1. IMAX shows a lot of Justice League. Like, yo, that League was big, and it was LOUD.
2. Coming off Batman vs. Superman, the movie overall was exponentially better than I thought it would be. I still don't think that the DCEU has come up to the standard of the MCU, but this one movie at least was a lot more fun than it was grim, gritty, and noir.
I've seen some reviews that say that this is a movie that doesn't know quite what it wants to be, and I have to agree with that. It opens with a decidedly grim worldview. Zach Snyder clearly draws influence from the old World Without a Superman books from the 1980s. They showed a preview of the new Steven Spielberg Ready Player One before our movie started, during which a voice-over says, "I wish I grew up in the 1980s."
The problem with this being that the DCEU hasn't exactly earned it just yet. I mean, I get that actors age, so if they want to tell some of these stories, they have to in some ways condense the timelines. This is, in fact, the fourth movie down this particular rabbit-hole, starting with Man of Steel. But Man of Steel went to a lot of trouble to establish Superman as a weird-ass alien from another planet, and BvS doubled down on that particular version of this character, but now we're supposed to believe that everyone loved Superman? Wasn't it just two years ago that Congress was looking to lock Superman away for Crimes Against Humanity?
But this is the premise for our movie. It's very similar to the overarching concept from Marvel's recent Infinity event, during which the Avengers go off-world to help some aliens stave off annihilation, only to see Thanos use their absence as an opportunity to invade and conquer the Earth. Similarly, with Superman dead in Justice League, aliens from the dread world Apokolips use his absence and its attendant fear and chaos as a launching point for their own invasion. Astonishingly, this particular invasion takes place at a fictional version of Chernobyl rather than in downtown Manhattan, but that at least gets most of the civilians out of the way.
Dread premise aside, the movie quickly gets a lot lighter. Thank God for the influence of Joss Whedon. They've got Jason Momoa playing a very funny, very brawny version of Aquaman, and he's perfectly cast. Again drawing on relatively recent Marvel comics, Momoa's Aquaman is similar in both look and outlook to the Ultimate Universe Thor. If anything, though, the DCEU's Aquaman is actually more compelling than is the MCU's Thor, or any version of Thor from the comics for that matter. Aquaman's arch is probably my favorite part of this movie, and they get it down with both enough pathos and efficiency that his is the first DCEU movie that I actually really want to see. I mean, I liked Wonder Woman, don't get me wrong. I just wasn't particularly excited for it. Aquaman, though, looks like it's going to have something to say that might actually be new.
Ezra Miller is also very good as the Flash. He's also very funny, and he somehow manages to play his God-like superpowers with genuine humility. My one quibble is that the Flash's arch treads directly down the path blazed by CW's television show, but what can you do? Miller, at least, brings some legitimate humanity to a movie that is otherwise drowning in otherworldly badasses.
They do a decent job with Cyborg and Wonder Woman. Bruce Wayne correctly calls Diana out for not stepping into the leadership vacuum left by Superman's death, but the movie never quite plays it off. Instead, they give her an out through Superman's resurrection. Likewise, once Superman shows up, it's pretty clear that the rest of the League is more-or-less superfluous. Really, he barely needs their help.
It's a common problem in Justice League comics, to be honest.
Still, they do a nice job bringing Superman in at the critical moment, giving him a very effective hero turn that does a lot to redeem the movie's opening sequences. This is a world that had lost hope without Superman, and once he shows back up, it becomes obvious why we needed him so badly in the first place.
My final thought is that Batman is badly out of place in this movie. Where Hawkeye and Black Widow usually get some critical moments in the Avengers movies despite their status as mundane though very well-trained ordinary humans, Bruce Wayne is more like a rich tourist traveling through a world in which he flat does not belong. There is an entire would-be storyarc here about wealth and privilege--i.e. Batman can do none of the things that the other members of his team can do, but because he has money, he's able to buy his way in--but they don't play it that way, for better or worse.
 |
| "I came first. I should get top billing." |
Why is Batman here?
Because he owns the transport plane.
Just as the MCU has been setting up Thanos and Infinity War, Justice League spends most of its time setting up another confrontation as well, with the DCEU's Thanos, Darkseid. Ironically, Darkseid came first in the comics via Jack Kirby in 1970. Thanos was brought to life by Jim Starlin a few years later in 1973. However, the MCU has beaten the DCEU to the punch on this one, and though Darkseid is probably the more famous of the two in the comics, I suspect that the Russo Brothers' version of Thanos is going to be pretty hard to top on the big screen. The best we can hope, in any event, is that these two movie events play themselves out along different plotlines.
Aquaman is supposed to come out next year, with Shazam and Wonder Woman 2 coming sometime in 2019. That's all good. Still, I can't imagine that they'll wait too, too long to release Justice League 2. Actors age. As of now, the DCEU is on the clock.
No comments:
Post a Comment