Speaking purely as a critic, the best thing I can say about Justice League is that it is better than Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016) and Suicide Squad (2016), though I suppose that’s a bit like complimenting a two-year-old for not eating their own poo. The most remarkable thing about Justice League is how unremarkable it is. When the film ended, I simply remained seated for a few minutes trying to digest what exactly I had watched, for it felt like I had just finished the first episode of a superhero TV show on Netflix and not the long-awaited superhero vehicle finally featuring together the most iconic characters from the DC Comics universe such as Superman/Kal-El/Clark Kent (Henry Cavill), Batman/Bruce Wayne (Ben Affleck), Wonder Woman/Diana Prince (Gal Gadot), Flash/Barry Allen (Ezra Miller), Aquaman/Arthur Curry (Jason Momoa) and Cyborg/Victor Stone (Ray Fisher).

It’s no secret that Justice League has seen a world of trouble in production. After the disastrous performance of Batman v Superman with director Zack Snyder already too invested in the fast-tracked Justice League to dislodge, instructions were apparently sent to keep the film lighthearted. The feeling from Warner Bros Pictures was that Batman v Superman was too dark, but that was inaccurate. Batman v Superman wasn’t a bad film because it was too dark; it was a bad film because Zack Snyder didn’t have the skill to flawlessly execute the gritty tone.

Of course, Snyder isn’t a complete hack, and with all of its shortcomings (Martha!) Batman v Superman certainly still features a few awesome scenes. Batman v Superman may have been a ridiculously mad bull, but it still had the ability to inspire awe like a bull.

Justice League, on the other hand, is a bull that’s been castrated.

Justice League suffers mostly in terms of storytelling: the plot is throwaway clichéd genre nonsense and the villain in the film is terribly one-dimensional

One of the ways Warner Bros cut the tip off its own warhead was to reportedly enforce a two-hour runtime limit, hoping that they’d get a better film by trimming the fat. But this leaves Justice League tasting like a low-fat nihari, which as we can all agree, would be a travesty. I mean, you should only have nihari occasionally but when you do, you want the version that leaves your heart’s arteries begging for mercy and not the watered-down variety.

Warner Bros wasn’t necessarily wrong to want a more efficient film, they were just wrong to ask that from Snyder. Of course, they shouldn’t have handed a man with hardly a good film to his name the keys to the city in the first place. Then, instead of firing him and restarting production, they asked him to make a film that wasn’t in his DNA. It was like forcing a chef to bake a key lime pie when all he knew was making pizzas, and not very good ones at that.

A terrible personal tragedy forced Snyder to vacate his position at the end of production, allowing Warner Bros to bring in Joss Whedon who, from Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Firefly to The Avengers (2012), has had a remarkable career in pop culture. Whedon apparently formulated the final cut of Justice League, reshooting old scenes and shooting some new ones, as well as incorporating more comedy. Much of the humour works courtesy of Miller and Momoa, though some of it does feel forced.

You’d think that a film with two directors would have a multiple personality disorder, but some tonal, editing, and continuity issues aside, Justice League is fairly cohesive. While one can clearly tell what scenes were from Snyder’s mind and what were shot by Whedon, the former manages to keep the road bumps to a minimum.

Justice League suffers mostly in terms of storytelling. The plot is throwaway clichéd genre nonsense about the fate of the world in balance with powerful artifacts that would feel right at home in a Michael Bay Transformers film. To make matters worse, Steppenwolf (Ciarán Hinds) is a terribly one-dimensional villain made with the sort of computer graphics from an older generation video game. The most interesting scenes seem to be the ones that were edited out, including the return of you-know-who, and his extended rogue sequence. Instead of reshooting this portion and getting it right, Whedon and co disappointingly decided to forgo it all together.

Admittedly, the action scenes are entertaining, though how much entertainment you can draw from them depends on your ability to ignore the poor CGI. Like Doosmday from Batman v Superman, and Steppenwolf here, some of the effects are just plain bad. This is shocking for a film rumoured to have cost north of $300 million.

Speaking as an ever hopeful fan of DC Comics, Justice League isn’t a complete loss. There are suggestions here that they could still do justice to their extended cinematic universe. For instance, both Barry Allen and Arthur Curry are interesting and fun characters, played well by the actors. Victor Stone isn’t particularly compelling, but has the potential to be more watchable in future installments. Meanwhile, the last son of Krypton is the most heartening piece of an otherwise underwhelming puzzle. After Batman v Superman it felt like DC had forgotten who their flagship character really was. Here, he is warm, human, and truly cares about mankind unlike the uncharacteristically city-leveling alien from Man of Steel. What’s more, he gives us a glimpse of his true power. If the boy in blue can rediscover some of his groove then hopefully so can DC. With Snyder’s role minimised, it’s a start. He may have been their kryptonite.

Published in Dawn, ICON, November 26th, 2017