User blog:Teddyfail/Teddy Reviews: Justice League

Justice League, the Avengers of the DCEU, the hard on of the nerds, the revenge of the Sith wat. You get what I mean. The big event of this year for DC, just hit theatre, and with the really not great opening box office numbers, it's time for me to shit on it. Yes, Teddyfail, the fucker only writes a review when he hates something. Call me the Joeaikman of movie reviews luv u joe

All jokes aside, if you want a non-spoiler very short review, read literally any other reviews, even Amont's is better than this Asian's amateur review. But if you still want it, here it is: Watch it if you really like DC and don't really mind a movie with plot holes enough for a Swiss cheese.

What you said? More? Oh you said stop. Well to bad this is what you are stuck with. Here's a spoiler full review (not like this movie has any kind of twist for spoilers)

Full disclosure, I never read any comic books in my life. I watched the DCEU movies and have the most basic knowledge of the heros: Flash run fast, Aquaman swim fast, Cyborg is a....... human-robot cyborg...... yeah I know shit about Cyborg.

Also, I'm just gonna call the "DC cinematic universe movie franchise" DCEU, cause no one knows the actual name anyway and it's easier for me.

The cast:
It's good. Ben Affleck as Batffleck, Henry Cavill as the smiling Superman, Gal Gadot as the only good DC movie, Ezra Milleras Spider-Man Flash, Jason Momoa as Buzz Lightyear, Ray Fisher as the plot device man.

They all are charming. They are funny, cracking jokes. Superman is not depressed anymore. Look, DCEU's problem was never the cast. It's just how much the movie gives them to do.

The plot:
Oh boy here we go

The general plot is fairly generic. A villain want to destroy/rule the world and has a bunch of CGI minions. The heros getting a group together. The villain has to get some plot devices to destroy the world. Heros tries to stop him but fail. Then they start punching the CGI minions in the third act. Then they destroy the doomsday machine, rekt the villain. Set up sequels. The end

Justice League has the same thing. Steppenwolf is the villain. Parademons is the CGI minions. The doomsday plot device is the very Freudian Mother Boxes. The film ends with Steppenwolf Scar'ed by the Parademons and rekt like Pennywise (no really, he was defected, crawling on the ground. The league went, "you're the one who is scared". Then he went back to a hole wherever he is from. Tell me that's not how It (2017) ends.) Then set up all the movies for next year. Credit, then more tease for more movies in the future. The plot is fine.

One of the bigger problem is an important plot point in the end of the second act is to Frankenstein Superman back to life. Here's my problem:
 * There was a scene of Flash needed to touch the Mother Box right as it touches the water to properly bring back Superman. It really really bugged me. They didn't even explain how does the Krypton ship can frankenstein Superman back to life only with the Mother Box, cause if you slap three not explained plot devices together, you basically can do anything in your movie. *sign* whatever it's a comic book movie and I don't even want to hear more sci-fi mumble-jumble. It get me through the movie and it's fine. It just really bugs me afterwards.
 * The overdramatic scene of Flash needed to touch the Box on time. The buildup, the slowmo. Just why. Why the suspense. You know he will make it. Superman needs to come back at that point. You know he is in the movie. Why pretend the result will be a mystery.
 * After Superman is back, the Mother Box and Superman shot in the sky. The Box landed on a police car, and Sups landed on his memorial place. Then the whole league except Batman, who can't fly or run fast, ran after him to confront him. But no one even care to like look after the Mother Box? They met Steppenwolf. They know he needs that thing to destroy the world, so why is no one grabbing it or look after it. Batman isn't doing anything until halfway through their fight. (Side note: I keep thinking what happened inside the ship after Superman shot up in the sky. Everyone just ran off and Batman was like, "Guys? Can anyone give me a lift? Guys? Shit." Then just slowly ran off.)
 * Oh btw, after Superman was brought back to life, the first thing he did is just him fighting the without Batman League, which just reminds you how much of a threat Superman was before.

