The hardcore Snyder faithful will not see it as awful, any more than they did his previous DCEU entries. To them, he is a cinematic visionary for the ages, whose every frame is as if composed by the fiery finger of God.
DC Movies - To Infinity and Beyond
- Thread starter dahj
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You have to distinguish between the passionately formulated desire to see an alternative version of a movie by the director of said movie, which is known to be very different than the released version, on the one side, and a feeling of entitlement on the other. The #releasethesnydercut movement was large and passionate enough to show WB and HBO Max that there was serious and widespread interest in the Snyder Cut, and I'd argue that the vast majority of those in that movement were part of the former, and only a small minority belong to the latter group. Just as those people burning their JL BluRays certainly are just a loud few.
I'd also argue that "by popular demand" is not an entirely new concept, and neither is popular pressure on movies. Why was Jar Jar Binks' role in Episodes II and III so much smaller than in Episode I? Because the majority of the audience hated him. Why did Diamonds Are Forever bring back Sean Connery as James Bond? Because the audience wanted him to return. Why did Warner Bros. bring about the Richard Donner Cut of Superman II? Because a large enough group of fans wanted it.
And as several active users in this thread prove, those who want a Snyder Cut certainly don't have a monopoly on obnoxity.
This is certainly a possibility, but you also make the mistake of assigning the same motivation to all Snyder Cut supporters. Not all want to see it because they are convinced it will be better. Many want to see it to give the director the chance to fulfill his vision (whether one agrees with it or not). But I'd say most are just very, very curious. We've heard all about how different the theatrical version was to what Snyder was doing.
Also, the idea of vastly different versions of the same movie is not new, either. We've seen this before, with Blade Runner, with Dune, with Das Boot, Kingdom of Heaven, the Rogue Cut of X-Men: Days of Future Past, etc. The scope of how different this version is, and how much money and effort is put into bringing it about, that is what's new.
Old management. Clearly new management thinks differently.
C’mon. You’re better than this.The hardcore Snyder faithful will not see it as awful, any more than they did his previous DCEU entries. To them, he is a cinematic visionary for the ages, whose every frame is as if composed by the fiery finger of God.
Precisely. Well said.
As I may have mentioned already, the DCEU already has a very loose continuity with a number of inconsistencies and retcons, and the more recent films tend to stand alone and make only the most cursory acknowledgment of the larger universe. So I doubt the difference in details will be relevant; all that will matter, if anything, is that the event happened in broad strokes. Movie series in general have never been absolutely bound by past continuity; instead, they freely rewrite the rules and events of past movies in order to justify sequels, like how the Planet of the Apes sequels retconned a 2000-year cryogenic sleep into a reversible time warp, or how the Pink Panther films had Inspector Dreyfus go homicidally insane and die in one movie and then had him alive and sane(ish) again in the next without explanation.
There are usually more factors at play than that alone, though, since there are plenty of things audiences want that never happen, for good reason. And there's a difference between making adjustments in a sequel and going back and undoing the revision process in a completed work.
In the case of the Donner Cut, it was well-known that the reasons for replacing Donner with Lester had been financial rather than creative, and there was good reason to conclude that the original version had merits the final version lacked. Enough of the lost footage had been seen through various outlets over the years that it confirmed that. I just don't think this is an analogous situation. Yes, sometimes director's cuts turn out to be better than the studios' chopped-up final versions, but a lot of the time, what the director delivers is a total mess and the studio has to try to salvage something watchable out of it as best they can. It would be illogical to assume that the revision process always makes things worse. That's the exception, not the rule.
The evidence is before us that I'm not.
But FWIW, I wasn't talking about the general run of Snyder admirers, just the most fanatical devotees.
It's not a matter of better or worse, though, as that is a matter of taste. The main point is that the Snyder Cut is vastly different than the theatrical version, so much so that HBO Max has to contact the unions in order to clear up whether it even is just an alternative cut of the same movie, or a different movie entirely.
