Originally Posted by
Ilan Preskovsky
No, you're right I stated that very badly. That's a fair call.
My point is that they should not be attempting to create R-rated Justice League movies in the first place. And I absolutely stand by that. Again, that doesn't mean that R-rated stories can't be told with DC's characters but any sort of traditional superhero story with the likes of Superman and the Flash has no business trying to appeal only to adults. Not because comics and superheroes are only for kids but because built into the combination of these characters and these sorts of stories is something that is genuinely childlike and innocent so trying to mix that with brutal violence or, to a much lesser extent, sex and profanity, results in what I can only describe as an abomination. Every last inch of this movie felt wrong, even if I enjoyed parts of it. The goofy superhero stuff ends up looking extremely childish, while the "adult" content just looks desperate, out of place and particularly ugly. It may have been attempting to be an "adult" movie but it absolutely failed at reaching that goal - and, because of the material it was working with, it never actually had a chance in hell of doing so. The end result is a movie that looks far more juvenile than something explicitly aimed at kids like Teen Titans Go.
What's really befuddling about this movie, though, is that it has a genuinely good grasp on a character like Superman but somehow completely fails to see how incongruous it is to have such a traditional Superman share the screen with graphic depictions of Captain Marvel having his leg ripped off or Batgirl being eaten alive. Hell, just read that sentence again and tell me how any of this makes the slightest amount of sense.
R-rated DC animated films? Awesome. Give me adaptations of stuff like Morrison's Animal Man, Milligan's Shade the Changing Man, King's Mister Miracle or Robinson's Starman. Just don't give me embarrassingly adolescent crap like this. These characters and the audience deserve better.