Justice League

With Toasty taking an internet hiatus I better pull up my socks and post with regularity.  He's been keeping this thing floating for a couple years now, suppose it's my turn.  Come back soon David, I'm tired already...
 
2017, d. Zack Snyder (*cough*andJossWhedon*cough*)

Is this the real life, or is this just fantasy
Caught in a landslide, no escape from reality

The biggest problem Justice League had facing it was everything that Zack Snyder established before it.  Man of Steel was a big enough problem on its own: Snyder produced a decently interesting film, but his fundamental lack of understanding/dislike of the character made for a terrible Superman movie, one where a beacon of hope and altruism became a dour, glowering, brooding, put-upon Christ-like figure.  For the sequel, rather than tone shifting, Snyder basically doubled down on the brooding otherness of Superman, and pitted this sickeningly gloomy version of the character against a bitter and broken Batman.  If there's a bright spot to the 150+ minute Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice,  it was Gal Gadot's Wonder Woman, something even more recognizable when Wonder Woman finally got her own film on the big screen (in fact the only not great part of Wonder Woman was the wholly unnecessary prologue/epilogue that shoehorned it back into the Snyder-verse).

The events of Man of Steel are integral to the plot of Batman V Superman, and likewise the events of Batman V Superman are integral to the plot of Justice League.  But Warner Brothers, following the wild success of Wonder Woman, and the critical lambasting of every other DC Comics-centric film they have made, determined Justice League needed to course correct...and since Justice League had already finished principle photography by that point, it was like making a U-turn on a cliffside highway.  Snyder had a vision for a 3-hour Justice League acting as "Part 1" set-up for an even greater "Part 2" menace.  The 3 hour run time would have given enough time to properly introduce three core members to the cast in Cyborg, Aquaman and Flash (as well as establish their own smaller realities and supporting casts) while also running through the gathering of the team and (blowing yet another possible Superman solo outing) shoehorning in the rebirth of Superman. 

By the time Snyder left the project (due to a personal tragedy) this past summer, he had already expressed that Justice League would be lighter AND that it was no longer going to be a two-parter.  When Warner Bros. brought in Joss Whedon as a replacement to handle the reshoots, everyone became very aware that the Warners were likely undercutting, if not attempting to eschew entirely the Snyder aesthetic.  The film that made it to theatres bears that out.

Justice League is a hot mess.  It's a film that's less cobbled together than stripped down.  Gone is the 3-hour runtime, in place is a rather brisk 1h 50 (plus 10 minutes of credits).  The film opens with the world facing the weight of Superman's death (though what it signifies completely flies in the face of what Snyder established in films previous), it tries to catch us up on Batman, Wonder Woman and Lois Lane some time later, but it's all quite rushed.  There's no time to think about the weight of prior events, something else is happening. 

All the dream sequences and all the foreshadowing of Batman V Superman were not for naught, but almost for naught.  They have no real weight or relevance in this film.  What was supposed to be a tried and true sequel now feels like the cinematic equivalent of a U.S. politician distancing themselves from a campaign aide who was discovered to have ties to Russia.  They would just rather you forget about the past altogether, but it's hard when the past keeps creeping into the film.  Despite only having 4 months to reshoot, edit, score and animate, I'd guess about anywhere from 1/4 to 1/3 of the film is made up of the reshoots, so there's totally a rushed feeling to this at times.  I'm sure if this had been all Whedon's vision it would have been completely distanced affair from Batman V Superman.  Likewise if this had been all Snyder's vision, it would have been much more polished (and utterly laborious).

What Whedon brings to the table is an understanding of comic book superheroes and what makes them fun. Snyder wants them to be capital-i "Important" while Whedon mostly thinks you should enjoy their adventures.  What Whedon also brings to the table is relentless quipping.  Every damn character now has quips edited in as asides (Batman has far too many, and while it humanizes Bruce Wayne, it demystifies Batman), to the point where it's always obvious and often annoying (it was pointed out to me that these were probably extracted from longer scenes in the editing process).  Ezra Miller's Flash is almost all quips, with not much else to his character.  At the same time, I appreciate his enthusiasm.

Whedon also brings us a Superman we actually recognize.  Death was probably the best thing to happen to Snyder's Superman, because he came back a much happier, sunnier, uncannily-vallier person.  Almost every scene of Superman is obviously from the reshoots, as evidenced by the now infamous CGI mustache-mask (Cavill was working on the latest Mission Impossible as the villain when the reshoots call came in, and the MI producers refused to let him shave it, so the producers had to edit it out with not enough time to make it look anywhere close to natural).  But in spite of Superman's creepy upper lip, damn, this is the Superman we've wanted Henry Cavill to be for 6 years now.

In fact all the main Justice Leaguers wind up coming out of this okay.  Everyone's getting the short shrift, here, especially supporting cast, but of the main team there's enough there to like, and even want more of.  The same can't be said for the villain, however.  Steppenwolf might as well just be a sharknado that the Justice League is fighting, he's just a force of nature.  There's no personality, no defining traits, nothing remotely close to drive or real motivation beyond plot necessity, and almost no emotional connection for the characters.  Think of the worst of the Marvel Cinematic Universe villains... he's right in league with them, and probably beneath them. 

It's almost the worst case scenario.  While it would have been awful to have two bloated, Snyder-directed Justice League movies, at the same time at least it would be presented as a whole saga alongside Man of Steel and Batman V Superman.  No matter how bad it was, at least the vision would be fulfilled.  Like, imagine if Guy Ritchie stepped in for Christopher Nolan to complete The Dark Knight Rises... it's a flawed series but the consistency of vision makes up for it.  I don't even like Snyder's vision, and somehow I still kind of wish it were allowed to be completed.  Because otherwise we get this, where Steppenwolf, meant as the set-up for Darkseid, but is now just a generic nobody that closes out half of the damn point of Batman V Superman with such a whimper.

Justice League isn't a film you suffer through -- it's actually somehow kind of fun -- but I've been waiting for a Justice League film for almost 40 years (and others have waited much longer than I), and this is just barely serviceable.  This is a starting point, albeit a highly unfortunate one.  This is the WB recognizing that they were wrong and course correcting.  They messed up Superman, twice, they messed up Green Lantern, they've messed up the Joker, and they damn nearly messed up the Justice League (the box office is so underwhelming that, in reality, they did mess it up).  If it weren't for the resounding success of Wonder Woman (and the fact they have an Aquaman feature already finished shooting), I'd be certain they would plan yet another universe reboot in two years time.  But they're committed now.  They so desperately wanted to play catch up with Marvel that they've done just about everything wrong.  The fact is, even with the Wonder Woman/Justice League course correction, the entire DC Cinematic Universe is situated on an foundation that will always taint it.  No matter how good it might get (and let's be realistic, the odds are kind of against it getting really good), it's going to still have Man of Steel, Batman V Superman, Suicide Squad, and, yes, Justice League to answer for.*

(*unless the Flash-based "Flashpoint" movie completely reboots the Universe)

Zack Snyder's Justice League

2021, d. Zack Snyder - HBOmax

[Preface - written prior to watching]

I have no love for the Snyder/Whedon hybrid Justice League from 2017, because, let's face it, there's little to love about it.  It's messier than a sloppy joe served on a napkin.  In my review of that release, I said "I don't even like Snyder's vision, and somehow I still kind of wish it were allowed to be completed."

The reality is Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice was garbage as a Superman movie, not great as a Batman movie, and incomprehensible as a prologue to introducing the Justice League in what was then an already interminable DC Cinematic Universe.  But at least BvS was interesting in its wrongheadedness, it had a vision it was trying to achieve no matter how utterly ridiculous that vision was.  As such, I've been certain a Snyder cut of Justice League (no matter how much I don't really care if it exists or not) would be better than the hatchet job that came out nearly 4 years ago.

I've been a DC Comics fan nearly my entire life.  I've been waiting for a big ensemble superhero movie that had all the spectacle and grandeur in live action that the comics have on the page.  Justice League 2017 was not it, but I know for certain, without even seeing it, that neither is the "Snyder Cut" (as it's been called, but not actually named).  Snyder, we've learned from Man of Steel, BvS and even what remains of his vision in JL'17, has no idea what makes DC's heroes special.  He has his own motivations and half-baked philosophical discussions he wants to have utilizing these characters, and you know what...fine.  Countless people have had their way with these characters over the years, but it's just weird that, at any time the powers that be at Warner Brothers were like "yeah, sounds good Zack, you do what you want with them, make Superman grimdark and Batman a murderer."  

