Justice League (2017) (1 Viewer)

[Brandon Conway]

I can see them going with the black costume upon his initial rebirth, then as he gains his powers back it transitions into the traditional colors. It would be a good way to tribute the 90s comics while not dwelling on it.

 

[Oliver Ravencrest]

I don't mind seeing the black costume in JL, I hope they keep the silver S Shield and no cape.

 

[TonyD]

Going by that photo the shield is black too.

 

[Sean Bryan]

A black costume would basically be just what Zod and Jor-El wore in Man of Steel.

If after he resurrects he just wears the traditional Kryptonian black suit while coming to terms with who he needs to be, that could work. As long as he fully embraces the role of Superman by the final act and goes back to the blue and red.

 

[Oliver Ravencrest]

Yeah, that makes sense but they still have time to make some alterations...

 

[Lou Sytsma]

Audience complaint: The colors of Superman's costume are too dark and muted.
Snyder/D.C. response: Black costume, bitches!

I definitely side with the audience given the morose portrayal of Superman since MOS. Yes, the black costume follows comic book canon but this is the worst thing WB could present to disgruntled fans.

 

[Brandon Conway]

Pics of Cavill with kids on set show him in the regular suit, so if they do use the black suit it's certainly only temporarily in the film.

Spoiler

 

[Sean Bryan]

It's possible that picture is from the set of Batman v Superman. But either way, there's no way they wouldn't get him back in his bright(er) colors even if they do use a black suit initially. Not after the "too dark" criticisms. Then again... Snyder.

But I think it is safe to say that WB and Geoff Johns will be making sure Snyder brings more color, fun, and inspiration to this installment.

 

[dpippel]

According to Screen Rant it's from the Justice League set:

http://screenrant.com/superman-justice-league-set-photo-henry-cavill-spit-curl/

I also watched the video at that link, which contains a long comment by Deborah Snyder about the criticism of the dark tone of MoS and BvS. She really just doesn't get it.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

I read an interview with Deborah Snyder after BvS came out, and she blamed the box office fizzling out on the movie on the fans - "I guess people don't like to see their heroes deconstructed" she said.

There might be a certain element of truth in that. But when a movie has an opening weekend of something like $175 million, and then immediately falls off a cliff, that says to me that something didn't click with the audience. For an opening that big, you have to have an audience that's dying to see your movie. And if it was just a matter of people not liking any sort of different take on the characters, they wouldn't have shown up at all in the first place. This kind of opening says to me that people wanted to like the movie, but something about the movie made it hard to do so.

Specifically in the case of BvS, the theatrical version is incoherent and filled with plot points and characterizations that make no sense within the context of the movie. It's not that it doesn't make sense according to what your or my take on Superman or Batman would be; it doesn't make sense according to their own internal rules. That's a giant failure for a movie. (I single out the theatrical version here because the extended version actually does make sense. It might still not win over everyone, but at least the movie's internal logic is more sound.)

The other argument I have against Snyder's notion that people don't like to see their heroes deconstructed is this: you have to construct something before you can deconstruct it. But with only one previous Superman movie in this series, and no previous Batman movie, there hasn't been any time to build up the characters in the first place. It wants the payoff from having years of emotional investment, but hasn't put the time in. My screenwriting professor used to say "Show, don't tell" all the time, but this movie spends a lot of time telling us things instead of showing us - by necessity, since there aren't previous films in the series for this to be building on. To me, one of the biggest examples of this flaw is the portrayal of Batman as a man over the edge who will kill (directly or indirectly) - the movie tells us that Batman has lost himself in the fight, asking us to fill in the gaps of imagining this Batman as both a noble crime fighter and a man who's lost his way, but the movie doesn't actually show us any of that.

All of which is a long winded way of agreeing with you that I don't think Deborah Snyder gets it either. I don't think Zack Snyder would be such a terrible choice if he wasn't in charge of creative decisions (along with Deborah). If these movies had a strong producer who was hiring Snyder for his visual sense alone, as a director for hire, I think things would be a lot different today. But because he's co-producing with Deborah (or rather, that the movie is being produced by people who are part of a team with Snyder, rather than Snyder answering to a producer that's hired him for a job), it doesn't sound like there were any other voices in the room at times when in hindsight it would have been crucial to have those other voices.

I think it's possible to simultaneously be proud of a work and to understand why it didn't succeed as anticipated. And in this case, they're clearly proud of their work (and there's nothing wrong with that), but they seem very unaware as to why everyone didn't love it as much as they did.

 

[Nigel P]

Agreed. To me the tone was not the film's biggest problem. That they tried to do Dark Knight returns, Doomsday, death of Superman, plus set things in motion for Justice League all in one film (only the second in the DCEU) meant it was an uphill task from the off. Then there is the writing with the whole Martha situation and Superman flying with the kryptonite spear. Such a shame, as you said the opening weekend numbers show there is huge demand for these characters and if they could get things right they would have a mega hit on their hands.

 

[Sean Bryan]

According to Screen Rant it's from the Justice League set:

http://screenrant.com/superman-justice-league-set-photo-henry-cavill-spit-curl/

I also watched the video at that link, which contains a long comment by Deborah Snyder about the criticism of the dark tone of MoS and BvS. She really just doesn't get it.

Right. She really just doesn't seem to get it. People don't need to identify with Superman they need to be inspired by him.

