Justice League (2017, Zack Snyder), the Snyder cut

The absolute saddest part of Justice League: The Encore Edition is the new stuff’s not bad. It’s not great, but it’s not bad. You almost want to see the movie, which is basically Ben Affleck Batman teaming up the not even A-list for 2021 of DC Comics movies stars and roaming a post-apocalyptic wasteland. But then there’s even more new stuff with Affleck and it’s the best Affleck’s been in the whole four hours. He has a thirty second or so conversation without screenwriter Chris Terrio’s indescribably horrific dialogue and it’s fine. It’s kind of charming even and there’s no other time in all of Justice League: The Uncensored Version Affleck’s ever near charming. He’s obviously miserable in the rest of it, having realized after his last Snyder outing whatever he thought he was doing on set, it wasn’t ending up printed on film. Though Affleck doesn’t even get an arc, which is kind of funny. Like, Affleck, Gal Gadot, Henry Cavill, Amy Adams—all the people who’d already had their solo movies—they don’t get arcs.

And it makes sense, because Justice League: The Commemorative Edition takes its time introducing its new superheroes. There’s Aquaman (before Aquaman) Jason Momoa, Cyborgman Ray Fisher (who got screwed the most in the theatrical version), and Flashman Ezra Miller, who’s done so well since Justice League: The Theatrical Version Warner had to beg him onto the TV shows the movie people all dissed. All three do pretty well with some lousy material. All three get extended introductions, with Momoa doing a cologne commercial set to Nick Cave—if you’re going to sell out, sell out big (and it’s actually the second Nick Cave in fifteen minutes because Adams’s D plot gets a Cave song too, so double up, sir)—Miller doing a lovely slow motion meet cute with Kiersey Clemons, albeit set to very annoying music—while Fisher gets a football success flashback. Snyder really can’t direct sports scenes. Whatever Zack Snyder thinks slow motion accomplishes, it does not. If you ran Justice League: The Special Edition at regular speed, you’d probably lose an hour.

The action in the first half is all very elaborate. None of it involves the superheroes. Snyder really can’t be bothered with the superhero action. He takes his time with the Amazons—led by an atrocious Connie Nielsen, but her level of atrocious doesn’t even get her in the top five—he takes his time with some of the Momoa stuff (Momoa’s stuff figures into the A plot, whereas Miller’s doesn’t at all and Fisher’s sort of figures in but only coincidentally). But there’s Atlantis stuff and there’s a lengthy flashback to ancient battles against a terrible CGI bad guy. Justice League: Untitled does a great job proving Marvel had the right idea all along (minus hiring Joss Whedon); build up the characters in solo projects, hire an actor to motion capture your inter dimensional blue bad guy. Justice League: The Bootleg Cut spends a lot of time on very pointless setup; at least the Fisher stuff gets closed off, but it turns out it’s because he’s the only one who’s not getting to come back after Justice League: Integral Version. The film leverages Joe Morton to get it done.

Joe Morton can get it done. No one in the movie makes the crap dialogue seem as reasonable as Joe Morton.

Even if he and Fisher never really get any good scenes together. Of the new three, Fisher’s the best (and actually good). Momoa survives unscathed. Miller survives… scathed.

So if Affleck’s bad, Gadot’s kind of fine but has no character arc and her characterization is very thin. Actually, more abrupt. Terrio’s scared to write people talking to one another so everyone just spouts declarative statements. Though Gadot does get a lengthy narration scene—when Thamos is fighting against Bronze Age super magic people—and she is terrible. It’s terribly written, but she’s really bad at it too. Like, maybe throw in some John Lennon to make a human connection. Wonder Woman does vaporize a guy in front of school children in her action scene though; Snyder wimps out on CGI’ing blood all over them.

Cavill’s fine. He’s in Justice League: Redux seemingly less than in the other one when he had the silly CGI jaw (they should’ve used all that footage but made it Bizarro). Adams is fine too. She gets the second biggest shit part in the movie though. Her part actually gets worse the more we learn about her, which happens because of the biggest shit part—poor Diane Lane. First they give her a shit part, then they change it Carrie Fisher in Star Wars 9 style and make it even worse. Plus all the Cavill, Adams, and Lane stuff is clearly not meant for the pan and scan. It’s a sad end to their trilogy and it’s kind of obvious Snyder cut more of their stuff than anyone else’s. Except maybe Gadot’s; even though she gets the terrible narration thing, her solo action scene gets trashed through editing. Also the music.

