Zack Snyder's Justice League (2021)

I really, really REALLY wasn't expecting this - it felt like the extended edition of Lord of the Rings, if Zack Snyder directed it!
No, this was Zack Snyder's vision of Justice which we should've seen, if it wasn't for Joss Whedon hadn't pissed all over it. I mean, I understand why Snyder had to pull out the production, I really do, but Whedon could've had the decency to keep to heart on Snyder's work. Looking back, it was a total disrespect to the visionary director. This film...wow! It was truly and 100% amazed me.
Plus, my best highlight was the voiceover of of Superman's dads Johnathan and Jor-El reminding him of who is he - it felt poignant.
That said, a couple of things I feel I must complain about this, just small things; 1) I noticed Mera had a change of accent. Probably an original idea, but it sounded funny especially soon after 2018 Aquaman was released. 2) Victor Stone's dad Silas sacrificed himself - not only was it upsetting but it changes everything for the future of DCEU films. I guess this means they;ll have to rewrite everything for that Cyborg movie!
At least we got the introduction of the Joker (Jared Leto reprising his role) as well as the (not so) surprising twist of the Martian Manhunter!
Not to mention we finally got to see the appearance of Darkseid - it was all like a fusion of 300's Persian empire and LOTR's Sauron!
In the end, this was a true masterpiece from Zack Snyder, since Watchmen and Sucker Punch, and I am so pleased - no, grateful this was made. I thank not just the director himself for returning to this project but also the many fans who petitioned this director's cut to happen.
For once, we finally had something good out of all this chaos that was covid 19, hence why they chose the song Hallelujah for their Snyder cut trailer!
Thank you so much, Zack Snyder - you have always been my fav movie director.
Joss Whedon, you are officially dead to me!

Some HBO Max subscribers were accidentally able to access, 10 days before its premiere, an hour of Zack Snyder's Justice League (2021) before the movie was cut off. This is not a bad strategy. An hour at a time of this gargantuan abomination is more than any thinking person can bear. ZSJL reminds me of Ambrose Bierce's famous book review; “The covers of this book are too far apart.” It doesn't help either that half the movie seems to occur in slow motion.
Superman's quote-unquote death has resulted in the reactivation of the “Mother Boxes” and the appearance of Darkseid's servant Steppenwolf on Earth. Steppenwolf hails from Apokolips, a planet that exists on a different plane of existence from the regular DC Universe, in spite of which he speaks perfect English, and his name is a German word for an animal presumably found only on Earth.
Steppenwolf retrieves a Mother Box from Themyscira, following a battle of incredible proportions – not because it involves mythological beings and alien deities, but because the world of the Amazons is almost entirely computer generated, its scenery only slightly more sophisticated than an Age of Empires screenshot.
How can this movie ask us to believe in a place like Themyscira, when the film itself doesn't seem to have much faith in its existence? This is symptomatic of ZSJL, much of which takes place in a setting completely divorced from the real world – and my complaint is not that it's unrealistic, because ZSJL is fantasy after all; my problem is that it's not real. I mean, it's just not there.
Other than as childhood wish fulfillment, true-blue superheroes are very hard – sometimes even impossible, as with the immortal, omnipotent Superman – to identify with or care about; their physical and moral perfection renders them boring and predictable. ZSJL makes it even harder by placing them in front of green/blue screens most of the time, constantly surrounded by wall-to-wall CGI, and unconvincingly engaging enemies who are literally an afterthought – digitally added in post-production, and very poorly at that.
And speaking of characters that are nothing short of caricatures, there’s Flash (Ezra Miller). Barry Allen is annoying, irritating, obnoxious, insufferable, grating. He's like a very fast Jar Jar Binks. He's like the bastard son of Andy Dick and French Stewart. If he's so quick, why does it take him so long to get off my screen?
All things considered, there's nothing here we haven't seen in Avengers. Darkseid is Thanos, the Mother Boxes are the Infinity Stones, Batman is Ironman, etc., etc. The one difference is that Zack Snyder's Justice League is, though I would not have thought it possible, longer and more boring than any Marvel movie. The only thing that alleviates the overwhelming oppressiveness are the brief interventions of Willem Dafoe and Jeremy Irons, whose considerable talents are wasted on this debacle.