Zack Snyder's Justice League

The moment has come that some had clamored for. The moment I never wanted to see happen. Let me start by saying this. I don't like that this exists because it validates all the toxic fan boys, angry over how Justice League turned out, who cried out for the Snyder's original vision of his movie. I hate that public pressure made this happen. If only people like this would use their power for good. How about more representation? How about better story telling? No, give me that thing that I don't have because I'm going to bully you for it. I love comics, but the community surrounding them can be very toxic and I hate that. I feel like this movie is the manifestation of that.

Clearly I have a lot of feelings before even coming into this movie. I will try to be as objective as possible, but remember, these are my opinions and I will feel what I feel.

To prep me, I took the crazy step of re-watching the theatrical release of this movie first, so I can have something to compare to. It is absolutely a mess. It is exactly what happens when you have two people with competing visions working on a movie, like what happened here.

Let me start by answering the question, is this Snyder Cut better than the theatrical. In one of the few nice things I will say about this movie is that yes, this version is better than the theatrical. However, that does not mean that this is a good movie. Before I go too far, let me say a few things about the theatrical version of the film that we initially got. Maybe the shine has come off Whedon, but he made some strange choices with the material he was given and what he decided to add. One huge difference right off the bat is how the movie begins. In the Whedon version, we get these kids taking a video of themselves asking Superman what is the equivalent of "Con questions". You know, dumb questions you would ask at a comic convention. It is such a weird choice. Are they trying to humanize Superman? Show how he is missed? It is out of context and weird. In the Snyder cut, we get Superman being killed by Doomsday and letting out a sonic scream that drives that version of the movie. It goes on for a while. I'll be honest, I hate this as well. Both beginnings are dumb. 

Also, Whedon tries to inject humor into this movie at the wrong places. I guess he was chosen because of what he did with the Avengers movies, but I can tell you that is a wrong choice. It doesn't fit this movie. We get a couple of one liners from some of the characters that are forced. Batman in particular has some that don't fit how they made his character through this movie and BvS. For example, when they fight Superman just after middle of the movie, he quips about bleeding a little after Superman zings him with his own line from the last movie, "Do you bleed?".

As evidenced between the two hour running time of the theatrical version and the four hours of the Snyder cut, there is a LOT left on the cutting room floor. The disjointed nature of the theatrical version is evidence of that. Whedon seemed disinterested in most of this and just wanted to get it done. So things flow weird.

Anyways, I could continue to talk about new scenes, different musical choices and other things, but I'm here to talk about what I thought of the "definitive" version of this movie.

Any version of this movie should NOT be FOUR HOURS. I'm sorry, if you can't decide where to cut your movie to make it into a 2 and a half to three hour film, that problem lies on you. That is where Snyder fails. He needs to be edited. Left to his own devices, we get this movie. He meanders or creates scenes that are completely unnecessary. We do not need an explanation for every little thing. The entire epilogue is confounding and does not need to exist. It tells us nothing.

My biggest complaint is how overstuffed this movie is. This movie is trying to do a lot. It is a tall order to establish a world ending threat, bring together three characters we know and then introduce three new characters and give some of their backstory to get us up to speed. One of my big problems with both of these versions is it does what the Avengers didn't. We learned about Cap, Iron Man, Thor and Hulk from their own movies before they get thrown together. With that out of the way, they didn't have to try and weave in any backstory for them, you could just focus on how they mesh as a team. This movie tries to have it's cake and eat it too. I suspect that's another reason they brought Whedon in. Instead it does a disservice to every character involved, specifically Cyborg but also Aquaman and the Flash.

Let me get to some of the details of what I actually liked in this version before I go into more dislikes. For those of you that are fans, I'm sorry, but there are going to be a lot more dislikes. 

I like that Steppenwolf is now positioned more as the lackey that he is and that he bows down to Darkseid. We even see and hear from Darkseid in this movie. So that is cool. What I didn't like is how Steppenwolf's new design looks. Somehow, they made him even more generic looking. He is wrapped in this silver armor and given the muted colors of this movie, it can be hard to distinguish him from the parademons or the Justice League he is fighting unless the camera is centered on him. I hate his new look. 