Thomas Holkenborg’s music is occasionally fine. Mostly for the Aquaman stuff, but in general it’s not too terrible. Except for Gadot’s stuff and Cavill’s stuff. With the latter, it’s like Holkenborg’s giving the old Hans Zimmer material the finger. With Gadot’s stuff, Holkenborg’s just got terrible ideas. He also completely avoids giving Affleck any music, which is too bad because it’d be great if there was some sad Affleck music whenever you can just see the dejection on his face. He’s painfully miserable. He can’t even keep pace with Jeremy Irons, who’s doing everything to try to keep their scenes afloat. Irons can save Gadot, but Affleck’s a sunk rock.

He’s terrible to the point he’s annoying to watch.

Oh, and J.K. Simmons. So bad.

Amber Heard’s fine. Willem Dafoe’s terrible but not in an embarrassing way like Simmons or Lane or, you know, Affleck. Meanwhile Billy Crudup seems to be doing an impression of John Wesley Shipp, who plays the same part (The Flash’s wrongly convicted father) on the “Flash” TV show.

Who else… Oh. So the voices for the CGI bad guys, who all look terrible because the visual concepts for Justice League: The Final Cut are all bad. But Ciarán Hinds. Not good work. Ray Porter, terrible. Peter Guinness, terrible.

Another misunderstanding I had about the theatrical version and Justice League: Extended Collector's Edition… I thought the lousy CGI backdrops, like when people are out on the street—I thought all those scenes were post-Snyder. Nope, there’s a bunch of shot in front of green screen instead of on exciting nondescript city street. It looks terrible. Worse, when they do the Kansas corn fields with the CGI backgrounds? It’s like a museum diorama where just a little further away it’s the wall with the painted horizon. Ruins the scenes.

Again, Justice League: The Reconstruction does no favors for the Man of Steel gang.

Fabian Wagner’s exterior photography is all exquisite. It’s just the composites. They’re all crappy. Every single one. If Snyder leaned into it more, the artificial, exaggerated distance between foreground and back, he might have something. But he never has something with Justice League: The R-Rated Director’s Cut because there’s just nothing to see here.

Wonder Woman 1984 (2020, Patty Jenkins)

Outside allowing Chris Pine to charmingly mug for the camera while doing an eighties men’s fashion parade, there’s not much reason for its 1984 setting. Unless they thought it would be absurd if Wonder Woman Gal Gadot pined after dead WWI love Pine for more than sixty-five years or so. No reason for the setting until the third act, anyway, when it turns out director Jenkins and co-writers Geoff Johns and Dave Callaham just need the time period so they can do the USSR vs. USA nuclear war bit. It’s one of the only eighties movie accurate tropes.

Though there could theoretically be others and Jenkins and company just made them eight times longer than they needed to be so they ceased being homage and just caused micro-naps. 1984 isn’t very good at homage. Based on the mid-end credits scene, it’s not even good at self-homage, but Jenkins really screws up a Superman: The Movie homage. Just stunningly messes it up and you wonder why they’re doing the homage if Jenkins and cinematographer Matthew Jensen are going to shoot it so poorly. But it’s an effects heavy shot and Jenkins is terrible with those throughout the entire film.

But nothing like the last act, which has Gadot’s showdown with pseudo-nemesis Kristen Wiig. The sky is muddy, but somehow still has more detail than the CGI eighties James Bond movie playset they’re rendering the CG in? On? Where does one render CG objects in CG sets. Regardless, it’s a terrible action sequence. And for it to be terrible is something because 1984 already has this graded on a curve action sequence thing because none of them have any weight.

1984 is full of action set pieces with absolutely no dramatic impact starting with the prologue flashback, which takes place on Paradise Island so they can put Robin Wright and Connie Nielsen in the movie for way too long and so young Gadot (Lilly Aspell) can learn a valuable lesson to reference in the finale and for it to have no emotional weight because it’s a terribly written and directed scene. But there are no stakes in the fight scenes. Not until somewhere near the end of the second act and then it’s the one fight scene with some drama. But still not very much.

