5 Years Ago, Zack Snyder Turned Back Time To Deliver A Comic Book Epic

Gore Verbinski’s BioShock. Edgar Wright’s Ant-Man. Colin Trevorrow’s Star Wars: Episode 9. Since studios discovered the financial potential of blockbuster adaptations of well-known IP, there’s been an ever-growing graveyard of directorial visions chewed up and spit out in favor of something else, usually something more palatable to a mass audience. Filmmakers stepping away or being removed from projects is nothing new, but with the benefit of the internet, curious fans now have access to the details of these projects in a way they’ve never had before — storyboards, screenplays, and even early footage can offer a glimpse at an alternate universe where the seeds of these artistic endeavors blossomed into fruit.

It’s incredibly rare for these projects to belatedly come to fruition, as indulging the whims of fans or burned directors would only raise questions about studio decision-making. But five years ago, one man defied the will of the system and turned back time itself (with the help of a fanbase dedicated to a fault), delivering a film whose very existence was so shrouded in rumor and secrecy that it became the stuff of legend: Zack Snyder’s Justice League.

The behind-the-scenes story surrounding Justice League has become a monomythic reflection on the struggles of film production: after the completion of principal photography in late 2016, Snyder chose to step back after the loss of his daughter Autumn, prompting Warner Bros. to hire Joss Whedon, the architect of 2012’s The Avengers, to finish the film in post-production. Still reeling from the divisive reaction to Batman v. Superman, the studio took the opportunity to pivot away from Snyder’s vision of a somber, sweeping epic into something more like the kitschy Saturday morning cartoon energy of the MCU.

It was a decision that blew up in their faces: the film’s theatrical cut was a box-office catastrophe that failed to break even, and the final product inspired a fan movement that spent the next four years demanding the release of Snyder’s original vision with all the footage he shot. When the fabled Snyder Cut finally arrived in 2021, it was a case study on how different filmmakers can inhabit the same material, and even the same footage, in drastically different ways.

Whereas Whedon’s Justice League was a whiplash-inducing course-correction that stood out from previous films with a garishly saturated color palette, cringeworthy attempts at comedy, and jarringly incompatible reshoots, Snyder’s film was a four-hour epic with the seismic stakes of one of DC’s numerous Crisis events. It’s not quite as grim as his previous DC outings, but it’s undeniably, singularly his. You can still feel the pressure from studio executives to appease criticisms of the last film — Snyder’s version does feature more (tonally appropriate) humor, and Batman’s newfound belief in the decency of humankind can’t help but feel a little incongruent with where we last saw him — but the film’s authorial vision can’t be denied.

Being a Zack Snyder DC film, ZSJL isn’t perfect. Not every minute of those four hours is earned, Cavill’s Superman still feels like a glorified plot device instead of a genuine character, and Steppenwolf doesn’t feel nearly as idiosyncratic or compelling a villain as Michael Shannon’s General Zod or even Jesse Eisenberg’s Lex Luthor. But there are things it does remarkably well, well enough to arguably be the best of Snyder’s trilogy.

His undeniable eye for visual spectacle is at its peak here, combining awe-inspiring shot composition and his signature speed-ramping technique to evoke the frames of a comic book with our heroes bursting off the page. There’s also an effective marriage of camaraderie and mythic reverence for the team. The initial forging of relationships between characters is earnest, but the film never loses the raw power and iconography of these larger-than-life heroes; one moment, Batman and Wonder Woman are bantering like coworkers, and in the next, they’re fighting off Parademons with the weight of folkloric heroes. It’s a satisfying balancing act, and it’s bittersweet to get a glimpse at a world in which Snyder’s planned DC saga got better and more confident with each installment.

Considering its tumultuous journey to release, there’s something remarkable about how Zack Snyder’s Justice League feels like it’s commenting on itself and its architect, specifically through the journey of its central characters: Cyborg and The Flash. Ray Fisher’s Cyborg is the heart of the film, which makes it all the more frustrating how the character is treated in the theatrical cut. His journey is defined by the ability to recalibrate and make the best out of life in the aftermath of tragedy, and one can only imagine how personal that subplot must have been to Snyder during the editing of a movie so connected to his own tragedy. The beauty and emotional weight of Cyborg’s affirmation that he’s “not broken” and “not alone” is multiplied when thinking about the fanbase that sprouted up to champion Snyder’s vision in the aftermath of unimaginable loss.

The Flash, on the other hand, feels like a representation of the Herculean effort it must have taken to actually get the Snyder Cut released. His arc rests atop a false narrative — that his Dad murdered his mother — and the whole movie, he’s fighting time itself to redefine the story of the Allen family and prove himself to the world. It’s not all that unlike the story of the movie: four years spent trying to do the impossible and turn back the clock, all while facing a critical pan of the theatrical cut with Snyder’s name attached, and fighting against a studio narrative that claimed the original vision was “unreleasable.”

“Make your own future. Make your own past.” The words Barry Allen speaks while racing to change fate itself in the film’s climax also speak to how the Snyder Cut has transformed Hollywood and the filmmaking ecosystem. It satisfied countless fans, but it’s also responsible for a shift in the relationship between artists and audiences, one with implications that are still being felt. Zack Snyder’s Justice League, with all its flaws and moments of operatic glory, is a glimpse of a world in which studio blockbusters, for better or worse, are exactly what they always should be: the unrestrained, idiosyncratic perspective of a filmmaker sharing something that only they could make.

Zack Snyder’s Justice League is streaming on HBO Max.