That's a facile oversimplification. You can't assume an uncooked meal is as good as a cooked one. You can't say a new software program still in the testing phase will perform as well as a thoroughly refined and debugged version. You can't expect an incompletely built car to be as safe to drive as a completed one. So it is nonsensical to pretend that an unfinished movie will invariably be equal in quality to a finished movie except as a matter of taste. That's just not how it works. As I said, sometimes the early edit is better than the final theatrical cut, but it is irrational to assume that there is never any objective improvement in quality between the two.
General argument and specific argument are two different things. My point is that just because some directors' cuts are improvements, that doesn't mean they all are. Yes, the theatrical JL was deeply flawed, but it could be that the original cut was even worse. Given Snyder's previous films and Whedon's previous films, I think it's highly probable that the original cut was worse. People are always curious about what they didn't get, but that doesn't mean it'll be better than what they did get.
A certainty I'd say when you take into account the clear pattern of declining quality from MOS to BVS to the JL that was released. We know the basic outline of JL, so it's hard to see how adding a few cut scenes will dramatically improve it.
Bullshit. There's no "certainty", primarily because your "clear pattern of declining quality" is not an incontovertible statement. But hey, as long as we're playing "opinions are now facts"--the "Snyder Cut" of BvS (released as the Ultimate Cut) is clearly an IMPROVEMENT over the one that was messed with by "the suits" from the studio. Is it perfect? No. But it is better.* And while not all director's cuts are better, there are numerous examples of films revisited by their directors that were serious improvements (Ridley Scott has several--Blade Runner; Kingdom of Heaven [a textbook example of how a studio mandated run-time can be ruinous to a film]). So how about we let Snyder produce his version and judge it AFTER having seen it? I know it's a radical idea and everything, but, hey, I'm willing to give it a try. Who's with me?
*As entirely correct as your "pattern of declining quality" statement.
As someone who liked but didn’t love the Snyder movies and most of the DCEU for that matter, I’m a bit bemused by the reaction to the announcement of the release of the Snyder cut and the possibility of an Ayer cut for SS.
As someone else said, you don’t have to see these films any more than you have to rewatch the existing versions, nor indeed will they stop the original ones existing. Of course the new versions are going to primarily appeal to Snyder fans, though I’ll probably watch at least part of it out of curiosity.
I’m also baffled by the idea that it’s rewarding bad behaviour, as I’ve seen suggested (not so much here but on twitter). It’s a response to demand by fans, by Snyder himself and by some cast members, including Affleck and Gadot. Really, it’s not all that different from the Donner cut, from Lucas changing the Han v Greedo scene again so that Greedo no longer shoots first, from the various other directors’ cuts that have been made, to the forthcoming legacy sequel Ghostbusters etc. Much, if not all of what Hollywood does is driven by demand or what it perceives to be in demand. This is just another example of it.
As for which version is canon; well, it’s all made up anyway. And we’re never going to see that particular lineup onscreen together anyway. Affleck is out, Cavill’s future as Supes is uncertain and WB appears more interested in solo films from now on in. So the idea that 2 differing versions of JL will have any effect whatsoever on future DC films seems unlikely in the extreme to me. Pick your own version, whichever you prefer, as your head canon but don’t expect it to really matter.
Honestly, every time over the last 3 years that Snyder (who I’ve always thought was all wrong for Superman and who I blame for much of the DCEU’s flaws) posted pics from his version, I thought it was a little sad and he should move on. But fair play to the guy, he has succeeded and it looks like he’ll get to see his version onscreen. He’s not spending my money to make it and nobody is going to force me to spend money on seeing it. So if WB are happy to spend their money on it and if it makes his fans happy, then I’m really not seeing a downside.
As someone else said, you don’t have to see these films any more than you have to rewatch the existing versions, nor indeed will they stop the original ones existing. Of course the new versions are going to primarily appeal to Snyder fans, though I’ll probably watch at least part of it out of curiosity.
I’m also baffled by the idea that it’s rewarding bad behaviour, as I’ve seen suggested (not so much here but on twitter). It’s a response to demand by fans, by Snyder himself and by some cast members, including Affleck and Gadot. Really, it’s not all that different from the Donner cut, from Lucas changing the Han v Greedo scene again so that Greedo no longer shoots first, from the various other directors’ cuts that have been made, to the forthcoming legacy sequel Ghostbusters etc. Much, if not all of what Hollywood does is driven by demand or what it perceives to be in demand. This is just another example of it.
