Justice League: War is DC first movie of the New 52 era. It was officially released Feb. 4, 2014, and sort of serves as a sequel to Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox. Jay Oliva is back as the director, and the basic animation style is the same, although all the voices are different. This highly-anticipated movie was based off the first six issues of Justice League by Geoff Johns and Jim Lee, which is collected in a trade paperback called Justice League: Origin. Before I review the movie, I'll provide a brief recap of the source material.
Justice League: Origin is an extremely simple, by-the-books origin story specifically designed for new readers. All the Justice League members met each other one at a time, briefly fought each other, then were quickly forced to unite to defeat the biggest threat imaginable in the DC universe — Darkseid. The comics failed to give Darkseid a strong motivation to attack Earth — he mentioned something about looking for his daughter, but then DC seemed to forget about that later on. Darkseid was also defeated way too quickly and conveniently, basically because of a loophole. But the comics succeeded in showing that these seven heroes are the biggest and the best heroes around. But they first had to learn how to work together and gain the public's trust. As with most Geoff Johns stories, these six issues read like a perfect screenplay that could easily be collected in trade and adapted to a movie. DC probably could have made a perfectly serviceable movie without changing a single line of dialogue from the comics, but they felt they needed to make some interesting changes.
I guess I'll start by listing all the positives of this movie. (Spoiler, there aren't too many.)
The animation and action was top-notch. As to be expected with these movies, the action scenes were incredible and everything anyone could hope for in a movie like this. I laugh whenever people say this is an "anime" style of animation. I guess it's as much anime as the Young Justice cartoon, but it's nothing like Naruto or Bleach. In any case, you'd be hard-pressed to say that this style of animation is not good. I also noticed some slight improvements from Flashpoint — the problem of super stiff characters in the background was fixed, or at least made less noticeable. Of course, there were still a few flaws and shortcuts I noticed. Like all the Wonder Woman protesters carrying the exact same sign, for example. And the weakest bit of action (perhaps intentionally) was the football game. It seemed like it was animated by people who knew very little of football. All the players were exactly the same size and seemed to move in slow motion. Obviously the football game shouldn't overshadow any of the superhero action, but it would have been nice had it looked better.
Hand-in-hand with the animation is the character and costume designs. I thought all of them looked great, especially the Flash's. His New 52 costume at the end of Flashpoint was atrocious, so seeing it improved here made me especially happy. Another big complaint from Flashpoint was the sheer enormity of many of the characters, but most of them were slimmed down here; although Superman still had a 30-inch neck. But altogether, everything worked very well. I thought Wonder Woman's ponytail would bug me, but it didn't. If I did have one complaint, it would be Shazam. They intentionally kept him smaller than Superman, which I think is a mistake, and I would have liked his lightning bolt symbol to extend farther down his shirt. But that's just a minor quibble.
The one character who got a true origin story in the comics was Cyborg, and pleasingly, this movie actually improved upon it. Making him the quarterback was a nice change, since it gave him some leadership qualities, which was much needed in this movie. They also played up the tension with his dad to good effect, and they did a better job of showing how he was nearly killed than Jim Lee's artwork portrayed. The scenes where he became Cyborg were also quite horrific, making us feel bad for the kid and understand his desire and need to run away from his dad. I was also happy that the movie didn't repeat Jim Lee's odd habit of constantly posing Cyborg in front of an American flag. Overall, Cyborg was very good in this movie, but I don't think it was necessary to make him connected to the Flash and Shazam.
My final compliment for this movie is the omission of Green Lantern's stupid fireworks. In the comic, he made a few green fireworks to distract Darkseid long enough for the other heroes to stab his eyes out. It was a very unimpressive scene, especially considering how detailed and amazing Jim Lee had drawn Lantern's other constructs in the previous issues. Now this movie easily could have ramped up the fireworks big time, and actually made them look like something that would distract Darkseid, but they chose to forgo that idea altogether, and probably for the better. Of course, in place of this, we got tons and tons and tons of fighting with Darkseid. Perhaps too much, but it was rather entertaining all the same.
Now it's time for the bad …
First of all, I have to complain about the voices. It seems like Jay Oliva and legendary voice director Andrea Romano took the idea of younger superheroes a bit too literally. Everybody sounds like an annoying college frat boy. They all came off like immature idiots, and I just wanted to smack every single one of them. Green Lantern (Justin Kirk) was the worst, partly because, as Batman said, he could not shut up. Batman (Jason O'Mara) was not much better, and Wonder Woman (Michelle Monaghan) was up and down. Even the great Sean Astin (who received top billing) couldn't prevent Shazam from sounding like a super annoying college freshman. And the Flash (Christopher Gorham) just made me sad. He had this really stupid tendency of talking really fast. And he came off as the biggest idiot in a movie full of idiots, especially with his, "Uhh, it looks like somebody took my chimichanga by mistake … I don't know how that could have happened … I mean, these ten burritos I bought are all identical …" I might just be prejudiced because the Flash is my favorite character, and I'll go into more detail on him later.
