Movie Review- "Justice League: War" - 'Man of Steel' Meets 'Avengers' (SPOILERS)

With "Justice League: War", DC animation has officially entered the New 52 era, and what better inaugural story to adapt than the "Origin" arc from Justice League, detailing the heroes' first meetings and formation of the team. How does it hold up? While it shares some fall backs with its comic book source, I feel it improves upon it as well.

To start things out, it should be noted that this film is action based more than anything. If I had to compare it to something, it would to "Man of Steel", the action in that movie which I've also compared to Dragon Ball Z. The fights in "War" are definitely destructive, especially among the heroes themselves. The stand out scene to me is when Green Lantern places himself and Batman within an energy ball to protect themselves from Superman, only for the Man of Steel to smack the ball around Metropolis, causing a lot of damage in the process. It was like in Dragon Ball Z when Frieza froze Goku in his own orb of energy and smacked it around Namek.
However, that doesn't mean character interaction suffers. Like the original comic story, the banter between Batman and Green Lantern is the highlight. You have this guy with a ring that can do anything, and he's trying to deal with "just some guy in a costume" who feels superior to him. As Batman says to him later though, they're technically the only two normal people on the team, which makes their interaction very down to Earth if you think about it.

Since the New 52 depicts DC characters very differently than before, it would seem redundant to say that this film's depiction of Superman is unlike any other animated adaptation. Much like the original Siegel and Schuster comics and Grant Morrison's own depiction of the character in his Action Comics run, which was set along side the event of the Justice League origin story, this Superman is much more cocky and willing to show off. Between his first meeting with Batman and Green Lantern to dealing with a horde of Parademons, Superman wasn't afraid to show what he could do. Pretty much "punch first, ask questions later."
While on the subject of Superman, his first meeting with Batman is also something we haven't seen before in animation. Let's look at their first meeting in the original DC animated universe as a comparison:

When you think of Batman, he's the guy who's read for anything and won't take shit from anyone, like when he flipped the rational Superman and left him dumbfounded in the preceding clip. When the two first meet in "War", while Batman does his best to fight Superman, he honestly doesn't have a prayer. Combine the facts that Superman is more headstrong and that Batman probably knows nothing about Kryptonite at this point, it definitely makes Superman a little better in this version.
I won't spoil this part, but if there's one thing some Superman fans REALLY won't like, it's what he does to Desaad.

If I had to pick a breakout star in this film, it would be Wonder Woman. Think of it like Hulk in "The Avengers." Whenever she goes into action, she REALLY goes into action, especially against the Parademons. It probably helps that she's a born warrior compared to the other heroes. While that "born warrior" aspect kind of makes her initial non-action scenes hard to get through, what she ultimately gets into is worth those. Also, just as Hulk punched out Thor, she gives Shazam a hard hit as well. We also got some hints to the potential relationship between her and Superman; the two definitely had chemistry together in the film. It makes me hope that a future animated feature will focus more on the two.

Given that the rest of League have already been active up to this point, the film only details the origins of Cyborg. Like the comic source, the catalyst to Victor Stone's transformation is him seeking appreciation and attention from his scientist father, which makes for great emotional moments in the film. Having my own father issues, it hit me as well. The strained relationship between Vic and his father has been an ongoing subplot in the main Justice League book, and has recently been resolved during the "Forever Evil" arc, though it seems like they've made amend by the end of the film. Though I guess they couldn't leave a loose end like that in a film compared to an ongoing monthly series. Still, it would have been nice to see how they made amends considering the last interaction between the two was Vic saying how his dad could only pay attention to him by making him a machine.

There has been some controversy in this film concerning the detail that Shazam had replaced Aquaman as a founding member of the League. I mean, Aquaman was such a badass in the original story that there was even a meme made:

However, once actually seeing the film, I can see that using Shazam was a good idea. As 15 year old Billy Batson, the boy is a fan of Victor Stone's high school football career. By placing Shazam on the team, this gives Cyborg more of a connection to someone than compared to anyone in the original story. In its essence, Shazam is the one who helps Vic see he still has some humanity in himself despite all that's happened. As for Shazam himself, he turned out to be a fun aspect of the film. Maybe it's because it's the same voice actor, but his attitude kind of reminded me of Raphael of the Ninja Turtles.
I have forgiven that Aquaman was not used in the film, especially since the mid-credits scene teases that the next Justice League film will be based on the "Throne of Atlantis" story. This also makes me realize that DC doesn't have to use the New 52 roster in all adaptations, which gave me the idea that they should use Green Arrow in Lantern's place in the live action film, and have Stephen Amell play the character and help tie the films and TV series together.

