DC Extended Universe

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BryceC

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Definitely anti-DC bias out there, and it drives me nuts. It almost makes me think there's some kind of conspiracy, and that WB should have some lawyers getting to the bottom of it.

I'm going to try to get out to see it this weekend with my daughter.

The anti-DC bias stuff IMO is wrong. I honestly thought Wonder Woman was overrated for example. Good movie, Nice start for the character, was really fun and I like the time period, and proof that if you put something good out there then people will eat it up. I'm a fanboy about a lot of things but I'll admit I have pretty deep super hero fatigue at this point too which changes my opinion about a lot of things.
 

harimad

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I did see it this weekend. I wasn't amazed by it, but didn't think it was bad either. It should be more like a 55%-60% RT reviewed movie than a 39% one.
 

State43

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Oh yeah, the second worst thing about Justice League was no-joke the Superman mustache debacle. For those of you who don't know, Josh Whedon came in for Zack Snyder to direct a ton of reshoots for this movie and during those reshoots, Henry Cavill was forced to keep a mustache due to his other Mission Impossible contract. Therefore, all these reshoots, which were seemingly Superman heavy, were shot with Henry Cavill's mustache, which they later CGI'd out. Well, while I figured I wouldn't even notice the CGI, I was COMPLETELY wrong. The CGI job was so so so so bad, I could literally notice every single scene they had to do it in, which was a lot of his scenes. In fact, its so distracting, it was hard to notice anything else, and you get hit with it literally from the start. The movie actually starts with a Superman flashback scene where BAM, there it is front and center, probably the worst CGI job of it you see the entire movie. No getting around it. Would love to hear other people's thoughts.
I was wondering why his mouth looked so funny. I couldn't stop looking at it to the point it pulled me out of the movie lol. I was disappointed with this movie overall but it wasn't suicide squad levels by any means. I think after watching Thor last week, it knocked this movie into the dirt entertainment wise.
 

coolerifyoudid

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I didn't notice the mustache at all, but I wasn't looking for it. I wasn't expecting any CGI being done to the actors's faces so I wasn't really paying attention to it. We saw it in 3D, too!

I went into the movie expecting a more carefree approach to the movie and I came away very pleased. Steppenwolf was pretty vanilla, but it allowed the focus to be on the heroes, which was needed. We knew what we had with Batman and Wonder Woman, but they had to introduce the Flash, Aquaman and Cyborg, along with brief backstories, and have them mesh onscreen as a team. It was definitely a lot to do in the short run time, but I was happy with the result.

I may be alone on this, but I really liked Affleck's Batman. He fit the leadership role well and played a slightly more vulnerable Batman well. I also thought Flash, Aquaman and Cyborg were all cast well and they seemed to mesh together nicely. The bits of humor were pretty well done and not over the top. I don't mind a darker feel to the movie, but it can't be depressing. I thought they had a good mix.

My biggest gripe was that Steppenwolf's minions seemed to vary in toughness throughout the movie. Some scenes made them seem like typical disposable henchmen and other times they seemed like formidable adversaries.

Oh, and I liked the score of the film. The opening scene set to "Everybody Knows" by Sigrid set a great tone.
 

harimad

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I was wondering why his mouth looked so funny. I couldn't stop looking at it to the point it pulled me out of the movie lol. I was disappointed with this movie overall but it wasn't suicide squad levels by any means. I think after watching Thor last week, it knocked this movie into the dirt entertainment wise.

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I didn't notice the mustache, but it did seem like his face was "off" to the point where I noticed... something. Just couldn't tell what it was. I came away thinking that maybe he looked older, maybe the hairline was starting to recede or something? Or maybe it was the mustache thing after all, and I just didn't realize it.

Either way, he's still hot AF.
 

Triggermv

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Now that I've posted my full Justice League review, which is obviously pretty positive, like usual, I thought it would be fun to throw all the DC titles into my MCU rankings to show how they compare. As you'll see, the DC titles are kind of all over the place for me.