One thing that really added to the frat boy image was the script and dialogue. There's a difference between being inexperienced and being immature, but these filmmakers didn't seem to grasp that. It really just kind of felt like everybody was goofing off the whole time, not ever worried about the planet being destroyed. They constantly pulled themselves out of what should have been tense situations to crack cheesy one-liners and flirt with Wonder Woman. Seriously, four guys were fighting for a chance to be with Wonder Woman — Steve Trevor, Green Lantern, Superman (who didn't start dating her until later in the comics) and Shazam. I get that she's Wonder Woman, the most amazing woman on the planet, but couldn't we have limited the constant flirting a bit? And couldn't we have done without so many stupid lines of immature dialogue that wasn't in the source material? Like at the end when everybody asked Cyborg where Shazam was, and he says, "Uhh … he said he had to go on a hot date." And Green Lantern immediately responds with, "Who'd want to go on a date with that immature loser?" Seriously? You guys just fought side-by-side in the most horrific alien invasion the planet has ever seen. Half the city is destroyed with fires and buildings crumbling all around. And you have to throw out one more lame frat boy joke.
One of the great things about these direct-to-DVD movies for DC was the decision to make them PG-13. This gave them the freedom to be more faithful to the source material that was usually harsher than what would normally appear in DC's cartoons. But what happens when the source material isn't harsh enough to earn a PG-13 rating itself, but the producers still want that higher rating to presumably increase sales? You get an awkward movie like this. Geoff Johns' story was perfectly acceptable for comic book readers of most ages, which is exactly what you want for a big entry-point story like this. But since a direct adaptation of this comic wasn't harsh enough, the filmmakers did what they could to boost up the rating by adding a few extra parademon decapitations, lots of blood dripping from Darkseid's eye, and a few extra (and unnecessary) swear words. All they needed to do was follow the comic a little closer and show a couple of kids about to be killed by Darkseid. In this regard, I missed producer Bruce Timm the most. I feel like he could have done a better job getting this movie up to a PG-13.
But speaking of kids in danger, this movie practically eliminated the common man from this story entirely. We saw about 15 people at the football game, maybe 10 people protesting Wonder Woman, and a handful of people all-too-conveniently rescued by Cyborg at the end. We caught a brief glimpse of Barry Allen's office, but there was no attempt to include Director Singh, Captain Frye, James Forrest or Patty Spivot in the background. I guess we did see Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen at the end, so that's something. But one of my favorite moments of the comic — David Graves huddling together with his family before Darkseid killed them — was completely eliminated, as was any sense of threat or tragedy to normal people. Darkseid and his parademons just showed to give these super powered frat boys a fun adventure, right?
Steve Trevor had a pretty minor role in the comics, and the movie somehow managed to reduce that role even more. He basically only had one line of dialogue, in which he chastised Wonder Woman for not fulfilling her responsibilities to meet the president, and then, in the same breath, he tries to take her out on a date. Wait, didn't you just say the president of the United States was waiting for her right now? Why are trying to take her to the best ice cream place in D.C.? The diminishment of Steve Trevor also killed the notion that the Justice League had to work to gain the government's and public's trust. The scene of a conflicted Trevor being ordered to open fire on his girlfriend and the other heroes was completely eliminated, as was any notion that the Flash was working hard to get the police off his back, since he was already working well with Dr. Stone and S.T.A.R. Labs. The only sense of any mistrust we saw was a couple of kids watching an iPad video of what appeared to be Batman, but was actually a parademon, so that didn't count; then there was the lady Green Lantern rescued, who acted like it was completely normal to be abducted by an alien and rescued by a glowing green guy. She was annoyed by his flirting, and angry that he dropped her off on the top of a random roof. That whole bit was too nonsensical to count. And then there was the Wonder Woman protest. At first, it seemed like the lead protester had a legitimate complaint — Wonder Woman and other superheroes were taking the law into their own hands, causing millions of dollars of damages and setting a bad example for the youth. But like everything else in this movie, this scene had to be turned into a joke. Wonder Woman used her lasso of truth on this guy to get him to confess about cross dressing as Wonder Woman to feel powerful. So really, the only complaint this guy had was that he secretly had a strange fetish with the Amazonian princess, was embarrassed by it, and decided to take out his rage against her with claims that he didn't believe in and probably weren't true. So ultimately, nobody was afraid of or angry with the superheroes. But we still had that line at the end where the Flash suggested they leave before they get blamed again. Blamed again? You haven't been legitimately blamed once this whole movie!