As for which version is canon; well, it’s all made up anyway. And we’re never going to see that particular lineup onscreen together anyway. Affleck is out, Cavill’s future as Supes is uncertain and WB appears more interested in solo films from now on in. So the idea that 2 differing versions of JL will have any effect whatsoever on future DC films seems unlikely in the extreme to me. Pick your own version, whichever you prefer, as your head canon but don’t expect it to really matter.
Honestly, every time over the last 3 years that Snyder (who I’ve always thought was all wrong for Superman and who I blame for much of the DCEU’s flaws) posted pics from his version, I thought it was a little sad and he should move on. But fair play to the guy, he has succeeded and it looks like he’ll get to see his version onscreen. He’s not spending my money to make it and nobody is going to force me to spend money on seeing it. So if WB are happy to spend their money on it and if it makes his fans happy, then I’m really not seeing a downside.
Not rewarding bad behavior, just creating unrealistic expectations that all you have to do is make noise and start an online petition and eventually the studios will give in. Most of the time, fan petitions accomplish nothing. Even the legendary Save Star Trek letter campaign was more hype than reality, since there's no compelling evidence that NBC was ever going to cancel the show anyway, and what really saved it was the producers' agreement to reduce the budget, which is what saves most on-the-bubble shows in their later seasons.
Frankly, I doubt we would've ever gotten the Snyder Cut if the pandemic hadn't shut new production down and left Hollywood starved for material to release. This is not a response to overwhelming demand so much as a compensation for failing supply.
Also, there's the "Amok Time" principle -- "you may find that having is not so pleasing a thing after all as wanting." I suspect a lot of people who've mythologized the SC in their minds are in for a big disappointment, and it's best not to get those hopes up too much.
Still, I'll concede that I'd be happier about all this if it were a version I actually wanted to see. I'm actually mildly curious about the Ayer Suicide Squad, although the prospect of more Jared Leto screen time pretty much cancels that out.
We've already got a whole new Batman continuity starting, and yet I've heard intimations that it could potentially cross over with future DCEU films despite their use of a separate Batman. Some are speculating that the Flashpoint movie will be used to soft-reboot the whole thing.
So you were at the meetings with the new management and got the inside scoop? You’re sure the demand had nothing to do with it? Must be nice to live in ones own bubble.
The biggest thing for me with the canon question is the characters who's scene were cut, like Iris If she is in whatever version of The Flash movie that ends up on screen, will they have to bring Keirsey Clemons back, or will they still have to option to recast the role?
Of course, they would have that option regardless. But yeah, one assumes Clemons's Iris will be in Zack Snyder's Justice League (guess that's the official title now?), and a different Iris will be in the "Flash" movie (if it actually gets made this time).
An official casting call reportedly went out recently for the new Iris:
https://www.theilluminerdi.com/2020/05/01/the-flash-movie-new-iris-west/
What. The fuck. Are you talking about? Who said anything about the unfinished version being better or worse? I certainly didn't say that even the finished version will be better. I'm saying that the quality of the finished Snyder Cut, as compared to the theatrical version, will lie in the eye of the beholder.
I'm not assuming anything. Except that the Snyder Cut is (and in its finished version will be) vastly different than the theatrical version. Whether it's better, equal, or worse, remains to be seen.
And, yes, there are things that can be relatively objectively measured in a movie, like how coherent is it, whether it is clearly structured, how well executed the themes are. Now, there are very good movies that are deeply flawed in some, even all of these categories, and there are bad movies that succeed in all these categories. Because in the end, quality in movies, as in any artform, comes down to personal taste.
I see you making both a general and a specific argument. As for the quality argument, see above.
The campaign has been going for years, with very expensive billboards and magazine ads, too.
It may have been a factor, but if there hadn't been a huge campaign showing popular demand, this would not have happened.
Yes, the greatest pleasure lies in anticipation. Of course, bringing that thought to its ultimate conclusion would mean that it's better to never get anything new ever again, because one might be disappointed. Seriously, it's like you're thinking of people as small children who don't know what life is.
This is something you actually have to concede?