The first act, minus the prologue, is pretty good. It’s silly in a surprisingly good way and almost charming. It’s hard for it to be charming because the writing’s so bad—like when Wiig and Gadot become gal pals. For a lot of the movie, Wiig’s actually pretty good. She can’t survive it but there’s no way to survive her arc. And the stuff with her and Gadot has potential. But not because of the writing. The writing is terrible. But there’s an inkling of possibility, at least until Pine shows up and Gadot doesn’t need any new friends.

The stuff with Pine and Gadot is a lot of fun . It’s not really heavy lifting—Pine mooning on about flying just makes you want Star Trek IV 2, but there’s some gravitas to the resolution of their whirlwind weekend romance. It’s just a cute couples adventure. There might even be some deleted scenes from it—unless, you know, someone forgot where they parked. They could’ve left off the end of the movie and just had outtakes. Because Gadot doesn’t have an arc. She’s got a contrived ground situation and the absurd indignity of having to be a “secret” superhero for continuity’s sake, which is a bummer because Jenkins at least has fun with the Gadot rescuing people and whatnot sequences. When it’s stopping Middle Eastern military caravans, it’s all crap unless Pine’s around to grin and be selfless and give the whole thing some heart.

Oh, yeah. The Middle East stuff. 1984 likes all its standard 1984 movie villains, including the Egyptian president (Amr Waked). The movie tries to compensate by having the Reagan analogue be a warmongering putz (Stuart Milligan) but no.

Pedro Pascal is the actual villain. He’s a failed telemarketer who becomes magic and grants wishes until the world goes to shit. There are all sorts of details and rules (nothing fun, like don’t feed him after midnight). Pascal’s okay. It’s a big shallow part and, what’s the best you could hope for in a performance? Frank T.J. Mackey? Like… really bad villain choice.

But the movie’s full of bad choices.

Gadot escapes mostly unscathed. Nothing bad is ever her fault. Though she is a producer, so never mind. Also if she like refused to do effects work, it might explain why her CG model for a bunch of the action sequences don’t even look like her.

Though the CG’s terrible. Like. Really, really terrible.

Richard Pearson’s editing might be good? Hans Zimmer’s music isn’t.

1984 is kind of a bummer but also kind of inevitable. The script’s shockingly insipid for such a “big concept” blockbuster. Even with the bad action scenes, Jenkins’s direction has its pluses, and the cast keeps it afloat. Wiig, Pine, Pascal, Gadot.

No doubt it could be better, but it’s very obvious it could be a lot worse. Which is some kind of a win.

Justice League (2017, Zack Snyder)

Justice League exists, whether intentionally or not, outside a certain kind of critical examination. Director Snyder didn’t finish post-production. Or, at least, when the studio demanded lots of reshoots, Snyder wasn’t involved in a creative capacity. The job went to Joss Whedon, who gets a co-writer credit. Are the terrible scenes Whedon’s fault or Snyder’s fault? The generic, impersonal Danny Elfman score? Seems like Whedon’s fault. The terrible part for top-billed Ben Affleck? Probably Snyder’s fault. The crappy CGI?

Well, crappy CGI in DC Comics adaptations is definitely Warner Bros.’s fault. And it gets bad in Justice League. The lack of detail on the giant, personality-free adversary (boringly voiced by Ciarán Hinds) is stunning. Again, it’s not clear if Snyder supervising post would’ve led to better action scenes. The ones in Justice League are all pretty awful. Fabian Wagner’s photography is bland, David Brenner, Richard Pearson, and Martin Walsh’s editing is at best bland. It’s much often much worse. The action sequences lack imagination on every level, whether scale or just the idea of the superheroes working together.

Justice League has no scale. Someone–Snyder, Whedon, the producers, the studio, the twenty-third test audience–decided there shouldn’t be any establishing shots if they don’t have exposition. Justice League cuts from expository scene to expository scene, except Whedon and Chris Terrio’s Frankenstein script doesn’t have any texture to it. Not when it’s the main cast, not when it’s the supporting cast. Especially not when it’s poor Diane Lane and Amy Adams. Jeremy Irons gets terribly mistreated, but it’s nothing compared to Lane and Adams.