Since JL'17 we've gotten Avengers: Infinity War which is just about the greatest assemblage of comic book characters on screen that we're ever going to see, and not only that, it's a tight, captivating, fun, funny, epic rollercoaster of an event that ends on one of the biggest cliffhangers of all time, resulting in a follow up film that diverges from spectacle to delve into the emotional... all built on the back of a decades worth of set-up that didn't know what it was leading to.  It's comic books on screen as I've always wanted it to be.  Nothing about what Snyder has done, whether it be Watchmen, Man of Steel or BvS at all feels like comic books on screen.   I still want the DC version of Infinity War, but I don't think it will ever happen, and Zack Snyder is not the one to deliver it to me.  I'm ready to eat crow... but I don't think I will be.

[---Graig watches all four hours of Zack Snyder's Justice League with multiple breaks and one pleasant night's sleep in between---]
Spoilers?

It opens almost where we left off in BvS, as if it were a TV show continuing on from last week... with Superman dying (in slow motion) in his battle with Doomsday and screaming, sending a literal sound wave that's heard around the world.  We follow the sound wave as a device (a little Gaspar Noe Into the Void nod?) to see what's going on around the DC Cinematic Universe at this time.  Hey, there's Luthor in a wading pool with Steppenwolf (the adversary of this film), and Cyborg moping, and Atlanteans and Amazons watching as their hidden Mother Boxes (the macguffins of the film) awaken (it's speculated in the film that Superman's death awakens them but there's never a reason given why it would do that). Snyder's Amazon's are not the bright and powerful figures from Patty Jenkins' film, but rather female versions of his 300 Spartans, all shadowy and grainy with impressively defined musculature and rage faces.  The effects throughout this opening sequence, and much of the film, are not always the best, clearly the 70 million DC spent to let Snyder have his 4-hour epic was spread pretty thin.  An unnecessarily protracted fight between Steppenwolf, Parademons and the Amazons looks about on par with the arena battle in 2002's Star Wars: Episode II: Attack of the Clones in terms of how the many many performers handle squaring off against imaginary creatures.  And the subsequent chase on horseback, 90% CGI, is less big screen Avengers: Endgame, more small screen Game of Thrones.

There's a hubris to this production, presented in 4x3 aspect ratio (black bars down the sides) with the expectation of any eventual cinematic presentation being in IMAX (not sure how some of these effects will hold up on that big a screen).  The opening credits roll over a droning JunkieXL score, the camera panning across a desolate Nordic tundra, beautiful but cold and muted (the Snyder filter at its chilliest), following a traveler on horseback putting Bruce Wayne in a Nordic setting looking for the Aquaman.  I remember this scene from JL'17 and it was light, pithy, and full of bad green screen.  This one, not so light, certainly not pithy, but works (and looks) a lot better as it all takes place in a natural setting.  The hubris returns as Snyder pauses on a grateful village singing in their native tongue as Aquaman swims out to sea for a full minute.  Clearly this is a film not indentured to any running time and it's an early warning for laborious things to come.  It also drives home that there will be improvements upon what was done prior, but still not necessarily anything we were clamoring to see.

I still can't get over the empty weight of Superman's death in the previous movie, but the grand importance Snyder tries to imbue it here.  It was a tonal disconnect Whedon's version tried its best to acknowledge quickly, then ignore.  A set piece involving a group of terrorists introduces maybe the fourth and fifth slow motion sequences of Justice League, barely 20 minutes into the film (the first of literally dozens upon dozens of slo-mo shots we'll see over four hours), only to move into some sort of hyper-speed as Wonder Woman's actions against the badguys need to be superhuman.  It doesn't look good, and is unsurprisingly at odds with how we see this same Wonder Woman through Patty Jenkin's eyes in both her films, especially considering the blood splatter, swearing and aggressive violence.  A Justice League or Superman or Wonder Woman movie that can't play to children, and hiring someone whose vision is such, is just an outright mistake.  This is not for kids.  It's a hard PG-13, excessively violent for what it is and laden with swearing. 

An anxious, brooding Batman frantically tries to assemble a team, stating that he "spent too much time trying to divide us, I need to bring us together and make this right."  It sounds like a mea culpa from Snyder...but is it?  It's really not.  He doesn't do well at team building (Snyder nor Batman), considering it's more than 2 hours into the film before there's actually a team, and another 30 or 40 minutes before they resurrect Superman... and then another 45 minutes before Superman actually joins them.  There's a lot of time spent on the importance of Batman building, basically, a flying troop carrier, and when it finally takes flight, it's destroyed within minutes.  It's funny, but not intentionally so.

There's no economy to Snyder's storytelling here.  Points are labored over, and over, and over.  (The Amazons' fight with Steppenwolf ends with Hippolyta noting to send the flare that invasion is coming. We return to Paradise Island two scenes later to witness them sending the flare.  We go to another scene for Diana to learn about the flare's existence.  Another scene later Diana visits the sight of the flare to confirm its existence, which then leads to Diana discovering a cave that tells the story of Darkseid's first invasion.  This is intensely laborious when we got the point so much earlier.)  Many sequences are basically orchestrated to be music videos that maybe deliver tone, but not purpose (Aquaman walking out along a stone pier drinking whiskey for a minute...). Of course Snyder's been given free reign to do what he wants in his editing, as was his deal with Warner Brothers.  He didn't get paid, just free reign.  Without restrictions you get matchstick houses like Zack Snyder's Justice League.  It's 4 hours long, but it's not bloated, as it's not really full of anything.  It's empty and flimsy devoid of any direct purpose.

There are multiple flashback/storytelling sequences in the film which are real momentum killers (were there any true momentum to kill).   At the hour mark Diana shares with Bruce what she just learned of a great battle between the champions of Earth (Atlanteas, Greek Gods, the Amazons, a Green Lantern) and Darkseid's invading forces.  It's a sequence extended dramatically from JL'17, and is superior in it's excitement, but Gadot's voiceover feels phoned in (possibly literally) and it seems completely detached from the scene that bookends it.  It seems like it should have been the entrance point for the film, not Diana's storytime.  Similarly, Cyborg's father leaves him a recording in which he narrates Cyborg's capabilities, his powers over top a montage of images, some of them Lawnmower Man grade, but all of them handled with Snyder's usual subtlety, which is to say not at all. It's bizarre but not in a good way, portentious.

The biggest benefactor to ZS'sJL is Cyborg.  I can see why Ray Fisher was so dissatisfied with what resulted in JL'17 (on top of the behind-the-scenes issues with Whedon).  Cyborg is pretty much a non-existent character in what was released to theatres.  Here he is the only character with a genuine story arc and is the most integral member of the team (despite all the weight given to Superman's involvement this is really Cyborg's show).  Even still, his origin story is told shortly after Flash's introduction (a truly pointless sequence) and features the second car crash in less than ten minutes.  Again, economy of storytelling is not this film's strong suit.

Flash in this movie... well...he's a choice that's being made.  There's no attention paid to how he got his powers (I'm not sure we need more than one origin story in the film) but it's not the "crime lab technician gets doused in chemicals and hit by lightning" origin from the comics because here he's a college kid struggling to even find a job.  His speed powers, as presented in his many scenes, are not consistently visualized, which is maddening as Snyder doesn't seem to care for consistency in presenting how they work, only that they look cool (and Ezra Miller's floppy wristed "running" style still looks just as goofy as it did in JL'17).  So when Flash breaks his only rule late in climactic showdown, it's like...what rule?

This film assumes you know a lot more about this world and these characters that you do.  When JL'17 was released, Wonder Woman had not yet released, Aquaman was still a year and a half away, and planned Flash and Cyborg films still haven't happened.  A Ben Affleck Batman movie went through multiple iterations and directors before being scrapped altogether and there's not been any serious talk of another Henry Cavill Superman movie.  But this film acts like you know all these characters, and know who their peripheral supporting players are and what they might mean to them.  Alfred, Martha and Lois we met in BvS but have very little to do here.  Lois particularly is just a moping void waiting for Superman to return...and when he does...she gives him a hug.  That's what they paid Amy Adams to do...hug Superman (hey, I'd take that job too, but I'm not an Academy Award-winning actress). Commissioner Gordon is iconic enough, but he's not a character here (even with J.K. Simmon's adept mugging).  Martian Manhunter, played by Harry Lennox, is just a head scratcher... does anyone but the die hard fans remember him as the General from Man of Steel?  We don't even see a human face.  Aquaman's supporting cast make no impression unless you've seen the Aquaman film, same with Wonder Woman's cast.  It's putting the cart before the horse, and it does.not.work.  Even in hindsight, Justice League is at odds with what comes after it.

