Depending on who you ask, Zack Snyder is either a misunderstood auteur raging against the studio machine or a purely visual filmmaker that’s never grasped the concept of character development and pacing, but one thing that definitely can’t be denied is that anything he touches is guaranteed to generate conversation.
For the last two months it’s been the future, or lack thereof, of his SnyderVerse. There were no plans in place for Warner Bros. and DC Films to construct a shared universe when he was first hired to direct Man of Steel, but after the opportunity presented itself, the director was more than happy to shape the franchise in his own image.
Man of Steel and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice were divisive on a critical, commercial and boardroom level, and HBO Max’s Justice League was an operatic fantasy epic as opposed to a standard superhero blockbuster, but they’re all very much Zack Snyder movies. In a new interview, he was asked how he’d have fared if it was Marvel that came calling first, and admitted he’d have never been able to replicate Kevin Feige’s formula for success.
“I could have changed it, so it would have maybe made less money or been less beloved. But for what they’ve created? I don’t know that there is a better way to do it.”
That’s a completely fair and understandable assessment, when Snyder has always stuck to his guns in terms of making his movies exactly the way he wants them to be made and then waiting for the executives to weigh in after cameras have stopped rolling, whereas the MCU has always been a product of Feige’s vision. Indeed, the company’s Chief Creative Officer oversees every single project to ensure they all pull in the same direction and hit the mandated story points to tie everything together, which is obviously not something WB have paid much attention to.
