Over three years after the theatrical edition of Justice League was released, original director Zack Snyder will finally bring his vision for the project to life. However, Snyder has now revealed that he is not being paid for his work on the remastered, re-edited version of the DC superhero film.
In a new lengthy feature from Vanity Fair titled "Justice League: The Shocking, Exhilarating, Heartbreaking True Story of #TheSnyderCut", Snyder spoke openly about his experiences with Justice League. In the feature, the director claims that not being paid allowed him to maintain creative control after he returned to the project, stating, “I didn’t want to be beholden to anyone, and it allowed me to keep my negotiating powers with these people pretty strong.” The feature also includes behind-the-scenes pictures and new images of the cast, including a very 'biblical' image of Jared Leto's Joker.
Another tidbit of information revealed in the feature is that Snyder has not seen the 2017 theatrical cut of the Justice League. When Snyder and his wife Deborah, an executive producer on the Snyder Cut, left the film in 2017, Avengers director Joss Whedon was hired to finish the job. That version of the film was widely considered a financial and critical failure, and Snyder was eventually brought back to finish his version after a vocal online movement to "Release The Snyder Cut" was launched. Zack Snyder revealed that Deborah and fellow executive producer Christopher Nolan recommended he not see the finished product after they were shown a screening of the final 'Whedon Cut' before its release. According to Snyder, “They came and they just said, ‘You can never see that movie,’” to which Deborah Snyder added, “Because I knew it would break his heart.”
In the feature, Zack Snyder also goes in-depth about the sudden loss of his adopted daughter Autumn, who tragically took her own life in 2017. This was the main reason the Snyders left the film, with the intent to grieve and focus on their family. Zack Snyder has gone on the record before saying that after the death of Autumn, he didn't have the energy to fight Warner Bros. over the direction of Justice League. Even though this was initially Zack Snyders' reason for leaving, the director now says his late daughter is also, in many ways, what motived him to return to the director's chair. Snyder is quoted as saying, “At the end of the movie, it says ‘For Autumn, without her, this absolutely would not have happened.”
Snyder also elaborates on some of the creative differences he had with Warner Bros., such as the decision to remove a burgeoning romance between Lois Lane (Amy Adams) and Bruce Wayne/ Batman (Ben Affleck). “The intention was that Bruce fell in love with Lois and then realized that the only way to save the world was to bring Superman back to life,” says Zack Snyder. Despite the director's past success with comic book adaptations like Watchmen and 300, it seems the studio lost some faith in him after 2016's Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice was subjected to harsh reviews. Although Zack Snyder was initially kept on to direct Justice League, this lack of faith may have contributed to former Warner Bros. Chairman and CEO Kevin Tsujihara's decision to assign DC Entertainment creative chief Geoff Johns and Warner Bros. co-production head Jon Berg to 'babysit' the director on the set. Since then, all three of those men have been subjected to ongoing scandals, with Tsujihara stepping down after sexual misconduct allegations, and Berg and Johns being sighted by Cyborg actor Ray Fisher as enabling Joss Whedon's alleged onset abuses.
Although Zack Snyder seems to have come out on top of the whole situation, it does appear that Justice League will be the end of his time with DC Films, as the director has claimed that Warner Bros. has no interest in pursuing a sequel. So, it looks like he'll be focussing on other projects in the future, like his upcoming Netflix Zombie film Army of the Dead. He's also recently expressed interest in a 'faithful' King Arthur adaptation. Zack Snyder's willingness to return to the project and without pay does suggest that the director is more focused on carrying out his vision than anything else. Or maybe he just wants the money to go to a better place, like the suicide prevention programs he and his wife are raising money for with the release of his upcoming four-hour cut of Justice League.
Zack Snyder's Justice League will be released on HBO Max, and elsewhere internationally, on March 18th, 2021.
Source: Vanity Fair