When taking over the final cut of Justice League, replacement director Joss Whedon made an aspect ratio error similar to The Simpsons on Disney+. After years of demanding, fans of Zack Snyder's vision for the DCEU are finally getting their wish. The so-called "Snyder Cut" of Justice League, since officially dubbed Zack Snyder's Justice League, is on its way in 2021, releasing exclusively on the HBO Max streaming service. It's a triumphant example of the fact that online fan campaigns can actually work.
The many behind the scenes issues surrounding the production of Justice League are extremely well-documented at this point. Snyder was the original director, but left midway through production, officially to deal with the sudden death of his daughter, and Whedon was brought in to ostensibly finish the film. What ended up actually happening was Whedon reshooting lots of scenes and writing lots of all-new material, to the point where the theatrical cut bears little in common with Snyder's vision.
Once the Snyder Cut finally releases, fans will be able to directly compare and contrast it with Whedon's version, and conclusively decide for themselves which one is superior. In the meantime, it's become apparent that one area where Whedon utterly failed Snyder's intent visually was with the aspect ratio he used.
As Zack Snyder recently discussed at the Justice Con event, he had decided to shoot Justice League in 1.43:1 aspect ratio, a much more square ratio than usually used for theatrical films. Snyder had filmed some scenes for Batman V Superman in that aspect, designed to take advantage of a taller IMAX screen. Snyder has confirmed that his cut of Justice League will restore the square-like aspect ratio he intended, and stream in that format on HBO Max. Unfortunately, when Whedon did the reshoots for Justice League, he shot all his material in the standard 1.85:1 theatrical widescreen ratio, and to make Snyder's footage fit in, it was all cropped to 1.85:1 as well.
Cinematographer Fabian Wagner was infamously dismayed by what had been done to his compositions in the Whedon Cut, and thanks to Snyder's explanation, it's now fully clear why. Oddly, this is the same problem suffered by the classic pre-HD seasons of The Simpsons, which when remastered for HD by Fox a few years back, were cropped from a near-square 1.33:1 ratio to the wider 1.78:1, in order to fill HDTVs. This wreaked havoc on the look of the show, in some cases outright cutting off the hilarious visual jokes the series often employs.
Disney+ used these same cropped versions initially, until fan outcry finally led them to offer the uncropped 1.33:1 original copies. Thankfully, as with The Simpsons, HBO Max will soon allow fans to stream Justice League the way it was meant to be seen. Hopefully Zack Snyder's Justice League will get limited theatrical screenings, as it would be a pity if Snyder and Wagner's untouched vision for the film never gets to be taken in on the big screen.
from ScreenRant - Feed https://ift.tt/2F1jXVR
0 Comments