Always fascinating to see how many movies I’m never going to watch.
We rarely see R-rated movies, so going to see Deadpool & Wolverine opened up a whole new tranche of trailers, pretty much all of which we won’t be going to.
Red One – Doing a Santa Claus action movie, complete with Dwayne Johnson and a very ripped J K Simmons, looks amusing enough that I can see us streaming it some time.
Heretic – Hugh Grant as a religious (anti-religious?) fanatic that runs a couple of female door-to-door proselytizers through a horror maze thingamabob … nope. Even though I like Hugh Grant.
Wicked – Never saw the stage show (just never worked out), but the trailer looks pretty darned cool. This one we’ll likely see in the theater.
Speak No Evil – See, the problem with horror movies is that they say, “Let’s take something that everyone gets paranoid about, like meeting what seems like a nice family while on vacation and accepting their invitation to stay with them at their isolated farmhouse, only to discover that was a Really Bad Idea, and make a movie of it and everyone will want to see it,” whereas I say, no, that’s stuff I am paranoid about and do not need to see that paranoia instantiated in a film.
Borderlands – Something video-game based, which looks like kind of CGI action-adventure fun, but my son advises against it, so that’s likely the end of that.
Joker 2 – I really don’t need to see a picture that focuses on the Joker. No matter (in fact, probably very matter) how good it is at portraying the homicidal lunatic that’s driven up life insurance rates in Gotham. Let alone seeing another retelling of Harley Quinn’s abusive relationship with same. Nope. I used the time to run off to the restroom before the movie started.
A Complete Unknown – This is the year-or-two of Timothée Chalamet, and he looks like he’ll make a great Bob Dylan, and I really have no interest in a Bob Dylan biopic. But at least it’s not Bob Dylan jump-scaring people and then carving them up with a butcher’s knife. Unless there’s more to the story than I know.
Captain America: Brave New World – Clearly trying to riff off one of the best Captain America (in fact, MCU) movies, Winter Soldier, with its politics and spy tropes and betrayals, I’m just not convinced yet by the trailers. Oh, don’t get me wrong, I’ll go see it. But I’m not sure what I’ll think of it when I do.
Alien: Romulus – Because the original focused on a bunch of adults, so clearly the only way to milk more money from the Alien franchise is to have it focus on a bunch of teen/twenty-something and What Inevitably Happens When They Try To Steal Stuff From That Mysteriously-Deserted Space Station. The trailer showed me absolutely nothing I haven’t seen before, so I don’t see much reason (even if I were a fan) to go see it.
Hmmm … so … not a lot of prospect there in movies that thought advertising before Deadpool & Wolverine was a good idea. The only thing I can say is, well, the movie trailers were a hell of a lot more interesting than the more conventional ads that have infested movie trailer time like … well, like face huggers on a mysteriously-deserted space station …
A very funny, very actiony, very enjoyable way to wile away a couple of hours. NO SPOILERS.
3.5 Acting 4.5 Production 3.5 Story 4.0 OVERALL with a ♥
We went to see Deadpool & Wolverine on Friday (opening weekend) night. I kind of pushed for it — we’ve enjoyed the DP movies in the past (usually to our surprise), but the rest of the fam didn’t seem enthused — until we were watching it.
Deadpool & Wolverine. Their relationship is … complicated.
I run very hot and cold on Deadpool in the comics. I tend to take my storytelling fairly seriously, and DP — along with “fan favorites” like Ambush Bug and the Impossible Man and Mr Mxyzptlyk and G’nort and even Lobo — are intrinsically silly characters that I usually get tired of pretty quickly.
I’ve also got only a moderate tolerance for Wolverine, as one of these characters who is so over-used it isn’t even funny.
Live action is a little difference, since movies with a given character tend to come out far less frequently. I enjoyed the first couple of Deadpool movies, despite myself, and Hugh Jackman is Wolverine. So I figured … this should probably be worth a go.
And, in fact, this movie is a very, very fun (and bloody) romp through the Marvel Cinematic Universe, tying together narrative lines from the previous Deadpool movies (with plenty of flashbacks and talky-talk for those who don’t remember that far back), things having to do with Wolverine movies (with the same caveats), recent doings in the MCU, and plenty of Fourth Wall commentary about 20th Century Fox, Disney, and whatever else turns out to be funny.
There’s a plot or three here, much more coherent than you might imagine, especially with a zany character like Deadpool, slathered with a Church Spring Picnic-full of Easter Eggs, and much capering about the Marvel multiverse (with plenty of meta commentary). There are even some lengthy serious moments! And character advancement!
But there are really two things about this movie that stand out (speaking broadly and non-spoilery). First, is that it’s fun. Well, unless you dislike F-bombs, and find huge gouts of CG blood disturbing. I was usually smiling, and I was laughing out loud (embarrassingly so) more than once.
And second, it is a HUGE love letter to the 20th Century Fox Marvel movies — various iterations of the Fantastic Four, Daredevil & Elektra, and, of course, the X-Men. With the Disney acquisition of Fox’s movie properties, they are able to — and actually do — some delightful things, even as they fade into the multiverse.
Good times. I look forward to getting this one on Blu-Ray so I can pause a thousand times and point and laugh some more.
I enjoyed myself.
Besties — as much as that might mean for either of them.
Who’d think that a movie about a kid’s toy would be one of the most human films of the year?
4.0 Acting 5.0 Production 4.0 Story 4.0 OVERALL with a ♥
First off, let me say that the production aspects of Greta Gerwig’s Barbie are … incredible. It is a beautiful movie and an incredible homage to its subject matter and its selected era aesthetic.
The movie itself is far more complex, with dozens of delightful, if not bravura, performances (Margot Robbie is, no matter what Helen Mirren says, perfection), coupled to an intricate narrative and examination of concepts around feminism, patriarchy, interpersonal relationships, societal norms, existentialism, capitalism, self-actualization, and a stubborn defiance of expectations to turn an message movie about dolls into a cartoon of easy heroes and villains.
I’m always a bit leery about saying something is brilliant, or even profound, but I will say that Barbie is simultaneously entertaining, nostalgic, hilarious, moving, inspirational, and thought-provoking, and I look forward to re-watching it a number of times in the future.
(And if it doesn’t have a broad spread of Oscar nominations, I’ll be quite put out.)
A nice, neat, fun, high-budget intro to the new Doctor
Finally watched the Doctor Who Christmas Special, Holiday Special, or Special No. 4 (depending on which advert you see for it).
I think the Fifteenth Doctor is going to be a lot of fun, full of compassion and whimsy. Not gotten a solid coherent read off of Ruby yet, but we’ll see.
The plot it self was moderately intricate, left some bits dangling for RTD to come back to, and, if a bit fantasy-heavy … well, Doctor Who has always been fantasy with most the numbers filed off.
Florida’s race to get rid of Evil Sex Books has swept up a number of Jewish authors
But, hey, let’s talk about how “liberals” are anti-Semitic.
“Florida district pulls many Jewish and Holocaust books from classroom libraries”
A global bestseller by a Jewish Holocaust victim; a novel by a beloved and politically conservative Jewish American writer; a memoir of growing up mixed-race and Jewish; and a contemporary novel about a high-achieving Jewish family are among the nearly 700 books a Florida school district removed from classroom libraries this year in fear of violating state laws on sexual content in schools.
The purge of books from Orange County Public Schools, in Orlando, over the course of the past semester is the latest consequence of a conservative movement across the country — and strongest in Florida — to rid public and school libraries of materials deemed offensive. While the vast majority of such challenged and removed books involve race, gender and sexuality, several Jewish books have previously been caught in the dragnet.
The Orange County case is unusual for the sheer volume of books removed — 699 including some duplicates, according to documents the district provided — and for the unusually large number of books about the Holocaust and Jewish identity included among them.
A surprisingly low-key but satisfying wrap-up to Indy’s career
Hey, “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” is now streaming. Let’s watch it!
TL;DR: Not a great movie, plot-wise (but, then, Indy movies never are). But from a satisfying character study, it rocked.
Yes, there are SPOILERS below. You have been warned.
4 Acting 4 Production 3 Story 4 OVERALL with a ♥
Okay, first off, that’s a horrible title, as it turns out. I’ve been trying to figure out a better one, and haven’t but … still, not good.
So there was all sorts of controversy over the CG de-aging of Harrison Ford for the first chunk of the film. I thought it worked just fine, as a matter of fact. There was plenty of (presumably doubled) action to carry through the visual illusion. Really, the only thing that doesn’t work in the WW2 sequences is Harrison Ford’s voice.
That said, mad props to Harrison Ford following that up with a full torso nudity at age 80ish. He looks old and horrible and absolutely, therefore, sells where the character is at.
Which is, a Man out of Time, old and in decline, working for a (it feels) less prestigious college, and literally plummeting into retirement. The audience recollections of his past adventures are assertively upstaged by the first Moon Landing. His adoring students of bygone films are now bubble gum-popping, jaded, and disinterested in stupid old “history.” His grand romances are reduced to a tiny apartment and divorce papers.
But it’s played very straight, no melodrama. It just is, grounded, mundane, in keeping with where Indy is in his twilight, a life of memories, bounded by noisy neighbors and the concrete jungle of New York.
God bless John Williams. The soundtrack is, with a few leitmotifs, unique unto itself … but so very, very Indy.
The story and direction (and Harrison Ford) convincingly give us age, even frailty, punctuated by a great right hook. Perfect.
I was really kind of hoping that CIA Lady would be a “figure of authority who ultimately sees that the bad guys are actually bad guys and she should be on the side of the protagonists” character. Alas, no.
The car/car/tuk-tuk/tuk-tuk chase through Tangiers is delightful, arguably the best action sequence in the film. Indy’s skill, competence, age, and incompetence are beautifully balanced.
I love that Indy represents received knowledge in competition with Helena’s street smarts, with her having a leg up in modern ruthlessness and him having a leg-up in experience.
The one least-believable part of the script is the idea that the ship carrying the Antikythera was manned by “one hundred centurions,” which is like saying “one hundred master sergeants,” which is kind of nonsensical.
A decent round of applause for addressing the “Mutt” problem — not just addressing it, but actually making it a key part of the backstory as to where Indy is at the opening of the film. It plays a part of the setting (the Vietnam War era) and the backstory (and not-so-backstory) of Indy and Marion.
So, yeah, Indy is not the worst sort of grave robber (accusations notwithstanding), but only because he donates what he robs to museums (phone call from Lord Elgin, Dr. Jones). That said, any archaeologist in the audience would be crapping their pants over (a) Indy’s treatment of the university artifact collection and (b) the recovery, opening, reading, and treatment of the Grafikos.
I loved how the references to Helena’s relationship with / obsession over his obsessions with / asserted disappointment from her dad had very, *very* clear parallels with Indy and his own father. Rubbed in when she noted his role as her godfather.
Okay, nice to see the Big Brute Killer Bad Guy hoist by his own over-sized petard.
Good Lord. It’s the “If you could kill Hitler …” time travel question, pivoted with “… and create a better Reich from it” as a plot element. Fantastic.
The final fate of the Bad Guys is fitting, but relatively low-key. That said, their fate is not actually tied to the fate of Our Hero, which is both weird and actually kind of fitting.
I was really wondering if they would pull the actual time travel trigger. And … they did, marvelously. And then I was really wondering if they would have Indy stay in the past. And … they resolved it quite on-point.
I love that, at the beginning, we are told that “Mutt died in Vietnam, Marion was inconsolable, Indy didn’t handle that well, their marriage fell apart.” And, when Marion returns at the end … maybe it wasn’t quite the way he described it. “Are you back?” I am not at all surprised that Indiana Jones is not a reliable narrator.
And, after a movie with lots of John Williams cues that are quite Indyesque music, with brief moments of leitmotifs … we get the full, bad-ass Indiana Jones March over the closing credits.
Character-wise, it’s a pretty large cast. Most are competent figures in passing, tropes to play a scene or five and be disposed of. The bad guy henchfolk fall into that category. So does the kid, Teddy. Toby Jones’ Basil Shaw is fun, but more of a plot device. Antonio Banderas’ Renaldo feels like a character who was contractually required to be prominently displayed in the posters, but who mostly ended up (appropriately) on the cutting room floor. John Rhys-Davies returns delightfully as Sallah, adding to the character’s richness but definitely in a supporting role.