  1. Captain America: The Winter Soldier – Thought this movie had the best drama and best writing and story line of all the movies. Its action sequences were probably only second to Civil War as well.
  2. Marvel’s The Avengers – Iconic way to pull everything together with the best villain in the MCU. The final battle was so epic and unlike anything we had ever seen up until that point.
  3. Captain America: Civil War - Most fun and one of the funniest movies on the list. Also produced the best action sequences, had some of the best character moments, and showcased the best balancing act of so many characters. Biggest downfall was having a very good, but not great story line, which kept it from topping my list.
  4. Wonder Woman - Epic movie that was just fun throughout. Both Gal Gadot as the star and Patty Jenkins as the director were amazing in this. The best parts of this movie were the heart, compassion and characterization of Wonder Woman.
  5. Iron Man – Epic way to start the Universe with an unbelievable star for a headliner. Never got into the Iron Monger villain though.
  6. Guardians of the Galaxy – Best space epic since the original Star Wars movies. Also was probably the funniest movie of the MCU so far.
  7. Man of Steel - Unlike many others, I actually really liked this movie, particularly the casting, the score, the cinematography, and the villain. Unlike many Marvel movie's villains, Zod actually had a point to being there. He may be the best villain on this list.
  8. Justice League - While this movie was too short, had bad CGI at times, had a bad villain, as well as many other flaws, this movie was still tons of fun. What it got right and what made me really like this movie was its characterization of all the heroes and the team chemistry it built. I couldn't stop smiling throughout this movie.
  9. Marvel's Daredevil: Season 2 - The introduction of Jon Bernthal's Punisher in Season 2 was what truly made this season great and better than Season 2. Had a few pacing issues, but overall, the series only improved all the characters within it from Season 1, but I'm still so-so on all the Electra stuff. Still needs a few more crossovers, but had a few.
  10. Marvel’s Daredevil: Season 1 – Loved the street-level more-adult-themed tone of this show. Also contains probably the second best villain in the MCU. Being on Netflix is a great way to un-cuff all the normal problems of making a TV show for network viewing.
  11. Ant-Man - Had super-low expectations, but walked away pleasantly surprised. Yet another weak villain, but contained some great comedy with some great actors. Paul Rudd won me over when I once was really skeptical of him.
  12. Captain America: The First Avenger – Epic first-half of the movie with Cap’s origin story, but believe it or not, I found Red Skull a little underdeveloped. Loved the WWII time period aspect of this one.
  13. Spider-Man: Homecoming - Amazing casting on this movie throughout, with Tom Holland being the best Spider-Man yet. Also featured one of the greatest villains in the MCU yet with Michael Keaton, with one of the best scenes and best twists. Movie just lacked the music score and emotional weight of some of its predecessors.
  14. Marvel's Agents of Shield: Season 4 - Best season of AOS so far with a very good two-part story line. Ghost Rider was amazing movie quality all around (casting, acting, visuals, story) and fit perfectly into the story, as well as tying the series to the Doctor Strange multi-verse/mystical/inter-dimensional world. Tons of fun with a lot of great emotion.
  15. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 - Huge on the laughs, fun and heart, but a little mediocre on the story and substance. Also, went a little overboard at times where things got a bit too campy. Characters were probably more fun than story.
  16. Marvel's Jessica Jones - Series filled with great actors, great drama, good diversity to what we are used to, and one of the best villains in the MCU (Kilgrave). Series suffered most from having probably 3-4 too many episodes, poor pacing, and not enough ties to the overall MCU.
  17. Iron Man 2 – Many will mock me, but I actually really enjoyed this movie and actually enjoyed it more than Iron Man 3. Make fun of me all you want, but I didn’t think Whiplash was that bad. I think this movie gets unfairly criticized.