So apparently Ryan Choi (another version of "The Atom") is in this version, so he was completely cut from the theatrical version. I wish I knew the reasoning behind that decision. If there is one thing this movie does RIGHT, is it is now starting to world build outside of the main group. This character is done a huge disservice. However, not as bad as how they did Cyborg. Let me just go into that real quick.

I totally get why Ray Fisher, the actor portraying Cyborg, was super pissed about the Whedon version of this movie. A lot of backstory that at least helps to flesh him out is completely lost in that version. As far as you know, he's some black dude that is mostly robot. In this version, you know he was a sports star, was actually smart and really had some deep seeded issues with his dad. None of that is contextualized in the theatrical cut. As much as they cut from him, you would almost be better off cutting him out of the entire movie completely. It's that egregious.

It is weird to see Martian Manhunter show up in this version, but ultimately he feels very fan service-y. When he does feels very weird and out of place. He is a guy you can leave until the next movie. This movie was already overstuffed as it is.

Another issue I have with this movie and the theatrical version is the treatment of Superman in the Snyder films. He is always regarded as a threat and we are shown many times in all the movies preceding this how people were afraid of him. Now that he's dead, the world seems to forget all that and mourns him. Like a LOT. These movies didn't earn that reverence, especially when he was always played up as dangerous and needing to be controlled. Don't forget Batman's whole deal in the previous movie was to KILL him. This movie goes a long way to trying to talk about how Superman is so important, but really he is the Deus Ex Machina in this film. At least in this version of the film we see a little more of him and the fight scenes play out a little different. I do not like that they put him in the black suit here. That is also more fan service we didn't need. Put him in the red and blue. This movie's color palette is already muted as it is, I don't need more monochrome nonsense on my screen. Also, everyone just treated like it was normal and made no mention of it.

Similarly, I think it is a weird choice to say that the invasion of Earth was held back by the presence of Superman and that once he was dead, Darkseid felt like they could invade this world. I truly doubt after conquering thousands of planets, this one dude is a threat to him. To put my last point on Superman, I am tired of Snyder always reverting to having Superman floating in the air with the sun behind him, making him feel like a religious figure. It's so tired.

I have much more I could say, but let me get to my last point. Some of you might have seen a meme or picture about how this movie has over 24 minutes of slo-mo shots. You may be like, "So what?". I absolutely hate how much slow mo is used in this film. It made me come to grips with the main reason why I hate Snyder as a director. When he did it in 300, that was fine. That movie was all about action and no story. I think he did it a lot in Sucker Punch. He absolutely did it a lot in Watchmen. He did it a bit in Man of Steel. He did it in Batman versus Superman. He does it even more here. You can see where I'm going with this. He overuses this a lot. I know that may be his "thing", but it is obscene. Not everything needs to be slowed down. We joke about JJ Abrahams always using lens flares all over the place, but at least he's not doing it once every 5 minutes. That is what this movie feels like. Snyder is a guy obsessed with these shots and he has not evolved over the course of all those films I named. He should be better than this by now, but he isn't. The only time I would forgive it's use is when the Flash is involved. However, look at X-Men: Days of Future Past and watch the Quicksilver scene to know how you SHOULD use slow-mo with a speedster. This movie fails. I'm sorry, but clearly this really bugged me. I'll finish by saying the Flash scene in the movie where he saves Iris (or I'm guessing that is her) is borderline creepy in how long it takes. 

I could probably go on and on, but I will stop here. I subjected you, dear reader, to enough of my complaining. Look, Snyder did a good job setting up pieces to be used by other more talented (or competent) directors, so he will get kudos for that. I do not want him ever touching anything in the DC Universe. I hope this movie does not make Warner Bros. reconsider him because that is a mistake. Put him on cinematography because he knows how to create cool shots, but he cannot craft a cohesive story.

This is your warning to not waste four hours on this if you can help it. Take it from me. The crazy person that watched six hours of this almost willingly. 

WandaVision

I've had a few days to sit on what I thought about Marvel's WandaVision. I know you come here for my hot take on comic book shows I actually take the time to watch. Let's get to it!

