The following post contains SPOILERS for both versions of Justice League.

You can blame a lot of the Justice League theatrical cut’s issues on Warner Bros. They’re the ones who took control of the project after Zack Snyder left the film. Even before that, they were the ones who supposedly lost faith with Snyder’s bleak and angsty approach to DC Comics’ characters after the so-so box-office returns for his previous superhero movie, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. 

Some of the fault also has to go to Joss Whedon, who Warner Bros. initially brought in to punch up Snyder’s vision with more jokes. When Snyder quit, Whedon took over. He reshaped the script and directed the reshoots used to rework the initial concept into the mess that eventually opened in theaters in 2017. He’s not credited as the film’s director, but, y’know, would you want to be the credited director of Justice League?

Now that both Whedon’s cut and Zack Snyder’s Justice League are both streaming on HBO Max, you have the opportunity to watch the two side by side and compare them. Even though Snyder’s cut is a far superior experience, and even though Whedon’s version is a borderline incoherent mess, watching them together does reveal that not every problem with Justice League was Joss Whedon’s fault. Some of his film’s issues show up in Snyder’s version too, and clearly predated any and all corporate meddling, Here are a few of the most notable examples.

Gallery — Things That Were Better in the Whedon Cut of Justice League:

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