Justice League Grindhoused

Let me catch my breath... I just got done watching this and it was incredible. I have watched Whedon's and Zack's versions in the past. I was not thrilled with Josh's to say the least. Zack's is an excellent version and the 4 hours did not feel like 4 hours. He filled in all the gaps that Josh neglected. So I was very skeptical to whether this 2 hour and 13 minute movie could in any way rival what was my favorite version. Short answer, this is an awesome version. I do not use that word lightly. I love movies but I can be maybe overly critical if they don't hit all the bases with me. This movie is an inside the park grand slam home run. Ok, enough with the compliments.

Why is it so friggin good you may ask?

Firstly, the soundtrack is perfect. Gieferg outdid the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie's soundtrack. The callbacks, the oldies, the on-the-nose songs, they were all just great. This soundtrack just keeps you on your heels and adds so much to the movie. The soundtrack is for a slightly older crowd but so was Guardian's and that movie is beloved by all age groups.

Secondly, his editing was great. Gieferg took out almost 1/2 the original runtime and somehow what he left was a very compelling, non-stop, exciting, and satisfying movie. I thought Zack's was great because he took the time to flesh out all the characters which gave the story and ending more meaning. You care more about character's you understand. This version, even with the shortened runtime, still left me satisfied in so many ways. The pacing is great. I never wanted to take my eyes off the screen. I was so afraid I was going to miss something. While writing this I can't help but wonder if I never watched either of the official versions would I feel the same way. Subconsciously, even though certain content is not in this edit, I still know it exists, and I can't help but wonder if I went into this "blind" would I still feel like I understood everything. Truth be told, I think this may be a moot point. I believe most people who come here looking for fanedits, and specifically take the time to acquire this edit, most likely have watched either or both of the official releases, and have those stories in mind while watching this.

Technically speaking the production is seamless. Nothing is jarring or out of place. The sound seems crisp and the video quality is professional grade.

Do I have any criticisms? In the beginning the faux "aged film" effect was a little distracting but somewhere along the way, I would say before the 1/2 way point, I stopped noticing it. I became so immersed in the film and it just was what it was. I don't even know if I would call it a criticism, maybe I just needed to acclimate to the theme. I mean it is a "grindhouse" edit, it kind of comes with the territory.

No spoilers, but "Missing Reels" (when you watch it, you'll know what I mean) is genius. Bravo for that!

If you like Zack's version, or even if you like Josh's, or even if you just like super hero movies, you have to watch this.

I never thought I would be typing this tonight...but THIS is now my preferred version of Justice League.

I watched this because of a short preview clip that amused me, featuring Wonder Woman with the original theme from the 70s. But music replacement is easy enough, any hack can do it with a clean center channel. I decided to give this one a try and got the entire 10 gb thing and had no clue how much of a treat I was in for.

With its unassuming and even pretty generic title, "Justice League Grindhoused" is easy to overlook but what Gieferg created is absolutely remarkable. From the custom titles at the beginning to his choice of funky tracks (some might be controversial like the song he used for The Flash in the begining but I like it) to the exceptional sound editing which is more difficult to pull off than you would think in a grindhouse fanedit, this is a must see. Characters have their own themes back, the ones they are known for and I'll never understand why Warner Bros chose to not use them. And the sound editing is on point, this faneditor knows what he's doing. I removed a point because I'm a nitpicker but it's some of the best I've heard.

The editing choices themselves seem apt to me, I never managed to finish the never ending Snyder cut which I think we will all agree is bloated but a gift to faneditors. I don't care much for the DC movie universe, it seems to me that after the success of the Nolan Batman movies everything needed to be dark and broody but to me DC is exactly the opposite. Wonder Woman was fun in the 70s, Batman was cartoony and fun in the Burton films and Christopher Reeves' Superman was colorful and filled with hope. This fanedit injects much needed fun in this movie and most of the time, even though I might have gotten bored in a few places because of some unnecessary action, at least I was tapping my foot to the groovy soundtrack. This fanedit is DC done right. By no fault of the editor some things can't be changed and I'm sad to remove two points from my overall enjoyment but if you consider my score for the original would probably hover around 5/10 this is a massive improvement and quite an achievement for a fanedit. Excellent work.

For those who know me it's no secret that despite (or because of) being a lifelong DC fan, I'm very far from a Snyder one, his DC output or otherwise. I dislike his videogame-like style, his over-reliance on CGI, and his self-important grim/emo approach to the superhero genre. Fortunately, along came this edit and injected much needed fun into the source material, and on the way pointed out the high level of cheese in the original film (come on, that store/car crash introductory scene for Flash is laugh out loud corny, it belongs in a spoof of romcoms!)

The choice of songs is spot-on and often hilarious (I even anticipated a few, thinking "will it dare or won't it" - it did!), the editing itself is excellent, and the technical quality is as high as a recreation of old battered film reels allows - something that is *very* hard to do convincingly, in fact. The only shortcoming is that the original score sometimes creeps under the added songs, but I do realize the difficulty of completely cleaning a dialogue channel to get rid of it (it requires the use of massive quantities of filters, and sometimes not even that does the trick) and given the high enjoyability of the final result, it won't be me holding that back against it.

This was a real breath of fresh air, and there's no further need for me to watch Justice League in any other form. THIS is the one version for me from now on. I was around when the classics of grindhouse fanediting first showed up (Jaws the Sharksploitation Edit, War of the Stars I and II, Robots vs. Kung Fu), and I admit that I had missed the style. This one is a more than worthy addition to that pantheon. Not to be missed.

I find grindhouse versions quite tiring after a while and i didnt expect to sit through 2hrs of one, but this cut was simply to fun not to. With this said i didn't finish any of the other versions I've seen of this movie. Most Snyder films feel like they were written by an Autist, this one especially. In here scenes that put me off or made me cringe, like most stuff involving flash were made bearable or even fun, through the right use of music and visual effects. The narrative is surprisingly strong, i didn't expect that much story going in and for it to make any sense. The only negative i could bring up would be that sometimes its hard to make out the dialogue over the music. But for that you have the polish subs, don't understand polish, still preferred watching it with subs on. In closing recommend it over any other version out there.

Edit: Before anybody takes offense to the Autist comment, i meant no disrespect. I just wanted to express that Snyder's characters and dialogue lack a certain human touch.

There are a lot of words that have been used to describe Snyder's Justice League, though I do not think the word "FUN" would the first word out of most peoples mouths.

But all that has now changed with this fan edit.

This is a FUN fan edit.

Gieferg has injected some much needed levity into Snyder's very dour grim & gritty heroics with his grindhouse antics and new musical score.

While not every song choice worked for me, many were indeed inspired, even bordering on genius. Any movie that climaxes with that Bonnie Tyler classic is an instant win for me!

Funny, some have criticized that the music is too loud, while I on the other hand, thought it could have been louder in certain epic sequences. To each their own.

Narratively, I like the restructured scenes, though due to personal taste, there are portions I would have preferred the Whedon cut versions as I prefer his less extreme version of certain characters. I also thought in this style of edit, more could have been trimmed for faster pacing. But again that is all very subjective.

Gieferg successfully meets all his fan edit objectives and creates a very interesting alternate take on Snyder's Justice League.

Well done! :)