Following the release of Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, it was made clear that Justice League would feature a lighter tone and the handful of journalists invited to the set of the DC Comics movie pointed to the Flash providing plenty of laughs, a good sign that was indeed going to be the case. So, it appeared as if the DC Films Universe had been set on the right path and that we would get a Justice League with all of Zack Snyder's sensibilities but a feel far closer to the comic books.
After Batman v Superman (a movie I enjoyed but one which was essentially two hours of the Dark Knight plotting to murder the Man of Steel), this third part of Snyder's trilogy needed to bring a little levity to proceedings but, alas, that simply wasn't enough for Warner Bros. and as the development of the DC Comics adaptation continued, they brought in Joss Whedon and, well, did they make a massive mistake or was that the smartest move they could have possibly made for the project?
Click below to keep reading and for our look at whether Whedon ruined or rescued the movie.
Clearly unhappy with Snyder's first cut of Justice League, Warner Bros. hired The Avengers and Avengers: Age of Ultron director Joss Whedon to write reshoots Snyder would direct. For whatever reason, the studio clearly felt he and original screenwriter Chris Terrio weren't up to the task but things then took a shocking and drastic turn for Justice League which none of us saw coming.
It was revealed by the trades that Snyder had decided to step down from Justice League because his daughter had committed suicide. Realising he couldn't finish working on the project, Snyder decided to hand the reigns to Whedon not only as the director of those reshoots but for the entire post-production process as well. Many fans questioned whether Snyder might have been fired from the project by Warner Bros. and that this was being used as an excuse for both parties to save face and stop any more negativity from engulfing the DC Comics adaptation. If that is the case, it's shocking but stranger things have happened in Hollywood before now.
So, with Whedon now working on the movie and Snyder having no involvement whatsoever, changes started being made. For starters, the filmmaker fired composer Junkie XL and instead hired Danny Elfman to take charge and deliver a far more traditional superhero score. For an insight into the chaotic production process, look no further than recent comments from Elfman in which he revealed that he was scoring storyboards as opposed to actual footage! That's unprecedented but shows how much Whedon was reworking Justice League and how rushed the whole process was.
Those reshoots required the return of almost every cast member, lasted for months, and cost upwards of $50 million. Henry Cavill, in the midst of shooting Mission: Impossible 6, also came back but unable to shave off his moustache because Paramount Pictures wouldn't allow it, drastic measures were taken to hide it. However, we'll get to that fiasco a little later!
Months passed by and the hype surrounding Justice League continued to grow. We'd often get reports about the movie being a mess but Whedon's involvement made a lot of fans very happy and the trailers and TV spots pointed to this being one of the best DC Comics movies to date. Little did we know that a clip featuring Steppenwolf was probably our first look at scenes which were rushed out after reshoots because the CGI clearly wasn't up to scratch and sadly looked no better in the finished product. Warner Bros. delaying the date that critics could Tweet their reactions also didn't help matters and neither did the fact that reviews would hit just days before Justice League was released. That wasn't exactly a sign of confidence on the studio's part!
The Tweets and reviews all started hitting social media within days of each other and while those early reactions were mostly positive with some complaints, the full verdicts were far more negative and it quickly became apparent that it wouldn't fare any better than other DC Films releases (Wonder Woman not included). Rotten Tomatoes holding back Justice League's score only made matters worse and those early estimates of a $110 million opening - already way down from Batman v Superman - started dropping.
Justice League debuted with $94 million, a shocking result which will lead to the movie losing $50 million - $100 million for Warner Bros. However, now that we'd seen the movie, it was easy to see just how much work Whedon had done on it and you need only look at Superman to see the extent of that. Henry Cavill's CGI mouth is present in all but a handful of scenes and that's a result of his moustache being removed in post. There was also upwards of thirty scenes from the trailers which had gone missing and with cast members like Jason Momoa and Ray Fisher coming forward to detail deleted scenes involving their characters, it quickly became apparent that Whedon had cut an awful lot from Justice League.
That was particularly the case with Superman because as we've mentioned, the director clearly reshot almost all of the Man of Steel's scenes. This could have something to do with the fact that Snyder reportedly intended keeping Superman evil for the cast majority of Justice League, something most fans and moviegoers would not respond well to. Throw in reports that he also cut a cliffhanger ending and it didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that Joss Whedon's Justice League was not Zack Snyder's Justice League despite the fact that it was initially reported he would keep his fellow filmmaker's vision in place.
I enjoyed Justice League and there's no denying that this Superman is vastly superior to what we got in Cavill's first two appearances. However, the movie is a mess and that's down to two clashing tones which simply don't work well together. Snyder's Justice League probably would have been overlong, dark, and a tad convoluted but it's a version I believe would have been a better experience overall even if the reviews probably would have been just as bad and there would have been moments in there upsetting to fans.
Did Whedon rescue us from an inferior version of Justice League? I don't think so. Instead, he subjected us to a lot of ill-fitting humour, a Batman who didn't really feel like Batman, and a whole new final act. On the other hand, he gave us a vastly superior Superman, a Justice League movie which actually felt like the comic books and a fun, breezy adventure which feels like a step in the right direction for the DC Films Universe. However, saying Justice League was saved by Whedon would, in the words of the Flash, be a major oversimplification.
To some extent, Whedon did actually ruin Justice League because he essentially changed its entire foundation and delivered a movie which didn't really work. However, I don't think the blame really lies at his feet. This is what Warner Bros., a studio which seemingly has little to no confidence in it's DC Comics properties, wanted and that meant we got a movie which was created by committee. A Marvel facsimile which fails to reach the lofty heights of anything delivered by the Marvel Cinematic Universe and the complete opposite to the filmmaker-driven approach which made Wonder Woman such a hit. The studio's lack of planning is what really ruined this movie.
Ultimately, though, a series of unfortunate circumstances is what hurt Justice League. Regardless of whether or not Warner Bros. wanted Snyder to finish this movie, the tragic death of his daughter put a stop to that and we ended up with an enjoyable but flawed superhero movie. To answer the question posed above, though, yes, I think Joss Whedon probably did ruin Justice League when a is said and done. Sure, he delivered a lot of good work but somewhere out there is a much better version of this movie with only Zack Snyder's fingerprints on it. It's just a shame we'll never get to see it.