Adams is literally reduced to broken woman. While the whole world is ceasing to function because of what happened with Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, instead of being a strong character who perceivers in the aftermath, she just breaks down. Not on screen, she just tells everyone about it. Well, she tells Lane and Henry Cavill about it because she has nothing else going on.

But Lane. Poor Lane. It appears Lane’s scenes are entirely, with one exception, Whedon’s. Cavill had a mustache while doing reshoots and there’s some bad (though apparently exceptionally expensive–read rushed) CG to mask out the mustache. The result is his mouth not moving right and his teeth being scrunched. So you can kind of tell. You can kind of tell who to blame.

And it’s Whedon who reduces Lane and Adams to broken women. At least Terrio and Snyder–apparently–made Affleck a broken man. He just can’t get on after what he’s done. Except he’s not haunted about it. He’s just bad, actually. He’s really, really bad. He’s supposed to be the straight man to a team of misfit superheroes, only they’re not misfit superheroes.

Misfits need personality and the Justice League has none. Ezra Miller’s got the most as the Flash and all he does is tell wisecracks. Then there’s Ray Fisher; he gives the film’s best performance in a thankless part. Even though he’s got a lot to do in the script, Fisher gets the least story of anyone. More offensively, it wastes Joe Morton as his dad.

Jason Momoa’s Aquaman. He’s got no personality, doesn’t really do anything in the action sequences except save people occasionally–by people, I mean the other superheroes. Like all DC Comics movies, no regular people are in danger in Justice League. Well, except one family; but they’re actually trapped in a Russian version of Tremors. Otherwise, no one’s in danger. Ever.

Anyway. Momoa. It’s not his fault. More than anyone else, it’s not his fault. His part’s terribly written and the editing on his introduction scenes is atrocious.

Gal Gadot’s supposedly the real straight person on the team, because she can see through Affleck’s guff. Only Affleck wants Gadot to lead the team. Or something. They get some painful scenes together. Again, it’s unclear if it’s Whedon or Snyder, but their scenes are awful. There’s negative chemistry coming from Affleck, even when the script has him mooning over Gadot. Though he does attack her personally when he needs to make a point. Affleck’s writing is so bad. Just. Beyond bad.

Gadot’s fine. She gets the most to do in action scenes, which is either because she’s had the most successful solo movie or just because no one else’s superpowers are good for the fight scenes. Snyder’s direction of the Flash action is terrible, for example.

Amber Heard’s got one scene and makes more impression than practically anyone else.

Cavill’s performance is hard to gauge. Whedon doesn’t write him good scenes. And he’s got a giant unmoving mouth. He and Adams exhibit their usual wondrous chemistry when it’s not a Whedon shot or line. Even still, Elfman’s music ruins even the non-Whedon material. Elfman’s score doesn’t fit. It’s frantic and rushed and usually clashes with the editing.

The only thing saving Justice League from being a disaster is the film disqualifying itself from being serious enough proposition to be a disaster. You open a movie, any movie, with the single worst cover of Everybody Knows–and there have been some terrible Everybody Knows covers–but an offensively bad Everybody Knows cover… well, it’s just too stupid to take seriously enough for it to be a disaster.

Instead, Justice League is intriguingly terrible. Was Snyder’s intention worse? Maybe. I doubt it, because even with all that material’s problems, it doesn’t have Cavill with the silly CG face. But the things Whedon clearly contributed are godawful.

What a mess.

Wonder Woman (2017, Patty Jenkins)

Wonder Woman has one set of official, awkward bookends and one set of unofficial ones. The former does lead Gal Gadot no favors–after spending a moving building a character, it goes all tabula rosa and turns Gadot into little more than a licensing image. The latter does the film no favors. The latter is lousy CG composites. Wonder Woman is full of them, but none of them are worse than the first one and the last one. They jarringly destroy any verisimilitude director Jenkins and Gadot (in the case of the closing bookend) have been working towards. At least in the prologue–which comes after the first bookend (Allan Heinberg’s script is never plotted well)–there’s the rest of the film. But to close on being yanked out of the picture? It’s the final kick in Wonder Woman’s shins.