To be honest, I surprisingly liked this show. I will give it a solid B+, but that is still high praise from me. Specifically because I don't care for Scarlet Witch and the Vision in their comic forms and even less so in the Marvel movies. Both are extremely powerful and had to be de-powered in weird ways to make them work in the movies. Also, despite how good the actors are, who really cared about them? Not me, that's for sure.

So one thing I will give this show praise for is it fleshed out the character of Wanda. We get backstory (finally!) and at it's core, it's a story about someone trying to deal with the grief of a loved one. Getting this insight made her infinitely more interesting and convinced me that Elizabeth Olsen is a good actor. 

There was also a great deal of tension in the first few episodes of this show. You knew something was off and you had to wait for the show to slowly reveal itself. I will admit that I initially didn't like the conceit of this show. We were going to see Wanda and Vision's life play out in this faux TV sitcom universe. I was impatient through the first two episodes, but that started to wear off once they revealed more of what was truly going on. In retrospect, I think that was a good choice.

This was a slickly produced show and I liked the lesser characters they pull in from the Marvel Cinematic Universe. They obviously can't get any of the big guns, but you like to see consistency and believe that all these characters exist in the same universe unlike some shows (looking at you, Agents of Shield). I like Jimmy Woo, I don't mind Darcy and I loved seeing Monica Rambeau. So having those be focal points of the cast were a good move. Also, how awesome was it that we got to see the Quicksilver we all love from those Fox X-Men movies. That was a nice surprise.

I think what worked against this show and for many of my comic book nerd friends are our expectations. We have not had any Marvel content in a while and we all knew events here would lead into some of the movies coming up. So this show gets weighed down by what we wanted versus what their Vision (see what I did there?) was. Me personally, I kept hearing rumors that maybe, possibly, this could lead into the Fantastic Four making an appearance. Maybe we thought Mephisto was involved. Perhaps we were going to get a House of X style thing and in the reverse, we get mutants and the X-Men get brought into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. So as the show kept doing more reveals, I was disappointed that NONE of the theories I thought panned out. It's unfortunate because the Agatha Harkness reveal, while seemingly underwhelming to some, works in the context of this show. 

The other expectation is that because these are super heroes, we're going to get a lot of super hero battles. In a way I wanted that, but I'm glad we didn't get too much of that. I love hand to hand combat stuff, but I loathe battles where lightning bolts, energy beams, projectiles in general are just shot back and forth from a distance. This show had a take on that at the end, but at least it wasn't a couple of episodes worth.

At the end of the day, it got people talking and I loved being able to be part of the moment and see reactions from people or talk with friends about it. In that way, the show was effective. It was a creative show and it also sets up Wanda for bigger things in this post Avengers: Endgame world. Like I said at the top, I was not a fan of either character, but this show helped change that. Now if we can just find out what happened to Vision. If you watched the show, you know what I truly mean.

The Inevitable Best and Worst List of 2020 - Part II

Let's carry on with Part II of my year in review. Now we get on to favorite writers, mini-series, events and favorite series. I have also started to read more graphic novels, so I now have a category for that as well.

Favorite Writer of 2020
Dan Slott - Fantastic Four (Marvel) - I may be telegraphing my pick here, but I loved the Fantastic Four book so much this year. I am biased because it is my favorite super hero team, but Slott has infused some of the old with the new. Clearly he has a reverence for these characters and it comes through and how he has brought back old, classic feeling tales of the four. He has the voices for everyone and I am glad to see that not only has he progressed Ben Grim and Alicia's relationship, but also that of the Franklin children as well. There are a lot of characters now, but he juggles those relationships well here. I was not convinced with him on this book at first, but he's turned me around. What can I say?

Honorable Mention: Chip Zdarsky (Daredevil), Saladin Ahmed (Miles Morales: Spider-Man), Donnie Cates (Thor)

Pleasant Surprise of 2020
Doctor Doom (Marvel) - I already sang some praises for Christopher Cantwell above that writes this book. When I picked this book up, it was done so primarily because I'm a huge Fantastic Four fan and I like Doctor Doom. I figured at best this would be an interesting mini-series. I did not expect to love the characterization of Doom and the general story of this book. Doom is spot on in this book.