Those aside, there are really three main characters. Harrison Ford is, of course, Indiana Jones, and plays him with weary enthusiasm and splendor. Phoebe Waller-Bridge is a delight as Helena Shaw, Indy’s almost-Irene Adler / god daughter, uber-competent and very much not a romantic interest for the protagonist (thank heavens). Mad Mikkelsen’s Dr. Voller plays a worthy anti-Indy, the Nazi physicist / scientist who’s out to re-write history; he never gets much motivation other than “Nazi scientist!” but plays the role gamely.
In sum … a movie that flows in a competent narrative from scene to scene, with fine (if not spectacular) FX and action scenes … but a truly marvelous character sketch for Indy, and a profoundly fitting wrap-up for his career.
A look back at Season 4 of NuWho, and the best Companion ever.
David Tennant as the Doctor (Ten), and Catherine Tate as Donna Noble.
I will confess, I am a total Donna Noble fan (and have been for some time). So prepping for the 60th Anniversary Doctor Who specials by rewatching the Donna Noble season was a task I readily welcomed.
After endless ages in Doctor Who S1-2 of the Holy Beloved Rose Tyler, and the weirdly abortive S3 “oh, she’s falling for the Doctor, too” tenure of Martha Jones, having a Companion for S4 that was (a) out for a good, interesting time, (b) not falling on love with the Doctor, (c) sassy and independent, (d) definitely not falling in love with the Doctor, (e) nagged by an inferiority complex, and (f) oh so very much not falling in love with the Doctor, was like a breath of fresh air.
The chemistry between David Tennant and Catherine Tate was lovely. The dynamic of a Companion who wasn’t cowed or dominated or (as noted) smitten with the Doctor was delightful. There was humor, there was terror, there was so much of an EveryPerson about Donna, that every moment in her early tenure was a delight.
Her first encounter, in the S3 “Runaway Bride” gave us a person-on-the-street encounter with the weirdness of the Doctor. “Partners in Crime” shows both how that encounter has changed her and how the Doctor (a lesson that holds true for every regeneration, but particularly for Ten) absolutely needs a Companion. That’s reinforced in “Fires of Pompeii,” showing how the Doctor’s hit-and-miss adherence to the rules, like a good little Time Lord, can lead to moments of amoral inhumanity, and in “Planet of the Ood” gives the Doctor a boost in the moral outrage over that race’s slavery.
Donna gets pushed a little to the side with a standard alien invasion in “The Sontaran Strategem” and “The Poison Sky,” and, for obviously reasons, continues to play support in “The Doctor’s Daughter.” But she’s back on stage for the Agatha Christie “The Unicorn and the Wasp.”
The Doctor and Donna (and, welcome, River Song!) in the Library
After what is, at that point, a pretty normal Doctor Who season (a few invasions, some weird planets and historical pieces), S4 becomes nightmarishly dark. I would say that “Silence in the Library” and “Forest of the Dead” are the scariest bits of the season, if not for the Twilight Zone-perfect “Midnight,” but Donna remains a presence — her phantom family drama in the Library two-parter makes up for River Song’s introduction pushing her a bit to the side, and her grounding of the Doctor after a very, very unpleasant encounter in the worst parts of human nature are critical parts of what make those episodes work.
All of which leads to an even darker tale in the first of the three-ep season wrap, “Turn Left,” where we see what the world — and, by extension, the lives of Donna and her family — becomes if she never takes the step that brings her to meet the Doctor. It’s an hour of progressive dystopia with shades of Alan Moore’s V for Vendetta, as the various disasters and plots that the Doctor averted over the course of S3-4 actually come to pass when Donna’s not there to pull the Doctor back in “The Runaway Bride.” After the horror of the Library saga and the psychodrama of “Midnight,” “Turn Left” just becomes horribly depressing (with a frisson of horror from the bug on Donna’s back).
Throughout it all, though, Donna remains — if not positive, then resolute. Capable of outrage. Determined to make things better. Self-deprecating, but willing to step up for a fight. She is utterly human and utterly a force of nature.
It’s Old Home Week (or Two) on Doctor Who … but, yeah, I loved it.
That brings us to “The Stolen Earth” and “Journey’s End,” as Donna lets herself be recruited to save the world. The pair of episodes carries a massive, sometimes almost overwhelming amount of fan service, drawing in every NuWho Companion and hangers-on, including key cast members of Torchwood and Sarah Jane Adventures, into a massive, multi-layered conspiracy by and battle against the (of course) Daleks.
Through this, it would be easy for Donna to fade a bit into the background, but she’s a key, if controversial, part of the plot. By the end of things, she’s proven herself, the “Temp from Chiswick,” to be the most important human in the universe … and is, for Reasons, demoted into amnesiac former Companion, unaware of what she’d seen, done, accomplished.
Donna Noble, burning too brightly
It feels outrageously, massively unfair to the character, of course (esp. as Martha heads off to new possible adventures, and Rose ends up with her mom and the Man of Her Dreams, sort of). It’s still gut-wrenching to watch (even as it includes the meme-worthy “David Tennant in the Rain” scene), but, aware how much of it must have been driven by Catherine Tate’s contract (she had a successful career both pre- and post-Who) and the winding down the Russell Davies era, it’s actually a far better ending than “Oh, I’m tired of / traumatized by / unrequited about traveling with the Doctor, so I quit” (which is pretty much what sort of happened with Martha, and with a number of Companions over the decades). It hurts like hell, but it’s also a tribute to the character at the same time.
And where did things go from there? Lacking Donna, the Tenth Doctor goes into what turns into a self-destructive spiral ending with him (and the showrunner) regenerating into Matt Smith’s Eleven and Steven Moffat — accompanied by increasingly Mary Sue-ish Amy Pond and Clara Oswald.
Which, of course, brings us a few Doctors along (Peter Capaldi’s gruff rock star Twelve, and, under Chris Chibnall, Jodie Whittaker’s lovely Thirteen) to the 60th Anniversary specials, with David Tennant somehow becoming the regeneration into Fourteen and (we are told) Catherine Tate back as Donna. How will that work? Well, yeah, I’m a day or two late in watching, but I’m very eager to find out.
Because sometimes the trailers are the best part of the theater experience
There were fewer trailers than usual at our Regal theater prior to our Friday night premiere showing of The Marvels.
The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes: I am sure that someone thought that there was some huge audience for a Hunger Games prequel (as if “yes, this is how things got so horribly miserable, plus, character hints for the people who end up so even more miserable in the original movies!” was a winning pitch), especially given the last film was eight years ago.
It all looks appropriately post-apocalyptic, and the trailer hints at it all being terribly depressing, despite some fundamental sense that somehow, sometime in the future, virtue will prevail, kindasorta.
Seriously not my cuppa.
Migration:Something animated about birds (mostly? ducks) migrating or maybe taking a vacation, and ending up being stuck in New York City, where hilarity ensues. Looks amusing. Not planning to see in the theaters.
Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom: This trailer was interesting for the first ten seconds, until Jason Momoa stopped being onshore and started living in a CGI world under the waves. At which point it all turns into what seems like a synopsis of the entire film. I suspect I will eventually watch it, but it will not be in a movie theater.
On the bright side, this should, finally, finally, spell the end of endless articles about the far-too-delayed end of the DCEU.
Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes:So I was there back when the original Apes movies were made, and they were all around the juxtaposition of humans and intelligent apes who oppressed / were oppressed by them. As far as I can tell from this trailer, it’s basically about CG apes and the rise of their civilization, and while the CG apes look to be nicely done, I have zero to no interest in what they are doing.
Wish: For all this seems to have some nifty-looking animation, the story seems like such a pastiche of other Disney films that it’s hard to get at all excited for it. There’s a young girl! Who is magically special! And there is a power figure that doesn’t like it! And danger! And cuteness! And a meta-aware talking animal!
I mean, okay, sure, it’s better than a live-action remake of Sleeping Beauty (coming to theater probably around 2027, by my guess), but there’s nothing there that feels fresh or new or intriguing.
So, net-net … nothing I feel any great urge to see, though a couple I might get around to streaming someday.
Honestly, going back over the list … I’d probably rewatch The Marvels first.
The latest MCU film is a disappointing, sloppy jumble. But it’s also a lot of fun in enough places to make it worthwhile.
Seen in the theater this evening in 2-D. Not much SPOILERy, beyond what you can see in the TV ads.
3.5 Acting 3.0 Production 2.5 Story 3.0 OVERALL with a ♥
This movie was always going to be fighting an up-hill battle. Between constant media reports about “super-hero fatigue” from movie-goers, MCU and/or comics fans who have their very strong opinions about who should be allowed in the super-hero club, and people who disdain Marvel (and Disney) on some sort of principle, any MCU film that is less than perfection is going to take a very loud drubbing.
And, yes, this film is definitely less than perfection.
(To be fair, there are a lot of critics, and sites, that have good things to say about the movie. That there is still a very vocal contingent touting this as yet another sign that the MCU is inexorably spiraling into the toilet speaks to me more about the folk saying that than the movie itself.)
You will probably hear, somewhere, the line that “The Marvels is less than the sum of its parts,” and there’s something to be said for that. This is a movie that went through a major restructuring (from a Captain Marvel sequel to this three-fer) and never quite got put back together correctly. It feels like it needed about three more runs through the writers room, honing and focusing a scattergun storyline and smoothing the oddly frantic jerkiness of its pace, while giving decent attention and story and opportunity for its three protagonists.
Its also the shortest MCU film yet, which seems odd for a movie focused on a trio of heroes, and that dichotomy shows in missed (or edited-out) moments that could have made a big difference in the feel of the piece.
At the same time, and I’m going to bold this: The Marvels is a lot of fun, and there were enough positive moments to outweigh the negative ones for both me and my wife (who is far less a Marvel enthusiast than I am). It is at its best when being relatively light-hearted, even a bit silly (net-net, I think the controversial “musical” scene works), but falls flat when giving us overly-melodramatic emotional conflicts or trying to build stakes for the overall villainous plot.
The original film trailer actually captures some of the better tonal moments.
Interestingly, the final trailer plays up the “serious” super-hero side of things:
The Acting (and the Story)
Kamala is living the dream.
Let’s start with those protagonists. Best of the list has to be Iman Vellani as Kamala Khan, doing a bang-up follow-on to her Ms Marvel TV mini-series and leaning whole-heartedly into fan-girling her idol, Captain Marvel. Actress and character both brighten up everything when on-screen, and the substantial inclusion of her family makes it all the more delightful.
Her story seems to be about trying to prove herself, getting validation as a super-hero from her idol, and maybe enduring some sobering-up moments to show it’s not all skittle and beer behind the spandex. Those aspects never quote connected the dots for me — I could see the outlines there, hints and indications, but in the rush to wrap up the film, it never quite gelled.
Carol, please don’t bring your cat to work.
I liked Brie Larson in the original Captain Marvel, a lot more than some folk seem to. She could be a bit strident, but there was justification for it all down the line, and there was no doubt she was a strong character. Here she’s facing a very real tale of dealing with the consequences of her actions, both with her Earth family (Monica in particular) and with her previously-unseen actions toward the Kree.
That tale of consequences should be super-powerful, something that rarely gets highlighted in super-hero fare, and maybe in a solo film it would have been. Instead, it means too often that Carol Danvers came off to my mind as weak and emotional and apologetic far too frequently. Her eventual efforts to Do The Right Thing and Fix the Problems She Created come too late and feel too brief, like checking a box to solve the problem. Maybe, hopefully, there was more left on the virtual cutting room floor.
Not Captain Marvel, Spectrum, or Photon. Just Monica.
Which then brings us to Teyonah Parris as Monica Rambeau. After an initial setup (as a child) in Captain Marvel, and an unexpected heroic power bump in WandaVision, this movie takes that teed-up, defined character and …
… does nothing of substance with her except for a very fun mid-credits scene. Monica comes off too often here as whiny, untrained, entitled, uncertain, and for the most part unpleasant, except when she’s called upon to be the movie’s Voice of Expository SCIENCE, and when she finally gets around to becoming a hero. The character, and actress both deserve better.
