Super effort pays off nicely
ITHINK DC and Warner Bros have finally figured out this superhero movie thing — and not a moment too soon, either.
The latest chapter in the DC Extended Universe (DCEU) series, Justice League, is a welcome sign that the franchise finally knows where it’s going.
Following on from the events of Man of Steel, Batman v Superman and Wonder Woman, Justice League sees a new threat preparing to devastate the Earth, a Steppenwolf — no, not the band, more of an alien/demigod/interdimensional bad guy kinda deal. It pays not to think too hard.
Steppenwolf (voiced by Ciaran Hinds) is trying to find and reunite three mystical boxes, in order to unleash some sort of all-powerful force that will allow him to dominate the entire world.
Diana Prince/Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot) and Bruce Wayne/Batman (Ben Affleck) are aware of the danger, but know they can’t stop him alone, so Batman enacts his back-up plan: assembling a team of gifted individuals who might be able to help.
He enlists Arthur Curry/ Aquaman (Jason Momoa), Barry Allen/The Flash (Ezra Miller) and Victor Stone/ Cyborg (Ray Fisher), the beginnings of the Justice League.
Despite their differences, the league of heroes must work together to stop Steppenwolf.
Yeah, so that all sounds like a very basic, cookie-cutter plot, doesn’t it? And, quite frankly, that’s as it should be.
Batman v Superman took a reasonably simple idea and turned it into a plot so overwrought and convoluted that it no longer made sense
MARTAIN
and was no longer fun.
Justice League has a bad guy who needs to be stopped. The good guys get together to stop him. Simple.
And we really do get to see plenty of costumed hero action in this one, as well as some strong character development and interactions among the ensemble cast (I smell a bit of Joss Whedon’s influence here).
I finally enjoyed watching Batman. Affleck is wonderful in the role (yes, I was wrong when I said he wouldn’t be, we all make mistakes), and Justice League finally gives him the scope to just BE the Batman.
Miller’s Barry Allen is a total hoot. This raw and untested incarnation of a young Flash is the comic relief for the story: the fastest man alive, who is constantly tripping over his own feet and in need of rescuing. His dialogue is very funny, his character one of the more relatable.
And of course Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman is superb in every way.
She is easily the best thing that has happened to this series, and I’d say the success of her solo movie taught the producers some hard lessons in how they should have been doing the other movies better.
Gadot captures those contrasting elements of Diana’s character, the strength, the compassion, the power and the innocence, combined with a perfect physical performance as well. She was good before, she’s still good.
Momoa is also great fun as Aquaman. I fear I can no longer use that gag “Aquaman sucks”, because this version of Aquaman does not suck, he is relentlessly cool.
Thankfully they opted not to go for the classic orangeshirted look of the character, but a variation of the more modern incarnations — it works.
Cyborg is possibly one of the more interesting characters, from an origin perspective, but his Frankenstein’s monster-esque character feels oddly underexplored here for some reason.
And his far-too-shiny CGI body is the shoddiest special effect in the film. It looks like it was rendered in a real hurry and nobody bothered retouching it to fit in with the rest of the frame. It looks so artificial that it was distracting.
Steppenwolf is also oddly underdeveloped. Sure, he’s big and scary and makes a great punching bag for the good guys, but we never really get a handle on what he’s up to and why.
The movie uses that classic tactic of belting along so fast that you don’t get a chance to worry too much, but at the end, looking back, I realised how little I actually knew about his motivations and his plan.
Danny Elfman’s score brings the movie to life with the kind of epic, orchestral overtures that this kind of story needs. And yes, those are snippets from the original Superman theme and Batman theme that you’ll hear popping up occasionally.
It is a shame director Zack Snyder still insists on inserting semi-ironic pop music and overstated rock bangers throughout the film.
There is a solid cast here, a good story, a great production design, but it feels like nobody is quite trusting the movie to be taken seriously on its own merits yet.
But at least the DCEU finally feels like it is going somewhere. After some clumsy attempts to launch it in a hurry, without really doing the groundwork properly, it seems to be returning to an even keel now: no slavish pandering to the mega-fans, no dumbing down for the other end with a video-clip attention span, just a good, accessible, exciting comic book superhero adventure.
is now Showing at Village Cinemas and Cmax, rated M. Rating: