DC have a stepping stone

Rating: 5/10 (19 December 2017)

Justice League: the 5th movie from DC (Warner Bros) and they're 3rd 'team' movie. The world is in danger from a big CGI guy (Steppenwolf) and his faceless hoard (Parademons), so a team must be quickly formed. Very quickly.
Justice League went through so much production hell its a miracle it works as well as it does. For those that don't know: the director Zack Snyder basically finished filming and had to pull out of editing due to personal tragedy. So Joss Whedon was brought in to edit and direct the reshoots. Not only are these two directors styles complete opposites but Warner Bros put a strict time limit on JL; it could not got over a 2 hour run time. Constricting and stifling any background or character backstories to a minimum. Cyborg (Ray Fisher) is titular to the films plot but little is really revealed... He's essentially a big USB. With this time limit every aspect feels rushed- the 'we can't stay in the same place for more than 2 minutes' kinda rush; which is where you can kinda see that JL was directed by 2 people. Scenes don't flow together well and feel more like a collection of clips. This might come as a bit of a surprise but the villain was not very good. Try as they might Steppenwolf was not an overly effective threat nor did he have much presence despite being built up as a menace.
But putting the problems to one side Justice League has fun moments and shows promise, it's also an incredibly easy watch (that could mean it ends up forgettable however). The characters personas are good and, mostly, work together. I just wish I saw more of that and less "quick we got fight that big dude". The actors are good; Gal Gadot (Wonder Woman) and Ben Affleck (Batman) are on mark and still super enjoyable. The new characters, although underdeveloped still showed their potential. And Henry Cavill has given his best portrayal of Superman yet. Though during the reshoots Cavill was filming Misson Impossible and had a mustache which needed to be edited out off JL, which is noticeable at times. Nothing severe but you can tell that's not a real upper lip.
Justice League has some story and pacing issues but nonetheless this is definitely a step in the right direction for the franchise which hopefully carrys forward. It would've been nice to see several other films prior to this to set things up a bit better. And Warner Bros definitely need to take a step back; thus far all major issues with the DC cinematic universe can be traced back to the executives.
I give Justice League a C+