Dar-Benn is … not good. Not just morally, but as an antagonist.
Every hero needs a villain, and with three heroes we should have a villain that is three times as good, right. Unfortunately, Zawe Ashton, for all her impressive resume, is directed here as a third-rater Kree leader/villain, Dar-Benn.
Given her background and the situation on Hala, there are a lot of interesting ways you could have done that character. An admirably do-or-die patriot for her people that you could almost appreciate as a noble enemy. Or maybe a victim of madness in the face of her race’s impending death, someone you can feel sorry for and hope that she will be helped.
Instead, she comes off as just a “mean girl,” animated more by petty resentment toward Captain Marvel than a deep-seated philosophical stand or a fiery-hot desperation. Her scheme is crazy to begin with, and turning it into revenge tour on Carol just makes it feel more not-in-a-good-way silly. As such, Dar-Benn ends up weakening every scene she opens her mouth in, and keeps a lot of the “serious” aspects of the film from gathering any weight.
The rest of the supporting cast is workable — some random SABER agents, a handsome prince, a Skrull emperor, and, of course, Samuel L Jackson drawing a tidy paycheck for a very pedestrian Nick Fury rendition.
But, again, as legit as all those disappointing elements are, we still had fun. Keep remembering that.
This and That
The backdrop for all this has problems as well. There are some decent VFX, in my opinion — but also some not-very-good ones as well. The hex-grid hyperspace effect from the Guardians movies is still here, but both more simplified and more oddly tactile than before. Okay, fine.
On the other hand, some of the fixed sets (on the initial planet, on the Kree ship) are pretty disappointing, and feel like visual sacrifices were made to make them convenient locations for big battles.
That said, the fight choreographing with three protagonists — especially against the villain, especially when they are body-location-swapping — is very neatly done. Indeed, the whole quantum entanglement / body-location-swapping thing works far better than it should, to both humorous and action effect (see the Original Trailer, above, for examples).
Music-wise, aside from the Captain Marvel primary theme, and the “musical” scene, the soundtrack varies from mediocre to hackneyed. Laura Karpman has an amazing resume and I liked her work on “What If …?” but here the music is conspicuously, distractingly conventional.
Random other thoughts which I will try to keep not-too-spoily:
* So what exactly is Earth’s tech level these day? Apparently we have full-fledged space stations, with energy-cable space elevators, and instantaneous cross-galactic comm units, and recognized and active hyperspace gates. With no discernable difference to the people of Earth.
* On the other hand, the galaxy (or galactic neighborhood) sure seems awfully small. We have a limited number of hyperspace gates, and no indication that anyone but the Kree, the Skrulls (previously), and Earth are out there using them (or worrying about the problems occurring with them). I realize we weren’t going to see a Guardians cameo, but it makes the playground feel a bit cramped and unambitious.
* As always, very much appreciate that Ms Marvel’s costume aligns in style with her comic book version, and that it is “modest” in a non-frumpy way.
* Monica’s costume was unimaginative at best — though I did enjoy the under-arm sashes that the water people offered her, as a call-back to her original goofy comic book uniform.
* My problem with the “musical” scene was not its existence, but that the music was very Earth-conventional in chords and other musical structures. It didn’t feel intriguingly alien, it felt pedestrian Bollywood.
* Whatever happened to the water planet? Sorry, no time to consider that planetary ecological disaster, too bad, so sad.
* Nice to see Valkyrie’s too-brief cameo, but not only it feel way too much like almost-literal deus ex machina to solve a plot issue, but it was a solution to a plot issue that might have made a very big difference in a recent MCU TV show. Crikey.
* I loved the flerkin stuff. All the flerkin stuff. Kamala and the flerkin. Nick and the flerkin. Flerkins in space. So much fun. (Okay, all maybe except the question of why Carol flies through space, into danger, with Goose on her shoulder; it seemed more plot-driven than logical.)
* My wife suggested that SABER’s Employee Assistance Program was going to get a lot of heavy demand for the next few years.
* WTF happened to the other bangle at the end? No, seriously. Horrifying continuity gaffe or a last-minute edit of a cut scene that didn’t get explained (or CGed) in the final edition.
* Man, I sure hope we don’t have a new invasive species problem here on Earth.
Bottom Line
This movie feels like it suffered from too-choppy writing, even with the highly publicized reshoots, exacerbated by a far shorter run time than it deserved.
As a result, character development and coherent plotting, not to mention the opportunity to take a breath from constant planet-hopping, were all in short supply.
It still has plenty of good moments, though, and I don’t mind the somewhat light-hearted, even whimsical nature of much of the film. Not taking itself too seriously was honestly not a bad thing; the movie’s weaknesses came up when it tried to be more serious and started dropping things all over the place.
I can see watching this movie again, though not at theater prices. Maybe on Blu-Ray when it comes out.
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A previous version of this review appeared on Letterboxd.
There might be spoilers … (but it’s hard to care too much).
I went into Shazam 2 knowing only that, with a huge stable of classic Captain Marvel villains, the creative team had chosen to come up with something new of their own — a big waste of possibilities, even if Captain Marvel’s classic villains tend to be stuck with a Golden Age sensibility to them.
(Don’t worry: there’s a lamp-shading post-credit scene for that.)
The bottom line is, after a sort of rocky start, and toying with questions of self-worth, of identity, of belonging, of independence, the movie finally settles for rollicking sibling action with some independent side quests (especially for Freddy) along the way. It’s cute, and it’s actually more engaging than when brushing on some of the deeper, more serious themes, but at the same time, it’s really, really generic. Half the kids (in either form) are random tropes, and aside from Billy having imposter syndrome and Freddy falling for a girl, there’s not much there actually there.
The antagonists are generic godly types resentful of the wizards who stole their powers and the one wizard in particular who passed them on to Billy (and through him to his family). There’s some slight interest here in that the three godly sisters, the Daughters of Atlas, don’t agree on policy, which leads to some not-insignificant conflict between them. But even with talents like Lucy Liu and Helen Mirren involved, it still feels (to use the word again, and intentionally) generic.
(How this movie’s depiction of the fall of the gods jibes with the the analogous backstory from Wonder Woman is not worth thinking too much about. Ironically, SPOILERS, Diana herself makes an appearance, leaning into the god thing herself a bit more than usual, but also classing up the joint tremendously.)
Shazam 2 isn’t a bad film. It’s just sort of fluffy, middle of the road, undistinguished. If there is actual “super-hero fatigue” in movie audiences (and I think there is, to the extent that super-hero movies are now like anything else: audiences demand something special and interesting, not just a satisfaction to a hunger for anything about super-heroes; they want steak, not hot dogs, or at least a thick, juicy burger), Shazam 2 is definitely a self-victim of it, generally entertaining but safe and unchallenging. It’s the summer family comedy that you’re sure you’ve seen the commercials for, but don’t know anyone who went to see it (or who thought the viewing noteworthy enough to mention at work).
What it also is, is proof that in no way would a Shazam/Black Adam film ever, ever work. Ever. They are tonally way too different.
Or, on consideration, maybe I’m wrong: the seriousness and confrontation with violence that Black Adam would bring to Shazam might shake the sub-franchise out of its family dramedy doldrums, while giving Teth-Adam something to do other than brood and murder.
Not that we’ll ever know one way or the other, since it seems unlikely this iteration of Shazam will ever make it into the New, Improved DCU. And, with Billy Batson turning 18 “in only five weeks” (something he makes a somewhat uncomfortable point of mentioning to Wonder Woman), maybe this a good opportunity to bring this particular tale to a close, even if it weren’t being shut down by WB in the first place.
Very cool poster, and very ironic given how the movie ends up.
After its critical and box office drubbing, I was not holding out much hope for Black Adam. To my surprise, it’s actually a decently crafted super-hero flick, with some unique elements that make it not just another slog. It’s not the paragon of the genre, no matter how much Dwayne Johnson wants you to think so — there are some plot and characterization elements that are more than a bit goofy. But that said, there are far worse DCEU films (I know — I’ve watched several of them this past week).
The theme of being a hero vs. being an avenger (small A), or force of anger, or even just a protector, is centrally, though shallowly, addressed. Johnson, in the title role, sometimes comes across like David Bautista’s Drax — literal and violent in a way that’s meant to be endearing (and turns disturbing if you give it any thought) — but when he relaxes he — and the movie — are eventually able to more or less walk the fine line between serious issues and situational humor.
Some notes from the viewing:
¶ Ultimately, the question for the movie is going to be how well Dwayne Johnson does Black Adam. If this movie had never been made, fans would have debated the matter for decades.
Well, the movie was made, and the answer is: pretty darned well. Physically, of course, he’s perfect — big, bald, and brooding. Emotionally, the brooding part works, too, as well as the glower. He has some emotional scenes he carries off decently. This is not a King Lear star turn, but he filled what it was just fine.
(OTOH, we can debate whether his wrestling-style publicity-driving behavior — aggressive hyperbole about his future role in the DCEU — might have been one of the factors that turned audiences away from the movie, or, more importantly, turned the WB execs away.)
¶ Along those lines, the anti-hero thing is getting a bit tired, but Black Adam does provide us with a novel instance of it: a brutalized man, from a brutal culture, with the power to be brutal to the folk he thinks need brutalizing. I sort of got some flashes of Conan the Barbarian there, early on.
¶ While appropriate, it’s also kind of cool to see a movie like this set in a foreign country — and focused on its people — rather than another supers film centered on the US. That another country could have a history, could have patriots, could serve as something more than an exotic plot layover or a homeland for terrorists — is probably the most imaginative thing about the film.
That said, the treatment doesn’t get more than skin deep. While I’m a little glad that we didn’t get the usual gang of juntaists or dictators, saying that Kahndaq has been taken over by Intergang for the past several years isn’t telling us much (even for someone who recognizes the reference, as 95% of the fans won’t). Other than strip-mining for the hitherto unheard-of “Eternium” for their hi-tech weapons and transport, the question of what Intergang is doing there — how and why they are controlling the country, or who is even running the show — is handwaved aside, leaving those bad guys as merely often-faceless mooks for Black Adam to kill.
That speaks to a bigger flaw here: the idea that a nation could fundamentally exist, especially as a perpetually-conquered geographical realm, for five thousand years without serious cultural disruption or confusion of identity. To take a parallel example, Iraq doesn’t deem itself Assyria, or Babylon; it barely holds itself together as a nation, vs. regional ethnicities. The history and socio-politics of Kahndaq is (or should be) no different. We’re not just speaking out against colonialism, here; a lot of that “foreign” domination would be by regional neighbors.
Ditto with people tracing their heritage back 5,000 years. No matter what Ancestry.com tries to sell you, or how much your family talks about an object being “in the family for generations,” 5,000 years is really beyond the pale. Anyone who stepped forward claiming to be the last descendent of Nabonidus would be locked away.
That’s a problem brought over from the comics, though, not new with this movie. And, yes, it may seem weird to cavil at such a point in the face of a guy who can fly and punch people through stone walls. But romanticizing such things is culturally degrading in its own way, a subtle but real orientalism. Moon Knight had its own problems here, but still did a better job of focusing on the present world and its problems, not making everything dependent on the past.
¶ It’s brought up on a couple of early occasions that Black Adam is vulnerable to Eternium — what Intergang has been using (and even labeling!) in their new weapons. Weirdly enough, this basically gets dropped as a plot element (so to speak), even when Adam gets caught in the explosion of their fancy jet bikes.
¶ There are some odd (or at least noteworthy) narrative choices in the film. One is that the titular character is absent for a big chunk of the Fourth Act, after he surrenders to the JS and gets locked away under the Arctic Ocean. Such a powerful presence leaves a big gap — and that’s a bold move.
On the other hand, we have the narrative structure that Kahndaq is being controlled by Intergang (one in a list of five thousand years of conquerors, as discussed above), but we only ever see low-level mooks and mid-level fellow-traveler Ishmael; Intergang almost a McGuffin antagonist, there to provide victims to Black Adam and big explosions as their strip mining operations blow up real good. I read that there was originally an intent to include Bruno Mannheim as the head of Intergang; that might have been a distraction, but it might have lent a bit of focus to this aspect of things.
