If you smellelelelelelelelllllllllooowww! The fun of the DCEU?
Ever since Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice was largely savaged by critics and audiences for its' gloominess, anyone even remotely associated with the DCEU has gone out of their way to tell us that things will be "brighter", more "fun" and "optimistic" starting with the Justice League. We can now count the man playing Black Adam amongst them. In an Instagram post, The Rock spewed forth the same diatribe familiar of sunshine that is the new direction of the DCEU, and those words ring just as whack as they ever have.
Say it ain't so Rock! I get he's hyping his role and he's pumped about it, as are we, but this further eschewing of the darkness of the DCEU that we all love is getting boring. The studio seems to be under the impression that people didn't like BvS:DoJ because it was too unlike Marvel, and not the fact that it was poorly written/edited... *breathe*
Adding even more "fun" to the fire is one time Justice League / current Aquaman scribe Will Beall. In a recent interview with Collider he really wanted to hammer the "fun" home. Again. And again.
“It’s going to be fun, it’s going to be really fun. What we’ve come up with and James [Wan] especially — he has a really clear idea of the tone he’s going to have, and I think Aquaman is one that’s going to blow people’s minds, not just visually, but I think the story and the scope of it is really great.”
“I think Justice League again is, what you’re going to see — I hope I’m not going to get in trouble for saying this — but it’s much more fun, much poppier, than … I haven’t seen Wonder Woman yet, but Batman vs Superman was a little more somber. But Justice League is a lot more fun. And I think that feels to me like the direction those movies are heading now.”
I fear the studio's idea of "fun" means "funny". We've already seen, pardon the pun, flashes of humor in the Justice League trailer so it's very likely that's the tonal shift everyone is referring to. While quips and banter are an integral part of some of these characters, it felt odd given how dark BvS ended that Bruce Wayne is dropping sick burns on the King of Atlantis, while smirking.
I know that it's hard to determine the quality of a film based on the trailer, especially since the studios don't cut trailers together themselves so maybe we should cut the studio some slack. After all, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice the film was way better than the trailer.
