🪦 Theatrical Cut Review — aka “The Josstice League”

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🧠 Opening Thoughts:

Okay, look—I’m keeping this one short.

Why? Because we all know this movie is a trainwreck. And more importantly, because Zack Snyder’s Justice League exists now, and this… this just feels like the decaying skeleton of what could’ve been.

I have zero desire to spend more time on this mess than I have to, but I’m still gonna break down why I hated this movie. Let’s suffer together, shall we?

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📖 Non-Spoiler Plot Rundown:

The story? Barely.

Batman and Wonder Woman team up to stop an alien threat named Steppenwolf, who wants to collect three things called Mother Boxes. What are Mother Boxes? No idea. Why are they called that? No clue. What do they do? Apparently, blow up planets. Cool. Great name. Feels like a budget version of the Infinity Stones.

The three boxes are scattered across:

• Themyscira (with the Amazons)
• Atlantis (even though Aquaman doesn’t live there because… reasons)
• Cyborg’s dad’s lab (because he used one to rebuild Victor’s body)

So Batman and Wonder Woman recruit Aquaman, Cyborg, and The Flash to stop Steppenwolf. Along the way, they realize they need Superman back, so they pull a Frankenstein and bring him back from the dead.

That’s it. That’s the plot. But oh lord, it’s so much worse in execution.

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👥 Characters & Actors:

• Batman (Ben Affleck):
  Sleepwalking through every scene like he regrets signing the contract.
• Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot):
  Tries her best, but they completely strip away the power and nuance she had in her solo film.
• Aquaman (Jason Momoa):
  Mostly here to drink, shout “my man!”, and flex. Atlantis who?
• Cyborg (Ray Fisher):
  Brooding and angry, but you’d never know why because this version cuts out his entire backstory.
• The Flash (Ezra Miller):
  Tries so hard to be funny. Tries too hard. Fails every time. The king of cringe.
• Superman (Henry Cavill):
  He’s dead for half the movie and CG-waxed for the other half. That lip… that cursed upper lip…
• Steppenwolf:
  A gray, boring, slow-moving CGI axe guy with zero personality and some of the worst lines imaginable.
• Commissioner Gordon (J.K. Simmons):
  Appears in one scene, does nothing, vanishes. Waste of a good actor.

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✅ Pros:

• …Give me a minute.
• Okay fine—some of the costumes look cool.
• Danny Elfman’s score has one or two nice nostalgic moments.
• Uh… it ends?

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❌ Cons:

• The CGI. My god. The color grading looks like the whole film was shot through a dirty window. Steppenwolf looks like a PS3 cutscene reject. And then there’s the mustache. WB had to CGI off Henry Cavill’s Mission: Impossible stache because Paramount said “no shaving.” And the result? Uncanny valley nightmare fuel.
• Secret identities? Who needs ’em!
  Batman says Alfred’s name out loud in front of a criminal.
  Aquaman shouts Bruce’s identity in public while surrounded by villagers.
  Lois screams “Clark!!” in front of dozens of cops when Superman returns.
  Why does no one in this world care about keeping secrets anymore?
• The Flash is unbearable.
  Every single joke falls flat. At one point, when Gordon lights the Bat-Signal, Barry says “Hey look—it’s your signal!”
  Thanks, Captain Obvious.
• Cyborg’s storyline is butchered.
  He’s mad at his dad… for reasons? We don’t get to see the tragedy. No backstory. Just “I’m mad and I have tech powers.” Congrats.
• The tone is a mess.
  It tries to be fun and lighthearted, but none of the jokes land. The pacing’s awkward, and the emotional moments feel completely unearned.
• Steppenwolf is painfully generic.
  He’s just evil because… he is. And he swings his axe in slow motion like he’s underwater. Zero tension. Zero stakes.
• Superman’s comeback is a joke.
  The CGI lip ruins what could’ve been a powerful return. He shows up, smiles, and starts tossing Steppenwolf around like it’s a Saturday cartoon. The tone doesn’t match. Nothing matches.
• The final battle is another sky beam mess.
  Big CGI city. Big CGI beam. Big CGI punches. Yawn. Seen it. Felt nothing.
• The “I bought the bank” joke.
  When Bruce helps Clark get the Kent farm back, Clark asks how he pulled it off. Bruce goes, “I bought the bank.”
  Ha ha ha. He’s rich. That’s the joke. Laugh.
  No really. Laugh.

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💬 Final Thoughts:

This movie is a disaster.

It’s a stitched-together Frankenstein of two visions—Zack Snyder’s gritty tone and Joss Whedon’s forced quips—and neither of them work together. It feels hollow, rushed, and tone-deaf. The characters are underdeveloped, the plot is a joke, and the entire thing reeks of studio panic.

The only reason this thing exists is because Warner Bros. didn’t want to delay the film past a shareholder meeting. It’s the most expensive group project failure ever made.

The fact that this even got released is still baffling to me. Thank god the Snyder Cut exists now to wash this taste out of our mouths.

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🧮 Final Rating:

1/10 – One point for effort. No points for execution. I never want to see this version again.

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⚠️ Spoiler Warning Ahead ⚠️

Let’s talk about the mess that is the third act.

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🧨 Third Act Breakdown:

Our heroes travel to some random Russian town that’s under attack by—wait for it—a giant sky beam. Because originality is dead.

Steppenwolf’s building something with the Mother Boxes that’ll destroy the world. Again, it’s barely explained. Cyborg needs to pull them apart. But first, the team fights a bunch of Parademons in a gray CGI hellscape.

Steppenwolf swings his axe at like 1 frame per second. Flash trips. Superman shows up late, says “I’m also a big fan of justice” (cringe), and punches Steppenwolf into the dirt.

Oh—and somewhere in the middle of this chaos, Clark and Lois return to the Kent farm, and she greets him with:
“You smell good.”
Seriously. That’s the first thing she says to the love of her life who just came back from the dead.
And he replies: “Did I not before?”
Romance is dead.

Back in the fight, Superman and Cyborg stop the boom tube, separate the boxes, save the town, and send Steppenwolf packing. But instead of a cool death scene, Steppenwolf just gets scared by his own Parademons and dragged away like a loser.

The day is saved. No one really celebrates. The tone is weird. The ending is awkward.

Clark gets his life back. Bruce buys the bank. Everyone smiles.
The audience weeps.

The end.