Note that it’s not that the Intergang thing is unbelievable in and of itself (glowy jet scooters aside). Read a bit about how the Wagner Group (yes, that Wagner Group) has been involved (or involved itself) in a number of African civil wars, mostly to literally take over extraction industries there for a tidy profit. The thing is that Intergang here has absolutely no personality. They operate checkpoints in “the city,” and strip mines in the desert, and that’s about it.
¶ On the other hand, there are two very neatly done twists. First, that the solitary named bad guy (Ishmael) actually wants to be killed by Adam (thus why he turns off the Eternium force field at the penultimate conflict) so that he can … get turned into Sabbac (which he figures out will happen in some unexplained fashion). It turns what looks like an early, almost-big-enough victory, into just a stepping stone for the final act. I know that I didn’t glance at the clock, but instead wondered, “Is this really how it ends, with the bad guys foiled, and Adam being sent into black ops exile?” They fooled me, and that’s a good thing.
Second, we have the unexpected twist in Teth-Adam’s backstory — and what he does about it. It’s quite nicely executed, and actually lends some character to the character. Having followed Black Adam as a character since DC pulled him out of just being a Captain Marvel/Shazam antagonist, I wasn’t surprised by it (variations have show up before), but the abrupt but believable shift in the history does good things to make Black Adam — if not more sympathetic, at least a bit more understandable as a person.
¶ I am amused to read that, for a movie that features (indeed, calls out) such a high body count, it originally garnered an “R” rating for it, and so had to be toned down — largely, I suspect, by simply not “showing” the deaths, just showing Black Adam tossing people high into the air, dropping them from great heights, or smokelessly electrocuting them.
I don’t know — turning (even marginally justified) mass murder into something of a bloodless joke is a bit disturbing. I mean, it was also disturbing in The Suicide Squad (2021), and even in the various Guardians of the Galaxy films, but there it worked. In those films, the question is, can someone who kills people (for fun, for sport, for money) also be a good person in some way, caring, self-sacrificing, even arguably heroic? Here, Black Adam is trying to establish who he is, for himself and his associates and his nation, and he seems happy to not be any of those positive things, as long as he can work out his anger.
I don’t know — it bears more consideration. Perhaps it’s simply that The Suicide Squad wasn’t afraid to lean into it — it accepted its “R” for “strong violence and gore” (among other things), rather than hiding the results of that strong violence by simply having Black Adam throw bad guys over the horizon.
¶ I will confess I watched this movie much more to see the Justice Society than to see Black Adam. And, remarkably enough, I was not disappointed.
The Justice Society — Dr Fate, Hawkman, Cyclone, Atom Smasher
Well, disappointed a little. That their mission is to protect “global stability” is … in its own way, as amoral and anti-heroic as Black Adam, vows against killing aside. They represent a world order that seems accept Intergang controlling a country (or, since there’s been no independent Kahndaq for five thousand years, a region within some other country) and stripping it for resources — accepting enough that when someone pops up and potentially will be disrupting their operations, the US Government calls in some big guns to publicly knock that someone down.
The Justice Society are not the good guys here. That they get called out for that a bit by Adrianna was a good thing to see.
That illusion of moral high ground is further damaged by their being in bed with Amanda Waller (and dumping a prisoner off to a Task Force X black site). To date, we’ve only seen Waller running her “Suicide Squad.” Presumably, the JS doesn’t have bombs in their heads, which makes me wonder what the backstory is for these ostensible heroes. We never get much hint of it
In such a (literally) gritty environment, the cool Nth Metal (!) Hawk Jet (and its very silly launch sequence) feel quite out of place.
That said, I loved the characters. I could do without the Atom Smasher / Cyclone flirtation, but Pierce Brosnan’s Doctor Fate and Aldis Hodge’s Hawkman were wonderful, and quite in character. I am actually surprised we got to see as much of them, in and out of battle, as we did — though they all lacked much in the way of context (if only to provide contrast to Black Adam), and they all needed briefings on (a) de-escalating conflict, (b) how to minimize civilian casualties, and (c) the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict.
I mean, you only say “Kneel or Die” when you want to escalate conflict, right?
Yes, Hawkman is usually this big of a jerk. Which is why he is never put in charge of teams.
Damn. I really do want to know more about this group, because it seems under- and poorly staffed. Hawkman is the world’s worst choice of leader, given his clear anger management issues, Doctor Fate is too often checked out, and the only other two members (one of them brand new) are too young to be acting independently. Is the Justice Society just a public operation of whatever group Waller runs or is part of? An actual government-sponsored team to be sent in when covert wet-work is not preferred, but an overt statement of US policy is? That would be a very cool twist (and an inevitable conflict with the JL) that we will never, ever get to see.
¶ Adrianna sure seems to turn on (or at least get suspicious of) Black Adam pretty quickly, upon conversation with the JS. It felt like there was a scene or two missing there.
¶ I’m sure there was no winking message there when Black Adam, in beating up Hawkman in Amon’s room, pointedly demolished every DC comic book poster he had. (Eyeroll.)
On the other hand, it’s fascinating to learn that the very real heroes in the DC Universe have comic books (and comic book posters) of themselves.
¶ The Black Adam / Sabbac BBEG battle at the end is almost anticlimactic, given what’s come before. Still, it actually does a much better job — maybe because it is grounded in a realistic-looking setting — of feeling real, even with all the energy being thrown about and illusions being cast. Having watched a lot of BBEG battles, this one was one of the best.
That said, it there’s no real sense going into it who is better, or if the two SHAZAM figures are dead even. That lowers the tension a bit, especially with multiple heroes involved.
Nice twist on the vision that was fulfilled/averted/accommodated.
I guess it was nice that the civilians had something to do during that battle other than scream madly and flee down the streets — but the zombie battle felt a little bit silly.
¶ In keeping with the comics (well, some threads of them with this character over the past decade or two), Black Adam becomes, not a hero, not a ruler, but a protector of Kahndaq. Which is totally cool, totally needed, and I’d love to see that kind of model show up elsewhere in whatever the DC Universe looks like in the future.
¶ The mid-credits sequence … yeesh. I know the DCEU’s Amanda Waller doesn’t always use the best judgment, but she has three Justice Society people working for/alongside her that could tell her that approaching Black Adam with threats is SO counter-indicated.
Of course, she (through some unexplained means or another) demonstrates the power she claims to be able to wield. Also, of course, though we don’t see it, I can very easily see Adam punch Superman in the snoot a half-second after the credits continue rolling, because, again, Black Adam as a character is all about showing who’s dick is bigger if he thinks someone is challenging that point.
It’s all a moot point, of course. Black Adam was a cinematic dead end. Its mediocre financial performance — not really deserved, but Johnson’s ego-boosting hijinx around this, as well as fatigue over the known collapse of the DCEU — means we will not see a sequel to this, or see Black Adam show up elsewhere, and, most likely not any of the Justice Society members, either.
Which is a shame. As I said, I kind of liked this film. I can see coming back to watch it again in the future, too … even if it’s just a footnote in cinematic history.
Do you want to know more?
This review, in a less expanded form (but still probably too long for what we’re actually talking about here), was previously posted on LetterBoxd.
3.5 Acting 4.0 Production 4.0 Story 4.0 OVERALL with a ♥
This, this, is a Suicide Squad movie. This is what was advertised and promised for the first one (such a piece of dreck).
Light-hearted except when being murderous. Light-hearted even when murderous. Bloody humor, and humorous blood. Enough smattering of character trauma and systemic corruption and even apocalyptic threats to make the mass murderers actually seem like heroes to root for.
The selection of characters, from the conventional to the quirky, was lovingly done. The nature of the Squad (high, random mortality rate) is respected. You’ve got bad guys, kinda bad guys, and bad guys who manage to be sympathetic. It literally hits all the notes that make up the best Suicide Squad tales, nearly all of which was missing in the 2016 film as released.
Heck, we even get a decent Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman). Who is actually the same actor from the 2016 film. Which in turn shows you how much a difference writing and direction make.
All the actors though, from the famous (Margot Robbie, John Cena, Idris Elba, Viola Davis, Peter Capaldi) to the relatively obscure do their job splendidly. There’s nothing too deep here demanded; it’s not “King Lear.” But to the extent that they are there, they do rock-solid jobs.
The story as full narrative is pretty straightforward, the magic being in the thousand little details, character asides, and overall zaniness.
The production values are remarkably high: great stunts, flawless CG (big and small), an excellent sound track, and gorgeous, expansive sets.
Throw in an delightful BBEG villain (delightfully rendered), and it makes just a freaking fun movie.
If I have to be critical about one thing, it’s that Davis’ Amanda Waller gets just a bit too shrill and out of control. Playing the control team for laughs doesn’t work quite as much for me as for some, but it was, at least, done well.
And I’ll give them those flaws in return for getting that fabulous Harley break-out, flowers and all.
In short? This film, in a small way, redeems the DCEU, it makes up for the 2017 Suicide Squad (or allows it to be well and truly forgotten), but best of all, it bodes well for James Gunn’s shepherding of the rebooted DCU in the years to come.
I love this take on old action-adventure paperback covers.
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This review, in an earlier version, was posted to LetterBoxd.
I keep wanting to think that WW84 is a bad movie, but the fact is that it’s bad mostly in comparison to the original Wonder Woman movie. It is a very mediocre movie, though, to the point where it’s as if setting it in 1984 rubbed off that particular decade’s silliness in TV shows (1984 was home to classics like Airwolf, V, Hunter, and Charles in Charge) onto the plotline here — which runs along at a breakneck pace, hoping the viewer won’t notice the duct tape and paper clips holding it together.
The original Wonder Woman captured both a strong mythology and a remarkable historical moment, all of it gorgeous and richly realized, coupled with a story about hope, heart, naivete, hatred, duty, and sacrifice. WW84 … doesn’t. Its emotions are, at best, greed and selfishness and the dangers that come from them, handled with the nuance of an Afterschool Special. WW84 just uses some of the props and pieces from the original film gave us to provide lots of chases, shooting, punching, and occasional tears.
More notes …
¶ The posters for this film were pretty — rich rainbow metallic / glass / neon color loveliness. That color loveliness is nowhere in the film.
¶ The initial sequence with young Diana competing in Amazon Ninja Warriors feels over the top, turning the the highly trained warriors into the Cirque du Soleil. There’s some sort of entitlement and self-gratification and cheating trope that’s supposed to relate to the decisions Diana and the world have to make later — but the connection never really gelled for me.
¶ The tone and period aesthetic are established by setting the initial “current day” action sequence in a shopping mall. Man, I remember those.
¶ Diana having a collection of old photos of her old friends who have since died sets the ground for how her relationship with the revenant Steve Trevor will go. That has a few good moments in the film — and Chris Pine does his utmost — but the personal relationship element gets squashed under a series of action sequences and dealing with the Bad Guy, punctuated by melodrama. All that dilutes what should be the heart of this movie: Diana is alone and isolated and unhappy, and has chosen that course (and will remain on it until we get to at least Batman vs Superman, decades in the future).
She does, eventually, “gets over it” to a degree, by letting Steve go — but the final scenes show that she is now alone and isolated and accepting, rather than unhappy. Not a great improvement. I mean — she couldn’t have invited the body dude for some hot chocolate or something?
Some Golden Age Duke of Deception here
¶ Pedro Pascal IS Maxwell Lord (with an accent). I also insist on bonus points for actually saying the words “Duke of Deception” to myself way early in the film.
¶ Hit-on culture is something I am glad we have (largely) moved on from since 1984. Or, at least, is restrained by social and legal forces a lot more than it was.
¶ Something not touched on with Diana’s wish: what happened to the original guy (or his soul, or whatever) whose body and life Steve (Steve’s ghost?) takes over due to Diana’s wish? If Steve hangs around, what happens to his job, his rent check, his friends, his family? Heck, his soul? No, Steve staying in that body is never a long-term option, but nobody ever seems to realize that.