The problem with Justice League wasn't that Snyder was removed from it before it was completed.  The problem with Justice League is Snyder himself.  He's a great visual stylist, but a poor storyteller and a bad editor.  He should be taking photos, maybe shooting music videos, not being given hundreds of millions of dollars to make movies about characters he neither cares for nor understands (Zack, if you want to continue this story, buy some Hot Toys action figures and make photo comics).  Seriously, tell me what the purpose of Zack Snyder's Justice League is (besides an ego trip)?  Story wise, very little happens to advance any of the characters here.  Steppenwolf has no arc, but is at least given a bit more motivation than from JL'17.  Batman has no arc, he ended BvS promising to form a team, so he forms a team.  What did he learn? To be part of a team? Wonder Woman has no arc except she's reminded of a home she can't return to.  And to be part of a team?  Aquaman I guess learned...to go talk to his dad...and be part of a team?  Flash learned to ... be responsible maybe, and be part of a team?  Superman learned to...come back to life and not be a rage monster?  He didn't even learn to be part of a team.  Cyborg has the ONLY character arc here (and I'll admit, it's okay).  

As a film, it nudges forward Snyder's overall "grand arc" story only a smidge.  There's one brief reference to Bruce's Knightmare sequence (from BvS where Superman's gone bad and Darkseid has taken over the world) midway through the movie, and then an extended 10 minute sequence in the very long coda to the film.  The Knightmare sequences indicate a major threat coming but we're now 6 1/2 hours into Snyder's story and we've advanced that plot almost not at all.  The whole Mother Box chase in this film was ultimately irrelevant.  This film's Knightmare sequence (as out of the blue as it is) gives the team and its members (consisting of Batman, Cyborg, Flash, Mera, Deathstroke and Joker) a very specific motivation, and even some unique character motivations.  But in terms of where this film ends, it seem light years away... not even close to the horizon.  And Batman's conversation with the Joker (Jared Leto, in better form here than in Suicide Squad) in that sequence seems like a fan-made youtube video and not something a major studio would produce with it's most valuable intellectual property.

I've waited nearly a lifetime for a big budget Justice League movie.  This is not what I've been waiting for.  I haven't watched JL'17 since seeing it in theatres and will probably never watch it again.  Likewise I don't see any situation where I'll watch this again.  This... is not for me. 
It's the opposite situation as The Last Jedi. An exceptionally well told movie certain fans don't like because it contains scenes and situations that they don't like.  This is a very poorly told movie that certain fans will like because it contains scenes and situations they think are just really cool.
If you're down with it, more power to you, have at it all you want.

[---RANDOM THOUGHTS---]
- My favourite scene - Diana with Alfred.

- "What's your superpower?"  "I'm rich."  Still the funniest line of both cuts.

- Cyborg, looks like a Michael Bay transformer, moves like a Ray Harryhousen skeleton.

- Every time Wonder Woman performs an action the same damn chanting music sting is played.  It gets especially annoying in the final battle

- Martian Manhunter looks awful.  He's a main character on Supergirl and he looks far better there. On a CW show.

- Steppenwolf, supposed to be an intimidating, scary figure, has the most adorable little monkey face. I just "awweed" every time they did a close up. His armor gets a serious upgrade from JL'17, and looks nifty.

- The coda to the film is about 25 minutes, the first third sort of tees up where the heroes might be going to next in their solo features (...but obviously not really...) as well as insinuating Ryan Choi, Cyborg's dad's colleague, has a larger part to play.  Snyder's so bad at storytelling he couldn't even work in a good easter egg about him becoming the Atom.

- One final note on how Snyder just doesn't understand these characters. Superman beats Steppenwolf to a pulp and heat visions off one of his horn-things... you know how Snyder's Superman just loves to maim and disfigure.  Then when Superman punches Steppenwolf so hard he's sent soaring back towards a Boom Tube to Apocalypse, Wonder Woman leaps and severs his head in midair...apparently because Steppenwolf taunted Wonder Woman and said he killed her mother.  Ugh.

 

Crisis on Earth X

Supergirl, Season 3 episode 8 (part 1) - CW/Showcase, Nov 27, 2017
Arrow, Season 6 episode 8 (part 2) - CW/CTV, Nov 27, 2017
Flash, Season 4 episode 8 (part 3) - CW/CTV, Nov 28, 2017
Legends of Tomorrow, Season 3 episode 8 (part 4) - CW, Nov 28, 2017

I last year's "Invasion" crossover among the DC CW "Arrowverse" shows was quite disappointing.  My chief complaint was that it wasn't a cohesive unit.  Despite being a crossover, each episode still tried to remain a Flash or Arrow or Legends episode first and foremost.  The comic book analogy is when there's a big event comic, like Crisis on Infinite Earths or Invasion or Zero Hour where all the big, fun, important stuff happens in the event book, and then there are tie-in issues in the ongoing titles.  "Invasion" last year had no event book, it was just made up of tie-in issues, and thus the event was barely an event.

Creators/producers/writers Greg Berlanti and Andrew Kreisberg (who was literally just fired for being a sleazebag) seemed to understand the faults of last year's "event" and tried so much harder this year with the two-night, four-part "Crisis on Earth X".  The fact that each episode opened not with the usual Supergirl or Arrow, Flash or Legends title card, but instead the "Crisis" title card alluded to this fact: this would be the event story, not the tie-ins.

"Crisis" was exactly what I had expected from "Invasion" last year... a seamless crossover that delivered a single epic adventure for a multitude of characters.  But this isn't just a 170-minute movie, it's a true comic-book styled event, where the status of the characters at that time isn't just as much a part of their story as the crisis they face.

Barry and Iris are getting married, which reunites Oliver and Felicity with team Flash, as well as the Legends who spun out from Flash and Arrow - Sara, Mick, Stein and Jax.  Stein and Jax are still fighting like family members because of Martin's looming departure and Jefferson's father issues.  Kara is reeling from the return of her boyfriend (who is now married), while her sister Alex is still upset following her break-up with her partner, so the wedding is a perfect opportunity to forget about it.  Oliver uses the wedding as an excuse to take a break from being Mayor, and under investigation from the FBI, and a new dad, and focus on his relationship with Felicity.  Obviously there's a lot of supporting cast members not invited to the wedding but most are not forgotten.

The introduction to Earth X, or the reality where the Nazis won WWII and many of the superheroes we know and love either don't exists or are the bad guys, we first see the Black Arrow (or whatever the Nazi Oliver calls himself) facing off against James Olson as the Guardian.  We know they're playing for keeps here when Oliver murders James without any hesitation.  Nazis suck you guys.  Throughout various cast members are seeded into the crossover: in the opening act Joe West gets to make a toast, and Wally is charged with protecting Joe and Cecile (effectively explaining why Kid Flash isn't part of the ongoing fight); in the second act Mr. Terrific, Wild Dog and Black Canary showing up after the Earth X-ers invade STAR Labs (and proving that even together they're still not a match for Oliver); in the third act Winn's doppleganger shows up as a hard-bitten General on the good guys' side, while Quentin Lance is a high ranking official on the bad guy's side; and in the third all the rest of the Legends come to the rescue, to join for the big finale showdown.  Even Diggle makes an appearance at the end, continuing the ongoing gag where he barfs after Barry moves him at super-speed.  Where last year most of the supporting cast were cast aside when it wasn't "their show" here there's no reason why characters shouldn't be all over this thing.

What I wanted most out of "Invasion" last year was character interaction, a sense of discovery as people from different teams meet each other for the first time, and this delivered in spades.  The best of which was Sarah and Alex hooking up during the rehearsal dinner, and having that play out in an exceptionally meaningful way (more for Alex than Sarah, because Sarah's cool like that) across all four episodes.  Alex, of all people, probably has the biggest character arc here, but a lot of characters have meaningful events by the end... Barry and Iris, Felicity and Oliver, Jax and Stein.  Hell even Leonard Snart (albeit a much different Leo Snart) is back to torment Mick.   This event doesn't leave our characters in the same place where they started, which is amazing.


As for the Crisis on Earth X story itself, well...hell, it's better than Justice League.  The basic strokes are Barry and Iris' wedding is interrupted by an Earth X invasion.  Their goal is to capture Supergirl and steal her heart to save her dying Earth X counterpart.  After that, their plan is to take over yet another Earth.  By episode 2 our main heroes are captured and deported to Earth X for episode 3, where they escape, meet the Freedom Fighters led by General (Winn) Schott, The Ray, and Leo Snart, and have to return home.  Episode 4 is the big showdown climax, because of course it is.

