Joss Whedon Vowed He’d Never Do What Zack Snyder Did in His Films
Avengers filmmaker Joss Whedon famously jumped ship to DC to rewrite and finish Zack Snyder’s original Justice League. But a couple of years prior, Whedon was adamant that he wouldn’t do what Snyder has done for quite a few of his comic book properties.
Joss Whedon had a different approach to filmmaking than Zack Snyder did
There have been a few times where Snyder’s films have been watered down when they hit theaters. Moviegoers often see a slightly shorter version of Snyder movies than the movies the director envisioned in his head. This has resulted in Snyder releasing director’s cuts, which he’s become known for over the years. The director’s cuts show the actor’s full vision for his projects in all of its glory, with minimal or no interference from the studio.
Snyder once explained why he was so used to doing director’s cuts for his features.
“I would make a movie for the studio,” Snyder said according to Yahoo. “And then my relationship with DVD would be like, I’d kind of be done with the theatrical division who wanted the movie made. I would just talk to DVD like, ‘Hey, if you guys give me a little extra money, I can get you a weirdo version of the movie that you can sell again.’ When people started to get to know me and get to know that director’s cut — there was always something in it that they weren’t going to get from the theatrical version, then that started to become anthemic of what I do.”
Movies like Watchmen, Batman v Superman, and recently Justice League all received the director’s cut treatment.
“You end up with Justice League as sort of the quintessential, insane journey to a director’s cut. I don’t know if that story is ever really going to be told in its entirety, but it’s a microcosm for what I was able to achieve with Rebel Moon, but with everyone’s eyes wide open and everyone really like kind of into it,” he added.
But ironically, Whedon had the exact opposite approach when it came to filmmaking. The Buffy showrunner was against using director cuts for his projects.
”It has always been my ambition never to do a director’s cut of anything, and always to make the movie with the studio that we both want to make,” Whedon once told Collider.
Why trying to ‘fix’ Zack Snyder’s ‘Justice League’ was Joss Whedon’s biggest regret
After working on Marvel, Whedon was brought on board to help finish Snyder’s Justice League. Snyder had to leave the project early due to a personal family tragedy, leaving the superhero feature in limbo. According to Vulture, Whedon claimed he was recruited under false expectations. He thought he’d only be polishing up Snyder’s Justice League. But overtime, Whedon felt the studio wanted him to revamp Snyder’s vision entirely.
“They asked me to fix it, and I thought I could help,” Whedon recalled.
But doing Justice League seemed to be a far different experience than doing Avengers. Whedon asserted that the actors were too used to Snyder’s loose directorial style. When Whedon shot the project, he did so with a more hands-on approach that the actors involved weren’t comfortable with. Additionally, Whedon found himself butting heads with stars Ray Fisher and Gal Gadot. Fisher felt Whedon intentionally cut down his role as Cyborg to perpetuate racial stereotypes. Gadot claimed Whedon threatened her career after a heated argument. Whedon denied both allegations.
He admitted to intentionally cutting down Fisher’s scenes, but that was due to narrative purposes, and his negative opinion on Fisher’s acting ability. With Gadot, Whedon felt the Wonder Woman actor was simply mistaken.
“I don’t threaten people. Who does that? English is not her first language, and I tend to be annoyingly flowery in my speech,” he said.
Although Gadot responded that she understood exactly what Whedon meant.
All of this came in the wake of many accusations casting Whedon as verbally abusive and demeaning to actors that he’s worked with over the years. Justice League only helped furthered this narrative, with the movie itself causing a divide between DCEU fans. With all of these factors, Whedon eventually considered his involvement in Justice League as one of his biggest career regrets.
Zack Snyder didn’t see Joss Whedon’s ‘Justice League’
In an interview with IMDb, the Rebel Moon director confided that he never saw Whedon’s take on his project. So, he had little knowledge of the changes Whedon made to his original vision. Snyder did know, however, that Fisher’s Cyborg didn’t have as significant of a role that was originally intended. He was looking forward to remedying that omission with his Max director’s cut.
“You know, because I haven’t seen the theatrical version of the movie and how it ended up, I was never really sure — and I’m still not — maybe, at some point, I’ll take a look at it, but I’m still not exactly sure what roles were maybe diminished or removed,” Snyder told IMDb. “Of course, number one on the list — you know, for me — is Ray Fisher’s Cyborg story being released. Central to the entire movie.”