That brings us to Green Lantern and Flash. While Green Lantern is the first hero seen in the film and gets a lot of screen time, I found that he didn't really get too much respect in this film. Don't get me wrong, I like Green Lantern, but by the time Darkseid made his appearance and Hal charged at him headfirst two times only to get swatted away, not to mention getting his arm broken, I felt like he needed an "Owned Count" to keep track of his "fail" moments.
As for Flash, he really just seemed to be there for the sake of being there. Compared to being the focus in "The Flashpoint Paradox", it seems like the developers decided to make Barry sit in the back seat for this film.
With these two characters, I can now see why they didn't make the cover art.

Which brings us to the villains. Darkseid is of course the biggest threat to the DC universe, which is probably the reason he was used in the original story to begin with. While he and the Parademons were definitely threatening in the film, the one thing I found lacking was motivation. In the comics, we learn Darkseid had travelling the multiverse to find his runaway daughter and defeating each world's Superman in the process. At the moment, the Superman of Earth 2 has been brainwashed to serve him and the Superman of Earth Prime (which is what the Superman of this film is based on) has been the only one to defeat him. As for the film, it seems like Darkseid is just being evil for the sake of being evil.
There's also the one issue I had with the original story that I have in the film adaptation, and that's how they were defeated. Cyborg was able to open the Boom Tubes to pull Darkseid and the Parademons back to Apokolips. It just seems overly convenient and doesn't seem like a real defeat. To compare, the Chitauri forces in "Avengers" all conveniently died when their main warship was destroyed. It may seem like the same thing, but at least in "Avengers", they sent a message not to mess with Earth. In "War", it doesn't seem like Darkseid was scared into never attacking Earth again.

It's been stated that this film is the start of a new animated DC universe, with 2 films set within the continuity planned to be released every year, with the next film being "Son of Batman" coming this May. With "Justice League: War" the beginning of this new universe, it sets the tone for what's to come and introduces the new generation of voices actors for the iconic characters, though lifelong DC fans may find it hard to separate what they already know of the old continuity to fully enjoy this film. Overall, great action and character interaction make this an enjoyable film.

RATING: 8/10

Comics Review: "Damian: Son of Batman" - Stick to Drawing, Kubert (SPOILERS)

 

In the mid-2000's, writer Grant Morrison began his 6 year run on Batman by introducing to readers two versions of the offspring of Bruce Wayne and Talia al Ghul, Damian. The first was the 10 year old little bastard that everyone hated, but would come to love. The other was a look into the possible future, where Damian would take his father's role as the new Batman. With comics though, these possible futures almost never happen, and with Damian's death around this time last year, that said future may never come to pass; but with comics, death is also never permanent. Despite that, DC decided to give fans more Damian with a miniseries written and drawn by Andy Kubert, who co-created the character with Morrison, showing exactly how Damian would have become the Dark Knight. While the concept is brilliant, Kubert's execution is wholeheartedly underwhelming.

Before this miniseries, the origin of Damian as Batman shown in Batman #666 was that he took the role after the previous Batman had been killed. That's how this series starts out, with Batman and Robin investigating a pile of dead bodies at a fishing dock, but a booby trapped placed at the scene led to Batman's death, with Damian placing some blame on himself. By the end of the first issue and the start of the second issue, we learn that it was actually Dick Grayson who died, while Bruce had retired. Now this leads to my overall problem with the series, a twist that I feel shouldn't have been a twist. Dick is considerably smaller than Bruce, yet the Batman shown in that first scene could have passed for Bruce, not to mention the dialogue didn't make me think of Dick at all. To be fair though, dialogue is a major problem throughout the series. Though I think what really gets me about this twist is when Damian goes to visit Ra's and Talia and unsuccessfully asks them for help to find who was responsible for killing Batman. Talia says she had a deep bond with Batman, which makes sense if it was Bruce, but it was actually Dick who died. The only way I could see that making sense is that Ra's and Talia didn't know Dick had taken over the role. I find that hard to believe though because while the al Ghul's don't have a real partnership with the Waynes, they would at least keep tabs on them.

