Earlier this year, Warner Bros. released the latest DC Animated Universe film Justice League: War. This is absolutely not associated to any of the prior DCAU films. It’s based the beginning tale from big “The New 52” reboot in 2011. The first issue was Justice_League: Origin, a reboot of the introduction and origin of the Justice League. In the New 52, the characters are slightly different, the interactions are different, Superman and Wonder Woman are an item, it’s all rebooted. This film uses a much different voice cast than most other DCAU films:
- Sean Astin — Shazam (voice)
- Zach Callison — Billy Batson (voice)
- Christopher Gorham — The Flash / Barry Allen (voice)
- Justin Kirk — Green Lantern / Hal Jordan (voice)
- Michelle Monaghan — Wonder Woman (voice)
- Shemar Moore — Cyborg / Victor Stone (voice)
- Jason O’Mara — Batman / Bruce Wayne (voice)
- Alan Tudyk — Superman (voice)
- Steve Blum — Darkseid / Computer Voice / Ocean Master (voice)
Parademons have secretly invaded Earth. They are abducting people and setting up mysterious devices in major cities. The story begins in Gotham, and Green Lantern is following a Parademon, where he eventually runs into Batman for the first time. After some chest thumping, they seek out “the alien in Metropolis” (Superman) to find out if any of this was related to him. Once meeting Superman, the full enormity of this impending invasion becomes clear.
All of the major characters get their brief introduction. Victor Stone is thr only character who gets an origin story as he is violently transformed into Cyborg. Soon enough, all of our heroes eventually find themselves together in the same city, which I think is Washington DC or Metropolis, but it’s probably not important. Although this is a large scale global invasion, the heroes are all in one city, and that is where Darkseid also makes his entrance. The group soon learns that humanity’s only chance is if they work together to stop Darkseid.
So…. I didn’t care for this film all that much. I didn’t find the characters either heroic or very likeable. They mostly didn’t like the idea of working together, which I suppose is more realistic, but it didn’t make it very enjoyable. I want to like my heroes, and I only saw elements of that in Batman, Flash, and Cyborg.
The portrayal of Darkseid also threw me off. He’s the intelligent powerful leader of a vast army, and yet here he is more of a silent final boss in a video game. Actually, the final fight felt like a video game. I also wasn’t a big fan of all the slightly creepy comments directed to Wonder Woman by various characters.
Based on a mid-credits scene, Warner Bros is already setting the next film in 2015 starring Aquaman — Justice League: Throne of Atlantis.
Should you watch this film? Sure, why not. It’s more of a rental than a purchase for me, though.
Justice League: War (2014)