So far, there have been two notable names absent from the press tour for “Justice League“: the film’s original director Zack Snyder, and Joss Whedon, who picked up the reins in post-production and guided the reshoots. The final film is said to a mix of both filmmakers sensibilities, and it’s understandable why they both might not be ready to talk about it. For Snyder, it’s probably not easy to let go of a film — and franchise — he’s spent nearly the last decade working on, while Whedon probably doesn’t want to take too much credit for a project that was already moving like a freight train before he stepped in to add his touch.
At a press conference for “Justice League,” producer Deborah Snyder (and also the wife and longtime collaborator with Zack Snyder) says that she hopes that when audiences see the movie, they can keep all the chatter about reshoots out of their mind.
“I think, for us, this whole thing is so bittersweet,” she said about Zack Snyder’s departure. “We had been working on this franchise for the last, almost eight years [from] when we’d been developing the script for ‘Man of Steel,’ and then we moved on to ‘BvS‘ and also, Zack developed the story for ‘Wonder Woman,’ which was leading up to the point of ‘Justice League,’ where the characters were going to come together. I mean, this was a great hero’s journey, and a journey for these characters to be the characters that they are today. So not being able to complete his vision was extremely difficult.”
“Our feeling is, we’re hoping that people don’t think about how this movie was made when they go to see it, because these characters are bigger than any director, they’re bigger than any of us. We love and adore these characters,” she continued.
Indeed, “Justice League” does have a lot of baggage it’s carrying into next week’s release, but we’ll see if the end result can rise above its challenging production. Watch the entire press conference below. [THR]