  18. Doctor Strange - This was a fairly Marvel formulaic origin story with some ground-breaking visual effects, a mediocre villain, an innovative ending, and some great characters. However, its biggest problem for me is that it was probably just a bit too out there on the magic side to fully be my cup of tea, which is okay. I still enjoyed it.
  19. Avengers: Age of Ultron – Fun movie, but suffered from too much CGI action, too many characters, and too many storylines.
  20. Iron Man 3 – Don’t know what it is, but I just never really got into this one, and it probably had something to do with the big Mandarin villain twist towards the end. Also never really liked Killian either. Again, I surprisingly like Iron Man 2 better
  21. Thor – Don’t know what it is, but I just never got into this storyline or villains as much as the others. However, it is growing on me over time and I now like this more than Thor: The Dark World
  22. Thor: Ragnarok - I appreciate them trying to go in a creative new direction on this movie, but it ultimately felt too much like a quirky improv comedy (how he shot it) to me. Went a little too heavy on the comedy, which ultimately offset and mitigated the substance, scale, and weight of the movie. Hela was great villain though.
  23. Marvel's Luke Cage: Season 1 - Loved the music angle, loved Cottonmouth as the villain, loved the first 4 episodes. However, this was another Netflix series that really lost its way somewhere in the middle, and I really didn't care for any of the Diamondback stuff. Still enjoyed it, but definitely the worst Netflix series yet.
  24. Thor: The Dark World – Criticize me if you will, but I actually liked this movie more than probably most, but after re-watching it recently, it did fall some in my rankings. I now have the origin Thor above it.
  25. Marvel’s Agents of Shield: Season 2 – Liked the less cheese and more serious tone than the first season. Also, loved the Inhuman’s storyline. Used to hate Skye, but now don’t mind her. This is definitely the best AOS season so far
  26. Marvel’s Agent Carter – Loved the period timepiece aspect of this. Great show.
  27. Batman vs Superman (Ultimate Cut) - This movie only ranks this high due to the fact that I'm including the Ultimate Cut. Only a few times have I been so disappointed walking out of a theater. Bad characterization, confusing plot, too many Easter eggs, too many plot holes, bad editing, too much CGI. While there were a few things I liked, particularly Affleck as Batman and Gadot as Wonder Woman, there was just too many bad things to outweigh them.
  28. The Incredible Hulk – Good movie, but not great. Never was into Norton for the role or the look they gave theHulk, so I was super glad when the switch was made and they remade the Hulk's appearance.
  29. Marvel’s Agents of Shield: Season 1 – Struggled hardcore in the first half-dozen episodes, but then finally picked up when Winter Soldier story line set in and the cheese started to fade. Overall, ended up really enjoying this.
  30. Suicide Squad - Like Batman v Superman, I was super disappointed walking out of the theater for this one. This movie was just a mess of a story and characters that didn't make sense, and overall was just poorly directed and edited. The whole thing was ended up resembling a bad music video.
  31. Marvel's Agents of Shield: Season 3 - Was VERY up and down throughout. There was times I really liked what they were doing, whereas other times where I really did not like what they were doing. Overall, the series is getting a little tired, too many forced fistfights, and still too high on the cheese factor. Still fun at times though.
  32. Marvel's Agent Carter: Season 2 - Great actors and characters combined with a poor stand-alone story, which lacked substance and true stakes to the MCU
  33. Marvel's Iron Fist: Season 1 - A combination of terrible casting/acting from Danny Rand, terrible boring story, poor fight sequences, and too low a budget resulted in Marvel's first major dud for a TV show. At least the back half of the season was much better than the front half.
Feel free to critique.
 
