Justice League Reviews: 12 Early Reactions You Need To See

12. It's A Mess

Uh-oh. If there's one thing most of the early reviews seem to agree on, it's that lots of Justice League doesn't work, because it's a mess. Polygon says it tries to be too many things at once:

"The problem is that Justice League zips back and forth between extremes, trying to encompass two different movies. It happens so frequently, and without prompt, that the dizzying pace is impossible to follow."

Empire says the “Swiss-cheese plot” is a huge problem, while The Village Voice seems to suggest poor direction is to blame, and the result is a lack of cohesion:

"Meanwhile, action scenes start and stop and then start again, then go in different directions, and it was a few moments into The Big Climactic Face-Off before I realized we’d arrived at The Big Climactic Face-Off."

While The Guardian suggests that it's down to the film's gestation:

"This new film has had a troubled passage. Its original director, Zack Snyder, had to step aside after a family tragedy and Joss Whedon took over, reportedly reshooting between 15 and 20% of the film, a segment which may or may not have included the ending. It’s an unhappy state of affairs that may account for the film’s tendency to shapelessness."

And the most scathing overall reflection comes from The Telegraph:

"But for whatever combination of reasons, the end result is a broken film, swimming in bad CGI and forgettable mayhem, that you can’t imagine any number of rewrites or reshoots could have saved. It can’t even decide how to start, and offers up no less than five introductory scenes, including Bruce Wayne pony-trekking in Iceland, Wonder Woman thwarting a terrorist attack in London, and yet another instance of that DC franchise staple, the slow-motion funeral."

At least IGN say the mess isn't entirely fatal. though:

"It’s messy and flawed but it still offers enough entertainment value (mostly thanks to its likable characters) to make it worthwhile."