If there is justice in the world (pun fully intended), fans will get a documentary about the behind-the-scenes drama that occurred between director Zack Snyder and Warner Bros. after the release of ‘Batman v Superman’ and before the release of “Justice League.” While there have been thousands and thousands of words written about the relationship between the filmmaker and the studio, there just seems to be a lot of unanswered questions, particularly about what could have been if Snyder’s full vision was realized in “Justice League.”
Slowly, but surely, we are getting answers to these questions from the man himself, Zack Snyder. Recently, on the social media network Vero (Can we stop with trying to make Vero a thing?), Snyder answered a couple fan questions about his DCU films. Particularly, with relation to ideas presented in “Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice.”
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First, the director discusses the opening to ‘BvS,’ where Bruce Wayne dreams about his younger self literally being lifted into the air by bats, complete with an almost poetic narration by Ben Affleck. A fan asked the director about what he was going for with that scene.
“The idea that in the dream the righteous man the good man seeks justice but that quest for justice lead him into darkness and his own moral code is in question or may only be a construct of his grief so the life of the light becomes justice=light for Batman it’s the opposite,” says the director (via a screengrab from Cinema Blend). While there’s definitely an explanation in there somewhere, the director honestly doesn’t clarify things very much.
Snyder was also cryptic when answering about the famous “Knightmare” sequence in ‘BvS,’ which was supposed to set up a storyline that would play out in “Justice League” but was clearly scrapped after Snyder left the project. He was asked by a fan about what would lead Superman to go evil and imprison Batman, as seen in the sequence.
“…if someone lost someone close to them they might become susceptible to a certain equation and might blame a certain Bat for the events that a too soon Bruce would know nothing about,” said Snyder (via Screen Rant).
While still up for interpretation, this is a little easier to figure out. If you understand DC Comics’ history, then its clear Snyder is referring to the Anti-Life Equation, which grants someone immense power and gaining control over people’s minds. If Synder was planning this for “Justice League,” this clearly goes back to the original plan of the film being split into two parts. The first part would have been the League fighting Steppenwolf with the aid of the newly resurrected Superman, and winning, but not before Darkseid (the true big bad) comes to Earth. Then in the sequel, someone close to Superman (probably Lois Lane or Ma Kent) would die, which would be compounded by the Anti-Life Equation, and would send Superman to the dark side, so to speak.
As we mentioned above, this is all just proof that there is so much to the story that fans just don’t know. Obviously, there’s no “Snyder Cut” of “Justice League,” but perhaps down the road, we’ll get a better understanding of what went wrong, and what could have been, in Snyder’s vision of the DCU.