While there are moments -- as the CW shows always have its moments like this -- where the needs of the story more dictates the events than logic, it's a hugely entertaining crossover.  There's so much to delight in.  The fact is the crossover is so joyously LGBTQ positive, with Sarah proudly declaring to her father's Nazi doppleganger her bisexuality, the wonderful interactions between Sarah and Alex (every.time.), and the so adorable pairing of The Ray and Captain Cold (Wentworth Miller's new take on Captain Cold is even more delightful than the last one).  The show isn't even trying to make a huge deal out of it (otherwise that interaction between Mr. Terrific and The Ray would have been about being gay instead of their charming discussion of their superhero identities).

Likewise, for an event written by a guy who just got fired for sexual harassment, it's resoundingly awesome in its depictions of female heroes.  Not just Sarah and Alex, who make for a fantastic, and deadly, duo, but the trio of Zari, Vixen and Frost get to wreck a Waverider doppleganger, and Iris and Felicity tag-team to save Supergirl using smarts and moxie. Even the Earth X Felicity is a hero, just by being a good person amidst such evil.  Hell I even count it as a win that they remembered to bring back Clarissa, who has rarely been mentioned with all the talk of Lily and baby Ronnie.  There's a real sense of equality in this event, which is important when facing down against fascists and bigots.

I had to admire the event for not ever trying to make the Nazi Earth-Xers into anything remotely approaching sympathetic.  Oliver frequently tries to appeal to various opponents sense of humanity and finds them sorely wanting at every turn (including to the surprise reveal of Earth X Prometheus...probably one of the biggest surprises I've gotten from any entertainment in a long long time).  Thankfully there's absolutely no sympathy for straight up killing these top-tier a-holes, and there is even something mildly cathartic about it.  I mean, from a character arc perspective, Oliver has been wrestling with being a killer for quite a few seasons now, so it's a little uncomfortable seeing him do it with such relentless efficiency...but I feel no sympathy for the generic stormtroopers.  Barry on the other hand, when faced yet again with Eobard Thawn (somehow alive after the end of Season 2 of Legends), still can't bring himself to kill.  That even in the background we see the lethality of some characters and the non-lethal nature of others shows a remarkable attention to character detail.

It's almost impossible to not bring up Justice League when looking at "Crisis on Earth X" given the timing.  I mean they're two different beasts, but at the same time "Crisis" manages to entertain on an even bigger scale than Justice League on a fraction of the budget and time.  Sure there's hundreds of hours of character set-up backing "Crisis" up, but the payoff is huge, and constant, where Justice League flounders at even coming up with an antagonist with any real motivation or character.  Even at a fraction of the cost, "Crisis" still manages to deliver action sequences that, while maybe not as polished, are more dynamic than Justice League.  That even with the time and budget they had, Justice League's Flash effects are somehow inferior to the TV show.  "Crisis" legit feels like an event, Justice League feels like a small, forgettable story arc.

---
Looking at the Ivan Reis-drawn "cover" for Crisis on Earth X above, it's totally inspired by the late-70's/early-80's Justice League/Justice Society crossovers.  It sparks a fury of nostalgia, which the show legitimately harnessed and executed upon.  If the goal is to outdo themselves every year, I can't wait to see what comes in 2018 (especially if they get Black Lightning in the mix). But seriously, there's 15 heroes namechecked on the cover, with a few more even missing:

Everyone who appears:
HEROES
1- Supergirl
2- Green Arrow
3- Flash
4- White Canary
5- Firestorm
6- Heat Wave
7- Vibe
8- Killer Frost
9- Black Canary
10- Wild Dog
11- Mister Terrific
12- The Atom
13- Vixen
14- Zari
15- Citizen Steel
16- Alex Danvers
17- The Ray
18- Captain Cold
19- The Guardian
20- Red Tornado
21- Iris West
22- Felicity Smoak
23- Kid Flash
24- J'onn J'onzz
25- Mon-El
26- Winn Schott
27- Joe West
28- Cecile
29- Clarissa Stein
30- Lily Stein
31- John Diggle
32- Kid Flash
33- Harrison Wells
BAD GUYS
34- Dark Arrow
35- Reverse-Flash (Thawn)
36- Overgirl
37- Metallo
38- Quentin Lance
39- Prometheus

That's an epic scale cast list we're not going to see again until Avengers: Infinity War.

DC Animated times 4

Son of Batman (2014, d. Ethan Spaulding) - netflix
Justice League: War (2014, Jay Oliva) - netflix
Batman: Assault on Arkham (2014, Jay Oliva, Ethan Spaulding) - netflix
Batman Unlimited: Animal Instincts (2015, Butch Lukic) - Teletoon

---

DC Entertainment's direct-to-video animation wing has been steadily cranking out animated features for almost a decade now, with seemingly more and more productions being released each year.  Despite being a pretty huge DC fan (well, I was anyway) and was a fairly religious watcher of their animated output (particularly their Batman and Superman animated runs leading into Justice League in the 90's and early 2000's), it didn't take long before I not only stopped buying their new animated movies but began ignoring them altogether.

Though originally starting as original stories, or at least semi-original stories inspired loosely by existing story lines, the run of DC Animated movies quickly devolved into lazily adapting existing stories.  I had read most of the stories being adapted (or I purposely skipped them for disliking the creative team) so I had no real need to invest any more time or money into these animated features.  The features I had seen to that point, like Justice League: New Frontier, Green Lantern: First Flight or All-Star Superman just didn't feel very satisfying.  They took long form stories and compressed them into a rougly 75-minute animated feature and that compression never seemed to serve the story particularly well.  The fact that there was no continuity between features and the voice casts would change dramatically from one to the next also didn't help maintain my interest.  The biggest problem I saw at the time was they were adapting fairly recent stories, one which were already well enough told and available, when they could have gone back into DC's deep, deep repositories and found some vintage stories and updated them for modern audiences but in a new medium.

The final straw for me was when The New 52 hit (wherein DC Comics cancelled their entire line of books and relaunched their entire universe with different and in some cases radically altered versions of their characters) and the DC Animated features coming out were reflecting these so very recent stories.  I was already quite disinterested in the New 52.  Animated adaptations seemed like the furthest thing I was interested in.

So, after so long, why the recent spell of DC Animated watching?  I'm not exactly sure. Partly a burning desire to watch something with superheroes in it, and having only a shorter amount of time to spare, and even a little curiosity.

Of the four I watched in the past two weeks, Son of Batman is perhaps the most egregious example of what I dislike about these animated features. It runs at a stilted pace, the characters don't feel connected to one another at all, and the animation gets lazy (when the man-bats spew out of the ocean there seems like hundreds of them taking to skies as the same animation repeats itself, but moments later it only looks like a couple dozen actually flying out there, with what looks like the same image of Man-bat repeated over and over but at different sizes to fake out some depth).  There's a lot of animated nonsense, things happening on screen to create action or visual drama but are utterly pointless, and a lot of egregious death but with no real sense of any relevance to death.

  This film is a very loose adaptation of Grant Morrison's initial Batman run from a few years back (though he's not even given story credit) which introduces Bruce Wayne's son, Damian, into the DCU.  It was a storyline I wasn't very fond of, but this is a poorer rendition of it.  The voice casting isn't bad (Jason O'Mara makes a decent Batman) but again, it just doesn't feel like the actors are relating to one another (in all likelihood they're recording their lines separately) and there no warmth at all to it.  Plus, they didn't even have Damien do his trademark teeth-sucking "tt".

But it was watching Justice League: War and noting Jason O'Mara again as Batman that I realized that this current spate of DC Animated movies was looking to tie together as a cohesive universe, using a consistent voice team and  a small stable of directors).  The "War" story is based off the first story arc of the New 52 Justice League, by Geoff Johns and Jim Lee.  That storyline also served as a complete reintroduction to the DC Universe for the readers at the time, so there was a lot of groundwork it was trying to lay.  A lot of that ground-building spills into this feature, such that there's no sense of familiarity between the characters (Flash and Green Lantern have met prior though), everyone gets an introduction but few get an actual story (pretty much only Cyborg and Shazam have what could be described as a character arc here).