Now, I understand that things need to be changed when you adapt a story into a movie. That's why it's called an adaptation. But I can't stand unnecessary changes that don't enhance or improve the movie in any conceivable way. My first minor complaint with this was changing Green Lantern's firetruck at the beginning to a train. That opening splash page in the comic was incredible because of the detail Jim Lee put into that truck. It had windshield wipers, bumpers, tires, ladders, hoses, everything. Now, I know a train is more powerful than a firetruck, but it's also easier to draw, which seemed to be the primary motivation here. It also sucked that Green Lantern made a second train to bash into Darkseid later on. Shouldn't he have started with a firetruck then work his way up to a train?
But my biggest complaint about an unnecessary change was the little girl who taught Wonder Woman the joy of ice cream. In the comic, the girl was black. In the movie, she was white. Why? Did these filmmakers feel it wasn't realistic to have a black girl in Washington, D.C.? Did they feel it wasn't realistic to have Wonder Woman talk to a black girl or for a black girl to idolize this super heroine? Or did the filmmakers not actually read the comic but only the script adaptation that just happened to omit the girl's ethnicity? Whatever the reason, there is no justification for this. These filmmakers either come out looking racist or sloppy.
Now, of course, the biggest change to this movie was replacing Aquaman with Shazam. This one really shocked me, because Geoff Johns made it his personal crusade to make Aquaman cool in the New 52. And he succeeded. But his omission in this movie sends out the message that DC was worried audiences wouldn't think Aquaman is cool. Don't give in to those fears! Include Aquaman to show us why he is awesome, just as Geoff Johns did in the Justice League and Aquaman comics. Now, these filmmakers did include a post-credits scene leading into the Throne of Atlantis storyline to potentially justify excluding Aquaman. But that's a really stupid justification because one of the great things about Throne of Atlantis was that Aquaman was a founding member of the Justice League and had built a five-year history with the other heroes. Eliminating that aspect will surely hurt that movie when it does come out. Also, that post-credits scene was pretty weak. Ocean Master came out of nowhere, holding a dead man in his arms, and said, to no one in particular, "The surface world killed our king! This is an act of war!" It would have been better had he actually been talking to somebody.
I have recently taken quite a liking to Shazam. I don't even mind not calling him Captain Marvel anymore. I bought the Shazam trade by Geoff Johns and Gary Frank and loved it. In fact, Shazam is now my second-favorite character after the Flash. So while I was angry that Aquaman was left out, I was hopeful that Shazam could be an interesting replacement. In Johns' story, Billy Batson was a brat, who really had no business gaining the powers of the gods. But Black Adam had recently been freed, so the old wizard really had no choice and had to turn Billy into Shazam. But that experience taught Billy a lot, and he started to grow up and be less of a brat. So how did this movie treat him? Billy certainly started off as a brat — he snuck into the football game, stole Vic's jersey, and openly resented his foster family. But then he saw a parademon in his backyard and suddenly, randomly turned into Shazam, and continued to act like an immature jerk the whole time.
It feels like the filmmakers rushed to make this movie so quickly that they wrote the script before Geoff Johns had finished writing his Shazam story. They saw the part where Billy was a jerk and ran with it, not bothering to ask Johns what he had intended with the character. They really missed a great opportunity here. They could have seamlessly incorporated Shazam's origin into this story by making the old wizard give Billy the powers in anticipation of Darkseid's invasion. Instead, we're left to wonder why this rotten little kid who frequently runs away, steals, lies and cheats can turn into a superhero whenever he wants to. And another thing that really irked me was the de-powering Shazam got so as to not threaten Superman too much. Historically, Captain Marvel has always been on equal terms with Superman in regards to size and strength. But this movie made him noticeably smaller and reduced all his powers to the ability to create lightning. If you watch closely, you'll notice that Shazam never throws an actual punch in the movie. He throws a lot of lightning and electrocutes Darkseid a bunch, but that's it. Having him help Cyborg power the boom tubes did not increase his significance. I actually kind of suspect Shazam really only replaced Aquaman because he has the ability to fly.
Everybody can fly in this movie — even Darkseid, who I've never seen fly before. And I guess it makes sense to give Cyborg a jetpack, especially when a big priority of this movie seems to be to re-create the aerial battles from Man of Steel. The only problem with this is my favorite character, Flash, can't fly. Batman can't either, but he was busy saving Superman, so he's fine. But Flash spent a large part of this movie literally doing nothing. At one point, Wonder Woman seemed to feel bad for him and shouted, "Now, Flash! Put out his other eye!" Even though anyone else could have easily done it. So Flash runs up to a firefighter, pulls a crowbar out his hand, and says in his annoyingly fast voice, "Hi, I need this to save the world. Thanks! Bye!" And then he jams the crowbar into Darkseid's eye, but that's not enough, so Shazam hits it with a bolt of lightning. No, a crowbar is not a worthy replacement of Aquaman's trident, and no, this moment does not count as Flash's "big moment."