I also learned, in researching this review, that there was some criticism raised about what sort of hi-jinx Steve got into with his host body without the owner’s consent — from sex with Diana to getting into gunfights. The answer that this is a “body swap” trope, like Freaky Friday, is unsatisfying on a couple of levels, not least of which is where’s the other body that Steve’s new body got swapped into? A light scattering of old much over Belgium, as I recall …
¶ I do love that Diana lives in the Watergate.
¶ There’s a lot of namedropping going on in this film, with Simon Stagg and Bialya both showing up, even though there’s only passing similarity to their originals in the comics.
¶ So Diana fights crime (occasionally?), but zaps security cameras (in this pre-cellphone world) so that her identity remains a mystery. That’s because Superman, thirty years later, is supposed to be the dawn of (known) superheroes in the DCEU, but it’s still a bit goofy. If she’s swinging into action even once a week, enough people will eventually see it that the secret of her existence will become known.
¶ There’s a lot of madcap adventure that seems to happen in this film, to keep it all hurtling along faster than the characters (and viewers) can consider what’s actually happening. The whole trip to Egypt/Bialya feels distracting. Part of that is intentional, to keep the central characters chasing after things and distracted from the problems around (and within them), but it adds to that sort of mindless 80s action-adventure feel to the whole film.
¶ Whom did they steal that jet from (that Diana has a cardkey for the grounds)? Why did they steal it? Why are they in a plane that (a) really looks like it should require air masks (for a non-pressurized cockpit) and (b) really looks like it should not have anywhere near the range for a cross-Atlantic + cross-Mediterranian flight?
I mean, wouldn’t it be hysterical (and a scosh more realistic) if Diana’s Invisible Plane were a Herky Bird or something?
Also, flying through fireworks, even if you are invisible, is NOT recommended. Stupid, distracting padding.
¶ The big highway gun/truck fight feels like someone randomly filled in the blanks for “Insert big action sequence here.” I mean, it does begin to hint that Diana’s powers are waning, but it’s mostly ten minutes of vaguely Indiana Jones-style action.
Also … why do Diana’s powers fade? I initially thought that Barbara was gaining powers as Diana lost them, but it seems to be tied to her Steve wish. But why? Diana wished (silently) on the stone, so did the stone just take her most obvious asset in some weird way? Was Diana’s wish predicated on a sense that her powers made her an outsider with responsibilities that kept her apart from others, and therefore she needed to sacrifice those powers to get Steve back?
And how is it that the sacrifice for the wish is kept a secret until after it’s granted? The point of the Monkey’s Paw isn’t that “Oh, dear, I have gotten my dead son back, but it seems all my stocks and bonds are owned by the Monkey’s Paw now,” but, “Oh, dear, I have gotten my dead son back but I failed to ask for him back alive and recovered from rotting in the grave.” The unexpected twist.
The rules of the wishcraft are really unclear, and never actually addressed in the film, so it all become part of the sloppy plot magic.
¶ I appreciate the pseudo-Reagan in the White House, whose wish is for MOAR NUKEZ! It’s wildly stupid, but in keeping with the era.
Now with wings!
¶ Anton Chekhov ought to get writing credits for this one:
If there’s (out of nowhere) armor of an Amazonian warrior-martyr who gave up her life to protect humanity, up on the mantle in Act 1 …
or
If there’s a pilot giving instructions to a non-flying super-hero about how easy it is to fly planes, up on the mantle in Act 1 …
¶ Asteria’s armor is … just dumb. I mean, it’s modeled after the armor Alex Ross designed for “Kingdom Come,” so it’s not dumb in that way, but it’s never quite clear why Diana goes and gets it and puts it on. Except that it will add a new visual element to the impending battle against Cheetah. And then Cheetah rips the invulnerable golden wings to shreds, so now it’s just golden body armor Diana wears for the rest of the main action of the film. Dumb.
¶ Why didn’t Diana just take down the broadcast tower to cut off the broadcast?
¶ The Diana/Cheetah battle was not good CG. The team knew this, which is why it’s 100% at night and 50% under water.
¶ I do appreciate their seizing the 80s zeitgeist of personal improvement movements and “Why not more?” excessive consumerism. It was the most realistic aspect of the movie.
That said, Diana’s little speech about how the world is actually a beautiful place just as it is and we don’t need wishes to make it better is all well and good for an upper middle-class professional woman living in an expensive apartment in Washington, DC. A starving kid in Ethiopia or a war refugee in Afghanistan or a dying AIDS patient in New York City in 1984 might feel a leeeettle differently.
But, then, “Wishes Bad! No Wishes!” is a silly TV trope that dates back to the 60s with Bewitched and I Dream of Jeannie. It made no more sense then than than it does in 1984 or today. Wishes driven by anger or greed or envy or fear or selfishness are probably not going to be good wishes. With great power comes great responsibility, to quote a different comic book.
¶ The denouement credits scene was just the right level of cheesiness for this film.
In conclusion …
Net-net, this film was shallow, unfocused, and facile in the motivations of its characters, and heavily laden with action sequences that had only a passing connection with the narrative. In short, it was very 1980s.
Worse than that, though, there seems no reason for this film. The events impact neither the world (nobody in any other DCEU movie has mentioned the time when Everyone Got Their Monkey Paw Wishes And How Horrible That Was) nor the titular character. Diana can smile now, but she isn’t any more sociable. She’s been given a talking to by Steve about living life, but when we see her again thirty years later, she’s still isolated, cleaning statuary by day, punching bad guys at night, studiously solo.
So why, exactly, does this story deserve to exist, other than the fact that in the 1980s, TV was still episodic, and no matter what happened in one episode, it would have no impact on the next? That’s a lot of what this film feels like. And that’s one disappointment in WW84 too many.
Wherein I praise ZS’ film and set aside (mostly) objections to the whole #ReleaseTheSnyderCut cult.
Part of my DCEU Rewatch. First Watch? Yes (sort of).
3.5 Acting 4.0 Production 3.0 Story 3.5 OVERALL
There will be spoilers.
The Starting Point
1. I am not, in general, a fan of what Zack Snyder did with the introductory chapters of the DCEU.
2. I felt the effort by Snyder’s fans to get a “Snyder Cut” of the film was ridiculous (if not occasionally abusive).
3. I certainly had no interest in watching four hours of Zack Snyder’s Justice League.
But here we are, Bob.
And I will say this: Zack Snyder’s Justice League is a significant improvement on the theatrical Justice League release. No question about it. If (given the time) I were to rewatch one or the other of them, Snyder’s is the one I’d choose.
The (Literally) Big Picture
The basic reason is obvious: it’s a more coherent film, with one creative direction, vs. the theatrical release which was in post-production from Snyder, then was substantially rewritten, re-filmed, and re-edited.
The secondary, interlocking, but at least as important reason is that the theatrical release, by WB diktat, was only two hours long. The Snyder cut is four hours long.
Snyder doesn’t waste that extra time, either. He has longer scenes, more backstory, more exposition, more opportunity for character development. Very little of that is wasted time, though some of it is less necessary than others. Much of the slack is taken up with expanding the Flash and Cyborg stories (and a bit for Aquaman, Batman, and Wonder Woman). There are scenes I could imagine being cut, but not two hours worth.
And that’s the key. If the tragic death of Snyder’s daughter had never happened, and he had remained as director, we still would not have gotten the Snyder Cut as the release. We would have gotten literally half of it — selected by Snyder, to be sure, but, also, literally half the movie that Snyder had in the can (he only shot an additional five minutes for this edition). It would not have been the Snyder/Whedon/WB chimera, and that would be to its advantage, but it would also have been savagely chopped down (with maybe ten minutes given back for an “director’s cut” a year later).
Would it have felt hollow? Choppy? Would there have been protests about characters getting a short shrift? We will never know.
Which, ultimately, makes the comparison between the two releases unfair, at least when it comes to the little apples and the twice-as-large oranges. You’d have to travel to the Elseworld where we got Snyder’s two hour cut to really make that judgment.
Tonally, I’ll say that Snyder’s four-hour extravaganza is not as grimdark as I’d imagined it would be (except for, maybe, the Knightmare bits). There is substantially less banter, not surprisingly, but there’s still some. There’s arguably more violence (Steppenwolf’s fate standing out there), but though the movie ended up (both for violence and for language) being rated “R”, it’s not awful for either.
The Big Battle
For all that Snyder makes use of his four hours to further flesh out scenes and individual stories, the biggest difference between the films is in the BBEG Fight in the final act. Where the Theatrical Release is just a repetitive slugfest, the Snyder Cut has a much better narrative through-line, as well as a more exciting conclusion.
The one thing the Theatrical Release has that I think is better is a set of human stakes. Snyder clears the entire region of people, so he doesn’t have to worry about them. Whedon leaves refugees in the area, with a focus on a particular family terrorized by parademons and then threatened by the expanding Unity effect. I’m not sure the actual execution is optimal, but it keeps the affair from being totally a battle of SFX, giving us a focus for the human stakes beyond Our Heroes.
Another change in the BBEG battle is the nature of the conclusion. In the Snyder Cut we get a boom tube arrival by Darkseid (eep!), just in time to receive the stabbed and decapitated body of Steppenwolf — and we get the promise that Apokolips will be coming to invade soon (which then ties into the Knightmare scenes elsewhere).
In the Theatrical Release we got the “parademons sense and are enraged by fear” setup early in the film, which means they turn on Steppenwolf when he finally get scared of the League. It’s an easier if cheaper conclusion — but that might have been the reason for it. WB was deep, deep into the hole with this film (the Theatrical Release clocked in at $300M). I suspect the full CG setup of Darkseid and his court were part of what got cut in the final effort, and were part of the 2700-odd SFX shots that Snyder added back in (to a tune for the WB of 2021 of another $30M).
Along those same lines, I believe, Snyder took Steppenwolf and his armor — which was in the Theatrical Release an easier and less expensive rendering compromise from the original design — and restored it to what he originally intended, which was glorious.
Steppenwolf in 2017 vs Steppenwolf in 2021
Snyder also turns the environment at Steppenwolf’s lair and surrounding town much darker, much more ruddy, than the Theatrical Release … which seems very Snyderian. Most of the film is done in a visibly desaturated color palette, again very Snyder (there was even a full black-and-white edition released). And he chose to do it in 4:3 rather than the original’s 16:9 widescreen.
And, why not: Snyder restores the film score he had done by Junkie XL (who also worked on Man of Steel and Batman v Superman), replacing the score Whedon had replaced it with from Danny Elfman.
That Uniform
Superman in the Black Suit
Another very visible change, of course, was the Black Uniform for Superman. It looks very cool, and is all CGI. WB never cared for the black uniform concept. As a result, everything was shot with the regular red-and-blue (or whatever subdued tones Snyder preferred) outfit, but he made some tweaks to its form and the S-crest to make it easier to CG it to black (and filmed some footage to precede the uniform pick), on the chance he could get WB’s permission.
So, of course, the Theatrical Release stuck with the (filmed) blue-and-red (because WB wasn’t going to change their mind, esp. if it cost money), and Snyder spent a bunch of his CG money on the uniform change.
And, yes, it is, in fact, very cool, but … for purposes of the film, it’s unclear why Supes changes into it, as it doesn’t seem to include the functional aspects it had in the comic. And nobody actually comments on it. It’s just cool looking.
The Newcomers
Flash and Cyborg
The greatest benefactors of the four hours are the two noobs on the team — Victor Stone (Cyborg) and Barry Allen (Flash). Victor gets a lot more story time here, comes into his powers earlier (if in a bit more hand-wavey a fashion), and operates at a higher infodumpy level. The serious trimming in the Theatrical Release is unfortunate, but the primary impact, to my mind, is just on the character (and, perforce, his actor), not on the overall film (and, again, consider the context of needing to cut half the run-time here).
With the Flash we get more super-speed shenanigans with the added screen time, including an intro to Iris. Barry is portrayed a bit less dysfunctional, personality-wise (though we lose the coaching Bats gives him before the first battle, which is kind of a shame). But overall, the added time for Barry doesn’t give a lot of added value to the movie as a whole …
… except that the climactic battle depends on it, as, given we see more about turning back time when Barry moves super-fast, it means that in the Theatrical Release, we don’t get the brief moments when the team loses in its race to undo the Unity, which Barry is able to, just barely, turn back. It’s a nice bit, and adds to the strength of the last act of the film.
