Look, before you slam my article without even reading it. I am not here to slate the Snyder Cut film itself, in any sense. I love the film and I loved the movement behind getting it released.
For me, there are a few reasons why we should now consider looking on past what Zack Snyder built.
The first for me is the DCEU is a mess. This isn’t Snyder’s fault, it’s the poor cast choices and executive decisions from Warner Bros. I.e firing Ray Fisher from The Flash movie but keeping Amber Heard on in the second Aquaman film. Ezra Miller judging by the media is arrested for what seems to be every other month at this point.
This casts issues on the movies themselves and if they’ll do well. When you’re The Flash, and you’re being arrested for alleged trafficking, it’s going to affect box office numbers, it’s the same with Aquaman. If a movie performs poorly, it questions if another movie will happen. This is a shame because I have no doubt both of those movies will be good.
The second is, that it’s clear that Warner Bros. doesn’t want anything to do with this anymore. It’s rumored that The Flash movie is going to undo everything from the Snyder Cut. It took an entire movement to get the Directors Cut from the Justice League and even then, it felt like Warner Bros. did everything they could to make sure the movie never happened.
I know the Snyder Cut had a lot of reshoots but it deserved it. After the state of Joss Whedon’s version of the film, it deserved additional care from the studio and Snyder himself. Granted, it was almost 4 hours but it was broken up well and each character was developed very well.
The issue now is, for some reason, it seems like Snyder isn’t trusted. He did relatively well with both Man of Steel and (unpopular opinion) Batman vs. Superman. He was then given Justice League but due to the sad death of his daughter, he had to pull out of the movie. Since then, it seems like WB is massively against him.
This is another reason why it’s time to move on. What’s the point in WB even giving Snyder another project? They’ll pick his work apart and barely give him the creative control he needs to make it good. Green Lantern was written into the end scene in Justice League but instead, Martian Manhunter was put in place when this wasn’t planned.
As a result of this alone, it’s put the DCEU in a hot mess. Snyder had a vision for the characters and now it’s all over the place. This is why the DCEU needs a soft reboot so they can start again. It’s why I’ve said time and time again, if they don’t reboot it now, they will never catch up to Marvel.
The Justice League is meant to be on par with Avengers. It’s their big team-ups, everything builds up to those moments. Marvel did it well. If the Snyder Cut came first, then maybe it may have been different.
Don’t get me wrong, the DCEU has some solid projects coming including Shazam! Fury of the Gods and Black Adam but if WB wants to compete with Marvel then they need a roadmap.
Then there’s the small vocal, loud minority of Snyder fans that make the entire thing unbearable at times. The constant comparisons, even to the latest The Batman movie by Matt Reeves. Whilst it did start off as a joke, this section of the fandom has now taken it into every single comic book movie that’s coming out and it’s pathetic. I have also seen a small section of fans say that Snyder would have done better. They also jump on anybody aggressively if they dare to defy anything Snyder-related.
I know fandoms have their toxic fanbase, Star Wars is up there at present but some Snyder fans can be really nasty when all we superhero fans want is good content. Maybe Snyder can deliver that, but unfortunately without the creative control, there’s no point.
This is why if WB cannot give Snyder full control then we have to move on. There’s no point dwindling over this now, it’s time to see what other movies can do for us such as Shazam, Black Adam, and The Batman sequel.