Honorable Mentions:  Wonder Woman (DC)

Shocker of 2020
X of Swords (Marvel) - How exhausting it is - This is the best and worst of Hickman. When I heard about this initially I was kind of excited. We are back to the days of epic X-Men crossovers. Instead you are left wondering, did this REALLY need to be 22 issues long? That is asking a lot of people. It doesn't help that it is decompressed story telling at it's worst. I'm sure it will make a great trade. Also, he doesn't do a good job of explaining who the people are, so I am completely lost on why I have to care. Also, the choice of X-Men used leaves a lot to be desired.

Worst Mini-series of 2020
Empyre (Marvel) - I put this here because it was more disappointing than anything. I am also tired of these big events. This one was no exception in that you had to read like 5 other tie in books to get the gaps filled in. The main book should do that and it felt disjointed. What should have been a big deal with the Kree/Skrull aligning themselves turned into everyone fighting nameless plant monsters. SNORE. Also, I don't see this changing things long term at all. Maybe I will be wrong.

Honorable Mentions: X of Swords (Marvel)

Favorite Mini-series of 2020
Power Rangers/Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (IDW/Boom Studios) - For pure fun, nothing is beating this book. Watching the turtles ride in Zords wearing variations on the power ranger costumes? Pure bliss. Watching each of the characters pair up and talk to each other like you imagined they would? Also cool. Who cares about the cockamamie way you combine these universes, it just works. A whole lot of fun. I like both properties, so I'm clearly biased. It's like this was written for me. To be clear, these were the OG Rangers. There's been so many variations over the years I feel like I need to clarify here.

Honorable Mentions: Batman: Three Jokers (DC), X-Men / Fantastic Four (Marvel), Amazing Mary Jane (Marvel), Outer Darkness/Chew (Image)

Favorite New Series of 2020
Strange Academy (Marvel) - I initially picked this up solely based on the creative team of Skottie Young and Humberto Ramos. However, I was quickly sucked in because I am a sucker for teen team books and that is what this is. This is like a mystical new mutants or teen titans or any other variation of a teen based book. Like X-Men, you get older characters as the faculty. So for now, this is how I will get my fix of Doctor Voodoo for example. I think the closest book I would compare this to is the "Wolverine and the X-Men" book from nearly ten years ago. Same kind of vibe. It is a lot of fun.

Honorable Mentions: N/A

Favorite Graphic Novel of 2020
Kodi (Top Shelf) - With this year being devoid of joy, I NEEDED this book. I think you all need this too. It is a sometimes sad, but charming and delightful book about a little girl, Katya that befriends a bear she meets in the woods. What follows is a charming tale about friendship between Katya and the bear she calls Kodi. This is like those classic 80's or 90's films about kids and their pets. To say any more would give it away. It is written and drawn by Jared Cullum. I am also at the point where I try to think about what kind of books I can have for my future kids and this is something I think I can share with them and would love to even read to them. I implore you, go pick this up.

Honorable Mentions: Shadow of the Batgirl (DC)

Favorite Maxi-Series
Ghosted in LA (Boom! Box) - I will admit that I created this category just so I can give this series some love. It is a simple slice of life book that involves ghosts. I'm being reductive, but I loved the writing and the art of this book. Sometimes instead of reading about super heroes in capes, I just want every day life books about people. I would prefer if they didn't have a super natural element to them, but this book is different because there is not any evil involved. Just people being people. It is absolutely delightful. Sina Grace is quickly becoming a writer that I am starting to follow.

Honorable Mentions: Ronin Island (Boom! Studios)

Worst Series of 2020
Action Comics (DC) - I initially liked all of the Superman stuff that Brian Michael Bendis was putting out. It had focused more on the daily planet side of Superman's life. Then over the past few months, Action Comics became a slog. It was not fun to read. Combine that with the old school art of John Romita Jr. and I was over this book. I respect him and the work he has put in the last thirty plus years. Now though, his style does not work anymore. It really doesn't. I'm not sure what happened, but I lost interest in this book, even when Bendis tried to handle the fact that our pre-New 52 Superboy is now in this universe. It was too little, too late.