In theory, Aquaman is also a noob to the franchise (as this came out before his first solo movie). But he’s a mostly pretty straightforward character, and his role as a heavy hitter doesn’t much change in the Snyder Cut. We get a bit more about (ho-hum) Atlantean politics, but that adds little value.
Notes from the Movie Watch
Recapping Superman’s Death in BvSDoJ.
¶ In case you forgot Superman died, we get to see it again as part of our 4 hour experience, complete his his cry of “No!” (or whatever anguish it was) circling the globe and triggering the Mother Boxes to activate. Why does it trigger them to activate? Why did they not activate before Kal-El’s arrival on Earth? No idea.
¶ Why, oh why, when a powerful, dangerous, legendary artifact starts acting squirrelly, does someone feel obliged to touch it?
Part 1
¶ Again, a steadier, slower, longer, more detailed pace for the world-wide mourning of the fallen Superman. Which, to my mind, still doesn’t make sense.
¶ Wonder Woman’s introduction — at a nihilist / neo-Luddite terror attack — is (of course) longer and a bit more sensical — and also reinforces her inspirational nature.
¶ The fight of the Amazons vs Steppenwolf is longer, bloodier, more imaginative fight. I’m not sure that adds that much, but if you have four hours to kill, go for it.
Note to our non-archer viewers: perpetually drawn bows do not work well.
We get more references in this film to “The Great Darkness” rather than just “Unity” (which becomes solely about the joining of the three Mother Boxes). We also get (vague, but that’s the nature of the beast) discussion of the Anti-Life Equation. All of that makes the Apokoliptian stuff more comics-aligned, and adds some personality to the threat, but also complicates things; I can see why the Theatrical Release simplified it.
PART 2
¶ Unless I again missed some dialog in the original, we get a much clearer motivation for Bats to be less broody, less angry, in his “I made a promise to him” speech. But … nah, we need more dots connected to go from the cynical rage machine that is Batman in BvSDoJ to the earnest team-builder of this film. How did Kal’s self-sacrifice against Doomsday affect Bruce that profoundly? Why?
¶ Also, Luthor warned of the coming of the Great Darkness? Weird element to leave out (a) footage of and (b) the Theatrical Release.
¶ More Aquaman story detail helps. In the Theatrical Release, all the Atlantean politics bits were largely incomprehensible. We get a bit more here, which is helpful, but also time-consuming for its value.
Also, the Icelandic singers were nice, but only possible with the longer run time.
Darkseid, with DeSaad and Granny Goodness
¶ The Theatrical Release very much left out all the Darkseid and Apokolips stuff. Snyder’s cut — through CG — brings it back in. I think it helps the story immensely, but I’m that kind of comics nerd. I can imagine WB choosing to leave it out, even if partially complete, to save money on the finished product.
One change that gets made in the Snyder Cut is an extended version of the big Age of Heroes battle against the Apokaliptian invasion (starring King Leonidas as Zeus!). In this case, the invasion is spearheaded (so to speak) by a young Darkseid, not Steppenwolf, and is the point where he realized Earth held the Anti-Life Equation (and then promptly lost track of what planet that was, which seems like sloppy plotting). The change adds depth, esp. as Darkseid is (or should be) a more interesting character than Steppenwolf.
(On the flip side, the Apokalips gang never look quite right right to me in their CG guises.)
The CG scenes with De Saad showing up as an in-between help re-summarize the goings-on from the villain perspective, and so are helpful — but, again, also expensive, and time-consuming.
In retrospect, this brings new impact to the throwaway of the old gods (the Greek ones, at least) being killed by Ares that was part of Wonder Woman‘s backstory. In that film, it was explained that Ares was the only god still around, ah well. In this film, where Zeus, Ares, Apollo, and others fought alongside the forces of Earth against Darkseid in the primordial past, it makes that subsequent conflict all the more tragic, on the assumption that they would be pretty helpful were they still around.
At least this viewing around, the Human army in the Age of Heroes contains warrior groups from around the globe, not just Europeans. Nice.
The Snyder Cut leans a bit more into the idea that, in forming the JL, Batman and Wonder Woman are trying to recreate that Golden Age of Heroes alliance. Which is also nice.
Speaking of which, I do miss some of Diana’s introspection from the Theatrical Version. The arc it presented for her was a bit facile or at least quick, but it played on the character and what we’d seen going on with her before, in a way that the Snyder Cut does not.
Part 3
¶ We get more intro for Barry, including the aforementioned Iris intervention.
¶ Steppenwolf interrogates Atlantean guards. I mean, okay, fine, but another scene that doesn’t add much and was justifiably trimmed from the Theatrical Release.
¶ Lois is still mooning about Clark’s death. I thought the Theatrical Release handled Lois better — mournful, but not in a Staring At His Old Coffee Cup kind of way.
¶ Victor Stone is a Data God and can take over any computer in the world, bwah-ha! Okay.
¶ Alfred instructing Diana on tea making was lovely.
Cyborg meets Wonder Woman, 2017 vs 2021
¶ The way Victor and Diana get in contact is actually fleshed out more in the Theatrical Release. By this time, Snyder Cut Victor is out in full armor and flying around. In the Theatrical Release, he’s still lurking about in his hoodie. The former makes Diana’s speech about opening up fit better.
¶ J K Simmons is a great Jim Gordon.
¶ Mera is a lot more bad-ass in the Snyder Cut, but, then, she has more screen time to be.
PART 4
¶ The battle on the harbor island is fine (though “I didn’t bring a sword” is a better line than “Now it’s my turn”). We get a bit more with Barry and, esp., Victor, and everything’s tinted a lot more red. It seems a little weird, though, that after escaping captivity and torture by unearthly creatures the freed hostages just sort of absently mill around outside the building.
¶ So I remember the brouhaha when it came out (with the Snyder Cut) that Martha Kent was really the Martian Manhunter. But it’s not clear to me at all that she is in any other scene but her one discussion with Lois. Though that also begs the question of why the Martian Manhunter is having that discussion with her.
I, for one, am always glad to see the MM, and there’s some payoff in the Epilogue for that, but, honestly, the appearance here is just confusing.
¶ Even more than in the Theatrical Release, Batman is bound and determined here to use the Mother Box to rez Superman. But while in the Theatrical Release, it seemed more pragmatic (they need Superman against Steppenwolf & Co.), here it’s mixed with wanting save Kal’s life. The Theatrical Release also has, it seems, more debate over whether such a resurrection is doable, desirable, or dangerous. I have to go with the Theatrical Release, here.
PART 5
¶ The whole evacuation of STAR Labs is fine, but not really needed. It seems mostly there to set up another Silas Stone scene, leading to his eventual death.
I don’t actually recall Silas’ death in the Theatrical Release. Oh, that’s because it didn’t happen; in that version, we see Silas working with Victor on cybernetic upgrades, reconciled at last. Snyder, on the other hand, loves distant, destructive, or dead parents. The Snyder Cut fridging of Silas adds to Victor’s tale, I guess, giving him more reason to whomp on Steppenwolf, but it also does this with a strange “Oh, if we hit things with an X-Ray laser they get weirdly super-hot inside, as we see with this piece of Kryptonian Ship, and which I’m sure will also happen with the Mother Box” thing, to allow the tracking down of Steppenwolf, which is just not a good plot element.
¶ The fact that the JL knows and discusses that activating the Mother Box will let Steppenwolf know where it is makes their forgetting all about it to go hallooing after the resurrected Clark even worse in this edition.
¶ Funniest sight gag in the film: the Force Majeure Pregnancy Test.
¶ Ooh, Victor is getting Knightmare visions, just like Bruce.
¶ Barry reverses time, just slightly, to coordinate his touch of the Mother Box perfectly. This is mostly to tee up the time-reversal he’ll use in the BBEG Battle.
¶ The confrontation with Superman post-resurrection is (of course) a bit longer in the Snyder Cut, but I’m not sure it’s any better. The Theatrical Release predicts uncertainty about his mental state as one of the factors the JL considers, causing Batman to invite Lois along as a “big gun” — something that narratively works better for me than her just happening to be there for her morning mournfulness. The Snyder Cut also has Supes being fired upon by, and then blowing up, some military vehicles, which … has complicated implications that never get addressed later.
I see you …
Both versions contain my favorite Barry moment: Supes is grappled with Diana, Aquaman, and Cyborg, and Flash comes racing over with super-speed (in slow motion) … and his eyes widen like saucers as he sees Superman tracking his movement.
PART 6
¶ Clark’s intonation while he is getting his bearing is still a little weird, but the Snyder Cut doesn’t turn him into the slightly patronizing father figure for the team that the Theatrical Release does. Which, honestly, is good, except that I really loved aspects of his interplay with Barry in the Theatrical Release.
¶ Martha showing up at the farm while Clark and Lois are there still strikes me as weird — unless Lois called her. (Though the Theatrical Release dialog sort of counter-indicates that.)
And again, is this actually Martha? Or is it Martian Manhunter Martha (Marthian Manhunter?). Why would it be? Why wouldn’t it be? How do we know?
¶ I’m glad Steppenwolf has some motivation beyond “I kill things and am angry I didn’t get to kill things once upon a time.” I mean, wanting to impress Darkseid, and get out of his long exile, aren’t exactly novel motivations, but they are motivations.
Also, the Unity Effect stuff looks better this time out.
¶ Clark stopping by Bruce’s house and meeting Alfred is nice, but, again, a scene easily cut if you were making a real movie with a real duration limit.
Parenthetically, Whedon, of course, is known for his banter and quipping in dialog, and that was both fun and irritating in the Theatrical Edition. The one place I miss it in the Snyder Cut is with Alfred. Several of his under-the-breath comments aren’t here, and they were (as part of the long Alfred tradition) great.
¶ In this version, the assault on Steppenwolf’s lair is at night. Of course.
¶ Victor’s line: “I’m not broken, and I’m not alone.” Very nice.
¶ And it wouldn’t be a Zack Snyder edition without Steppenwolf being gutted with a trident and decapitated by a sword, both wielded by Our Heroes.
EPILOGUE
¶ Luthor escape and meeting with Deathstroke scene: check! Though … different ending here. Since both versions are setups for (different) future movies (neither of which will happen), I have to assume the Theatrical Release one was WB’s plan, and the Snyder Cut version is what Snyder would have done if he’d stayed in effective charge of things.
¶ We get (as in the Theatrical Release) the “Let’s set up old Wayne Manor as JL HQ” sequence. Fortunately Bruce has the money to replace all the water-damaged plaster and flooring, and clean up the bird poop.
¶ We also get in the Epilogue a very, very long Knightmare sequence, this time with Bats, an armored Flash, a pissed-off Mera, an unarmored Deathstroke (!), and … a Jared Leto Joker, in an Injustice-style world where Lois was killed by Joker, Superman joined up with the invading Apokolips forces, and everything’s gone to shit. Ho-hum.
I know (believe me) how seductive dream sequences are for teasing a future to be avoided. In this case, it was all interesting enough, but … did it advance the film it was in? Not really.
¶ The Knightmare ends when Bruce wakes up. He heads out to the deck over the lake to unexpectedly encounter the Martian Manhunter (not looking like Martha). MM says he’s ready to join the JL, introduces himself, then flies away. Bruce takes it with strange aplomb, asks him no questions (not even “How do we reach you?” let alone “Couldn’t you have reached this conclusion a few weeks ago?”), and that’s end of the film. Whuh?
Net-Net
Snyder’s film, though not without flaws, is a quite decent piece of work. It’s impossible to compare it to its theatrical variant because of the sheer amount of time he had to play with. The best that can be said is that he fills the time pretty well, letting some moments be slower than any theatrical release would allow, and letting in some scenes that make the tapestry richer but that could only show up in this longer format.
I’ll admit, I’m a sucker for longer cuts, but I don’t expect (and don’t know that I want) studios to go to a four hour format for pretty much anything.
In some ways, it’s more helpful to think of this, less as a film, than as a mini-series, or a short-episode-count TV show. The main difference is that it doesn’t end on a dramatic beat the end of each part.