After the silly opening frame, bad composite or not, Wonder Woman gets off to a strong start. Connie Nielsen is queen of the Amazons, Robin Wright is general of the Amazons. Lilly Aspell and Emily Carey play the younger versions of Gadot but they’re not the point. Nielsen and Wright are the point. Nielsen’s solid, Wright’s awesome. The costumes are a little questionable, as they’re on an island paradise and Nielsen’s in furs? But it’s good.

Then it’s time for Gadot to take over the role and for Chris Pine to literally fall into her lap. Everything starts moving rather quickly–Pine’s arrival, a battle scene with the Amazons versus German soldiers, Gadot and Nielsen bickering, Gadot heading into the world of man. She can never return to her family, but it’s okay because she’s got a mission. It’s World War I and she’s got to save the world, based on bedtime stories Nielsen told Aspell. Turns out they’re the Amazon equivalents of Santa Claus, which should break some of the film’s logic but no one seems to care.

It’s unfortunate Gadot and Nielsen–and Gadot and Wright–never really get scenes together. It’s always plot perturbing scenes, nothing to build the relationships. Again, Heinburg’s script is never plotted well. Ever.

Anyway, Gadot and Pine have immediate chemistry and for a while Wonder Woman is able to coast. Sure, the CGI London is small and weak, but World War I is a great setting for human sadness. The film oscillates between introducing Gadot and Pine’s ragtag team of personable sidekicks–Lucy Davis, Saïd Taghmaoui, Ewen Bremner, David Thewlis–and showing Gadot all the horrors people inflict on other people. Ostensibly it should add to some character development for Gadot, but Heinburg and Jenkins don’t ever let it go towards character development.

I mean, they’re going to wipe the slate clean in the end, so why bother.

Tossed into this mix is Danny Huston and Elena Anaya as a German general and his pet scientist, respectively, who are trying to make a mustard gas variant to get through gas masks and kill everyone. And Gadot and Pine only have forty-eight hours to stop them.

Eventually, they get to the Front–where the film introduces Eugene Brave Rock as the last throwaway sidekick, an American Indian who’s a black market profiteer selling to both sides, even though the Germans are really, really, really, really bad guys in Wonder Woman. There Gadot gets to show off her superpowers for the first time, though only in one sequence–albeit an pretty awesome one, save the weak CG composites of course–before the film starts its downhill run into the third act.

Most of the action–including Gadot and Pine sailing from “Paradise Island” to England–takes place in four or five days. And the big battle finale, with its numerous revelations and plot twists, takes up maybe a quarter of the film. Then it’s time for the closing bookend, which echoes one of the weakest revelation sequences from the finale, and the movie’s over.

Gadot’s good, regardless of the film eschewing the idea she’s supposed to be developing a character. Pine’s good. Davis, Taghmaoui, Bremner, Thewlis, and Brave Rock are good. Everyone’s good. The acting isn’t an issue, it’s the writing and the pacing. And the film’s reliance on some shallow, manipulative (and not even good manipulative) radio show positive message philosophy to wrap things up nice and tidy. Except Wonder Woman is supposed to be, at least on some level, a war movie–seeing sweet little Aspell get wide-eyed and excited at the prospective of war is something else–and the tidy finish rings false.

Better special effects would’ve helped. Not setting the last battle sequence entirely at night and in confined spaces would’ve helped too. A lot of things–like a better screenwriter than Heinburg, a better cinematographer than Matthew “shooting through pea soup” Jensen, a better score than Rupert Gregson-Williams can deliver–would’ve helped. Jenkins does fine with what she’s got. And editor Martin Walsh is all right.

The Wonder Woman action guitar riff (which isn’t even original to this film) is dumb.

The film ends up completely wasting Huston and Anaya. Anaya, actually, twice gets to be a metaphor for the script’s utter lack of integrity.

Still, it could be much worse. The bookends are almost threats to how much worse it could’ve been. But it’s a complete disservice to Gadot, who more than proves herself a capable lead.

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016, Zach Snyder), the ultimate edition

The extended version of Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice isn’t just the extended version of Batman/Superman, it’s Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice: The Ultimate Edition. There’s a second subtitle on the thing. It’s doubling down on the idea the extended cut in the post-DVD era. It’d be desperate if anything added in the “ultimate edition” actually made the film seem more “ultimate,” but it doesn’t. In fact, all the additional scenes and moments are good. And that quality is the problem, because they draw attention to the film’s failings.