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CloniesForLife

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Now that I've posted my full Justice League review, which is obviously pretty positive, like usual, I thought it would be fun to throw all the DC titles into my MCU rankings to show how they compare. As you'll see, the DC titles are kind of all over the place for me.

  1. Captain America: The Winter Soldier – Thought this movie had the best drama and best writing and story line of all the movies. Its action sequences were probably only second to Civil War as well.
  2. Marvel’s The Avengers – Iconic way to pull everything together with the best villain in the MCU. The final battle was so epic and unlike anything we had ever seen up until that point.
  3. Captain America: Civil War - Most fun and one of the funniest movies on the list. Also produced the best action sequences, had some of the best character moments, and showcased the best balancing act of so many characters. Biggest downfall was having a very good, but not great story line, which kept it from topping my list.
  4. Wonder Woman - Epic movie that was just fun throughout. Both Gal Gadot as the star and Patty Jenkins as the director were amazing in this. The best parts of this movie were the heart, compassion and characterization of Wonder Woman.
  5. Iron Man – Epic way to start the Universe with an unbelievable star for a headliner. Never got into the Iron Monger villain though.
  6. Guardians of the Galaxy – Best space epic since the original Star Wars movies. Also was probably the funniest movie of the MCU so far.
  7. Man of Steel - Unlike many others, I actually really liked this movie, particularly the casting, the score, the cinematography, and the villain. Unlike many Marvel movie's villains, Zod actually had a point to being there.
  8. Justice League - While this movie was too short, had bad CGI at times, had a bad villain, as well as many other flaws, this movie was still tons of fun. What it got right and what made me really like this movie was its characterization of all the heroes and the team chemistry it built. I couldn't stop smiling throughout this movie.
  9. Marvel's Daredevil: Season 2 - The introduction of Jon Bernthal's Punisher in Season 2 was what truly made this season great and better than Season 2. Had a few pacing issues, but overall, the series only improved all the characters within it from Season 1, but I'm still so-so on all the Electra stuff. Still needs a few more crossovers, but had a few.
  10. Marvel’s Daredevil: Season 1 – Loved the street-level more-adult-themed tone of this show. Also contains probably the second best villain in the MCU. Being on Netflix is a great way to un-cuff all the normal problems of making a TV show for network viewing.
  11. Ant-Man - Had super-low expectations, but walked away pleasantly surprised. Yet another weak villain, but contained some great comedy with some great actors. Paul Rudd won me over when I once was really skeptical of him.
  12. Captain America: The First Avenger – Epic first-half of the movie with Cap’s origin story, but believe it or not, I found Red Skull a little underdeveloped. Loved the WWII time period aspect of this one.
  13. Spider-Man: Homecoming - Amazing casting on this movie throughout, with Tom Holland being the best Spider-Man yet. Also featured one of the greatest villains in the MCU yet with Michael Keaton, with one of the best scenes and best twists. Movie just lacked the music score and emotional weight of some of its predecessors.
  14. Marvel's Agents of Shield: Season 4 - Best season of AOS so far with a very good two-part story line. Ghost Rider was amazing movie quality all around (casting, acting, visuals, story) and fit perfectly into the story, as well as tying the series to the Doctor Strange multi-verse/mystical/inter-dimensional world. Tons of fun with a lot of great emotion.
  15. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 - Huge on the laughs, fun and heart, but a little mediocre on the story and substance. Also, went a little overboard at times where things got a bit too campy. Characters were probably more fun than story.
  16. Marvel's Jessica Jones - Series filled with great actors, great drama, good diversity to what we are used to, and one of the best villains in the MCU (Kilgrave). Series suffered most from having probably 3-4 too many episodes, poor pacing, and not enough ties to the overall MCU.
