they are about to be crushed by a car, or if they are holding a gun to a person’s head. While down in the tunnels, Flash’s job is to get hostages out and he doesn’t know if he is up for it. Batman tells him to try and save one life and after saving just one, Flash then has an urge to save them all. Batman has encouraged Flash to become a hero, and the more he’s involved with the Justice League the more he is loving being apart of the superhero team.
One of the deleted scenes to “Batman vs Superman” showed Lex Luther being caught by a S.W.A.T. team. When they showed up, Lex Luther is looking at a giant figure made of individual atoms from the Kryptonian ship. I didn’t know what it was, but now I know that it was showing people who the villain of “Justice League” is going to be, Steppenwolf. There’s a lot of popular villains in the DC Universe, but Steppenwolf is not one of them, according to the fans of the DC comic books. Even Joss Whedon said that he wouldn’t have chosen Steppenwolf, but there was things Snyder did on this film that couldn’t be changed. They didn’t have time to replace the villain because they had to keep the schedule going. If you ask me the villain should have been Darksied, ruler of the planet Apocalypse. Darksied is one of Superman’s enemies and he also fights the League as well. He’s a very powerful being who wants rule the universe. He’s also more of a threat. Steppenwolf is one of Darksied’s warriors and Steppenwolf goes to Earth with an army of Darksied’s alien bugs. Steppenwolf being the villain didn’t ruin “Justice League”…….for me at least. It’s still a good movie.
Snyder wanted J.K. Simmons to play Commissioner Gordon. I wasn’t sure if that was a good idea to put Gordon in “Justice League” because there was already plenty of characters in it. I didn’t even see how Gordon could fit into this movie, but when I saw the first image of J.K. Simmons as James Gordon standing next to the Bat Signal I thought it looked good. J.K. called a couple of his friends, who are comic book experts, to describe what type of character Gordon is.
James Gordon has Batman come in and Batman brings his new friends with him. People are going missing, and the rumor is alien invaders took them. Steppenwolf has had those people rounded up because one of them knows the location of one of the three boxes that can destroy the planet. One of them is Cyborg’s father and he knows where it is because it saved his son’s life. Steppenwolf has already gathered the other boxes from Atlantis and Themyscira. The Justice League show up and save everyone from Steppenwolf.
Batman is always disappearing on Gordon before the conversation is over. In “Justice League” the whole League disappears, except for Flash, the fastest man alive, because he wasn’t aware that it was time to go.
Superman died at the end of “Batman vs Superman”, but everyone knew he was going to come back eventually, the question was how? Batman has a plan to resurrect Superman by using one of those boxes. It helped Cyborg cheat death. It works on Superman too, but his memory is fuzzy and he’s a little out of control after coming back from the dead. Batman always has a plan, and for this you bring in the one thing that Superman would never think to destroy and that is the love of his life, Lois Lane. It’s a good thing Lois stopped Superman, otherwise it probably would have been another one of those situations where Superman causes a lot of damage to the city. Superman needs time to refresh his memory and the League must continue to stop Steppenwolf.
Jeremy Irons returned to play Bruce Wyane’s trusted butler, Alfred, and Jermey wasn’t too big on being in “Justice League”. “Batman vs Superman” was hard for Jeremy to follow along because it had too much in it, and he knew “Justice League” would be the same. Jeremy couldn’t drop out because he had a contract. I’m glad Jeremy was apart of “Justice League”, even though he may not have liked being apart of it, but he’s a good actor and this is more exciting than “Batman vs Superman”. Zack Snyder changed Alfred’s ways too. Jeremy’s Alfred is not the butler type, which I had a problem with in “Batman vs Superman". Jeremy Irons sees his Alfred as more of a special services kind of guy who sits in front of a computer and guides you. Jeremy Iron’s Alfred may not be the butler type, but he and Bruce are very close and Alfred is always there for Bruce. Alfred and Bruce are like partners.
The scene I found the funniest in “Justice League” is when Aquaman is sitting on Wonder Woman’s lasso of truth and is confessing that he doesn’t think much of Batman, Cyborg, and Flash, but he thinks Wonder Woman is hot. After Aquaman finds out he’s been sitting on the lasso he feels embarrassed and Wonder Woman says “I thought that was beautiful.” Almost all of Wonder Woman’s teammates find her attractive. Flash tries to flirt with her a lot. There’s a moment where Batman and Wonder Woman are having a nice conversation with each other and that brings up a sexual tension between them. Wonder Woman was interested in having a romantic relationship with Batman in the “Justice League” animated series. In the movie they are growing closer the more they work together.