Honorable Mentions: Excalibur (Marvel)

Favorite Series of 2020
Fantastic Four (Marvel) - Look, I am as shocked as you are. As I noted above, I'm a huge Fantastic Four fan. However, the comic has been over the past few years when it's not cancelled, mediocre at best. This is Marvel's first family and a lot of tales have been told over the years, so it is hard to keep things fresh. What Dan Slott has done with this run and especially this year is to blend old classic heroes/villains with some different takes. In the middle of this run, we were told that the cosmic rays that hit the FF were not random, but targeted by this planet of aliens. I hated the retconning. Afterwards though, we moved past that and he went back to his stories. We have seen these characters grow. Ben/Alicia now have a little family comprising of a pair of kids (one a skrull, one a kree). Their story was tragic and seeing the turn it is taking has been nice. The Richards and their kids are continuing to grow up and now Val and Franklin have something to do. Even Johnny Storm has someone. So the family feel of this book has never been stronger. They continue to add more cosmic threats which is this book's bread and butter anyway. Sorry to gush so much, but it just lets you know how much I've enjoyed this title. It is always the first book I read when I get my stack of new comics. As I thought back on the series that gave me joy, this popped to the top of the list.

Honorable Mentions:  Wolverine (Marvel), Firepower (Image)

The Inevitable Best and Worst List of 2020 - Part I

I think we can all agree that 2020 has been a crap year. I don't think I have anything else to say that could more accurately capture that. Instead of focusing on all of that, let's get to my Best and Worst List of 2020. There was a pause in the comic industry at the beginning of the pandemic and then things picked back up. So even in the industry it was unprecedented. In trying to think back on this year with my old man brain, I will try to summon up my memories to capture them here.

I do know that my reading of Marvel Comics has continued to go up, while the number of DC titles have diminished to only really sticking with the Trinity of Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman. Outside of Far Sector by N.K. Jemisin, I'm out of DC for now. I continue to read more and more independent comics from the other companies such as Image, IDW, Boom!Studios, TKO Studios etc.

I even found myself funding a number of Kickstarter projects this year to support black creators. This year, I even decided to add a few more categories. Favorite Graphic Novel and Favorite Maxi-series (series that go to 12 issues). This is so I can give some other books much needed love.
Anyways, without further ado, here is part I of my review of 2020.


Dearly Departed (The Comics I dropped this year)
Before I get into the rest of my list, a moment of silence for the number of comics that I dropped this year after giving a good go at it:

• New Mutants - Marvel
• Batman and the Outsiders - DC
• Undiscovered Country - Image
• Quantum and Woody Books - Valiant
• Excalibur - Marvel

Favorite Comic Book Movie of 2020 

Birds of Prey and The Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn (Warner Bros) - Because 2020, this was a pretty easy pick. At this point, there were only two comic book movies that came out. This movie and "The Old Guard" which is based on a comic book series written by Greg Rucka. The pandemic pushed everything else out to next year for all the major releases. Wonder Woman comes out December 25th, so we'll see if that changes my opinion. I doubt it though because this movie was really good. I will spare you my full review because you can find that here. It was a fun movie and shows the direction DC should head in with their movies.

Honorable Mentions: The Old Guard (Netflix)

Worst Comic Book Movie of 2020
Wonder Woman 84' (Warner Bros) - Oh man. On the flip side of DC movies, there is this film. What a way to end 2020. This came out in just enough time for me to watch it and come up with my opinion. It was not good. I had high hopes and this movie dashed them. This was an easy choice for worst comic book movie of the year. I won't say any more than what my fresh review says.

Honorable Mention: N/A

Favorite Comic Book TV Show of 2020
Harley Quinn - Seasons 1 and 2 - I realize these may not be new, but they were new to me and as I've stated before, it was slim pickings in 2020. Even still, this show probably would have won this hands down anyway. After backing into HBO Max (apparently having the HBO add in for Hulu is good enough), I quickly blazed through this series. Kaley Cuoco is perfectly cast as Harley Quinn. The rest of the cast is amazing, with special shout outs to Alan Tudyk as both Joker and Clayface and Lake Bell as Poison Ivy. The show is legitimately funny and surprisingly violent. They got this show just right and I can't wait to see more. I have not laughed this hard consistently in a long time.