War isn't terrible, it's almost saved by a surprisingly quippy Green Lantern (a role usually reserved for the Flash), but at the same time it doesn't really fulfill the needs of a movie very well.  It feels like a pilot episode of a new program, introducing things, but unsure of itself or where it's really going to wind up.  The post-credits sequence hint at Aquaman's arrival, leading into the Justice League: Throne of Atlantis feature released this year (based off another comic-book arc from the same series).  Likewise Son Of Batman received a sequel this year in Batman vs Robin, again loosely adapting events from the Morrison run, and followed by Batman: Bad Blood to come next year, delving into Morrison's Batman and Robin run wherein Dick Grayson takes over as Batman and Damian's mentor.

Stepping aside from adaptation though, there's Batman: Assault on Arkham which actually takes place in the Batman/Arkham video game universe, something I'm largely unfamiliar with.  This film is largely a Suicide Squad movie, with Batman taking a supporting role, and what it does so brilliantly is manage to navigate all three of the DC Comics Universe, the classic DC Animated Universe and the Arkham videogame universe almost effortlessly.  Returning is the ultimate Batman voice actor, Kevin Conroy, as well as CCH Pounder returning as Amanda Waller, while Troy Baker does a mean impersonation of Mark Hamill's Joker, as does Hynden Walch of Harley Quinn pulling back the DC Animated vibe into it, while the look and feel draws completely from the video games (though it's not nearly as dark, the character designs, including Batman's weird pupils, are here), and overall it feels like a Suicide Squad story (more modern Squad than classic '80's but still not bad).

Son of Batman was a pretty bloody affair, but it was also blindly so.  As characters wound their way through piles of ninjas, cleaving them with swords, or tearing down man-bats, they were so faceless that they were the utmost of expendable, and their fights were meaningless.  In Assault on Arkham, we're watching bad people (the Suicide Squad is a team of criminals who are forced into serving the government to perform dirty tasks for which they need maximum deniability) invade a maximum security criminal asylum in order to achieve their objective (finding a particular Maguffin) but obviously things aren't clean and the bad people start killing prison guards.  Though sometimes played for laughs, each guard killed feels like a tiny punch in the gut.  We're along for the ride with Deadshot, Harley and company, and as such we're rooting for their success, in a way, but at the same time, it's almost better if they're stopped.   Which is why Batman flits around in the background.  By having a real hero partiicpate in the proceedings it continually reminds us just how bad the people at the center of the story are.

Assault on Arkham is a definite "mature audiences" picture, and not for the kids.  There's excessive violence and plenty of swearing and it feels quite natural.  It feels like an "R" rated production that isn't held back by anything, allowing the creative team to tell the story they set out to tell.  That it's an original story is also definitely in its favor as it allows for an "anything can happen" vibe.  Set loose from the constraints of any continuity it really does manage to surprise and occasionally shock, but it also entertains quite well to.  The action sequences are not only well done, but inventive, with more than a few moves that I've never seen before (Batman's facepalm to Harley was a classic).  Quite easily the best of the DC Animated features to date, one I'd more than likely revisit multiple times.

Finally, there's Batman Unlimited: Animal Instincts, the first of a new line of direct-to-video movies meant to promote and sell toys, namely the awfully ugly Batman Unlimited line.  Normally a new toy line gets an accompanying Saturday morning or weekday cartoon to keep the toys fresh in kids minds, so this tactic of forcing them to buy it is kind of counter-intuitive.  It presumes buy-in on the toy line in advance, rather than promoting it.

This new Unlimited series takes place in an alternate world (well, even more alternate than usual superhero stories), one where there's flying cars and all building seem to be sky scrapers and the police aren't that keen on superheros.  It's sort of a Blade Runner/Fifth Element  kind of vibe.  This story finds Batman, Nightwing, Red Robin, Flash, Green Arrow (the latter two included more than likely because of their prominent TV series) squaring off against the Penguin and a cadre of animal-themed villains (including Cheetah and Killer Croc) and a trio of robotic animals, as they try to suss out what is their master plan.

Though the futuristic setting is kind of ho-hum, and the costume designs are largely terrible, this wasn't actually that bad of a feature.  It's pretty juvenile compared to most other DC Animated features, but that's for the best given what its purpose is.  The characters, even Batman, are pretty light on their toes, so there's a lot of fun quipping and creative fights happening on screen (plus the Flash is very much a Wally West-style Flash, so that's welcome any day), and the overall scenario is kind of silly in a big, grand, 1960's suppervillain manner, so it pretty much demands that you don't take it too seriously.  Good for the kids, for sure

Overall, beyond Assault on Arkham these DC Animated features haven't exactly inspired me to dig deeper into the back catalog, but now with such easy access as they crop up more and more on Netflix, I just might when I'm bored or short on time.

We Agree: The Flash (was bad)

2023, Andy Muschietti (It) -- cinema

So, I guess I have a new benchmark for bad movies? And I don't mean Bad Movies, like the creature features and disaster flicks that I so love, but terribly executed blockbusters that are just not well done. And also not incredibly well executed flicks that I just don't care for, because I don't like the execution style (e.g. Thor: Love & Thunder; I have since tried to rewatch this movie, twice, only to solidify my dislike for it). This movie just made so many, so very very many, bad choices.

Of note, I will write this up in my drafts with a smattering of my thoughts, and then once Kent has posted his ... post, I will (have) add(ed) in some direct response/reactions to his commentary. Probably just a lot of shouting, "This! I meant this!"

Andy Muschietti looks like the supporting character in a bad action movie, either the sleazy side-kick drug dealer, or hench goon to an Eastern European arms dealer. Not sure why I have to share that, but there it is. And he does his cameo as someone who has their hotdog stolen by the Flash. Speaking of cameos, yes that was Nicolaj Coster-Waldau getting his pizza stolen by the Flash. I know he was in Mama but I guess they are not ... friends?

I don't like Ezra Miller, and I am pretty sure that was before they came out as a sleaze bag. I didn't like their meant-to-be-sympathetic villain in the Fantastic Beasts movies, but was only mildly amused by them in the Justice League movies. They were pretty much playing themself in Asking for It and The Stand, which is to say a messed up asshole. So, I am not sure I would have been able to connect with them as The Hero on any level, especially since the whole motivation of this movie is for us to sympathize with him (this stays, as the character is a Him) despite having obviously flawed choices.

Now if I was a Big DC Superhero Fan, I might be able to sidestep whom they have cast as Barry Allen, for the sake of seeing your Hero on the big screen. But, despite being an avid comics reader for three decades, I was never really immersed in any of the DC characters outside of Superman, Batman and The Sandman. I know I have read tons of Bronze Age comics but I cannot say I really know much about The Flash nor Barry Allen. He was probably just the supporting Justice League-r in whatever  I was reading, and I definitely did not read any Flash comics directly. I also did not watch the CW show. I don't know his proper character so cannot be offended by this portrayal, and yet...

I am relating this to say I have no particular expectations for the character, but yet I still think of the character style choices of Miller as just fundamentally flawed. At least in Justice League movies, he was just somewhat irritating, but they wanted a younger, eager character so I went with that. But here, he just seems... off. As Kent says:

"...this character, who is twitchy, anxiety-addled, seemingly neurodivergent (except when he's not), is inconsistently written and likewise inconsistently played. Whatever type of person Barry Allen is supposed to be, Miller either struggles to find him, or struggles to convey him."

And don't get me started on Barry 2.

OK, I have jumped quickly into the I Don't Like-s without really saying what the movie is about.

This is The Flash after the Snyderverse Justice League movie, after they have pulled together as a team and saved the world (at least once). But the movie opens with Barry Allen again late to his Crime Lab job, which they kind of hint as being related to his superhero duties but also to him just being... late. Hah hah, fastest man alive is always late. But then, related to his superhero duties, he is whining about being the "cleanup man", always being called in to support the League instead of leading the way. The movie solidifies this via a 20-odd minute sequence focused on saving babies, and a therapy dog, from a collapsing building, while Batman chases down the Bad Guys and their weapon of mass destruction. He is initially sent in to deal with the water & power. The babies are collateral damage.

I am thinking here that one of the Purple Suits told Muschietti that he had to do a Dead Pool style opening sequence, focused on the irreverent comedy. Oooo!!  Babies in danger! One's going to be splashed with acid, another is going to be squashed! Barry has to do a weird Rube Goldberg in ultra-slowmo to save all the babies, and the dog, and the nurse, within the seconds he has. Also while snacking. Barry's "snack hole" seems to be a running gag all through this movie -- see above cameos.

But this sequence was just bad. It looked bad, it set a wrong tone, it just did all the things badly. Did I say it looked bad? This is a decade-ago level video game cut scene CGI. The movie literally begins by establishing our hero as a clown. And it contributes nothing to the rest of the movie.