  17. Iron Man 2 – Many will mock me, but I actually really enjoyed this movie and actually enjoyed it more than Iron Man 3. Make fun of me all you want, but I didn’t think Whiplash was that bad. I think this movie gets unfairly criticized.
  18. Doctor Strange - This was a fairly Marvel formulaic origin story with some ground-breaking visual effects, a mediocre villain, an innovative ending, and some great characters. However, its biggest problem for me is that it was probably just a bit too out there on the magic side to fully be my cup of tea, which is okay. I still enjoyed it.
  19. Avengers: Age of Ultron – Fun movie, but suffered from too much CGI action, too many characters, and too many storylines.
  20. Iron Man 3 – Don’t know what it is, but I just never really got into this one, and it probably had something to do with the big Mandarin villain twist towards the end. Also never really liked Killian either. Again, I surprisingly like Iron Man 2 better
  21. Thor – Don’t know what it is, but I just never got into this storyline or villains as much as the others. However, it is growing on me over time and I now like this more than Thor: The Dark World
  22. Thor: Ragnarok - I appreciate them trying to go in a creative new direction on this movie, but it ultimately felt too much like a quirky improv comedy (how he shot it) to me. Went a little too heavy on the comedy, which ultimately offset and mitigated the substance, scale, and weight of the movie. Hela was great villain though.
  23. Marvel's Luke Cage: Season 1 - Loved the music angle, loved Cottonmouth as the villain, loved the first 4 episodes. However, this was another Netflix series that really lost its way somewhere in the middle, and I really didn't care for any of the Diamondback stuff. Still enjoyed it, but definitely the worst Netflix series yet.
  24. Thor: The Dark World – Criticize me if you will, but I actually liked this movie more than probably most, but after re-watching it recently, it did fall some in my rankings. I now have the origin Thor above it.
  25. Marvel’s Agents of Shield: Season 2 – Liked the less cheese and more serious tone than the first season. Also, loved the Inhuman’s storyline. Used to hate Skye, but now don’t mind her. This is definitely the best AOS season so far
  26. Marvel’s Agent Carter – Loved the period timepiece aspect of this. Great show.
  27. Batman vs Superman (Ultimate Cut) - This movie only ranks this high due to the fact that I'm including the Ultimate Cut. Only a few times have I been so disappointed walking out of a theater. Bad characterization, confusing plot, too many Easter eggs, too many plot holes, bad editing, too much CGI. While there were a few things I liked, particularly Affleck as Batman and Gadot as Wonder Woman, there was just too many bad things to outweigh them.
  28. The Incredible Hulk – Good movie, but not great. Never was into Norton for the role or the look they gave theHulk, so I was super glad when the switch was made and they remade the Hulk's appearance.
  29. Marvel’s Agents of Shield: Season 1 – Struggled hardcore in the first half-dozen episodes, but then finally picked up when Winter Soldier story line set in and the cheese started to fade. Overall, ended up really enjoying this.
  30. Suicide Squad - Like Batman v Superman, I was super disappointed walking out of the theater for this one. This movie was just a mess of a story and characters that didn't make sense, and overall was just poorly directed and edited. The whole thing was ended up resembling a bad music video.
  31. Marvel's Agents of Shield: Season 3 - Was VERY up and down throughout. There was times I really liked what they were doing, whereas other times where I really did not like what they were doing. Overall, the series is getting a little tired, too many forced fistfights, and still too high on the cheese factor. Still fun at times though.
  32. Marvel's Agent Carter: Season 2 - Great actors and characters combined with a poor stand-alone story, which lacked substance and true stakes to the MCU
  33. Marvel's Iron Fist: Season 1 - A combination of terrible casting/acting from Danny Rand, terrible boring story, poor fight sequences, and too low a budget resulted in Marvel's first major dud for a TV show. At least the back half of the season was much better than the front half.
Feel free to critique.
Seeing where you ranked Justice League definitely ups my excitement for it!
 

