 At first, I'd like to just start with some quiet reflection, honoring, or I guess more appropriately dishonoring, the 2017 theatrical release of the Justice League, directed by Joss Whedon. It will never need to be mentioned again now. The moment has arrived. Four years after the original version, Zack Snyder gifts us with his, and I guess for every year waited, we have an hour added, because this bad boy's four hours long. You know, I kind of spent half a day with it, had some breakfast, took a break at about the halfway mark, did some work, and then fired it up around noon, finished it I think around two o'clock. It's a meaty experience. And then I started rewatching it tonight with the rest of the family. We sat down for dinner, had a nice little meal, some burgers and fries, flipped on Zack Snyder's Justice League, got a good hour in the second time around. Things were more noticeable than they were the first, and let's dive in. I actually took notes, I didn't script this out like my other shows, but there's a lot of notes here. I'm going to kind of rapid fire the pros and the cons, not really in any order. This is a rant after all, it's not like a fully fleshed out in-depth review. Let's start with the biggest B for the movie right out of the gates, and that's the aspect ratio of this. I know it's not technically 4x3, it was shot in IMAX or something. I don't know what bullshit excuse is getting thrown around online or by Snyder or whatever. It's unacceptable that in 2021 I have black bars on the side of my goddamn TV screen. There's something truly off-putting about losing like 15% of my real estate because of some artsy bullshit. I don't know what happened. What are we doing here? Give me, release the widescreen cut. That's the new hashtag that should be trending, release the widescreen cut. Like I said, this is going to be all over the place. This might not be true, but did Amber Herd's character, Mira, Mira, Myra, did she sound different in this? I feel like she was far more British here than she was in Aquaman. Like I thought she was kind of going for an American accent in Aquaman, maybe not. Maybe I'm completely off base, her voice sounded very jarring here. I don't know why, maybe it was just because other people weren't talking with British accents, just only her for some reason. A big takeaway, Cyborg and Flash are far better. Now in the previous version, I didn't really like Flash. Isra Miller, Isra Miller, I'm a movie person, I'm supposed to know how to pronounce names and I don't. Isra Miller, I don't know. The weirdo from the Fantastic Beasts movies. He was not doing it for me as Flash in the previous iteration, the previous cut. Here I think he worked. I enjoyed my time with him, his jokes landed a lot better for me. He just seemed more personable and I think maybe making him more of a fanboy of Batman helped. I don't remember that in the Weedon version, I mean there really wasn't a lot there to begin with so to be fair. I liked Cyborg too, I was very indifferent to him in the last version because he just didn't have any scenes, he was just kind of there mopey and moody. Here he has way more scenes, he's still mopey and very moody, I don't know if he cracks a single smile in the film. He's understandable considering the trauma he's going through, it's however not the Cyborg I'm used to in my limited knowledge. Maybe he's comic accurate, I don't know, I'm only familiar with him from the Teen Titans series, both of them, the like really stupid one and then the more serious, yet still jokey one. I only know him from those, another big take away are the visuals, holy shit it's night and day. I knew the color grading was awful in Just Weedons but it's more than the color grading. Everything about the movie just looks so much cleaner. This is what I love the most about Snyder is his eye for detail, he is just a master when it comes to framing things up, showing what's in front of that lens of the camera, it's awesome, he knocks it out of the park. Now sometimes when he's doing these sweeping wide shots they do look really stunning, they do look great but a lot of the time with his movies I feel like I'm watching actors on a small sound stage, very 300 style. He never really has moved past that to me, it always feels like I'm just watching scenes play out in very small rooms, even though we might have a very expansive backdrop, it just still feels like they're on a green screen in a small little area. Now the big thing he blows most directors out of the water at is action and thankfully this version has far better action scenes, the ones that were previously in it are enhanced, there's more stuff going on. Other women especially early on at that bank, I think there's probably another 30 seconds to a minute of just fighting going on. If we count the slow motion there's another 10 minutes added to each action scene, this is going to be trouble for a lot of people I think, well maybe not a lot, but this is going to be trouble for people because even I watching it, there were some moments where that slow motion goes on for 20 to 30 seconds too long, yeah there's slow motion scenes that are like 2 minutes in length. A flash one specifically where there's a car accident and he runs to save the woman and I'm just like what are we doing here, are we ever going to speed this up, which is ironic because I'm watching the flash. Color grading is on point, it looks beautiful, Batman however, Batman's a problem for me. Now I don't know what happened in between movies with Zack Snyder but he had Batman absolutely nailed in the last film, shooting people with guns aside, I thought the whole vibe of him was awesome, he's like