I'm "watching" it in the background now as I do some pretty rote data entry at work. Overall, I like it so far.
Then again, I loved "Watchmen" and firmly believe that "Man of Steel" is the best Superman movie there is, mainly because, sorry to say, the other Superman movies are pretty much on par with the Batman '66 movie.
There's a fanedit called Man of Steel: A Symbol of Hope, which removes a few bad lines of dialogue they make Superman or his dad look naughty word, removes the dreary color grading, and cuts a few bits here and there that make it seem like Superman is ignoring human suffering. And they make more use of heroic music.
It really elevated the movie, in my opinion, while keeping it grounded in the complex morality of heroism that Snyder seemed to want.
What left you drained like that? I've never seen such a long movie in a theater. But I've seen my share of 4 hours movies at home. They're long, but by themselves they don't leave me feeling like that.
It's a four hour German antiwar movie, entirely in German, that takes place within the claustrophobic confines of a U-boat with no intermission and everyone dies.
Regardless of which cut you prefer, comparing the two is a fascinating study of two very different directors. I'm going to be re-watching both versions several times!!
I got through parts 1-5 last night, will finish tonight. The pacing is slow, but the tension builds well so far . . . I'm enjoying the movie so far, but this definitely didn't need to be 4 hours to properly tell this story!
Now we have to wonder . . . how different is the "Snyder Cut" from what Zack Snyder would have released theatrically if he hadn't had to step back from the film? I don't think they would have been the same movies.
yeah, I missed the “I hear you can Talk to fish” line
I also did a quick watch of Whedons version of the Amazon escaping the temple scene and think Whedons was better action (Snyder had Hippolyta stopping to mourn her dying warriors too often).
Overall its a better movie than the original. The story is more cohesive, and the stakes feel more appropriate to a true Justice League movie. That said, its too long, 4 hours is not really necessary, and it definitely drags at certain points. Ultimately, its a better movie, but its still not a great movie, and I don't think it "redeems" Justice League.
My longer take:
I think the real winners are Steppenwolf and Cyborg. Steppenwolf was upgraded from a cardboard cutout to a generic villain suitable for a marvel movie....aka good enough. Cyborg gets a much bigger chunk of story and characterization this time. Flash meanwhile gets the coolest new scene of the movie.
The biggest losers are Batman and Wonder Woman. Some of Batman's best lines are not in this cut, and the change to this scene
Lois Lane now comes to Superman out of coincidence instead of Batman's fallback strategy
just removes the last bit of Batman's actual plan making and scheming. I honestly don't know why he is even in this cut. Zack wanted to make a movie about gods and nothing wrong with that, but I think he really had trouble putting Batman in that league.
Wonder Woman also got some of her best character lines removed. She does get a few new ones, so not as bad as Batman, but I think the scene
where Diana tends to Batman's shoulder and they have a heart to heart
adds a tremendous amount of characterization in a short scene, and the lack of it I really felt.
Ultimately, both movies have the same fatal flaw at the end:
Superman just clobbers Steppenwolf without even trying, once again showing that the entire rest of the league was unnecessary to that fight. If the league had delayed the unity that would have at least been something, but they don't, so honestly Superman could have just flown through the shield, dropped Cyborg and Flash off, kicked Steppenwolf's butt....and you would have had the same plot.
At the end of the day, I feel that the 4 hours is mainly Synder going....hey, I'm going for broke, lets just show everything I wanted to show. And a lot of it was probably cut by Whedon for good reason, as much of it is really not necessary to the film. I think there is about 30 minutes of Synder material that is truly "better", and it would be neat to see a movie where that 30 minutes was inserted/replaced on top of the original.
Compared to the Whedon version, it (a) looked so much better and (b) every character felt real. Cyborg was just a different character to the one in Whedon's film; he had depth, and a full story arc. Aquaman was less surfer quip dude. The bad guys felt like genuine threats. And not having a CGI face on Henry Cavill is a relief.