CloniesForLife

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Good to hear, but I hope I don't disappoint you in the end.
No worries. I just agree with most your rankings so that makes me happy to see it ranked so high. Definitely not your fault if I don't like it!
 

harimad

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I like where you ranked Man of Steel. I liked it a lot, although I didn't care for the CGI fest at the end as Zod and Kal-el tore through Metropolis. I agree 100% on Zod being a fully-fleshed villain with an appropriate motivation. From a different persepective, Zod can actually be seen as a good guy.
 

Triggermv

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I like where you ranked Man of Steel. I liked it a lot, although I didn't care for the CGI fest at the end as Zod and Kal-el tore through Metropolis. I agree 100% on Zod being a fully-fleshed villain with an appropriate motivation. From a different persepective, Zod can actually be seen as a good guy.

Many of the best villains like Zod truly view themselves as the heroes of their own stories. As for Man of Steel, I hate that people automatically call people like me DC homers for ranking that movie so high, which I'm not. To me, that is one of the most underappreciated movies of all time. Also, to the homer thing, based on my ratings of some other DC flicks, I think it is obvious that I am not a DC homer. Shoot, I even understand some non-homer's out there liking of Batman v Superman. I recognize that movie does have some content that still fits some people's tastes. However, if you want to test for a true DC homer, look for those trying to still defend Suicide Squad. For those people, I refuse to even listen to you and I just can't help you.
 
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State43

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That is where I felt Justice League suffered above all else, fleshing out the characters. We have an attachment from previous movies with Wonder Woman, Batman, Alfred, Superman and Lois Lane. We didn't have an attachment and very little understanding of Cyborg, Flash, aquaman or any of the villains. Superman was barely in the movie and having him fight the justice league just cause but be clear minded 5 minutes later was silly. Everyone just did things in this movie that made very little sense at all. Again, clearly my take isn't universally shared here, I just felt the story and characters could have been written much better. To me, I felt BvS was better than Justice League.
 

coolerifyoudid

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My Top Ten. I tend to gravitate towards movies that have a little more humor in them.

1. Captain America: The Winter Soldier - Great action, writing, dialogue, characters and intrigue. Solid from beginning to end
2. Wonder Woman - I tried to go into this with lower expectations, but I couldn't help myself. Leaving the theater, I was still loving the movie.
3. Guardians of the Galaxy - I wasn't impressed by this movie the first time I saw it (not sure why), but it's one of my favorites now. Probably the most re-watchable one on my list
4. Spider Man: Homecoming - I feel like they finally got Spidey right. Humor, youth, awkwardness. And a great villain to boot.
5. Avengers - I had this higher, but I think I have seen it so many times that I'm getting nit-picky about things.
6. Thor Ragnarok - I loved this. Fun movie with a lot of laughs and some good action. Plot line isn't top-notch, but there was no lack of fun while watching it.
7. Captain America: Civil War - Action scenes alone put this here. I have it lower in my ranking only because it's clearly leading up to another story line and not as solid of a stand-alone movie.
8. Justice League - I want to move this higher, but I'm hesitating since I just saw it and it's fresh in my memory. Humor and action and character interaction were well done. Villain was a little too straight-forward, but still formidable.
9. Iron Man - As far as origin movies go, this one is one of my favs. Downey Jr just nailed Tony Stark and I couldn't imagine anyone else doing it at this point.
10. Captain America: The First Avenger - I'm a sucker for Cap. Red Skull was meh. I loved the era the movie was set in and the way the story wasn't forced to fit into it.

Just Missed - Man of Steel
 

Sigmapolis

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The anti-DC bias stuff IMO is wrong. I honestly thought Wonder Woman was overrated for example. Good movie, Nice start for the character, was really fun and I like the time period, and proof that if you put something good out there then people will eat it up. I'm a fanboy about a lot of things but I'll admit I have pretty deep super hero fatigue at this point too which changes my opinion about a lot of things.

I never thought Wonder Woman was that great of film.

What it was was adequate -- a perfectly acceptable superhero origin story that ticks all the boxes and is executed competently, if entirely formulaic.