pulling a fucking tire, he's all jacked but he's old man, Batman, he lost Robin, he's pissed, he's angsty but he's in the shadows, he's scary, he induces fear, this is the Batman that I know, what we get here is still not that separated from what we had previously, watching Batman in a day setting or even a dawn setting does not play. The dude has to be at night, maybe in the cartoons it works because it's already a little silly but when you're trying to do something so epic and the scale is so large to see the guy walking around in his dark grey suit, I don't know, nothing about it makes sense. You're not like scaring anyone in the middle of the day, you know? You just look like a jackass, fighting wise, action wise, he does fare a little better, he still gets his butt kicked a lot, I mean I know he's out of his element, that's the point is he's supposed to be kind of out manned, out gunned, out aliened, however I remember watching the cartoons, the dude still found a way to kick a lot of butts so I don't, he got to figure out Batman, you did him dirty here, character Snyder does I think absolutely get his Superman and again Henry Cavill's awesome, wearing the suit, I feel like he had less screen time here than he did in the other one, that's probably not true but because the movie is so long it takes quite a while for him to show up and it just feels like it's over so quick with him, again it could just be a total mindset thing of just that run time, I just, I thought his stuff was shorter, even the fight scenes with him felt like they were cut down, thankfully they got rid of the dumb ass side family story that Flash has to save, that was miserable, it made no sense, I got what Whedon was trying to do, it didn't work and it just added more of that ugly red hue to everything, that's thankfully gone here, so maybe that's why some of the Superman stuff feels really cut down, if you were looking for him to be like super bad ass evil that, no, basically that exact same scene plays out, most of that felt pretty similar, there was a couple moments that were extended or a couple more shots added but for the most part outside of the coloring it stays the same until Batman shows up, the one line from the 2017 version I did like because it was so freaking campy was when Superman holds up Batman he's like, tell me, do you bleed? and he's got the like the fake mouth, Flash doesn't fall on Wonder Woman's chest this time they got rid of that, the only scene I would say that I was, you know, I felt was actually well done in the previous one was the opening, just a lot of kind of montage eclipses showing how the world is mourning the loss of Superman, how kind of crime is run rampant, how now people are just, they're just in mourning, there's some video footage of the man of steel kind of being heroic and yes it has the bad, bad mouth again, that made sense, I saw what Whedon was doing, he was looking at the past and saying you know what we didn't really get to see Superman at all in the Snyderverse, man of steel was him, you know he's not Superman yet until the way end, he's learning how to kind of deal with everything going out, deal with his powers, try to figure out how to be the beacon of hope and then we get BBS where he's painted as kind of this scary villain, obviously there's a section of people that worship him and love him and he's seen doing some good deeds but that movie is so dark and depressing and somber that you don't get that hope from him, you know, you don't get that kind of classic Superman vibe and so that's a little bit missing here, I felt like the people didn't get to see him as Superman and yeah I think that that Whedon opening number kind of helped guide people there like hey look he actually was Superman for a while, people really loved him, he did a lot of good things. With the runtime pacing is somehow great, I didn't find myself bored at all, I was really into it, like I said I'm starting it again already with the rest of the family, I'm not bored again, I'm enjoying it still just as much, the music though, this is another part that's gonna really kind of I think annoy people, especially on further viewings, they do that gladiator-ass kind of like the chanting nonsensical bullshit and it's rampant in this film, every freaking time Wonder Woman shows up, even if she's just like saying hi, it's like I can't get over how much it's used and I wish there was a way to like go into the settings and just get rid of it, just click a button and turn that garbage off because it overstays its welcome after about an hour in and you still have three more hours of it constantly showing up, which is a shame because it overwhelms really cool scenes, you're like oh she's doing something awesome but your ears are hearing that freaking noise and it's kind of taking you away from it, villain-wise Steppenwolf is ten times better here, when they first released the shot of him in his new armor and it's just spikes and crap everywhere, I'm like oh god what is this, in motion, that suits sweet, that armor is awesome and Steppenwolf is more like humanized in an alien way, like the dude has some depth beyond just I'm gonna take over the world, I'm gonna terraform this planet, no no no no he's trying to impress his boss, dark side, he's got a whole backstory that they don't need to dive too much into, they just give you enough to go on, so you can say okay I get this, this guy you know he wants a seat at the head of the table, he wants to kiss the ring, he's trying to do everything he can to make up the mistakes of the past, so well done there, dark side is more of a tease than an actual villain which is also a bummer because I don't