This leads (in no way whatsoever) to Barry once again lamenting about the past, and his mother's death, and his father's unjust persecution. The evidence at hand all seems circumstantial, but its enough to convict, and despite Barry's chosen profession, he is not able to point out the flaw in the justice system. Instead, Barry runs away into The Past. Well, no not quite, into The Bad CGI Time Arena !!

You see, The Flash is able to run (in his incredibly stupid looking way) so fast that he ... enters the multiverse? Oh, I have no idea what they are trying to convey. Is it a mythical place? Is it a cognitive representation of the access he has while in the Speed Force? Is it just sciency-fiency gobblety gook to cause Barry to "break the Universe" for the sake of his mom? Yes folks, yes it is. Barry sees his chance, and despite knowing its a bad choice, he tweaks the past allowing his mother to survive. Not sure how though; just because his father never goes to get tomatoes, does that stop Random Murderer on coming into the house? Does his father fight off said Murderer? Do they even explain what said Murderer was all about, like all proper Uncle Ben moments do? Nope, Barry changes the past which changes the (a) future but he returns to... ten years in the past. Why? No reason but Plot Thickening. 

You see, Barry has fucked things up, as changing one point in the past doesn't just change the future but also changes the past even further. Everything is messed up. And altered. Or so he learns from Batman, but not his Batman (Ben Affleck) but the Michael Keaton Batman, who actually did a pretty good job making the world a safer place, and has retired. BUT the Justice League never appeared, Superman is not on the scene, Arthur Curry was never born, Wonder Woman is probably still hanging out of Amazon Island (the place where all the brown boxes are born) and nobody is around to fight with Zod when he shows up ready to fuck the Earth up. Oh, they do find a Superman alternate/sub-in in Supergirl, the scowling, traumatized cousin tortured in a Russian gulag for years, but that doesn't matter. This Universe, or at the very least, the Earth in this Universe, is fucked. And there is nothing that the Barry's, and Batman can do about it.

So, Barry has to go back into the Time Arena of Incredibly Rubbery CGI, to Not Save His Mom. Barry 2 is not happy about that, nor is Scary Barry. But, hey, contemplative other Supermen from other Universe Nickelodeon Spheres are watching. So he leaves the tomatoes on the shelf, albeit with one minor tweak, and the world is fixed. Kinda. Sorta. Maybe. I still like George Clooney Batman.

Did I like anything about the movie? I actually liked Scowly Supergirl, in what little characterization she had. As Kent said, "she's a presence more than a character." I liked seeing the updated Keaton Batman fighting with 2023 choreography. I liked seeing the Nick Cage Superman sphere. And I did chuckle a few times, at moments they wanted me to, and I was moved a few times, at points they wanted me to be, so I guess I was more entertained than disappointed? I mean, how could I be disappointed when I went knowing it was going to be terrible? It was, in fact, more terrible than I expected but... "it's good-bye and good riddance to the Snyderverse." So hey, we got that.

Where the quotes came from, in the Kent-iverse.

The Flash

 2023, d. Andy Muschietti - in theatre

The DC Comics fan in me, the one who had spent over two decades investing in nuance, continuity and legacy, has a really hard time saying bluntly what needs to be said about The Flash, because more than anything I wanted it to be amazing. I've lived a large portion of my life dreaming of big screen adventures of DC heroes other than Batman and Superman, and with very few exceptions those dreams have been dashed. So I knew The Flash wouldn't be amazing, because I knew the foundation the film is built upon is loose shale fortified with cheese curds.

I'm not angry about it because I've long gotten over the fact that the Snyderverse doesn't work for me. I'm not even disappointed because I could tell from the trailers -- which sold this as a Batman movie featuring The Flash -- that there was definitely something wrong with the film (the final trailer, which I saw about two weeks before the film's release, finally sold it as a Flash movie, and I had a visceral 'no thank you' reaction).

My problem stems from Ezra Miller's casting, which even before their controversies, didn't work for me. They are fundamentally wrong for the character as written, and the character, as written, is fundamentally unrecognizable as Barry Allen, or any other Flash for that matter. I can get over changing Barry Allen as a character -- he's about as boring a figure as they get in comics (I'm much more of a Wally West fan) -- but this character, who is twitchy, anxiety-addled, seemingly neurodivergent (except when he's not), is inconsistently written and likewise inconsistently played. Whatever type of person Barry Allen is supposed to be, Miller either struggles to find him, or struggles to convey him. And, physically, whatever Miller's weird floppy hand thing they've chosen to do when running as the Flash looks really, really, really stupid (just as it did in Justice League). Mindboggling choice on their part. One of many.

Then they introduce a second Barry Allen. He's a 10-years-younger alternate version whose mother never died because The Flash has figured out he could mess with the timeline, and then did, only to accidentally wind up in an alternate past. Miller plays this second Flash like Pauly Shore in every 90's Pauly Shore vehicle, buddy. Your mileage may vary on how amused by this performance you will be, but your tolerance for Pauly Shore is a good benchmark for expectations. The smart tactic would have been, at the very least, recasting this second Barry Allen (understanding that the film was too far gone once the Miller controversies hit to really make big casting changes.... Even still....)

Beyond that fundamental casting flaw (singular. Miller is the only casting problem, just doubled up), the other fundamental flaw of the production is that the DCEU/Snyderverse hasn't earned a story that revels in, and relies upon its cinematic history so deeply. The heroes of the DCEU haven't been explored enough to start tinkering with what we know about them and their place in this universe, and the film revelling in all the differences of the new timeline Barry has created has no resonance, unless, I guess, you were really, really, really invested in the Snyderverse. Even as a big DC fan, this all rang very hollow and unjustified.

Michael Keaton certainly seemed game for resurrecting a variation of his Bruce Wayne, while Michael Shannon has not been quiet about how much he disliked returning as Zod (I would say his apathy shows, but he's barely in the film enough for us to care about his performance). Ben Affleck was always good casting for Batman, but this is taking on the Joss Whedon Justice League as his worst appearance (the performance is fine, but what's being done with the character, not so much). Sasha Callie's Supergirl is good, but she's got maybe a dozen lines of dialogue at most...she's a presence more than a character.

If the good special effects of The Flash aren't notable, it's because the bad special effects are. The cgi characters, almost universally, look terrible. I've heard the uncanny valley of Polar Express cited and I'm not even sure it looks that good. Director Andy Muschietti says it was a deliberate choice. I call BS on that and say that Warner Bros pulled out of investing any further cash into finishing the effects once they learned about Miller's extracurricular activities. Not all press is good press.

When Miller is acting against themself, it's clear there were two people in the room, but one always gets a digital Miller face slapped over top, and it's as noticeable as Henry Cavill's digitally removed moustache in Justice League. It's unsettling. CGI babies, a weird time arena, ghoulish and weirdly conceived alternate earths as viewed through various CGI Supermans (why Supermans and not Flashes?)...it's a frequently ugly film, and yet the problem that bothered me the least.

From the nerd side of things, the Flash's powers were wildly inconsistent. The drawbacks and constraints of using the powers -- the charge they build up, or the need for fuel, or the effect on moving people, or rapid healing powars, among other traits -- were scattershot in their application. I noticed, and it bothered me.  The conceptualization of the speed force, the visualization of the Flash running, what it means to move that fast and the effect it has on one's body or one's surrounds, it doesn't hold together. With dozens of writers having worked on a script for this film for almost a decade, there's likely a hodgepodge, piecemeal effect of disparate parts that don't invariably fit as it iterated over time.

The costume designs, while nominally an improvement over those found in Justice League are, to be frank, still ugly. The Flash costume is very rubbery and glossy and bulbous and makes me uncomfortable (reminding me of Schumacher's fetishistic Batman and Robin costumes). Supergirl's costume has weird darts jutting from her hips to her crotch as if pointing to it for some unknown reason.  Consistency for consistency sake but Keaton's Batman still can't turn his head after 35 years of iterating costume designs?  And what was up with the nose on Affleck Batman's costume...?

I didn't enjoy myself with this movie. I started the film with my arms crossed, and sunk even deeper into my chair as it progressed. I like time travel and multiverse stories, so I did really want to get caught up in the adventure of it, but at every turn I was faced with an actor who wasn't working and reminded of a universe I don't really like.   I think about superhero films like '78 Superman or Ang Lee's Hulk or Iron Man which put you into the position of the hero in certain moments, that give you that sense of what it's like to fly or leap or smash or be in the suit of armor, a moment or two that is like a visceral experience. I never felt connected to Flash's speed. They try to replicate the great visualization of Quicksilver in the X-Men movies early on, but to lesser effect.  Flash's speed has so many different visual iterations that there is no connection point to it as a viewer.