When the cast came back to do the re-shoots for “Justice League”, Henry Cavill had a mustache and he couldn’t shave it off because he was using it for the new “Mission Impossible” movie, so the visual effects department had to shave it off using digital effects. There are certain shots of Superman where his mouth is moving weird and that’s because it’s a digital mouth.
Steppenwolf is activating all three of the boxes in a small village in Russia, and the Justice League go in. Funs not over until Superman shows up. Through his vision, Joss Whedon shows that kicking the bad guy's butt should be fun to watch.
Flash pushes a family of four away from the destruction that is going on. Superman is being a showoff by carrying a whole building of civilians to safety and Flash is a little jealous. Flash shouldn’t have to compare his strength to Superman, just his speed.
Hans Zimmer was the composer for “Man of Steel” and “Batman vs Superman”, but he decided to retire from the superhero genre after that and so a new composer had to be hired. Danny Elfman had worked with Joss Whedon on “Avengers: Age of Ultron” and he hired him to write the music for “Justice League”. Danny brings a fantasy and beautiful quality to his work. He gave “Justice League” the kind of music we needed to hear, something that sounds like saving the day. Also made it sound exciting. One of themes Danny is best known for writing is the “Batman” theme from 1989 film directed by Tim Burton. He used his “Batman” theme for certain scenes in “Justice League”. He even used the "Wonder Woman" theme Hans Zimmer wrote for “Batman vs Superman”. I could also hear John Williams “Superman” theme when Superman joins the fight against Steppenwolf.
The Justice League defeat Steppenwolf the way it should be, as a team. That village in Russian took a lot of damage, but it didn’t stay that way. After Steppenwolf has been defeated and the boxes have been separated, something happens. Nature is growing all around that area making things look peaceful. Zack Snyder brings destruction, whereas Josh Whedon brings peace.
This experience has changed Aquaman, Cyborg and Flash. They have come out of their shells and have become heroes. Batman, Wonder Woman, and Superman were already open to saving the world because they know it’s in their nature.
Things are lightening up for everyone. Cyborg and his father have never been closer. Flash has gotten a degree in forensic science. Superman is back from the dead. Batman, Wonder Woman and Aquaman continue to do the usual, fight crime and save lives.
The League spent a lot of time in Batman’s batcave. It was their headquarters, but now they’re going to need a more space. Bruce’s mansion was burnt some time ago. How it happened, I don’t know, but it is cool that Batman and Wonder Woman plan to rebuild it as the Justice League's headquarters.
“Man of Steel”, “Batman vs Superman” and “Wonder Woman" didn’t have a mid or after credit scene. Usually that is the main reasons to watch an entire movie. Marvel does it. DC’s “Suicide Squad” did have a mid credit scene that led to “Justice League”. It showed Bruce Wayne getting the files he needed on Barry Allen and Arthur Curry in order to find them and assemble the Justice League. “Justice League” is the first DC movie to have both a mid and after credit scene.
Growing up, I would always hear who can run the fastest Superman or the Flash, and the mid credit scene to “Justice League” shows Superman and the Flash preparing to race each other in order to see who is faster. Superman has his digitized lips in that scene.
It was hard to tell if there was going to be an after credit scene because the previous films didn’t have one. But once it was revealed that there is an end credit scene that got me excited. Lex Luther has broken out of jail and is planning to put together a team of his own, a team of super villains. There’s no telling if there will be another “Justice League” movie. As I said before the original plan was to have “Justice League” be split into two parts instead of just being one film and the after credit scene makes it look like there’s going to be another “Justice League” film. There’s no telling if Warner Bros. will approve it. They are however giving Aquaman, Flash and Cyborg their own movies, and the script for the “Wonder Woman” sequel is already in works. I’m open to another “Justice League” movie, as long as Zack Snyder is not directing it.
Next to “Wonder Woman”, “Justice League” is by far a very fun to watch in this new DC lineup and credit goes to Joss Whedon for making “Justice League” the type of movie I wanted see. “Justice League” truly deserves a five star rating and that’s what I’m giving it.