The whole scene is just pointless. The whole fight ends after Batman called Alfred for the "backup plan" which is just Lois arriving at the scene. Superman saw her, then just took off back to his home. (Another side note: why don't have Lois wait outside the ship. It won't hurt anyone if she wait outside. The only reason not to bring her at least near the ship is to have a fight scene before the big finale.) This ending to the fight scene is fine. It's whatever. But when Superman joins the fight in the third act, his response to Batman asking him why he decided to join them is, "I own you one." .....ten minutes ago the league is discussing if bringing someone back to life has consequence. Why they keep their philosophical subject in the film when the next scene has the answer which is "lol he's cool". Just why

Another problem is all the little detail that is stupid or pointless. During Steppenwolf's search for the Mother Box, the Parademons went to the lab to look for the Box, but they can't find it, then they just kidnap all the staff, including the janitor. First stupid thing, the first time we saw the lab, the janitor is cleaning out the entrance of the lab. Hours later when the Parademons robbing the lab, he is still cleaning the same spot. That's just a plain stupid mistake. The real thing is this: if a group of Parademons can find all the address of the lab employees, why they can't find a box in the lab or their home.

I can nip pick every part of the plot (I haven't even discussed the Russian family and their bug spray) and this blog will be War and Peace length but I'm not CinemaSins so I'll have the final thought about the plot right here. The plot is basic and not thought out, with many plot holes. You can tell Synder wants to tell a Synder-esque story, with his really complicated storyline, and Whedon finished it with his really straightforward storytelling. You can feel it's a three hour movie cut down to two.

The tone:
The tone has been a discussion since Man of Steel so let's discuss it more here.

Like I said in the last part, the film is a mix of Snyder and Whedon. There's the very Synder-esque, philosophical, dark and gritty, and Whedon came in with his witty comedy. Is there too much of a difference that the tone is incoherent? Ummmmm..... no if you don't want to look for it, but you can definitely tell if you try. It seems like they already tone down the Snyder-ism judging from the first trailer. But it still has what you would expect from a 3 hours long Snyder directed DCEU film. Like the really deep discussion about death and love is really different from the light heart jokes from the Flash. This really just show how the Snyder and the Whedon stuff not mix together, or at least neither of them have time to finish their vision.

The technical stuff:
Let's get it out of the way and talk the about the CGI infamous Cavil moustache. It's very noticeable. The movie's first shot is an alive Superman with weird his CGI mouth. I didn't want to notice it, but when you start the film with the weirdest news of the year. It's hard not to. Beside the stache, the CGI of Steppenwolf and Parademons are… just bad. Not Incubus level of bad, but still bad. They looked like they belong in a PlayStation game, which is fine if the whole thing is computer generated model but they are standing next to a flesh-made Ben Affleck. Again, the second scene contain a Parademon in a close up. It's not really a good sign when the first two scene both has some pretty bad CGI.

Another part that really bothered me is how the action was edited, especially that fight scene in the middle of the movie. It’s disorienting. Half of the time is just *insert superhero here* fighting Steppenwolf/Parademons, but you have no idea where they are. The scene set in a abandoned building thing, the most recognisable thing in the entire scene is a broken bridge. Everyone is either on a bridge or a dark room, doing stuff separately. Then suddenly, Flash needs to help Wonder Woman, Batman is getting the Bat Crawler to get everyone out, Cyborg is saving the hostages. The final fight is has similar problems but they are all doing one thing, kicking ass and getting into the middle. In this scene, everyone is in a different spot interacting with each other but all of their backgrounds looks so similar to each other.

Conclusion:
The film is.... fine, in DCEU standard. The action is entertaining. The joke is funny. The plot is basic but not very thought out. It’s really not a big deal, judging from the box office, or the fact that I finished this bullshit almost a month after I saw it. The future of the DCEU is a bigger problem. Most of their movie’s box office, excluding Wonder Woman, relies on the fans of the comics. The film itself is not that great. Justice League ’ s box office didn’t preform as anyone thought it would and this film just assume you know who the characters are.

I guess this is it? A not so enthusiastic review of a meh movie.