Justice League
Year: 2017
Rating: PG-13
Length: 120 minutes / 2.00 hours
While it can be difficult to separate comparisons of DC’s Justice League (2017) with Marvel’s The Avengers (2010), there are plenty of parallels and similarities between the two. That’s not to say this is a bad thing, as fans of comic book heroes will always love to see their favorite characters team up to take on evil forces almost as much as they want to see these bastions of justice duke it out. Justice League certainly delivers on this, but in a way that felt uninteresting and lacking the serious consequences to the world at large.
Concerning the characters themselves, Justice League succeeds in creating a unique team with some interesting heroes. Wonder Woman’s (Gal Gadot) success in her standalone film could be seen in one of the first (and possibly best) sequences of the film. Additionally, The Flash (Ezra Miller) was a constant source of entertainment as the comic relief. Most importantly, Justice League succeeded in making Aquaman (Jason Momoa) an absolute badass. And while there have been plenty of films with Batman (Ben Affleck), this version certainly seems to draw from its “detective comics” roots to significant effect.
I do find it somewhat ironic/fitting that Zach Snyder directed this penultimate collection of superheroes from the DC universe, especially considering he directed the darker DC superhero film, Watchmen (2009) early on in his career. Plenty of his style remains in this film, but the impact of the plot seems to be a miss here. I think this is mostly because the main antagonist doesn’t easily trace back to one of the known entities in the series: mainly Wonder Woman (2017), Batman v. Superman (2016), and Man of Steel (2013). At least in The Avengers, audiences had already met Loki in Thor (2010). I’m a little disappointed there wasn’t more Steppenwolf music as part of the soundtrack, though.
A procedural gathering of superheroes, I give Justice League 3.5 stars out of 5.
