Image via Warner Bros.
Remember Justice League?
What was originally supposed to be a cinematic event for the DC Extended Universe that matched the hype and anticipation levels of The Avengers never fully reached the, ahem, marvel of its competitor. The team-up movie between Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman, The Flash, and Cyborg was released in the fall of 2017, losing an estimated $60 million and failing to break even on its production budget of $300 million.
In the years since its release, there have been numerous attempts to Monday Morning Quarterback the situation, with a number of potential different solutions. The most accurate of these is that Warner Bros. simply tried to do too much, too soon. While Marvel and Kevin Feige took their time—albeit with a few stumbles along the way—to build Avengers into something meaningful for its audience, Warner Bros. didn’t have the same luxury, as they had to try and play catchup to an already dominant force. In short, Justice League was reactionary, just like Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice was before it; each movie tried to respond to the criticisms of the film prior, spectacularly missing the point each time. The other main point is the film’s rocky production. For those unaware, director Zack Snyder was initially at the helm of the film, before dropping out due to a family tragedy; Warner Bros. then enlisted Avengers director Joss Whedon to come in and rework the script through a series of reshoots that involved a horribly removed mustache among other things.
After the film’s failure, the DCEU largely moved away from the dour, joyless tones Snyder had imbued into Man of Steel, Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice, and Justice League opting for a full turn into a lighter, bouncer feel readily seen in films like Aquaman and especially Shazam!. But for a certain devoted group of fans, there was always a desire to see what Snyder’s vision of the film could be...and thus #ReleaseTheSnyderCut was born. What follows is a story about a lot of different things: fans who feel inherent ownership of a property and are therefore entitled to a certain outcome, how social media can be weaponized, and what means to ultimately be a “real fan.” It also discusses the allegations Ray Fisher (who portrayed Cyborg in Justice League) has made against Whedon about what happened during his time on the Justice League set, all of which culminated in the release of Zack Snyder’s Justice League on HBO Max on March 19, 2021.
If this is somehow the first time you’re learning about what The Snyder Cut is and means, I envy your ability to live a happy and healthy life. The movement, if you want to call it such, is based on the idea that Warner is somehow sitting on a finished, pre-Whedon Snyder cut of the film, that they refuse to release in order to protect the version that was ultimately released in 2017. Most of this speculation initially hinged on shots from the first trailer that didn’t end up in the final version of the film, leading to a larger conspiracy that there was something afoot. The first salvo was a Change.org petition that asked Warner Bros. to include Snyder’s version with the film on a home release. From there, the #ReleaseTheSnyderCut hashtag became a rallying cry amongst certain groups within the DCEU fandom. But most interestingly, Snyder himself and some of his collaborators began fanning the flames, confirming that yes a cut exists, and going so far as to reveal the drastic differences in plot and tone that it would’ve contained.
Perhaps Snyder was emboldened by Aquaman. Jason Momoa was one of the first people to publicly acknowledge the different cut and imply it had different narrative implications, explaining to Chris Van Vliet that “Zack’s cut” had a different ending involving his Aquaman co-stars Amber Heard and Willem Dafoe that would’ve set the stage for where his solo film opened. Momoa leveled up from acknowledgment to direct support the next time he mentioned it, when he admitted to MTV News that he, like the legions of fanboys trolling the annals of twitter and Reddit, was “obsessed” with the idea of a Snyder Cut, emphatically stating “Fuck yeah, I wanna see it” while also hinting at studio politics being the reason we hadn’t already. “That’s one thing that sucks with our business,” he said, “Where you just can’t speak your mind.”
From then on, Snyder’s used social media (especially Vero, his platform of choice) to incrementally tease what his original vision of Justice League contained. Here is where it’s prudent to recall that the original plan for Justice League intended for what was essentially a two-part film. Then, when the Batman v Superman reaction was largely sour, DCEU brass realized people were barely willing to give one Justice League movie a chance, and hastily buried plans for an immediate sequel. Anyway, Part One would’ve heralded the arrival of Darkseid, an intergalactic warlord who isn’t really far off from the version of Thanos depicted in the Avengers films. (Let’s just say if he did half of what he did on the ‘90s-aughts Bruce Timm cartoons, which included brutally beating Superman then brainwashing him to hate and destroy Earth, his on-screen depiction in the hands of Zack Snyder of all people would’ve been savage.) Batfleck’s "Knightmare" fever dreams of a villainous Superman and Parademons—Darkseid foot soldiers from his base planet Apokolips—in BvS, as well as Lex Luthor’s ominous warnings in the climax, were heavy enough hints that he was the DCEU’s Big Bad. Justice League enlisting Steppenwolf as the main villain only confirmed it—Steppenwolf is, primarily, a Darkseid lieutenant.
Of course, no such rocky-faced being makes a grand entrance in the final Justice League cut. But about a year ago, Snyder shared sketches of Darkseid’s likeness, following that up a few months later with the bombshell that character actor Ray Porter was set to play him. He tripled down on that thread not too long ago with more sketches of a younger version of the villain in battle, captioned “Uxas,” i.e. Darkseid’s pre-megalomaniac government name. That implied we were due for a flashback explaining his origins and original beef with the Atlanteans, Amazonians and humanity. The Zack Snyder OG Cut dispatches got shadier, too. He captioned a storyboard revealing Wonder Woman would’ve killed Steppenwolf in his version with “Not sure how they killed Steppenwolf in the theatrical version...but I use Gods to kill Gods.” So he didn’t even see the uh, Whedon Cut, then huh? Ouch.
