Reviews of the recently released Justice League have varied from being hopeful to calling the movie styleless trash. The film suffered from being Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, there were two very different tones in the film, due to there being two directors with different approaches.
One director, Zack Snyder, had a darker vision for the universe than his alternate, Joss Whedon. With the two differing views, Whedon brought in plenty of extensive reshoots to fit his tone.
A report from The Wrap, involving plenty of insiders at Warner Bros. Studios, has revealed what lead to Justice League and how Warner Bros. pushed to remove director Zack Snyder from the franchise after Batman v Superman.
According to insiders, Snyder’s hand in the DC universe was fairly unguided, he had the freedom to do whatever he liked. Greg Silverman, the Warner Bros. executive behind box office hits like The Dark Knight, The Hangover, and 300, reportedly didn’t read over the notes on Snyder’s scripts and was described as “remarkably laissez-faire” when it came to his attitude.
After the divisive Batman v Superman released, Warner Bros. studio executives reportedly approached Silverman with the suggestion of removing Snyder from Justice League. An individual close to the studio said that the DC President, Jon Berg, was sent to the set for the better part of a year to oversee the production out of budget concerns.
Addressing the concerns of fellow Warner Bros. executives, Silverman was “harsh” on Snyder after Batman v Superman released and obviously didn’t fire him (he directed most of Justice League after all!), the decision to keep Snyder on for Justice League was reportedly from Warner Bros. CEO Kevin Tsujihara. Warner Bros. didn’t want to show any signs of weakness or disorganization by firing Snyder while preparations for Justice League were underway.
Silverman stepped down from his role in December 2016 and was replaced by Toby Emmerich.
While Justice League entered development, Warner Bros. began putting pressure on Snyder to create a lighter tone for the film, hoping to emulate the Marvel tone. After plenty of push and pull, Joss Whedon, the man behind The Avengers, was brought in to add “levity and fun” to the Justice League script.
After filming was underway, Snyder’s daughter tragically passed away. In the beginning, Snyder looked to use the Justice League set as a refuge from the tragedy, however, this didn’t pan out. The pressure from Warner Bros. to embrace the “lighter, different, more confectionary ideas of Joss” pushed Snyder out, leaving Whedon to take over.
Whedon was forced to “choose between continuing Snyder’s vision or lightening up Justice League as much as he could.” His choice brought Henry Cavill back for reshoots, with his CGI removed mustache (which brought complaints) and built up the frankenmovie we got.
An executive told The Wrap that Warner Bros.’ “biggest misstep was not pushing the release of ‘Justice League’ when Snyder had to step aside,” in their opinion.
Warner Bros. is hoping that James Wan, the director behind Aquaman, will guide the DCU out of dispair.
