Is this the final nail in the coffin?
Six days ago, it was reported that Justice League stuntman Richard Cetrone allegedly outed the Internet’s worst-kept secret: the fabled Zack Snyder cut of JL actually exists, and it’s housed up in the vaults of Warner Bros. Pictures. Turns out that’s not the case, after all, as Cetrone has now set the record straight via Batman-on-Film.
The seasoned stuntman, who has worked on everything from Man of Steel to the Underworld series, confirmed that last week’s quote was, in fact, fake. Truth be told, it gained a lot of traction online, leading some to wonder whether we’ll ever get a true, definitive answer regarding Snyder’s version. Enter Richard Cetrone.
When quizzed about the allegations by Batman-on-Film (via Batman-News), Cetrone responded as so:
What we do know is that Zack Snyder submitted a preliminary cut of Justice League early last year, when Warner Bros. deemed the movie too morose – too po-faced – to be a four-quadrant hit. And so, as Snyder vacated the director’s chair in order to tend to a family tragedy, Warner turned to two-time Avengers director Joss Whedon to dot the i’s and cross the t’s, resulting in a two-hour car crash of lackluster CGI and weak storytelling.
That’s not to say that Justice League was an unmitigated disaster – far from it, in fact – but the idea that Warner Bros. is in possession of a Zack Snyder cut seems increasingly unlikely. For one, his initial screening took place in January, a full 10 months before Justice League‘s theatrical release, meaning those in attendance were treated to some early test footage teeming with unfinished CGI and raw audio.
Justice League also wound up costing a pretty penny – rumor has it the production budget ballooned past $300 million – so we can’t imagine Warner Bros. will dump millions simply to complete an alternate (and presumably extended) cut of a feature that’s since been written off as one of the worst DCEU movies yet.