The following is going to contain major spoilers for Zack Snyder’s Justice League. If you haven’t yet seen it, and still want to remain unspoiled, stop reading now.
When Zack Snyder got the opportunity to go back into his four-hour cut of Justice League – lovingly known as The Snyder Cut by his fans – he had to opportunity to refine visual effects, add back in scenes that he thought he’d have to remove, and also film additional footage with Ben Affleck and Jared Leto that fleshed out the Knightmare future of his universe. But every step of the journey was a battle with the studios over what he could and could not include. We already knew that Snyder wanted to include Green Lantern in his closing scene, until Warner Bros. told him not to. But we just now learned about a pivotal Flash scene that almost didn’t make the cut.
Snyder recently held a three-day film festival in California, where he screened the three DC movies he was able to helm, including Justice League on an IMAX screen. A Q-and-A was conducted following each screening, and during one, Snyder spoke about the scene in Justice League where Ezra Miller’s The Flash figured out how to run so fast, they were able to turn back time. But the way that he talked about it, he made it clear that the studio didn’t want Snyder to include the scene, and they even gave a reason. He said:
It wasn't supposed to exist. We had a big, I mean, not an argument. We had – there was a time when the discussion of whether or not to have Flash run time back was a big, you know, the studio didn't want to do that bit. It was difficult. it was almost one of these things where I had said, ‘Look, let me show you it, and it'll be cool and you guys are going to want do it.’ And they said, ‘Okay, cool.’ And well, you know, they were confused. There was a lot of confusion. But regardless, I think the good news is that we had shot enough material of Ezra running on the treadmill and doing his thing, saying those lines about, ‘Dad, I'm one of them.’ That whole thing. We had that, and thank God we did. Because there was no way we could have manufactured that. It was good that we had that. So that’s what you got.
I’m not exactly sure how Zack Snyder’s Justice League could have ended without The Flash turning back time, ever so slightly, so that he Unity didn’t come together and open a portal for Darkseid to peer through. I mean, I suppose it’s possible that he could have gone the same method of the theatrical cut of Justice League, even though we try not to speak of that film. In that version, the team stops Steppenwolf before the Mother Boxes are able to fuse. Really, the scene is so embarrassing. This one, from Snyder’s version, is so much more badass:
Thankfully, cooler heads prevailed, Zack Snyder had the necessary footage to include the scene of Barry Allen running fast enough to reverse time, and Justice League was able to end on that memorable sequence. Audiences will see more of Ezra Miller as Barry Allen when The Flash opens in theaters in June. It’s one of the many upcoming 2023 movies that you can look forward to, between now and the end of the year.