Captain America is a character who has a similar sensibility. Marvel managed to make a very likable character which people watch and wish they could be like him. Viewers can see that he wrestles with some frustrations and doubt, but are inspired by his strength of character (as are other characters in his films). DC really needed to take a similar course.

 

[Brandon Conway]

The other argument I have against Snyder's notion that people don't like to see their heroes deconstructed is this: you have to construct something before you can deconstruct it. But with only one previous Superman movie in this series, and no previous Batman movie, there hasn't been any time to build up the characters in the first place. It wants the payoff from having years of emotional investment, but hasn't put the time in. My screenwriting professor used to say "Show, don't tell" all the time, but this movie spends a lot of time telling us things instead of showing us - by necessity, since there aren't previous films in the series for this to be building on. To me, one of the biggest examples of this flaw is the portrayal of Batman as a man over the edge who will kill (directly or indirectly) - the movie tells us that Batman has lost himself in the fight, asking us to fill in the gaps of imagining this Batman as both a noble crime fighter and a man who's lost his way, but the movie doesn't actually show us any of that.

I think this is a key to how someone like myself can be totally fine with the deconstruction while someone like yourself can't. I've seen 12 other movies with Superman and Batman since 1978, not counting Man of Steel. TWELVE. I feel zero need to have more films show me what I can essentially glean from those other films re: how Batman and Superman are in the context of "normal" story positioning. I don't want to spend time on that again, therefore I'm totally fine with keeping that context external to the film and jumping right into the deconstruction.

But I can also see why others feel they need these specific actors in 2-5 movies as the "normal" versions of these characters before going to the edges that MoS and BvS go to. I don't agree with that perspective, but I can at least understand it.

One advantage JL has is that it's the first time presenting the DC hero team concept in live action. So they can go "normal" with the characterizations and story without feeling redundant, nor will they feel the need to push the characterization or stories to the edge because we've seen a dozen DC films in that vein already over the past 35 years.

Same goes for Wonder Woman.

 

[Brandon Conway]

Also, Superman was always coming back as the idealized hero in JL no matter how BvS was received. That's the entire point of how they conclude his character arc in BvS.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

I think this is a key to how someone like myself can be totally fine with the deconstruction while someone like yourself can't. I've seen 12 other movies with Superman and Batman since 1978, not counting Man of Steel. TWELVE. I feel zero need to have more films show me what I can essentially glean from those other films re: how Batman and Superman are in the context of "normal" story positioning. I don't want to spend time on that again, therefore I'm totally fine with keeping that context external to the film and jumping right into the deconstruction.

I don't know that I need it, but it's something I would like. What we've never really seen with Batman or Superman on the big screen, especially Superman, is character development and continued honing of his skills and missions over the course of multiple movies. Donner's Superman is fantastic; Superman II isn't bad either, and they share a continuity. But Superman III has pretty much nothing to do with the movies that came before, same with Superman IV. Batman Returns has very little to do with Batman (1989), and Batman Forever and Batman & Robin don't build on a story. I really liked what Christopher Nolan did with his trilogy, but with only three movies, we didn't really have a chance to see lots of different stories being told. I want to see Batman and Superman getting their stories told the way Marvel has been doing, where each new movie builds on the character and plot developments of the previous movies. To Snyder's credit, BvS does attempt to do this with Superman.

I feel, especially because they're making such a point of this being a new version of the story and not a continuation of the previous films, that they can't borrow from the goodwill or backstory that those previous films had. And it's not that I necessarily need the origin story told again - it's just the feeling that this universe has started with the best and most interesting parts of Batman's story already in the past. I'm not satisfied with the kind of narrative shortcut the film takes by showing us the Robin suit and alluding to the dead Robin that we know of from the comics - I want the movie to earn its own story beats instead of calling up memories of previous versions to do the heavy lifting. If they want to tell the same story as the comic, that's fine, but I don't want the presumption that I already know the history.

 

[Brandon Conway]

Like I said, a valid viewpoint that I just don't agree with. I like when films have external presumptive history when that history is so well known in pop culture, (i.e., Batman has fought crime in Gotham).

When Marvel finally gets around to re-doing some of their MCU characters in 20 years they're gonna have much of the same problems. (Personally I don't want them to do Iron Man remakes/reboots/recasts/re-whatevers, but it's inevitable, because they can't leave that $$$ on the table).

 

[TonyD]

While on a road trip today we stopped by this building.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Has it been announced who the director of photography is? Having rewatched both MoS (Amir Mokri) and BvS (Larry Fong) recently, I liked the MoS photography more than BvS. But Snyder seems to prefer working with Fong, so that's probably that.

I don't know if it's just me, but the CGI seemed to blend better with Mokri's photography in MoS than Fong's in BvS. There are shots of Superman (and Batman) in motion in BvS that look far less realistic and more cartoony than anything in MoS.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Has it been announced who the director of photography is? Having rewatched both MoS (Amir Mokri) and BvS (Larry Fong) recently, I liked the MoS photography more than BvS. But Snyder seems to prefer working with Fong, so that's probably that.

I don't believe it's been officially announced anywhere, but the evidence points to Fabian Wagner (one of the rotating DPs on "Game of Thrones").

Fong was busy lensing Kong: Skull Island during the pre-production for Justice League, which is probably why he's not back.

I'm excited to see what Matthew Jensen (another "Thrones" alumnus) does with Wonder Woman, since he doesn't have to operate within Snyder's particular sense of aesthetic.

 

[Brandon Conway]

Wagner was officially announced when production began in April.