To say the DCEU has been a rollercoaster would be an understatement: between rumours of directors leaving, directors stepping down from the directorial chair before the movie even begins production, a slew of announced movies that most are convinced won't even make it to production, being a point of contention of a brand war that the companies themselves insist exists exclusively within the fandom and polarising audiences, splitting them between "this movie is a misunderstood masterpiece and here's an essay to explain why" and "you're an idiot and you're lying to yourself if you like this movie." I personally fall somewhere in the middle, in that I found MoS and BvS to be frustrating, disappointing, yet fascinating experiences. I almost lost all hope in the DCEU after Suicide Squad. Thankfully, Patty Jenkins turned things around with Wonder Woman: a wonderful, empowering, inspiring superhero movie. Going into Justice League, I wasn't sure what to expect. I was disappointed not once, but twice, by Zack Snyder, & I was well aware of the troubled production of this film. That said, it was hard to resist the DCEU going in a more hopeful direction, embracing the hopeful tone of the source material, and opting for more self contained storytelling, and the marketing was great. Regardless of which side of the spectrum you fall on, a live-action Justice League was long overdue, and the prospect of one in itself was exciting. Does the movie reach it's full potential? Does it triumph above it's predecessors? Or is it a disappointment?

Justice League is neither the astonishing movie some hoped for, or the dreadful, unwatchable one others feared. It is a middle of the road action movie that suffers from pacing, structural, narrative and special effects issues, but is carried by a well-acted ensemble of characters, and a handful of great action sequences. Before I get into why I thought JL was a disappointing experience that didn't come close to reaching it's full potential, I want to pay attention to some of the better aspects of this film. Zack Snyder visuals are no joke. This shouldn't be a surprise at this point, but he manages to raise the bar with each film. Whereas BvS looked like a painting brought to life, JL looks like a comic book put to live action. Snyder's rendition of Gotham City is one of, if not, the best live-action rendition of the city, capturing the gritty nature of the city, and the gothic architecture of the fictional city. It looked like the pages of a Batman comic or an Arkham game put to live action. The score was also used beautifully, breathing life into it. In addition to this, Snyder's sensibilities as a director have shown a large improvement. Instead of showing a desolated crater while lecturing us about hope as he did in MoS, he will reflect on the themes of hope with colorful, bright and optimism-filling images that accurately represent them.

Newcomer Ezra Miller does a fantastic job as Flash. Infusing him with a sense of awkwardness, uncertainty and self-doubt. He has power you can only dream of, but has no idea how to handle himself in a fight. Just the thought of fighting scares him. It's makes for an interesting dynamic between team members as we see him bounce off of a more experienced fighter such as Batman, and the certain, self-assured warrior Diana. It paves way for a series of entertaining and memorable character interactions, something this movie excels at.

Cyborg was a surprisingly entertaining addition to the film. He by no means steals the film, and is a more subdued presence than most, but Ray Fisher did a commendable job capturing the spirit of the character, who looks better than expected in action (I searched up this guy's age after the movie and he's 30! I thought he was 25 at most). I enjoyed the interactions between Cyborg and Flash. If it's true that Flash is going to be in Cyborg's movie, that's cool. Good for them.

Aquaman, played by Jason Moama, is a blast to watch. He steals every scene he's in - in part due to his intimidating physical presence, but also because despite being the tallest member of the cast, he brings a lot of heart and humanity to the role. Any fears about Moama being a "surfer bro" can be put to rest. He feels like a human being, not a caricature, and they didn't overdo the "big, physically intimidating jerk" angle, even though as expected, he can be a bit of a douche. If only a little bit.

Returning to reprise their roles are Ben Affleck as Batman, and Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman. Batman has changed since the weary, jaded depiction we saw in DoJ. He has a newly acquired sense of hope, inspired by Superman's selfless act. Whereas in that movie, he stared at Jason Todd's Robin armour coldly and broodily, he stares at Barry Allen's high-tech suit in this film with enthusiasm (as shown in the trailer). Even though it's a less compelling portrayal, Affleck plays it every bit as good. Gal Gadot is predictably great, bringing conviction, strength and confidence to the role. It was great seeing the newcomers bounce off of the returning cast members, and as I mentioned earlier, the cast interactions carried this film. They were funny and amusing, but could also be unexpectedly emotional and poignant.

