tl;dr:
Justice League (2017): very shit.
Zack Snyder’s Justice League (2021): very good.
Some spoiler free thoughts if you’re interested:
The 1.33:1 aspect ratio is very deliberate; Snyder has talked often about how he wanted the movie formatted for tall full-frame IMAX screens, and he shot it as such. Nothing’s been cropped from the edges of the 2017 version to fit, if anything the original Super 35 open matte footage has been completely restored. It takes a while to get used to, but once you’re settled in, you don’t notice.
It could do with being maybe like 45–60 minutes shorter, but it takes the 2017 version and kicks the living daylights out of it.
Tom Holkenborg wisely reuses score elements from Hans Zimmer’s scores for Man of Steel and Batman vs Superman, rather than make new stuff up for the sake of it; well played, sir. (Although Auralnauts have the monopoly on making new stuff out of these movies …)
Some characters who came off as a bit … well, crap in the 2017 version get fully redeemed in the 2021 version. I won’t name and shame, but if you watched Justice League, you’ll probably know what I’m talking about.
The 3h 54m runtime (the last 8 and a half minutes are the credits, taking the whole thing to 4h 2m) can be daunting. The movie is broken up into parts. If you want to watch over two nights, stop the movie on night #1 when “Part 5” appears on the screen, and watch the rest the following night.
There’s no post-credits doo-dad, but there’s a cracking Special Thanks section which reads like a who’s who of the Silver and Modern ages of comic books.
Go, watch, enjoy. Just don’t watch the 2017 version first to “compare” or whatever. I didn’t, and I think I enjoyed this version more because of it.
EPILOGUE: The DCEU is still nowhere near as good as the MCU, but there are moments of grand epicness and moments of sheer fun in this movie. Maybe when DC Films stop trying so hard to be Marvel Studios, they’ll figure out they can do great things for us fans.
PS: Jack Kirby. Squeeee.