Some things about it annoyed me (not really defining Wonder Woman's powers, her having the same Superman problem of never really feeling like she is in any peril, butchering some fascinating history about the end of the Great War and treating it like it was WWII, cartoony villains even for the standards of superhero films and unbecoming a historical drama, Chris Pine's pilot/spy character being a million times more interesting than WW) -- but these are relative nitpicks for what was, again, a competent and enjoyable film.

I could post a list of things I liked, too -- the leads' chemistry, the attempt to keep the plot "small" and character-based until the ludicrous ending, the soundtrack, stuff like that.

I just think people were so ready for...

(1.) a good female-centric superhero film
(2.) a good DC superhero film

...that they put this one up on a pedestal just a little higher than it deserves.
 
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coolerifyoudid

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State43 and Sigma both touched on an important point. Since BvS and Suicide Squad were highly criticized, DC had a little leeway with Justice League and Wonder Woman in comparison. I still think Suicide Squad was a hot mess, but BvS has grown on me after a rewatch or two. It's still not one of my favorites, but it did a decent job of tying in several storylines and bringing the characters together. The scene where Superman was standing in the destroyed courtroom was really well done, IMO.

It's interesting to read what people like and dislike about certain movies. I admit that I'll let certain things slide if I end up being entertained in the end, especially in this genre.
 
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Triggermv

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State43 and Sigma both touched on an important point. Since BvS and Suicide Squad were highly criticized, DC had a little leeway with Justice League and Wonder Woman in comparison. I still think Suicide Squad was a hot mess, but BvS has grown on me after a rewatch or two. It's still not one of my favorites, but it did a decent job of tying in several storylines and bringing the characters together. The scene where Superman was standing in the destroyed courtroom was really well done, IMO.

It's interesting to read what people like and dislike about certain movies. I admit that I'll let certain things slide if I end up being entertained in the end, especially in this genre.

I agree that if any of these movies can do these three things, I tend to let other stuff fly:

1. Entertain me
2. Make me grow to love the characters
3. Exhibit a good level of emotional weight/heart

Oh yeah, I tend to get suckered in by good music scores too. Perfect example: The Rocketeer - the music score of that movie alone makes it impossible to not like that movie (my vote for the most underrated superhero music score out there)
 
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tm3308

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So, I just saw Justice League opening night last night and will post my usual spoiler-free review for everyone. Coming into this review, I should probably note a few things to put things in context. Rotten Tomatoes currently is showing a 38% Rotten score for Justice League, which isn't good, and in general, my reviews don't stray super far from RT scores. I even came into this movie pretty skeptical after seeing these scores. Also, my past history with the DCEU is this. I really liked Man of Steel, while I recognize its flaws. At first, I hated Batman vs Superman, although it has grown a bit on me some since, especially after seeing the Ultimate Cut that filled in a lot of plot holes. Still don't really like it. I really did not like Suicide Squad, although a few things in it were fun and good. I loved Wonder Woman to death and consider it a top-tier Superhero movie of all time. Lastly, I'm truly about a 50-50 Marvel/DC guy and want both universes to succeed.

With all that thrown out there, screw Rotten Tomatoes on this one. I really liked and enjoyed Justice League. Yes, the general consensus out there right now of its main flaws being a relatively weak CGI villain, a fairly vanilla plot, still botching Superman a bit, not enough back-story, and not being long enough are all true to some extent. However, I was easily able to look past all of those in this case due to what the movie did right, which was the team of the Justice League. In fact, over the course of this movie, I came to love every single member of this team, and the only thing better than each member, was their on-screen chemistry together. This chemistry is what Justice League, Guardians of the Galaxy and The Avengers got right, and what movies like Suicide Squad got wrong. I've been waiting my entire life to see the Justice League finally on the big screen, they are who I came to see, and they are who I got, which is why I was okay with Steppenwolf being downplayed a bit in this instance, since it allowed more time for the heroes to shine.