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice: The Ultimate Edition is a worse film for better scenes.

The first part of Dawn of Justice, in this cut, runs just around 107 minutes. Quite frankly, if the remaining seventy-three minutes–which have minimal additions, compared to the rather extended first part–just had Amy Adams narrating it and the first 107 minutes cut in as flashbacks, it might have all worked out. Because that first hour and fifty minutes are about Adams, Henry Cavill and Ben Affleck. It’s about Adams and Cavill trying to figure out how to date as Lois Lane and Superman while Affleck’s a bit of a crazy Batman. Thank goodness Jeremy Irons (who excels far more in the ultimate edition) is around to keep Affleck sort of in check. Sort of.

But having this strong opening, with a far better paced investigation from Adams than the theatrical cut–not just because she gets a semi-sidekick in an affable Jena Malone cameo–but also because Cavill gets to be a reporter too. Dawn of Justice, the theatrical version, was already a great example of a disastrously plotted script, but the ultimate edition just shows how bad David Brenner is at editing a motion picture. Or how bad director Snyder is in instructing Brenner how to chop out a half hour. Because the first part, the fleshed out ultimate edition version of it, it works as a movie. There are some problems, sure, because Chris Terrio and David S. Goyer’s script (or Terrio’s rendition of Goyer’s treatment) is still a mess. Affleck is still a very strange edition to the film. He doesn’t feel at all natural in the narrative. Not in the events of Dawn of Justice, but in how Brenner, Snyder, Terrio and Goyer have the character in the film itself. Snyder takes two different styles for Affleck and Cavill’s plots. The one he takes for Affleck is bad.

Only in the extended cut, it gets a bit of a pass. There’s just a better pace all around to help it out. And Irons is delightful. Affleck’s still good, he’s just not delightful. Having something delightful in Dawn of Justice is nice, because it lacks in delight. Though the ultimate edition does have a little bit more fun. And it does help. Snyder’s extremely competent–the stuff he does just for general superhero antics, like Batman beating people up or sneaking around and Superman flying, he has a great approach. I’d watch Zack Snyder’s three hour version of the “Can You Read My Mind?” sequence starring Cavill and Adams in a second. I’d watch it twice in a row. Snyder and cinematographer Larry Fong make beautiful superhero moments.

But Snyder wants Dawn of Justice to be more than just a superhero movie. He wants it to be serious. And Terrio and Goyer’s script wants to be serious too. It even sees how it could be serious, it just never wants to take the time. But it gets a pass; the first hour and fifty get a pass. Cavill’s great, Adams is great, Affleck’s good. Larry Fishburne making fun of Cavill is magic; it’s awkward but somehow likable. Dawn of Justice: The Ultimate Edition makes Morpheus a dick to Superman. What’s that about? It’s personality. Dawn of Justice needs personality.

It also needs a better reason to have Batman and Superman fight. At least in the theatrical version, the film ramps up to it. There’s no real narrative to concern oneself with. In the ultimate version, even Holly Hunter gets a better role. Not perfect, no, but better. Only there’s not room in a movie with such a narratively and somewhat stylistically inert finish to have better roles. The MacGuffin to Batman v Superman should be Batman and Superman fighting, but it isn’t because Snyder and Terrio and Goyer can’t come up with a reason to make them fight.

The fight scene between Cavill and Affleck resonates better in the ultimate edition. It doesn’t work–Snyder (and the script) can’t handle passing the film off from Cavill to Affleck in this moment. It needed to be when there was a real flashback to the Batman origin, not the opening credits. How Warner Bros. didn’t bring in someone to at least fix this thing up in post is beyond me. There’s so much material and it could be cut so much better.

And Gal Gadot suffers a little in the ultimate edition. She disappears for too long and when she comes back as Wonder Woman, she’s got very little to do. She and Affleck needed another scene together, not a creepy email from a forty-something man to a much younger woman. The ultimate edition amplifies the theatrical. Everything bad, it makes worse, everything good, it makes better.

Jesse Eisenberg is good. Scoot McNairy is good. Callan Mulvey isn’t. I don’t even remember Mulvey having enough to do in the theatrical version for him to not be good. Everything bad, worse. Everything good, better.