know what the state of the Snyder thing is after this, if he's gonna get to make more of these, personally I'd welcome it at this point I'm all in, there has to be 15 or so of these drop down from high places, land on the knee and get up, I thought we were kind of past this and I know this movie came out a few years ago, it was done a few years ago still, we could have edited a few of these out Snyder, I don't need to see it re-shoot wise I couldn't tell you what's new and what's not outside of just looking at Ben Affleck's face because there are moments where he's pretty bloated up here, other times he's pretty skinny, I think the biggest transition was from meeting Arthur Curry, the Aquaman and then they do a shot where he's kind of boarding a plane with with Jeremy Irons who's in this way more and he's great, Alfred's awesome, especially an interaction between him and Diana when they're making some tea, he's very specific about the tea and it's a funny scene I thought, anyway that was a very jarring difference between Affleck there and it's just much more thin, thin more healthy looking face I thought in this newer, I would assume the newer version, Cal-El, no, he's still in this, why is Batman not wearing his BVS armor when he's when he's reviving Superman, you would think that would kind of be paramount to him staying alive, they know there's a pretty big risk Superman could come out just completely jacked just out of his element pissed and especially at Batman still who he was you know he befriended for all of like three minutes before being killed so I would have thought you know from the master detective the guy that pre-plans everything maybe just throw that armor on maybe maybe be behind some something safe and secure he's just kind of jogs up he's like I'm ready I trust this I have faith you know maybe maybe just do a little more prep next time the movies rated R I think pretty unnecessarily there there's a couple F bombs thrown on I don't know why it just screams of just edginess like Batman throws one out and so does Cyborg earlier and I think that's how you get to the R just for having two F bombs I think that's all the no there's three I think in the whole thing because a bad guy says it earlier I don't think I've given any spoilers out but we're gonna jump into a couple at the end here one is the Martian manhunter stuff I mean man like Snyder this is not this movie is not made for like the vast audience of people and that's fine we know who's watching this is people that at least kind of liked BVS or people that are just curious or demented and just want to suffer through this so it doesn't matter anyways there is clearly an audience so that eats this up so Martian manhunter just kind of thrown in pretending to be uh who do you who do you pretend to be someone Lois Lane I think it was such a random scene and then he's in at the end again talking to Batman and he flies off and I think that's the closing shot of the film such a weird okay here's the thing the movie let me just get this out of the way the movies I really like the movie that was good I didn't love it but I really enjoyed it I thought seven out of ten maybe eight out of ten fun experience it's it's something I could go back and watch every couple years and get enjoyment out of it okay I think I would have given it one or two points more even um I wouldn't give it a nine but I would go a hard eight a solid confident eight out of ten if it wasn't for the last 20 minutes of BVS bullshittery the dialogue that's not really going anywhere but it's over long it's it's padded for no reason Joker's there he still sucks I don't care what people say online Jared Leto is a shit Joker then he's a shit Joker now and he's playing him two completely different ways which makes it all the more hilarious like he got it wrong twice he's just savoring it he's just so up his own ass with the dialogue he's like the throwaway sentence and then he pauses for what has to be a minute he's just I have something so profound to say but I I don't quite know how to express it in words in Suicide Squad he's doing like and I think he realized nobody liked it so he's workshopping in his garage all these different ways to do it I just imagine this playing out and he he sticks with like no that future premonition crap did not work for me in BVS it certainly doesn't work for me now had Snyder just moved all this trash to the end after the credits I wouldn't have even seen it and then the really die hard hardcore BVS guys would be like yes this is leading into injustice or whatever the comic equivalent of injustice is called I only know the video games maybe it is called that I I don't know um there's like Deathstroke shows up on a yacht hosted by Lex Luthor has a drink they have a nice little conversation and they they lead this into question mark as far as I know there's no more Snyder vs movies being made yet we have a full 25 minutes of Lord of the Rings ask endings but at least with Lord of the Rings it's still wrapping up all the stories and the stuff we just watched it's not setting up three or four intricately detailed plots for the next two or three movies why did he do this I put it all at the end credits and I would have left very satisfied it would have been like this was good I don't even know what I'm going to say to the rest of the family when they get there the Zack Snyder Justice League worked and I'm bummed out he didn't get to see this through four years ago but he got it now and I'm happy for him I'm happy for the fans I'm kind of a fan myself um I wish he could continue I wish he would not do this weird shit at the end of his movies that's that's where I'm at