I hate to say it, but I have to...The Flash is bad. If I'm being generous, it just doesn't work for me. If I'm being mean, it's good-bye and good riddance to the Snyderverse. 

Black Adam

 2022, d. Jaume Collet-Serra - in theatre

Had this movie come out 20 years ago, when the superhero genre in film was still finding its feet, I would have watched it over, and over, and over again, not believing my eyes that we have a film where Black Adam fights Hawkman, Dr. Fate, Atom Smasher and Cyclone. I'm a lifelong DC Comics fan, and I've long been dreaming of the deeper bench of characters making it to the big screen. That wow factor would have went a long way back then.

10 years ago, we got Green Lantern, and by then the bar on what I would consume on repeat was already pretty high, and it certainly didn't make the cut. Five years ago we got a Justice League movie, and I really wish we hadn't. Now we get Black Adam, with the Justice Society in tow, and while marginally more entertaining than Green Lantern or Justice League, we've also had Smallville, Stargirl, Titans and a decade's worth of Arrowverse shows playing with DC's deep bench roster in live action, so the wow factor of just seeing people in costume has pretty much been eaten up.

Of the "DCEU" movies, only Aquaman and James Gunn's The Suicide Squad impress me much. I like Wonder Woman and Shazam, but they don't "wow" me. Black Adam gave me little flutters watching the Justice Society quartet in action...they looked great, the costume design and effects were really nice, and the actors are all pretty solid...but there was no character development, no sense of their organization (why are they answering to Amanda Waller?), no meaningful sense of purpose within the world (maintaining world stability or some such) or to the story.... I get it, they're there to build out the DCEU and to provide some colourful flash and flutter to pit against Black Adam against, but it didn't have to be this clumsy or feel this tacked on.

And that's the stuff I liked about Black Adam.

What I didn't care for was most of what's left. It's not terrible, it's just nothing. It's not saying anything of real value, about the character, about its fictional middle eastern nation, about the world it all inhabits. Khandaq is a derivative of Wakanda with its special rare metal, but it's not a place or a people that is at all culturally defined. They watch Clint Eastwood westerns, listen to Player, read superhero comics and ride skateboards...so they're a bit stuck in the 1980s, except that they're living under a high-tech, non-descript foreign military state that Black Adam rightfully just decimates in an orgy of non-stop PG-13 murder.

As a character, Teth-Adam is here scripted to be an anti-hero with a tragic back story, which the film muddies by wading through 5000 years of muddled fables in the form of a tedious 5 (10 maybe?) minute opening sequence, a flashback or two, before a late-second act revision gives us the real poop on this guy and why he is actually so dangerous. It's all tedious circling that would have been better served straight forward and up front. It's not narrative intrigue, just mess. The Rock --still not middle eastern (despite having played the Scorpion King, twice)-- did grow on me in the role, but the script never keeps him consistent, but also doesn't really let him grow in any meaningful way. 

The human sidekicks served their purpose, and only annoyed me a little, which isn't too bad for that archetype.  I had hoped Sarah Shahi would be a superhero.  The film's villain is 80% maguffin, and 20% whatever.  A big nothing.  By the time Sabaac finally arrives, the film's purpose has been so obfuscated as to never actually feel, or even understand, the threat he poses. At one point he sits on a throne and a laser goes into the sky and apparently zombie skeletons arose from...not sure where exactly (if it had been all the dead Intergang guys Teth-Adam had killed that would have been more interesting) which aren't really much of a threat as the human characters pretty easily beat them down.

The music was, bluntly, overbearing and ever-present. A scene could never breathe, everything was punctuated all the time. More than anything, I found this audio assault to be the film's most challenging aspect to overcome. It's sweeping moments of triumph, especially early on, felt unearned, and often times the music felt incongruous to the scene. The closing credits composition, however, did feel quite epic (but again, unearned).

I wish this film had been properly titled "Black Adam vs. The Justice Society", as then there could have been more investment in the thinly wonderful Justice Society characters of the film. The title would have provided impetus for the film, to build up to their battle, and some time could have been spent building Intergang into some form of viable world threat with all their vibranium...I mean "eternium" mining.  But the film, as is, lacks such ambition.  It's a star-driven vehicle that requires the supporting cast to explain the character, their motivation and their backstory, because the star, as charismatic as he can be, is a bit too busy glowering and brooding and being all "extreme" like were back in the heyday of mid-90's comics.

Will I watch this again? Only if I can send it to myself 20 years in the past.

Commenting on Comic Things 3: Season Threes

Umbrella Academy Season 3 - 2022, Netflix
Young Justice: Outsiders (Season 3) : - 2019, Bluray
Locke & Key Season 3 - 2022, Netflix

It feels like we've hit a point in media saturation where season 3 of a TV/Streaming series means it's starting to get long-in-the-tooth, and perhaps should think about wrapping things up, versus the olden days of television where season 3 of a series tended to be where things just started getting good.

Or maybe that's just me, and my increasing discomfort with the glut of content being force-fed out into the world. Sure, more than ever creatives of all different backgrounds are finding opportunity to have their voices heard, and having more and more control over their projects, but, at the same time, all these productions are, in a way, competing for resources -- mainly money and behind-the-scenes talent -- and I feel that in the end the creative visions in a lot of cases are having to make sacrifices.  Or perhaps it's just COVID productions.

Season 3 of Umbrella Academy came, and went not that long ago.  I know I enjoyed the hell out of it, but at the same time, I struggle to recall exactly what the season was about.  Time moves so fast now, and content gets consumed so quickly.  A Netflix binge means we didn't exactly savour the show, but consumed it rapidly over three or four days knowing that the next thing was coming down the pipe.

(Often this forgetfulness is also from a lack of reviewing.  As I started typing, the memory centers got triggered and things started coming back to me)

This season, which picks up where season 2's cliffhanger left off, finds the Umbrella kids winding up in the present day but in a reality altered as a result of their meddling back in 1963.  Their home, no longer the Umbrella Academy, is instead the Sparrow Academy, and there's a whole different batch of birthday twins (and a totally alive Ben) for them to contend with.

Things get fighty, then dancey, then weird, weirder, and even weirder still.  But as usual with the Umbrella Academy it's all grounded with real emotions and tumultuous family dynamics which should be getting tired by now, but haven't really.

A tremendous amount happens this season, but perhaps the biggest is the meta-story of Elliot Page's transition and how it affected his character, who also transitions into Victor this season.  The show handles it very tactfully and brilliantly, and then moves on without making it out to be any more an issue than it needs to be.  Victor is Victor now, and everyone is accepting, because, really, transgender is one of the least unusual things to happen on the show.

But Victor is still reeling a bit from his ill-fated 1963 romance, and the young boy with a shard of his powers he left behind.  Alison, though, more than anyone, has the most trauma from going back in time and returning, having faced segregation and entrenched societal racism, getting married, but returning to the present because she missed her daughter only to find that in the fallout of their interference, her daughter no longer exists.  It understandably turns Allison's heart to something close to stone, having really nothing left to give from a world that only seems to take.  As understandible as her nihilism and selfishness is, she's very unpleasant to watch this season.

Luther and one of the Sparrows fall in love and they carry on an expectedly absurd Romeo and Juliet affair under the noses of their respective families.  Diego learns that he has sired a son with Lila (though it's been only weeks for him, it's been 13 years for Lila and she drops the boy on his lap) and has to come to terms with this deliciously droll kid (seriously, he should have been really annoying but I liked him a lot, the right mix of vulnerability and apathy and snark).  Klaus learns more about his powers thanks to the help of a somewhat different Hargreevs (leashed by the Sparrows), and Five is just ready to hang up his hat after living a lifetime of saving the world from apocalypses.

Of course there's another apocalypse brewing which ultimately will mean that the Umbrella kids and the Sparrow kids will have to figure their shit out before fixing everything, though, things get really, really, really dicey there pretty much until the last minute, and it kinda seems like everyone's given up on doing anything at all.