A more significant difference is that someone starting a miniseries will say, “I have four hours of air time. I can take my time with things.” That can lead to bloated productions (as any number of shows on streaming TV demonstrate). Snyder didn’t think he was making a four-hour movie. He knew he was going to have to cut his work in half. So while he filmed some things that maybe he knew wouldn’t make that final cut, he didn’t approach anything with a “well, I’m short five minutes of runtime for Episode 3, how can I stretch things out?” attitude.
Looking back on it the next day, I’ll offer the criticism that there are still some awkward plot moments in the Snyder Cut, and the character development (and display) is still pretty simplistic; Victor’s story, for example, is certainly longer, and arguably more interesting, but not any more sophisticated than in the Theatrical Release
But if you’ve got four hours, Zack Snyder’s Justice League is a pretty good superhero experience, definitely above average among such films. It’s been a while since I could say it of a Zack Snyder production, but I’m glad I watched it.
A cool video comparing the visual FX of both version of the movie (though they often forget the whole “Snyder had four hours of run time for this stuff” aspect, as well as “Snyder took an extra year of post-production for ZSJL” and “Snyder had 4-5 years of advancement in CG tech to draw on”).
So I feel a bit of schizophrenia about this movie. Because the bottom line is, I sort of like these iterations of the characters (at least Superman and Batman) better than I do the ones that came in the solo movies before them … but I also really dislike that they are so out of character from what came before … even though they are out of character-that-I-didn’t-like.
Okay, let’s take a step back.
I have to say I’m surprised on this rewatch. I haven’t watched this film since it was running in theaters, and my reaction then was kind of disappointed. And I understand where I was with that. The characterization here is part trope, part banter, always with that Joss Whedon quipping that worked so well on the first Avengers, struggled a bit in Avengers 2, and here …
… well, here, it’s hard to judge. Because this is a grim universe. And these are grim characters. And hearing them doing the Avengers-style quipping is jarring. Bats is no longer a bundle of violent rage. Supes comes across like Christopher Reeves with next to zero PTSD (after coming to his senses) from having been dead, tossing off patronizing banter and apparently more powerful than everyone else here combined. Diana processes her century-old trauma over losing Steve Trevor right before our disbelieving eyes. And Victor and Barry get their “Here Is My Tough Story” moments that effortlessly pivot into “Hey We Are Part of a Bunch of Super-Friends.”
It jars. It’s irritating. It’s also kind of fun. As I said, I sort of like these JL folk better than I have in previous films, in part because I love the first Avengers movie. But it’s such a set of differences from previous DCEU that everything is dragged down by cognitive dissonance. I really have to wonder what I’d think about it if I hadn’t just watched the Trinity movies before this one .
This is the film, of course, that got handed to Joss Whedon in post-production, after tragedy in Zack Snyder’s family pulled him away from the production. Whedon rewrote a bunch and re-filmed a bunch, both by his own doing and with reported insistence from WB execs who weren’t happy with BvSDoJ‘s numbers.
The result is a weird hybrid, and not one with vigor. I can clearly see the churning Snyderian bitterness and anger and darkness and cynicism brewing beneath the surface (Cyborg’s alienation, Flash’s desperation, Diana’s isolation, Aquaman’s also-isolation, Superman’s post-resurrection trauma, any sense of character Batman had in the last film), but all of it is thickly spackled over by Whedon’s glib humor and desperate need to make the film shorter than it was already sitting at. Add the tarnish of what was reported about Whedon’s behavior by some of the cast (here and in other productions), and it’s no wonder it all sort of turned out a mess.
SPOILER ALERT!
And yet … it does kind of stand on its own half-way decently (and, almost sadly, teeing up a future DCEU that will never actually exist). And, honestly, I’m happy to see a film that gives us a Flash vs Superman race (or two).
On the other hand, the whole Fourth Act BBEG Fight is … way too much, and too repetitive, punching and counter-punching and counter-counter punching, lather, rinse, repeat. And all that takes place in the middle of very vague stakes. There’s glowy CG stuff creating more glowy CG stuff that is going to destroy the world in some glowy CG way, or so we’re told. And there are local human lives in the balance, though we really only see a family of four. But even with that hand-waving threat, the JL holds their own pretty well within the parameters of such a fight — and that’s before Smug Superman shows up (who so unbalances the fight that the movie has to send him off repeatedly to go save faceless civilians). Bah.
Outside of that battle, though, and some other somewhat choppy pieced-together plotting, I’ll give a solid middle-of-the-road score, with disappointment for a franchise flagship should have been bigger and badder and less stereotypical (“Heroes come together! Heroes clash and fight and bicker! Heroes come through when the chips are down and learn they have a new level of trust in their mutual family!”). The actors here do decently enough with what they’re given, some of the quipping is actually funny, some of the set pieces are interesting in and of themselves. It just eventually doesn’t rise above a third-rate Avengers remake. Which, if that’s what you’re expecting, isn’t bad.
In short, I’m not sorry I rewatched it. Indeed, I might conceivable rewatch it again, sometime in the distant future. Because for my money, the murky, smoggy morning of Justice definitely beats the Dawn of Justice, hands down.
4.0 Acting 4.5 Production 4.0 Story 4.5 OVERALL (with a ♥)
Wonder Woman remains a delightful movie — hopeful and brave where Man of Steel is fearful and reserved, graceful and loving where Batman vs Superman is brutal and distrusting.
It’s not without flaws. The battle with the BBEG feels too unreal, and reuses too many moves, and ultimately David Thewlis makes a much better Sir Patrick than CGI-enhanced Ares.
But that said, there’s very fine stuff going on. Gail Godot nails Diana’s passion, confidence, determination, and strange blend of sophistication and naivete. She is a warrior — but, ultimately, like the Amazons, she is even more a protector. She punches, she stabs, but even more she shields. The more she learns that, the greater she becomes.
Sameer, Steve, Diana, the Chief, and Charlie
But we also get a great supporting cast for Diana: an overprotective Mom (no, really, lying about stuff to shield your child from what is inevitably going to come rarely works out well) and a so-very-buff extended family; Chris Pine’s noble, knowing, naïve (complementing these traits in Diana) Steve Trevor; the three amigos, demonstrating men aren’t all bad (and can be, in fact, victims as well); and indeed pretty much everyone in the cast who, with good writing by Allan Heinberg and excellent direction from Patty Jenkins, make for a much richer and enjoyable experience than any of its DCEU predecessors.
The fight choreography is amazing (except when it gets a scosh too CG), the period placement is excellent, and the Horror of War aspect is properly played. This is one of the only DCEU films I’d put in the Top Ten of super-hero flicks I’ve seen to date.
Do you want to know more?
This review was in an earlier form posted on LetterBoxd.
Also on LetterBoxd, my previoustwo viewing reviews.
That looks like a fun, exciting, kinda zany movie! Looking forward to it!
I don’t have a lot more to say about “Suicide Squad” (the 2016 edition) that I haven’t previously said on previous watches. It keeps dragging me back though, out of love for the concept and for at least some of the characters — and then leaves me to wake up the next morning, in a bathtub full of ice, missing a kidney.
I will confess that it gets a bit better with rewatching, turning into a sort of popcorn movie you can enjoy / groan at with friends. Once you expect the erratic editing of two or three “creative” visions blerged together, and the subsequent oddities of character development and herky-jerky plotline, it stops being quite as bothersome.
Acting-wise, this thing is all over the map. There are some good points — Viola Davis’ Amanda Waller is properly sociopathic, even if the denouement with her feels way out of character. Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn is delightful even if the story sexualizes her to a ridonculous degree. Jay Hernandez’ Diablo is lovely, if underserved.
On the other hand Jai Courtney’s Boomerang, Adam Beech’s Slipknot, Joel Kinnaman’s Rick Flag, and Cara Delevingne’s Enchantress are evidence of something profoundly wrong in the casting, acting, writing, and/or directing.
Will Smith plays Will Smith, as always. He does a decent job of it here, even with the tonal chaos.
Oooh, fun and pretty and light and artsy. Looks like a great movie!
I actually don’t mind Jared Leto’s Joker (method acting shenanigans aside). I don’t think it’s my favorite Joker of all time, but it’s a legit interpretation. Unfortunately, a whole bunch of it got left on the cutting room floor, rendering a good third of the movie’s narrative interest kaput. They either needed to make this a Joker/Harley movie, or cut the Joker/Harley stuff way back; they instead made decisions with a machete (very Joker-like) and duct tape, ending up with the worst of both worlds.
The other actors are simply reading from Tropes for Dummies, and we’ll leave it there.
Muddied stakes, plot threads that come up then disappear, dizzying tonal shifts, FX that range from fairly cool to conventional to just plain bad … it just all ranges from somewhat interesting (the introductory backstories, while they last) to teeth-grindingly frustrating.
As a reminder, this is what we were promised in the trailer:
I really wish we’d gotten to see that movie. Instead, we got the (supposedly grimdark) movie WB already had in the can from Ayer, lots of panicky meetings by WB execs about the critical drubbing that BvSDoJ got, reshoots and re-edits and fun adverts like this, all to give us something that shows the coherency of mood and tempo and narrative dependability of … well, of the Joker.
Ah, well. Nothing that more bourbon can’t fix.
Again, looks like brightly colored fun! I want to see that movie!
UPDATE: With that perverse sense of timing that the universe sometimes has, rumors are once again a-swirl that we might get the “Ayer Cut” of SS16 released by WB, the version Ayer had put together before all the studio interference made it into the dog’s breakfast it ended up as. Will that actually happen? Will it produce a more coherent (if more relentlessly gritty) film? Who knows?
If “Man of Steel” was a gorgeous movie with some deep flaws, BvSDoJ is a movie with a bundle of flaws and a few gorgeous moments. Originally meant to be a Batman movie, then retooled to introduce and unite the Trinity of the Justice League (Get it? “Dawn of Justice”? Yeah, I know …), the whole thing is a muddled mess, focused on a very old trope: “What if the bad guy got the good guys to fight each other, but then they have to get together to fight an even bigger bad guy?”
Which is like Issue 1 or 2 of every comic book ever.
As MoS gave us a Superman haunted with fear of rejection, BvSDoJ gives us a Batman haunted with terrible, terrible anger. Ben Affleck’s Bats lives in/under a shell of a manor, perpetually reminded (by himself) of, apparently, Robin’s death at the hands of the Joker. He’s become a “Watchmen”-style character, raging and brutal, branding villains with his insignia.
He’s also full of anger at Superman for the damage and killing done during the Zod battle in Metropolis, esp. how it impacted the people in his large Metropolis office.
Not surprisingly, Jesse Eisenberg’s Lex Luthor (quite nicely played, for my money) plays the two of them off against each other — Supes looking to stop a violent, savage vigilante, Bats looking to stop a god-monster-in-waiting.
Luthor overplays his hand (of course) and kidnaps the only surviving parent in the cast, Martha Kent, and uses that as the final lever to force Superman into a lethal battle with Batman, who is now in powered armor and armed with a Kryptonite-tipped spear. Big, violent battle ensues, which ends only when we all (characters included) realize the coincidence of both Bats and Supes’ mothers being named “Martha,” which stops the battle, still-weirdly enough.
Which is okay, because it’s time for them to shrug off their dire injuries and bitter feuding and join their new BFF Wonder Woman in fighting Doomsday, a Kryptonian revenant resurrected by Lex using General Zod’s body and some of his own blood. Go figure.
At least we still have that Kryptonite-tipped spear! Bet that will come in handy!
Oh, and Superman dies. Bravely. Very sad. The world mourns. We get to escape from the theater.
A few more thoughts:
¶ Zack Snyder has some mordant, if facile, things to say about celebrity.
In fact, this is a far less thoughtful, far more shallow film than MoS. And while the former was (of course) mostly fought in bright daylight, this one is (of course) mostly fought in claustrophobic night darkness, which ends up highlighting the exploding cars, etc., far more. It is a film lit by flames, and just as ephemeral.
¶ “No one stays good in this world.” (eyeroll)
¶ “Bruce Wayne / Batman is a law & order fascist” was bold and interesting and fresh when Frank Miller did it in “The Dark Knight Returns” in 1986. Affleck’s Batman comes across thirty years later as less a hero, more someone to be scared of (whether you are innocent or not).
