Justice League may have only just hit theaters today (our review), but fans have wasted no time in launching a petition asking Warner Bros. to release a director’s cut on home video in 2018.
The appeal was launched by Roberto Mata, and may well be longer than the actual Justice League script. However, at the gist of Mata’s proposition is a very reasonable argument: ardent DC fans want to see the original (and much longer) cut that Zack Snyder had envisioned, similar to how Warner Bros. launched the so-called Ultimate Edition of Batman V Superman late last year.
At the time of writing, Roberto Mata’s plea has garnered just over 3,000 signatures, but that number continues to grow by the minute. Here’s a brief extract from the petition:
…it’s understandable that the visionary filmmaker [Snyder] doesn’t own the rights to the film and that he stepped down for understandable, tragic and heartbreaking reasons, but fans deserve better the version the director always intended, than half a film, given that they are the movie-paying audience and from a business standpoint it makes sense that the studio will want to cut the film…but the petition [is not asking WB] to take the film out of theaters; the petition is to ask Warner Bros. to release Zack Snyder’s director’s cut, together with Tom Holkenborg’s (Junkie XL) score on home release.
What’s particularly interesting about this proposal is that Mata – and, by effect, more than 3,000 film fans – are also asking Warner Bros. to release the original Tom Holkenborg (Junkie XL) score that was to be included in Justice League, long before Danny Elfman was brought on board to compose the film. Critics have since branded Elfman’s work as “generic” and “lazy,” and it’s fair to say that an uninspired score was one of many criticisms leveled against Justice League.
Perhaps the Powers That Be will take heed of this petition? It’s too soon to tell, and Whedon’s contribution to the film may complicate matters. Rumor has it that the two-time Avengers director reshot 20 percent of the movie, so separating that from Snyder’s original vision may result in an incoherent mess.
Emerging from a long, trying spell in production, during which time Joss Whedon conducted six weeks of intensive reshoots, Justice League is screening in theaters from today, November 17th.