Also there's this crazy hotel with a whole pile of secrets, most of which lead back to ol' Reg Hargreevs.  The magical mystery tour element of this season was fantastic.  While I felt that 10 episodes was a little too long (maybe 8 would have been more the sweet spot), none of the episodes are duds.  Each one has a pile of entertaining story and character moments that are totally worthwhile, but I think at a certain point, once we know the apocalypse is looming, and pretty much everyone save the Umbrellas and Sparrows are obliterated, there really shouldn't be another two episodes.  And there's another cliffhanger.  It's a pretty grand season overall, and leaves me hoping there's at least one more to come that can maintain the same daffy tone.  It's a sweet sister series to Doom Patrol.

Speaking taking its time, the long-awaited (and long-ago-ran) third season of Young Justice runs at a whopping 26 episodes!  I don't remember the last time I watched 26 episodes of any series in a single season (probably Arrow?).  It's a lot, and it felt like a lot.

YJ was resurrected from its early demise (in 2013, after 2 incredible seasons) by the short-lived DC Universe streaming service (which only lasted about a year before HBO Max took over).  Subtitled as Outsiders we catch up with the Young Justice a number of years after we last saw them, to find that many of the team members we know are now running the Justice League, and that there's a whole new YJ team.  But some internal strife over having to take orders from a Lex Luthor-led United Nations council (restricting their ability to act on certain information or events) leads to a slew of people quitting the teams.

In the fallout of this Nightwing sets up an independent task force, drawing Tigress and Superboy out of retirement, and recruiting a reluctant Black Lightning, as there's been a slew of metahuman teenagers being kidnapped, brainwashed, and transported on and off world, sold as living weapons.  In the process of investigating, the roads lead to the tiny European nation of Markovia, which is facing its own crisis as the reigning monarch is murdered.  

This is all part of a much larger conspiracy which unravels in great (and intricate) detail over the course of 26 episodes.  As was hinted way back in season 2, the galactic evil of Apokalypse has taken an interest in earth, and these events are just one part of the story.  Along the way we catch up with many of the old crew of Young Justice, and just like prior seasons, there are side tales that feature random characters like The Guardian or Bumblebee which don't directly relate to the main story but really fill out the world like no other superhero show. 

Spilling out from the Markovia incident, Nightwing's side team winds up taking in a few strays: the exiled prince of Markovia codenamed Geo-Force; an amnesiac muslim girl found in a gravesite in Markovia, codenamed Halo; and an exiled creature from rival New Gods territory New Genesis, named Forager, the bug.  This trio winds up staying with Superboy and Miss Martian at their farmstead, with Nightwing and Black Lightning helping train them with their powers, and ultimately lead them on covert, off-the-books missions that YJ or Justice League can't touch.  This is sort of the core crew for the season, which is only a problem in that each one of them has vocal frys or affectations that get somewhat annoying given the amout of (over?)exposure they get.  Geo-Force is a total hothead with a fakey-fakey non-descript European accent.  Halo has a vaguely middle eastern accent, but is too full of naivete.  Forager always refers to himself in third person, and makes a lot of clicking noises.

The show has an on-the-nose parody of a right wing news broadcast in G. Gordon Godfrey, who is a totally boorish media personality of the Piers Morgan type, getting away with slander by phrasing everything as a question.  It's totally aggravating basically because of how spot on it is.

Also aggravating is the slow-burn lead in to Beast Boy joining the team, voiced by the same actor who has been performing the character across Teen Titans/Teen Titans Go! for 20 years, only instead of being a fun goofball, Gar is now a sanctimonious TV star using his platform to speak out about metahuman trafficking.  It's not really that it happens, but how it is executed, and it's not executed very well.  By the time Gar actually joins the series as a member of the team we're already kind of exhausted by him, and he only gets worse.  Also, Cyborg becomes a cast member, and I think between my decades of reading comics, Snyder's Justice League, the DC Animated Movie universe, and the Doom Patrol show, I'm really, really tired of mopey Cyborg. Not that he doesn't have a right to mope, mind you, but I feel like that ground is well trod.  I don't need Vic being a big, boisterous cartoon like in Teen Titans Go!, but I miss the spirited character of the 00's Teen Titans series who has already gotten comfortable with who he has become and excited for what he can be. 

It's strange praise, but the absolute best thing this season has going for it are its end credits, different each episode.  A tranquil, if slightly haunting lullaby plays over a still shot or barely animated loop - sometimes it's of Wolf sleeping, or Sphere "sleeping", or Atemis' dog "Brucely" sleeping (it's mostly things sleeping but with different backdrops), or catching up with what's going on with Lobo's severed finger.  It kind of reminded me of the end credits to Twin Peaks: The Return.

There is a lot going on across the 26 episode season, and a lot to like, but a lot of it I found aggravating (mainly in the choice for lead characters this season... the show makes them all kind of challenging to like in their own way, and it does make some of the episodes feel like a slog to get through as, you know, Prince Brion erupts in fury yet again, or Halo gets murdered and resurrected yet again or forager laments his outsider status yet again.  But by the very end, despite not thoroughly loving the season, I was eagerly scouring for the just-completed-in-June season 4 of Young Justice, subtitled Phantoms.  It's not available on physical media yet, but I want and am ready for more.  I love spending time in this world, maybe just not with the Outsiders, specifically. 

Where the third season of Umbrella Academy really felt like the show operating at peak, and the third of Young Justice felt more like it was awkwardly finding its footing again, the third season of Locke & Key, at a reduced 8 episodes, felt downright redundant at best, cliche at worst.

When we ended last season Tyler had turned 18 and decided not to use the Alpha key to remember the magic of the keys, while the kids used the Alpha on their mom, Nina, to let her remember.  Ellie had returned from behind the Omega door, and the kids had found victory over Dodge, but unaware of a greater evil in Frederick Gideon, who also was freed from behind the Omega door.  Oh, and a whole slew of teenagers died.

So this season has a lot it could deal with, and it does, but in a largely glib and off-handed way.  Ellie's trauma of being on the other side is hardly touched upon, and they disappear her until she's useful to the Locke family again.  Nina seems to enjoy the bonding she's having with Bodie and Kinsey over using the magic of the keys, but missing Tyler who is off finding himself or whatever.  There's not a lot of parenting going on from Nina, no restrictions seem to be set around key use, no discipline in place.  And there seems to be very little interest in searching for missing keys (presumed, I'm sure, washed away in the climactic seaside house destruction of last season), now in Gideon's posession.  Oh and the town should be reeling over the deaths of so many teenagers, but, again, it's barely touched upon.  Likely due to COVID restrictions, there's no in-school scenes, nor anything like a town hall or any sense of the town of Matheson as a character.

Tyler returns home, and we're once again in the territory where one of the characters doesn't know about the magic keys and the others have to hide it from him, which we've seen so much of already with Nina (and others in the prior season), and it's an inevitability that Tyler will get Alpha keyed and get his memories back.  Meanwhile Gideon makes his moves (Kevin Durand just sneering, snarling and Brit-talking his way through the role, chewing up everything around him), but they too feel so similar to what Dodge did in the prior season.  Except Bodie finds a new key which enables temporary time travel, and he accidentally brings Dodge from the past back to the future.  Dodge tricks Bodie out of his body using the ghost door, and then we spend a couple very tiresome episodes of Dodge pretending to be Bodie whilst the family just scratch their heads wondering why the kid is suddenly so ornery.  There's a whole thing in Locke & Key where 90% of the show's problems would be solved if characters just talked to one another about their problems and they so rarely do, and it's damn annoying the way these conversations are avoided.  Naturally the Lockes need to team up with Dodge to stop Gideon, and that goes about as well as you would expect.  And the way the season plays out seems pretty telegraphed and unsurprising.

Overall, this season was a drag.  It felt rushed, and confined, both likely a result of being a COVID-era production. The real joy of the show is the discovery of the keys, both the whispering secrets treasure hunt, and then learning how to properly use them.  I think I would have preferred it as a more of-the-week show that trying so hard to find some grand plan to tie the whole thing up with a bow.  No character this season gets a real story arc, except maybe Ellie.  The Lockes don't really grow much this season as characters, they don't feel much different than they did in seasons prior at the end of it all.  

In the comics, there's a lot more use of the time key as well as exploring the history of the keys over time, which really deepened the mythology.  The series takes the cheap route out and only gives us two very brief sojourns into the past, amounting to little except for Bodie's carelessness.  As well, the comics had a pretty grand final battle that employed the keys on a massive scale, and here they're used as tritely as they always have been.  I mean, sure, the Lockes aren't warriors or soldiers, but their ability to think strategically seems hindered by the writer's need for certain events to happen which is truly frustrating.   It takes any of the real menace out of the villain(s) for them to so easily defeat characters who don't pose them any challenge.

I liked the series overall, but a little less with each passing episode.