Justice League

Y’know something. Lets continue the course with that DC where the heroes become increasingly more lighthearted and have fun. Especially seeing how that ZS Justice League seems to be trying to reconstruct that idea of idealistic DC heroes considering how the movie panned out . . . as long as you ignore that apocalypse future that would be retconned by Flashpoint.

That apocalitic future was supused to be resolve in next movies.

And I will said is more zack dosen mind lighthearted but he come on make them lighthearted and epic, a sort of kindom come sort of way of "WORLD FINEST!" like the justice league intro sort of feel, unlike MCU were it range for "awsome!" to "charming" which is good but not the same.

That reminds me. I know this question had probably already been answered, but I'm not sure where in the thread; does the Snyder cut benefit from Aquaman already being released, as opposed to it coming out after the original Justice League did?

I think it does, because Aquaman has no arc in this. None. He's exactly the same at the end as he was at the start, except now he has armor and a trident that he got from... somewhere. (can't believe the 'Aquaman gets his costume' scene was a Whedon reshoot) Having the standalone film at least lets us impose that personality onto Arthur, because he doesn't have one otherwise.

I mean James Wan has said that he made Aquaman with exactly this version of Justice League in mind as canon. I don't know if it exactly lines up though.

It kinda does, the jokes like the lasso feel somewhat out of place when consider the aquaman movie.

Character wise I agree. I meant more little plot details don't really match. Like him meeting Vulko while the Aquaman movie they haven't seen each since Arthur was a teen. Or Mara having a british accent.

Edited by Bullman on Mar 26th 2021 at 3:56:30 AM

I think ZSJL also implied he isn't on good terms with his dad?

I agree. Shazam and Birds of Prey are personal high points and I would argue that neither feels like an MCU movie.

Edited by Synchronicity on Mar 26th 2021 at 4:44:06 AM

Shazam and Birds of Prey are both genre films but wildly different from each other and a lot of the MCU's output. Shazam being about a kid in the vein of Big is different from the adults in the MCU.

Yeah. There was sentiment earlier that making them lighthearted and relatable would make it too MCU-like; it's definitely possible to do that without aping them.

Huh… My Youtube recs had a review of the movie by Ben Shapiro of all people (which I promptly ignored, thank you very much)… Everyone and their mom feels like they have to talk about this, huh.

The theatrical version is probably more in line with the Aquaman movie by virtue of just not having as much Atlantean content. Things like the air bubble to talk, regular guards able to breathe air and hostility towards his mother don't quite line up with his movie. That said, tonally the Snyder Cut is closer to the Aquaman movie because of having a more bombastic style and emphasis on Arthur as a Jerk with a Heart of Gold. Arthur doesn't have a strong character arc here because his arc is joining the League in the first place, so the second half of the movie he is involved with the fighting but doesn't have the personal resolution that Flash and Cyborg earn.

Personally, regarding the Knightmare considering how dark the earlier movies were spending most of JL 3 in the Bad Future may not have been a good approach. Plus while it may be ambitious it's hard to say if it would feel all that original after Days of Future Past and Endgame. Though given how they are setting it up, I thinking a smarter move would be more of a Two Lines, No Waiting using Meanwhile, in the Future… where we get glimpses of the Knightmare trying to figure out the right thing to change in the past while Bruce, Victor and Barry connect their bad premonitions to understand what is happening. That way the Bad Future only takes up 30-ish minutes of a 3+ hour movie and place more emphasis on the League united together.

"Shazam and Birds of Prey are both genre films but wildly different from each other and a lot of the MCU's output. Shazam being about a kid in the vein of Big is different from the adults in the MCU. "

More or less, shazam does have a some of "heartlight, not taking seriously" thing around it, bird of prey feel more closer to deadpool than MCU, but that is because they are drinking from harley 52 which is VERY harleypool, for good and bad.

Trope question. I added Adaptational Nice Guy under Darkseid a few days ago and it got commented out with the user in question (Master Hero, if you're here) in question asking if it was really more of adaptational pragmatic villainy. You can see in the page history (not gonna get into an edit war), and since it's spoileriffic, I'll just link you to it, here.

A) Is this the right thread for that question, and if so, then B) does he have a point, or should it be restored?

Hmmm... I think you're right here. Whether it's pragmatism or not, it is still a form of mercy that most Darkseids would never show, and besides, Adaptational Nice Guy doesn't mean that the character is a flat-out Nice Guy. There's also the fact that "Adaptational Pragmatic Villainy" isn't a real trope. Besides, he probably also had zero expectations that Steppenwolf would succeed either. Desaad's "I told you so" was probably more of a "yep, we were right, that guy was a loser." And Darkseid was just all, "Yeah, totally. He sucked." and they went off to go laugh at the tormented fools in the slave pits or something.

Edited by lbssb on Mar 28th 2021 at 6:02:31 AM

If we can get a consensus, I'll add it back and link to the thread.

Regarding the scene where Barry saves Iris and the Unfortunate Implications regarding it involving the ethics behind Barry's use of his powers, I made a video where I change the music track to something different for the sake of improvement (I wasn't a fan of the music that was given in the Snyder Cut).

I mean I don't think Darkseid's made into an Adaptational Nice Guy. That seems like a weird definition of nice. Pure pragmatism and he doesn't really have a reason to kill Desaad there.

Edited by Bullman on Mar 29th 2021 at 8:43:56 AM

Has he needed a reason to kill his minions before? As I posted in the trope itself, in all other media where his brutality is even remotely played up, he's killed even DeSaad for less than merely saying "I told you so."

Edited by Rytex on Mar 29th 2021 at 8:45:39 AM

No, but that is still a weird definition of nice. As it's to brief to say, and he has far bigger things to worry about. There has to be a better trope. Because label him Adaptational Nice Guy is misleading and seems to be trying to read to much into it.

Edited by Bullman on Mar 29th 2021 at 8:50:14 AM

I’d say this is a textbook Downplayed Trope.

It's also such a minor thing and a single instance, rather than anything I'd consider a character trait. If you have two identical people and that's the major point of difference between them, I don't think one would be a nice guy and the other wouldn't.

"Adaptational" tropes tend to really get bogged down in these "maybe deviating a bit from the comics" which is also particularly problematic when you're referring to characters with decades of history and dozens, if not hundreds of writers. Especially when you're basing it off of a few minutes of screentime, no less.

I would agree that it's really not an example. Characterization tends to be a little flexible even in a single continuity, and adaptation tropes should be about radical alterations in behavior and portrayal and not just speculating that their "proper" characterization would have been 10% nastier. Adaptational Nice Guy should be about very broad alterations like Jerkass - Jerk with a Heart of Gold - Nice Guy.

Edited by EmeraldSource on Mar 29th 2021 at 7:33:10 AM

I'm halfway through this film right now and it feels like for everything I do like (Steppenwolf having actual motivation, everyone having a more pronounced backstory), there are still things that make me go "Yeah, it's not hard to see why the suits declared this unreleasable". I am firmly in the camp so far that it's much better, but that doesn't mean it's good. It's clear what Zack wanted to go for, essentially a modern Lord of the Rings with Batman as the POV character as the human among these larger-than-life legends and myths, but it's stumbling over its weight, runtime, and Snyder's own predilections in filming.

Keep in mind that had the whole Whedon situation never happened, this isn't the actual movie we would've gotten. This is more of an officially-released assembly cut, which would've been edited down to a more manageable length for a theatrical release, which would've probably included cutting some of the stuff that didn't work.

Also, the Joker scene was filmed for this release, so it wouldn't've had that.

Edited by lbssb on Mar 29th 2021 at 7:46:54 AM