Another aspect of the first issue is that apparently supervillains love social media, as some of them, including Mr. Freeze and Killer Croc, make posts online taking credit for killing Batman. It's kind of ridiculous, but that was just the beginning of ridiculousness as the series would progress.

While I do enjoy Kubert's work, sometimes it's a little hard to "read", if that makes sense. Along with hiding who the Batman that was killed was, I couldn't tell how old Damian actually was in this series. He was in his Robin outfit, which made me think he was still young, probably a teenager now, but he would become Batman in a pretty short time, which made me think, "Okay, maybe he's in his twenties." But with that thought, I think it's kind of weird that Damian would still be Robin into his adulthood. Yes, we've seen Dick as a much older Robin in the original Earth 2 comics and Batman: The Animated Series, but it's hard to see Damian holding on to the role that long.

While I've mentioned in previous comic reviews that writers tend to draw things out in order to lengthen the story, this is one story that I think could have benefited in some way from lasting more than 4 issues, particularly Damian's decision making process. In issue one, Damian is like "I won't be Batman." Then in the second issue, he's like "Okay, I'll be Batman." Another example is he goes from "I won't kill my adversaries out of respect for my father" in issue three, which then becomes "Fuck it, I'm killing this guy" in issue four. But I think that Damian's mind isn't all there for the most part anyway. By issue three, after Alfred saves Damian's life, he just drops dead, and when Damian wakes up, his cat, also named Alfred, begins talking to Damian in the human Alfred's voice. Now it's possible Damian's is hallucinating, but what if Alfred's spirit somehow went into the cat? Ridiculous? Yes, but I think I can see Kubert going this route. Throughout the story, Damian is also seeking guidance from a priest, who kind of looks like Gordon, on how to pursue Batman's killer, but then it turns out he was just a hallucination, which makes no sense considering he was at Dick's funeral. Now, I know Grant Morrison wanted to make Damian a different kind of Batman, but I don't think Kubert needed to make him the crazy guy who talks to his cat.

By the end of the series, Damian encounters someone claiming to be the new Joker, who kidnaps Bruce to draw out Batman. The problem I have with this character though is that he seemingly comes out of nowhere, and I feel like I have to connect some threads that aren't expressly there. Allow me to list them:

• Professor Pyg appeared at the midway point of the series, and with the new Joker's appearance, I must admit they do resemble one another. It would also make sense that both characters had Jackanapes, genetically altered gorilla henchmen, working for them.
• There was a Joker fish that triggered the bomb that killed Dick, and Damian found a Joker card with a fish on it when he found Bruce's bed empty, telling Damian who took his father. Not to mention there was also a resemblance, at least to me, between the new Joker and that fish.
• Bruce had a pretty ugly nurse that talked kind of weird and kept talking about her boyfriend. I know this is reaching, but maybe the nurse was Harley Quinn. I mean, why else would they show that scene? It would make sense if she was still working for Joker, or new Joker to be exact. Still, the years had not been kind to her if that's the case.

By the end of the story, Damian eviscerates the new Joker, but is still alive until the real Joker comes up and shoots him between the eyes. Despite defeating the new Joker though, Damian still believes that people responsible for Dick's murder are out there. I know that Kubert isn't exactly forward with details, which is why I had to make the connections above, but I don't understand why Damian would feel that way. Maybe this is showing that Damian isn't a good detective, or that Kubert's a lazy writer.

The last issue of this series definitely leaves more questions than answers, which is a bad thing to do with a limited series. Why does Damian think there are more people responsible for Dick's death? What does the Joker's reappearance mean? There's a catch-22 situation here. On one hand, I want to know what happens with Damian after this story, but on the other, I don't think I can handle more of Kubert's writing.

I give it props for concept and art, but dialogue and content hurt it. Honestly, I would only recommend this to those who love Damian or would like to add this story to their collection as a companion to Grant Morrison's Batman run. He didn't write this, it probably would have been better if he did, but Damian is Morrison's baby after all. I find myself like I did after I saw "Prometheus." I wasn't exactly satisfied, but I would be curious enough to take a look at a sequel. Overall though, if this is where Damian was heading, it was probably a good idea to kill him off.

STORY RATING: 5/10
RECOMMENDATION RATING: 2/10