¶ The “Martha!” reveal is … so bad. So cheesy.
¶ Cavill is so frowny, so, so frowny, so much of the time. Much more so than in Man of Steel. Result: he looks like an angry god. Way to play into the type you’re trying not to be, Clark.
¶ Yay for the Wonder Woman music.
That said, Diana’s presence here is never fleshed out quite enough. I mean, her name’s not on the movie, but she plays a pretty prominent role. I could just ask for a bit of clarification as to what she’s doing, even if this was before her own solo effort.
“Oh, crap, all these posters are too depressing! We better paste Wonder Woman and some sunlight into one of them!”
¶ Again with the zillions of dollars of “Disaster Porn” damage. Yeesh. Maybe Bruce Wayne will appreciate it more this time, since he’s in the middle of causing it.
¶ Superman’s nigh-instantaneous transition from “super-powered guy that we’re a bit unsure about because he’s an alien and was part of a battle that nearly destroyed a city” to being the subject of a state funeral feels a bit weird. I realize it’s part of Snyder’s Superman-as-Christ thing, but it needed more build-up. I mean — how do the people of Metropolis feel about the guy who was recently involved in demolishing half of the city on two different occasions getting a big fancy-dancy send-off?
This is a film that could really need a “Two Years Later” caption.
¶ I already mentioned I was cool with Eisenberg’s variation on how we normally see Luthor, even if he’s channeling the Joker a bit much. But having Luthor blood be part of the “mix” to create Doomsday was silly — though not as silly as trying to tie it to all into Apokalipsian hi-jinx via Steppenwolf as yet another “Hey, wait until you see the really cool Justice League movie coming real soon” forced promo.
Net-net, someone took the “Two superheroes meet for the first time, so of course they fight” dial and cranked it up to 11. Snyder does try to give some rationale for the hostilities — unfortunately, 90% of it boils down to Batman being a big, violent asshole, which ends up meaning that when it comes down to Batman v. Superman, the audience is going to have a favorite.
(Wonder Woman, of course. Which is why more recent posters for the movie highlight her prominently.)
This was my second watch of BvSDoJ. I don’t anticipate a third time.
In Color! (Which is pretty desaturated most of the time in the actual film.)
Do you want to know more?
This review was, in a previous revision, posted on Letterboxd.
My first-viewing of Batman vs Superman is reviewed here.
Good Lord. It’s been a decade since this film came out. That feels … way too long (it was just yesterday! or the day before!) and way too short (this movie has been one of the definitions of super-hero films forever).
A brief digression
So … the infamous Zack Snyder flick that started the whole … Zack Snyder DC thing. Stray thoughts scribbled during viewing.
So here’s my 30-second Zack Snyder thing. I loved Watchmen. I enjoyed and appreciated 300. I’ve had problems with all of the DCEU stuff he’s done that I’ve seen because it’s been relentlessly grim — or, when hopeful, it’s been about hope in a sea of grimness and human frailty. Administered with a bunch of (truly beautiful) explosions.
I would rather not watch a DCEU that Zack Snyder was running. That’s an aesthetic choice, not a moral judgment.
I’m also of the opinion that an activist core of Snyder fans (in the most fanatical meaning of the term) did more to bring down the DCEU than either Snyder or people who had creative visions different from Snyder.
Aside from that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you enjoy the movie?
¶ The whole thing sets up life-as-struggle, starting with Lara-El suffering through the first childbirth in centuries on Krypton, alongside her husband, Russell Crowe as Jor-El, Action Scientist!
(To be fair, Russell Crowe makes for a great Action Scientist. It’s just that Superman’s origin tale is usually more talky-shouty than punchy-kicky.)
The presentation of Krypton and Kal’s origin is nicely re-imagined, with some new bits to add to the standard narrative.
¶ “He’ll be a god to him.” The movie tees up its conflict of Clark-as-alien-monster vs Clark-as-Christ vs Clark-as-human early. And often.
¶ Kevin Costner does a decent job as a Jonathan Kent who is … a man driven by fear, but love, but fear. Scared for his kid (based on how bad humanity is), to the point of being willing to sacrifice his own life to keep his son’s identity from being exposed.
This was a red flag for me. Jonathan Kent should be inspirational. What he’s inspiring here is Clark staying in the closet.
¶ Trademark Snyder serious HDR-level contrast, with dimmed/tinted light, deep shadow, and suppressed color.
¶ I mean, bottom line, this movie is like a Superman story, but one framed to be sad, depressing, cynical, and unhappy. Yes, it all ends (mostly) well. The accusations that Zack Snyder doesn’t believe in super-heroes is wrong. But he also doesn’t love myth, and wants to complicate every tale with shadows and disappointment and flaws and cynicism and fear.
This is an Elseworlds tale of Clark Kent’s life as a tragedy.
¶ Clark is meant to be a force for good. But here he’s been raised in isolation, alone, fearful. He spends the first part of the movie as much in hiding as anything else. His dad really did a number on him.
Henry Cavill as Superman
¶ Given the film, Cavil really does a hell of a job. Big bravo there.
¶ And, for what it’s worth, the movie is beautifully crafted. The visualizations, the FX, all of it is done with a dear love for portraying the worlds that are encompassed. Big bravos there, too.
¶ “If the world figures out who you are, they will reject you.” Thanks, Dad.
¶ “I’m worried they’ll take you away from me.” Oh, Martha …
¶ The very powerfully visual connection between Jesus (in stained glass) and Kal-El in the pew is … a bit on the nose.
¶ Mad props to Edna Mode: the capes in this film look … dorky. It’s all so hyper-focused, high-contrast, gritty-reality feeling of a film, that someone wearing a cape (esp. when it’s not blowing in slow motion) looks goofy.
¶ The one FX shot that looked unreal: the CGI Kryptonian ship jets away from the human military defenders, blowing sand and dust in their face in a reverse shot … and nobody told the extras to flinch.
Michael Shannon as General Zod
¶ Michael Shannon really does a fine job as Zod. He’s a bad guy, clearly, but he very much fits that “Everyone is a hero in their own head” mold, and his speech about being existentially, genetically tasked to protect Krypton, and how that’s now been taken from him, is beautifully done (and beautifully chilling).
But why, WHY, if we have Zod, do we not have as the female and big male Kryptonians who get into prominent duke-outs, Ursa and Non. WHY?
¶ While the movie is criticized (not without justification) for the Disaster Porn of the Kryptonian attack and the El/Zod fight in Metropolis, it’s worth noting that it’s the US military that fires the first cityscape-destroying shot in Smallville.
¶ Best human touch of the film: MAGNETIC PHOTO ALBUMS from the Kent farm for the win.
¶ With all due respect to the Daily Planet, I’ve visited New York City: nobody has a vista that shows everything going on in the city like the offices of the Planet.
¶ Nice parallel struggle between Kal El vs the World Machine and Perry White trying to save his intern.
¶ As mentioned above, Disaster Porn. The visual destruction and implied multi-thousand body count in Metropolis is beautifully crafted, fits with the story, and is very, very real, except for the lack of bodies and the weeks of sifting the rubble to find them.
¶ Sorry. Spidey failing to save Gwen has made me very sensitive to the physics and physiological impact of Superman rescuing a lot of people laterally at super-sonic speed.
¶ “They say it’s all down-hill after the first kiss.” This move is, if not actually deeply cynical, set in a deeply cynical world. Also, after the mass destruction, Clark smooching Lois just calls to mind Niven’s classic essay, “Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex.”
¶ Superman kills Zod. That was the breaking point for a lot of people, and with reason. It violates the mythic role of Superman. The point of which is not that Superman would never kill anyone, but that no writer would ever put Superman in a position that to kill someone is the only solution.
Yes, yes, we want “impact.” We want this to be burned indelibly into Clark’s mind as the most horrible moment of his life (the mass casualties around him notwithstanding). Which might make more sense if we got him moping around with guilt for the rest of this and the next few movies he was in. Except that doesn’t happen, so … I guess it wasn’t the most horrible moment in his life.
¶ After all that disaster porn, plus some murder, the denouement moment with the US military feels … unjustifiably glib and light-hearted.
Net-net, a thoughtfully and beautifully crafted film that fails to satisfy me because I simply don’t accept the tone, the message, the forced narrative. “Man of Steel” is a gorgeous diamond with deep, value-draining flaws.
Do you want to know more?
An earlier version of this review appeared on LetterBoxd.
My review from my first viewing is also on LetterBoxd.
A last look before the DCEU goes off to the recycle bin of movie history
To be fair, I’ve never been a big fan of DC’s movie-driven logo, either.
UPDATES BELOW
Given it’s slow, tottering, if self-inflicted, demise, and with a fresh DC Universe coming on line (which I face with both anticipation and dread), I thought I would take the opportunity while my wife is away this week to watch (in a few cases rewatch) the DCEU.
I’ll kick that off by asking, once again, what the heck this is:
While the initial appearance of a standard DCEU intro clip for all its movies got me excited peering at the fuzzy images in the final tableau to figure out who they were, I very quickly got kind of ticked off that they weren’t actually making use of the characters in the form they were making movies of them.
That’s not Henry Cavill as Superman. That’s certainly not Superman’s suit. (What is with those gauntlets, people?) That’s definitely not Jason Momoa’s Aquaman. Nor is it Ryan Reynolds’ Green Lantern (own it, DC!).
This is, in fact, your father’s Aquaman.
Now, obviously, they are meant to be generic versions of these super-heroes, perhaps alluding to DC’s rumored liberality with how their characters are visually represented in comics. But why introduce an Aquaman movie — heck, an Aquaman sequel movie — with an image of Aquaman that doesn’t align with the movie the audience is about to see? Especially when only a small percent of that audience has ever seen or read the comic book version of Aquaman?
Branding, people! That’s why you have this universe in the first place!
(Marvel, for all its sins, understands this. It’s studio intro is, itself, too long, but there’s never any doubt that it’s focused on the MCU, complete with scripts, and, more brilliantly, it evolves with time as new movies come out.)
Anyway, with that off my chest for likely the last time, on with the movies!
Update!
And, eleven movie (re)watches later, I am done.
Here’s an index to the reviews here on the blog, linked to the individual entries. Due to time constraints, I did not rewatch Aquaman (2018) or the first Shazam! (2019); I have included links to my previos Letterboxd review to them.
* 4-hour event; ** Did not rewatch; numbers from previous viewing
Do I have any conclusions from all this?
¶ The above judgments are my own; your mileage almost certainly varies.
It is ironic (and wholly unintended) that the top two and bottom two are Wonder Woman and Suicide Squad films.
I was surprised by how much I enjoyed some movies I hadn’t seen before, and also by how much I disliked some of the movies I hadn’t seen before.
¶ The DCEU ultimately failed because there wasn’t a strong leader guiding the creative and meta-creative process, creating an actual shared world, analogous to a Kevin Feige on the Marvel side of things. They had Zack Snyder, who wanted that role, and de facto sort of held it (but never officially, in WB’s eyes), but whose vision was not shared by a majority of the viewing audience (just a very vocal and dedicated fraction of it).
As a result, the DCEU became more about creative wrangling, toxic fandom, and nameless suits in the studio trying to micromanage creativity in the worst possible way: as a reaction to the previous film released, not in pursuit of a coherent narrative. “Order, counter-order, disorder” became the DCEU way, and the desire to create movies people would want to watch was thrown overboard in trying to avoid more losses.
¶ Executive turnover at WB didn’t help things any. Some of these movies went through three different regimes at the studio, each with its own priority, budgeting, and desire to tinker. Creativity and good movie-making is not improved by all that.
¶ The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic — in terms of delaying movies, delaying the release date of movies (surely the plague will be over then and people will want to go out to the movies!), and the mish-mosh of theatrical and streaming releases certainly hurt any creative momentum and net profits.
¶ Ironically, just as I do my (re)watch, one of the ultimate DCEU films is finally dropping into theaters, Blue Beetle, and its predecessor, the much lambasted The Flash, falls into streaming in a week. Aquaman 2, assuming it is ever released and isn’t simply written off for taxes by WB, comes out later this year.