While I am still disappointed that all the new characters didn't get enough backstory to lead up to them teaming up together, I still found what we got as at least good enough, especially when you consider how short of time they had to do it with a 2 hour long run-time. When I say good enough, I mean that each character had just enough of a back-story to make the teaming up and the reason for the teaming up of all these guys to be pulled off fairly well and feel relatively natural. Then, once you get past that teaming-up, I felt the on-screen chemistry of all of them only grew as the film went on. Each character has their respective role to play and nobody felt left to the side. In fact, the two actors/characters I felt most skeptical of around a year ago were Cyborg and The Flash, and I would say those two characters were the stand-out characters for me. Aquaman was no slouch either. In particular, I loved how well they interwove Cyborg into the plot to make what could easily be a really goofy weird character not feel that way.

Overall, I came into this movie fairly skeptical and spent nearly the entire movie smiling and having tons of fun, even with recognizing all its flaws. The movie is break-neck throughout with no wasted time, which is both good and a bit bad. Truthfully, my biggest complaint by far was that the movie just WAS NOT long enough, not because it was bad and missing stuff like Batman vs Superman, but rather because it was good and left me wanting more. What I wanted more in particular of was the backstory to each character. In fact, I'm really kind of mad at the Warner Bros head mandating the movie be under 2 hours after the over-long debacle that was BVS. I'd just for once like WB to simply react to the mistakes of their previous movies, but not overreact. No, these movies don't need to be 3 hours long, but they also kind of need to be longer than 2 hours too, particularly with team-up movies, and even more so with ones which are introducing a lot of new major characters. With that said, this is one where I really hope they end up with an extended-cut blu-ray edition that adds another good 20-30 minutes to the film. I'll be chomping at the bit to see that if they do.

Anyway, I'd love to hear everyone else's thoughts. As I repeat, screw Rotten Tomatoes on this. I get to some extent some of their criticisms, but I do find them to be overly too harsh on this one. I'm even one who loves the service, thinks the aggregate scores get most things right, but not in this case. Are you seriously trying to tell me that Justice League is a 38 when movies like Thor:Ragnarok are a 92, Doctor Strange is an 89, Iron Man 2 is a 73, The Incredible Hulk is a 62, and Spider-Man 3 is a 63. I mean, Spider-Man 3 is a 63!!!! Are you freaking kidding me???? Maybe I'm finally starting to believe there is some DC bias out there. /rant

If you are looking for another really good spoiler-free review, I'd strongly recommend watching this. All these guys pretty much in total agreement with me.



I think you'll find that most actual superhero fans out there are in agreement with me also.


Agreed on all counts, although I didn't mind that it was only 2 hours. Maybe an over-correction from previous DC films, but it definitely kept things moving, and they still go enough backstory in on all the new characters to sufficiently introduce them. They've also taken a key page out of Marvel's book and added more humor (this was present in Wonder Woman, too). It's always going to be grittier than Marvel, but that's no reason for these films to take themselves as seriously as MoS and BvS did.
 

Die4Cy

Well-Known Member
Jan 2, 2010
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Oh yeah, the second worst thing about Justice League was no-joke the Superman mustache debacle. For those of you who don't know, Josh Whedon came in for Zack Snyder to direct a ton of reshoots for this movie and during those reshoots, Henry Cavill was forced to keep a mustache due to his other Mission Impossible contract. Therefore, all these reshoots, which were seemingly Superman heavy, were shot with Henry Cavill's mustache, which they later CGI'd out. Well, while I figured I wouldn't even notice the CGI, I was COMPLETELY wrong. The CGI job was so so so so bad, I could literally notice every single scene they had to do it in, which was a lot of his scenes. In fact, its so distracting, it was hard to notice anything else, and you get hit with it literally from the start. The movie actually starts with a Superman flashback scene where BAM, there it is front and center, probably the worst CGI job of it you see the entire movie. No getting around it. Would love to hear other people's thoughts.

If you didn't know about the mustache thing before seeing it, you probably didn't notice it. I didn't.
 

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