Mitchell Beaupre
The world stood still last week as everyone set aside four hours to watch Zack Snyder’s Justice League, the long awaited realization of a cut closer to his definitive vision of what the 2017 superhero extravaganza was supposed to look like.
The response? Largely positive, and not just for the Snyder obsessives. While it seemed destined that his league of passionate followers would appreciate the new cut, it’s also received plenty of praise from critics, currently standing at a 73% positive rating on Rotten Tomatoes after 217 reviews, compared to the 40% that the 2017 version of the film received after Joss Whedon cobbled it together when Snyder had to unfortunately depart the project.
Our review of the film landed mostly on the positive side, albeit with some reservations.
With the new cut generating countless water cooler conversations and internet thinkpieces, it’s no surprise that Warner Bros. and especially HBO Max want to capitalize on the situation, and it appears that they are doing so by announcing an all new black and white version of the movie coming soon to the streaming platform that made the Snyder Cut possible.
On Saturday night, the official Twitter account for Zack Snyder’s Justice League posted a clip of the film in newly de-colored black and white, with the tease “Zack Snyder’s Justice League: Justice is Gray coming soon to @HBOMax. #SnyderCut”, giving us no hint at a release date other than it coming sometime soon.
This isn’t the first time in recent years that a popular film has been recut in a black and white version and released to the public, as two other Warner Bros. blockbusters saw black and white versions of their films released, those being Mad Max: Fury Road (retitled Mad Max: Blood and Chrome), and Logan (retitled Logan: Noir). Even last year’s Academy Award winner for Best Picture, Parasite, got a theatrically released black and white recut that is now available on its Criterion Collection home video release.
Now, before you go and think that this is simply a money grab trying to take advantage of all of the attention the Snyder Cut is getting, it is necessary to mention that Snyder has spoken before about how the true “ideal version” of his movie is black and white and in IMAX.
As Slashfilm reported back in November, the filmmaker said, “That, to me, is the most fan-centric, most pure, most Justice League experience. Because that’s how I lived with the movie for two years, in black and white…when I do the live-stream of the trailer, Steph and I colored a black and white version of the trailer. So the first version that I’m going to put out, and probably what I’m going to talk about on Tuesday, will be the black and white version of the trailer.”
While it seems unlikely that his film will get that IMAX showing, it at least looks like Snyder is going to be getting one step closer to his ideal version of the movie. Does that give a hint towards a more hopeful future for those who have been wishing that the positive response to the Snyder Cut could lead to Zack Snyder being pulled back into the DCEU fold to #RestoreTheSnyderverse? We’ll have to wait and see on that one.
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