It’s around this time that we got confirmation of The Cut from someone outside of the DCEU, when Kevin Smith appeared on CinemaBlend’s Reel Blend podcast to corroborate its existence. “I've not seen it firsthand...That being said, I’ve spoken now to enough people at various levels in that production. There IS a Snyder cut. That's not a mythical beast.” Smith went on to allege that most of what Snyder shot before exiting was pre-visual effects and therefore not suitable as a coherent, finished film to ever be shown.
That’s where things get spicy. A fan campaign was made at Comic-Con earlier in 2019, involving a plane banner emblazoned with the hashtag, bus stop ads, an ad in the Hollywood Reporter, and more. Months later, Snyder’s go-to composer Junkie XL confirmed he completed a score for Zack’s version (Danny Elfman, of Batman and Batman Returns fame, scored the theatrical release.) Snyder let more teases fly, confirming the government official played by notable character actor Harry Lennix in Man of Steel and Batman v Superman was intended to be League hero Martian Manhunter in disguise.
But then your boy Momoa returned to the scene of the crime, addressing the Snyder Cut again in yet another interview with MTV, this time with even more innuendo. In the year since, Momoa confirms he has seen it, it does indeed feel like a different movie than what we saw in theaters, and he thinks “the public needs to see it,” with a similar caveat of not wanting to ruffle studio feathers by coming across disloyal or insolent. But most intriguingly, to the interviewer’s note about Smith’s comments saying Snyder Cut lacked vfx, Momoa deliciously replied “Oh, you think Zack couldn’t finish it?” Wow.
Since then, Snyder Cut has been a top trending topic intermittently, and it hit a fever pitch last weekend.
Looking to capitalize on the two-year-anniversary of the film’s release, fans launched another Twitter campaign this past Sunday, once again leveraging the platform to spread their message. Only this time around, things were different, as the campaign was legitimized by Momoa’s co-stars, namely: Cyborg actor Ray Fisher (!), Gal Gadot (!!), and Ben Affleck (!!!). Momoa is famously more of a loose-lipped interview than most of them, so his comments were never shocking, but Gal and especially Affleck joining the fray is unexpected and quite surprising, to say the least.
The 'Snyder Cut' of 'Justice League' made official
Then, a few weeks before the May 2020 launch of HBO Max, Warner made it official: The cut was on the way, set to debut exclusively on the newly-minted streaming service. In a statement, Snyder stated, “I want to thank HBO Max and Warner Brothers for this brave gesture of supporting artists and allowing their true visions to be realized. Also a special thank you to all of those involved in the SnyderCut movement for making this a reality.”
The not-so-secret secret about the Snyder Cut is that the movie wasn’t ever finished. When Snyder left, he took an extremely rough cut with him, lacking in completed visual effects and no finished music. Warner has supposedly sunk another $70 million into the project to allow the director to conclude his movie, which involved both reshoots during COVID, additional music, and finishing visual effects. Despite the frustrating final product, all actors came back to complete the project, which speaks to Snyder’s strength as a leader.
The cast’s support of Snyder seems especially notable in the light of recent reports around Whedon’s behavior on both Justice League and Buffy: The Vampire Slayer. Fisher tweeted last summer that Whedon’s “on-set treatment of the cast and crew of Justice League was gross, abusive, unprofessional, and completely unacceptable,” something Gadot also confirmed in an interview last year. Fisher went on to state Justice League producers Geoff Johns and Jon Berg, enabled Whedon’s alleged behavior. Warner opened an investigation into the events, with “remedial action” being taken. Fisher went on to further state that despite this conclusion, he believed DC Films president Walter Hamada undermined the investigation. As a result, Fisher stated he would no longer work with DC Films if Hamada remained in power, essentially walking away from the DCEU. These statements gained further attention after actress Charisma Carpenter and other Buffy and Angel crew members shared their traumatic history with Whedon in support of Fisher earlier this year. Whedon exited his upcoming HBO show The Nevers last fall; it’s currently unknown what his role in the industry will be moving forward.
Warner’s decision to release the cut is fraught, too. For one, it sets an alarming precedent of acquiescing to fan demand. There’s been no shortage of fan movements in recent years—a lot of them mired in inherently racist and sexist behavior—and the same can be said of the Snyder Cut. While legitimate good came of the push, it’s difficult to square that with the vitriol writers like Kayleigh Donaldson experienced from fans through the process or the fact that former DC Entertainment president Diane Nelson deleted her Twitter account after being harassed by Snyder supporters. It’s more than likely the movement would have eventually died off, but now that it’s been both acknowledged and rewarded, it’ll be hard to close Pandora’s (Mother) Box. Those fans will also feel especially vindicated by the strong reception for the release, as Zack Snyder’s Justice League has a 74 percent on Rotten Tomatoes, bolstered by reviewers who found Snyder’s tonally and thematically consistent vision to be much more appealing than the fractured fracas of Whedon’s version.
Zack Snyder’s Justice League serves as an inflection point for fan entitlement and its role in shaping popular culture. There’s already a push—#RestoreTheSnyderVerse, naturally—to get to Warner to restore Snyder’s entire vision to the DCEU. What happens next, no one knows, but the Snyder Cut’s most lasting impact is likely to be a towering example of how difficult it is for fandom to move forward. If enough pressure can make the past real, why bother living in the present?