So as I've said before, I'm a big Flash fan, so I'm probably more sensitive to these things, but I genuinely felt like these filmmakers had it against the Flash. They got rid of all his big moments and made him look like a worthless idiot. In the comics, Flash joins the action when Green Lantern calls him to save him and Batman from Superman. Flash arrives before Green Lantern even finishes his sentence, and has a fun little fight with Superman. But that scene was replaced with Batman calling Superman "Clark," who then uses his X-ray vision to discover he's Bruce Wayne, and Green Lantern yells, "Who the hell's Bruce Wayne?" This really hurt the moment that happened later, when Batman revealed his identity to Green Lantern to connect to him and get him to calm down. But hurting that crucial scene was worth the price to pay to prevent the Flash from potentially upstaging Superman!
In the movie, the Flash is brought into the action when he randomly calls Dr. Stone right when the parademons arrive. Dr. Stone yells, "We're in trouble!" But the Flash can't arrive immediately, because this is Cyborg's moment. Cyborg fights off the parademons, then Flash finally arrives and does absolutely nothing. He stands around for a bit, then awkwardly decides to leave after he kind of questioned Dr. Stone's parenting. Way to make an entrance, Flash!
And then the movie killed what I consider to be Flash's big moment of this story. In the comics, when Darkseid first arrived, he immediately knocked out all the heroes with one strike (the movie did help show that he pounded the ground with glowing red fists). Flash was first to recover, which makes sense because of his super speed. Superman was next, but he was slow to get up, and Flash had to pick him up and push him out of the way of Darkseid's omega beams. Flash then got rid of his omega beam by vibrating through a parademon, while Superman wasn't so lucky. But in the movie, Superman was completely resistant to Darkseid's initial attack, and he stood his ground while the other heroes were knocked out. Flash just happened to be standing directly behind Superman, so he was free to be chased by the omega beams. Flash didn't need to help Superman at all in this movie, and for some reason, the act of him vibrating through a parademon was too unbelievable for the filmmakers to include. Instead, he just kind of ran around a few parademons, and the omega beam just kind of died out. Of course, they had to weaken the omega beams because Darkseid, like Superman with his heat vision, was blasting his beams pretty much nonstop in the movie. But the real sin here is consciously making the Flash weaker, ultimately making it look like he didn't deserve to be a member of the Justice League. All his little "moments" in this movie were quite generic and boring.
The movie also failed to improve the very convenient ending Geoff Johns wrote. First, there was little to no motivation for Darkseid to invade Earth. In the comics, he mentioned something about his daughter, but then that was quickly forgotten. In the movie, they seemed to imply that his main goal was to kidnap Superman and turn him into a super parademon. It would have been nice to have Darkseid actually say a few more lines than all the grunting and yelling he did. And speaking of Superman, his rescue was pretty lame. Batman used his incredible detective skills to deduce that Desaad's microphone was on this left, which means he's right-handed, which means the power button is right here. Huh? Whatever, he's Batman. Anyway, that bit is immediately overshadowed by the oh-no! Superman has turned evil! Superman kills Desaad (and nobody says anything about it) and then attacks Batman. But then suddenly, Superman's alright and back on Earth helping them fight Darkseid. I actually think there's a missing scene here, because Superman and Batman come back wearing parademon armor … kinda.
Anyway, Cyborg spends forever trying to get the boom tube thing to work, which provided plenty of opportunities for everybody to get their last hits in. Turns out the mother box is actually just like a cellphone, and Cyborg needed to fly up into the sky to get a better reception. And then Shazam needed to supercharge it because he needed something to do and you can't include Captain Marvel in a movie without having him weaponize his Shazam cry somehow. And then Cyborg conveniently saves all the hostages and about 12 people walk up to the heroes to congratulate them. We then head to the big White House speech, where, just as in the comics, the heroes rudely talk during the president's speech while on stage. Seriously, you're in front of millions of people! Save these conversations for a later time! And then the movie ends with Shazam stealing the Flash's last joke because Shazam needs something to do and we don't like the Flash in this movie.
Ugh. I'm tired of complaining. Suffice it to say, I was surprised by how much I hated this movie. I was really looking forward to it, especially after the great Flashpoint movie. But this one … it just sucked. There's no way around it. And now I have absolutely no desire to watch any new DC animated movies. Not under these creators.
Final score: 1