Honorable Mentions: N/A

Worst TV show of 2020
The Boys - Season 2 - It's not that this show was bad, per se. I just didn't watch a lot of comic book based shows this year. I'm way behind in all of them. So this gets the spot. I will say, that I liked the first season better. The shock value in the first season was fresh. Here, they ramp up the shock value, but the escalation feels gratuitous. Also, the show felt a lot slower. I had more trouble taking the Boys seriously because our heroes spin their wheels doing a whole lot of nothing. Homelander is still just as menacing and I worry for any character that is in the room with him.

Honorable Mention: N/A.

The “Oh you still come out and I buy you” of 2020
Deadly Class (Image) - To be fair, I am still enjoying this book and I will keep buying it. However, it's schedule has been iffy all year and it comes out when it comes out. Problem is, I can't really remember what happened between issues most of the time. I'm glad I have this on my pull list, otherwise I would never remember to keep up. Sadly, the TV show didn't make it past one season and I wonder if that took some of the heat off this book. It hasn't made me want to drop it yet, so there's that going for it.


Favorite New Artist of 2020
Victor Bogdanovic (Superman, Wolverine) - In the spirit of this award, Victor is not new to comics, but I took notice of his work for the first time this year and really started to appreciate it. It is hard for me to describe his style, but it is a good mix of cartoony and serious. He has great panel layouts as well. I think of him as being a little similar to Art Adams. His is a name that will now sell me on trying out a book going forward.

Honorable Mentions: Joshua Cassara - X-Force (Marvel)

Worst Artist of 2020
Szymon Kudranski - Fallen Angers (Marvel) - Maybe he's better than this. I don't know. What I saw of the Fallen Angels series from Marvel was egregious enough that it was easy to put his name here. I saved it in my phone the moment I saw it so I would remember later. I don't plan to give any more oxygen to this argument.

Honorable Mentions: Dexter Vines - Batman and the Outsiders (DC), Mark Bagley - Spider-Man (Marvel), Neal Adams - Fantastic Four: Antithesis

Favorite Artist of 2020
Jorge Jimenez - Batman (DC) - Jorge has always been one of my favorite up and coming artists but he leveled up with his work on Batman this year. I don't have the words to describe it, but it is absolutely gorgeous. His cartooning is top notch and he draws a damn good Batman. Everyone looks good the way he draws it. I only hope that the amount of high profile books he gets only increases. There was a lot of good art this year, but this stands out the most in my mind.

Honorable Mentions: Dan Mora - Once and Future (Boom Studios), Chris Samnee - Firepower (Image), Pepe Larraz -X-Men (Marvel), Jamal Campbell - Far Sector (DC)

Favorite New Writer of 2020
Christopher Cantwell - Doctor Doom, Fantastic Four: Road Trip (Marvel) - I never heard of Christopher Cantwell, but I picked up the Doctor Doom book because he is one of my favorite villains. What I found fascinating about the story was how it humanized him, but also dealt with a little of behind the scenes stuff with how Latveria works. Also, this felt VERY Doctor Doom. He is the hero in his own story and they lean into that here. Also, a few weeks ago, one shot horror story of the Fantastic Four came out from Cantwell and that was also surprisingly good. Apparently he is a co-creator of the show, "Halt and Catch Fire". It's good to see a TV guy come into comics and actually do it right. You'd be surprised how the comic medium vexes some would be writers. You're not writing prose here.

Honorable Mentions: N/A

Worst Writer of 2020
Tini Howard - Excalibur (Marvel) - I honestly can't tell if my intense dislike of this book was due to Howard's writing or my lack of care of the content. I'm not a fan of magic in the X books and I definitely don't care for Captain Marvel. I really picked this book up because I like Rogue, Gambit, Jubilee and the art of Marcus To. What I got instead was a mess of a book in the writing department. She may be a great writer, but this book was not a good reflection of that.

Honorable Mentions: N/A. (I can't remember anyone else that should be on this list)