It would be nice if that first 107 minutes were enough better to make up for the worse, but they aren’t. The big problem with Dawn of Justice is the resolution and conclusion, the two big fight scenes. They’re narrative disasters, just like they were in the theatrical version. They just weren’t as noticeably weaker in the shorter version. The ultimate edition shows real quality, real potential. Dawn of Justice could’ve weathered its pretense. But Snyder and Brenner–not to mention Terrio and Goyer–messed it up. And it’s actually too bad, because it’s not about the franchise deserving better and it sure isn’t about the audience deserving better, it’s about the actors. Adams, Cavill, Affleck, Irons, Hunter, Eisenberg. They all do some really good work in this film. Their performances deserve a better film.

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016, Zack Snyder)

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice is, as a film, just as unwieldy as that title. Director Snyder, through a strange, comforting overconfidence, gets the film through its two and a half hour run time. By the end, when Snyder teases a cliffhanger, teases various comic book references, it’s a deceleration process. The viewer has made it to the finish line, here’s promise of a future reward (the setup of further movies).

Snyder brings no style to Dawn of Justice. He has a feel for the material–his dark and dreary take on Ben Affleck’s Batman, a lonely drunk surrounded by faceless women and haunted by Jeremy Irons (who might as well be a ghost, he has zero interaction with anyone else), is a big success, but it’s more. Most of Dawn of Justice is divinely fluid. David Brenner’s editing, Larry Fong’s photography, even Hans Zimmer and Junkie XL’s score–there’s a visual flow to the film. Snyder can get to all the various stories going on (at two and a half hours, the film’s about an hour too short and an hour too long), even if Chris Terrio and David S. Goyer’s screenplay cannot.

I can’t even list all the stories. Basically, every character has a story going on with every other character (except Jeremy Irons, of course, and Holly Hunter to some degree). All of the actors are pretty darn good at it, even if Chris Terrio and David S. Goyer’s screenplay is exceptionally lazy, but these stories don’t really go anywhere. They all get resolutions, usually lame ones, but the “big story” gets introduced halfway into the film. More than halfway into the film and it gets no more weight than numerous other plot points, so it taking over is a bit of a surprise.

Unfortunately, all of these stories tend to be to tie in to the characters’ other stories. The result is nothing for most of the actors to do. Terrio, Goyer and Snyder wuss out on Cavill, robbing him of various great possible scenes. They don’t even shortchange him for Affleck, they shortchange him as Superman. He gets more to do as Clark Kent, which is fine (and comparing how Affleck approaches his role with how Cavill’s approach is interesting), but it’s not called Batman v Clark Kent.

As a result of shortchanging Cavill’s Superman antics for most of the run time (the super antics get told in summary montages), he doesn’t feel like much of a character. He still is a character because of the Clark Kent stuff–and Cavill and Adams, failed by the screenplay, are wonderful together–but he’s also not. And neither is Affleck, because–again–there’s a lot of misdirection from the script.

So is Jesse Eisenberg’s Lex Luthor a large enough character? No. Eisenberg’s performance is great (for most of the film) but it all falls apart in the second half, when the film races to tie everything up and it becomes One Bad Night. In the end, Dawn of Justice’s action-packed finale has nothing to do with the film anyone had been building toward.

The script’s kind of bad, kind of mediocre. It gives Affleck and Gal Gadot (oh, yeah, she’s Wonder Woman–you’re supposed to get excited for her movie; you do) the opportunity to show off chemistry. They also get some boring moments playing on their computers to further the plot.

Snyder’s timing is good until the big finish. He hits a lot of good marks, but he’s in a rush. That overconfidence makes it seem like it’s okay to be rushed, but eventually it’s not okay anymore. Eventually, there’s a vacuum. Snyder can’t even find a tone for the film. It’s like he realized he was going to cop out of all the first act’s narrative expectations. He tries to distract the viewer from reaching the same conclusion with a lot of fanfare, a lot of nonsense. He’s got a strong cast, they get the movie through.

Dawn of Justice doesn’t succeed, it has enough trouble just surviving.

Wait, can’t forget–Holly Hunter is so good with nothing to work with. She’s real good.