Zack Snyder is looking back on his time at DC (#ReleaseTheSynderCut included), and that look back includes defending Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice a full ten years after it came out.
Snyder appeared on the Happy Sad Confused podcast to celebrate the popular but critically derided 2016 film that pitted Henry Cavill’s Superman against Ben Affleck’s Batman. While reflecting on it, he said that whatever the criticisms leveled against the divisive project, at least no one could say it was movie designed by committee.
“My 100% honest reaction to ‘BvS’ and how it’s received in the world is… Do you really want a movie that’s had all the edges shaved off it by the focus groups?” Snyder asked around the 41-minute mark. “Do you really want a movie where the decisions have been made in a boardroom, or tested ideas have been rendered for your enjoyment? Do you really want the Kmart version of your story? Is that what you really want?”
Snyder’s comments about a movie being made in a boardroom are interesting, considering that Dwayne Johnson’s underperforming DC flick Black Adam was accused of being one after a picture surfaced of it being watched in a boardroom.
In the new interview, Snyder spoke about the “mythological journey” that he took audiences on with his DC superhero trilogy: 2013’s Superman flick Man of Steel, BvS, and the 2017 Justice League. He also remembered difficulties with the ratings board.
“When we were trying for the PG-13 rating on ‘BvS,’ the MPAA kept kicking the movie back to us saying, ‘It’s still an R,’” he recalled. “I remember someone saying we got a report from the MPA saying, ‘We just don’t like the idea of Batman fighting Superman. That kind of makes it an R. He really hits him hard with that sink. That’s rude. That feels like an R.’ I’m just like, ‘Okay… let’s just pretend it’s not Batman vs. Superman for one second.'”
Elsewhere in the conversation, Snyder spoke about the support of fans of the “SnyderVerse” — fervent fans who fought hard and publicly for the director’s vision of Justice League to see the light of day. They eventually triumphed, with the so-called “Snyder cut” of the film being released in 2021 under the name Zack Snyder’s Justice League.
Snyder was the movie’s original director, but left during production following the death of his daughter. The theatrical version was both different in tone and much shorter than Snyder planned. Fans wanted to see his version of the film badly, starting an ultimately successful public campaign using the hashtag #ReleaseTheSnyderCut.
“I was on the ride that created Justice League, and if you were in my shoes there were numerous times, dark times, when there was no chance that there will ever be my version of it. It will never exist,” he said. “It can’t… cost, politics, everything stood against. And yet it exists. The fans should never forget they did that. They also raised a ton of money for suicide prevention. They did a lot of good. They catch a lot of flak for being toxic or whatever, but they literally saved human lives. You can go fuck yourselves if that’s what you think.”