The highlight of the film is an action-sequence that takes place midway, which isn't only the best action-sequence in this film, but also one of the best action-sequences in a superhero movie. It is some career-best material for Snyder, which isn't surprising when you give one of the best visual directors working today, a cast of characters with different power sets and different aesthetics to play around with. He felt right at home, and I wanted to shed tears seeing all of these characters come to life in such spectacular fashion. Every character looks great in action, ESPECIALLY Flash, who Snyder honed his visual effects with.

That's it for the good, as the rest of the movie proved to be a disappointing experience. I felt like something was off throughout my watching of the film, even if I found it hard to put my finger on it. However, as I wrote this review, it became clearer and clearer to me where I felt this movie fell short: it could've, and should've been longer. The movie is incredibly rushed, with some scenes given no room to develop and grow naturally. A character will say something that the character they're talking to will deflect, disregard of change the subject on because the movie's script has to get to point A from point B quick. I could tell what the characters were saying was scripted, which regularly broke immersion. This is especially true with the recruitment scenes, which is incredibly disappointing. These are the most pivotal points in the movie, where we're supposed to meet and get attached to these characters, but they breeze right through them. Because of this, the assembling of the team never feels earned. It never feels natural. It just feels like they're assembled because the movie had to be at a certain point in a certain time. The pacing is uneven, and the movie is lacking the punch, that oomph, of the live-action assembling of the Justice League - I guarantee you'll be surprised at how little Justice League action there is in the film, and how much talking there is by comparison.

I mentioned that character interactions were the film's strongpoint, but in terms of developing these characters, the movie doesn't do a good job of developing them as either an individual or a team. It pains me to bring The Avengers into this, but I must. That film did a great job bringing the team closer together as a unit through the death of Coulson. This film, on the other hand, did not do a good job in showing them growing closer as a team. They just felt like a group of people together doing stuff. The movie also does a mediocre job developing them as individuals. Say what you will about MoS and BvS, but at least those movies had distinct character arcs. No one changes in this movie in any meaningful way.

The CGI as a whole is very inconsistent, with some action scenes devolving into a gigantic, clumsy CGI-mess. Quite a few of the choices of location for the action-sequences were boring, especially the final fight, which is disappointingly small in scope, and surprisingly brief in runtime. The movie felt lifeless and empty in parts, due to 80% of the film being shot in front of a green screen, and the CGI not being all that convincing, with the characters sticking out like a sore-thumb from the background. Perhaps the movie were missing some good music to stitch it together: Danny Elfman's score is serviceable, and has glimmers of greatness, but Zimmer and Junkie XL's presence is unsurprisingly strongly missed.

Last of all, Superman's return in Justice League is disappointing. For those of you who aren't aware, when Whedon took over from Snyder to direct the film, WB called for reshoots. This was at the same time Cavill was shooting Mission Impossible 6, in which he grew a moustache for. Because of this, WB had to CGI-remove Cavill's moustache. And boy oh boy they might've as well kept the moustache, because the CGI couldn't have been more glaringly obvious. This was Cavill's opportunity to play the comic-accurate version of Superman (which the film delivers on in spades) but you can never enjoy it because the CGI is so distracting, to the point of being laughable. This isn't just one scene, or two. This is nearly every scene with Superman. I'd love to know what was so bad about the Superman scenes that Zack shot, that they decided this laughably bad CGI would be the better alternative. That's without mentioning that the return of the character itself is nowhere near the epic, moving moment you might've hoped for.

Conclusion

There are glimmers of greatness and the movie is carried by the strength of it's characters, but all in all, it is a rushed, empty action movie that sometimes works and sometimes doesn't. If the film had been given time to breathe, it might've been something good, but as it is is: the movie feels like it's constantly rushing to get from point A to point B to get the finish line, and forgets to acquire a heart. I'm uncertain about the future of the DCEU. I'm uncertain about Affleck's future in the DCEU. But more than anything, I'm uncertain about where I stand on the DCEU. I'm uncertain if I even care at this point. As tempting as that after credits scene was (there are two, by the way), it's hard for me to get excited or have any sort of reaction. It isn't that I disliked JL. It had enough fun action sequences and good characters for me to have a decent time, and say I have mixed feelings about it at worse. But it is such a frustrating experience and again, a waste of potential, and I can only sustain so much of those and remain optimistic. Do I recommend it? It depends. If all you're looking for is fun character interactions and good action, I'd recommend it. If you're looking for a well-paced, well-written, well-structured movie, I honestly wouldn't mention it. If you didn't like the past DCEU movies? Well, it depends on why you didn't like them. If it's because of the tone, then yes, I would recommend this. If it's because of the storytelling, pacing and structural issues, I would recommend you pass on this one.