What Could Have Been: George Miller’s Justice League Mortal

0:00 disappointed by both the mixed critical reception and underwhelming box office results of Superman Returns Warner Brothers decided to Fast Track a stand-alone Justice League movie instead of moving forward with a sequel to Brian singer's Superman film hoping to begin filming before the 2007 writer strike George Miller director of The Mad Max series and known for his wild and Visually captivating filmmaking style was hired to direct and while the movie would hurdle towards production at a Breakneck Pace It ultimately would never get made so let's dive in and find out what went wrong and what could have been George Miller's Justice League mortal had this film been made it may have altered comic book movie history as we know it as Warner Brothers wanted the Justice League to be the start of a DC Cinematic Universe which would have

0:45 beaten Marvel to the punch but unlike Marvel that had a standalone film to establish each character's origin story before teaming everybody up in the Avengers Warner Brothers would have taken the reverse approach and only plan to make spin-off films for each member if the Justice League movie was a hit from the outset it was decided not to connect the film to either of the two DC films that had just hit theaters therefore Brandon Routh was not asked to reprise his role as Superman nor was Christian Bale asked to return as Batman not that I think Nolan would have allowed that anyway but Bale did comment on the Justice League film saying it would be better if it came out after Nolan's planned Trilogy so that it doesn't tread on what they're doing regardless director George Miller chose to cast younger largely unknown actors as he wanted them to grow into the roles over the course of several films DJ

1:31 katrona was cast as Superman Armie Hammer as Batman Megan Gale as Wonder Woman Hugh K's burn as Martian Manhunter Adam Brody as the flash common as Green Lantern and Santiago Cabrera as Aquaman for the villains Teresa Palmer was cast as Talia al Ghul while Jay Baruchel was cast as the lead villain Maxwell Lord in the years since some of the concept art and costume tests from the film have been leaked which has given us a pretty decent idea of what the film would have looked like in respect a Batman it looks like Miller took some inspiration from Alex Ross's famous artwork when it came to the cowl but for the rest of the suit it would have been much more utilitarian and had a battle armor feel it's also important to note that this was planned to come out before Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight making this the first movie where Batman would have been able

2:17 to turn his head did you see the bat suit I saw the bat suit and I saw this with all the carbon fiber and all the like like mechanics and springs and pistons on it that's what seemed like it was really Miller wasn't afraid to shake up what people know about those characters what we did was uh we got down there and George Miller was basically like we're going to push these DC people farther than they are ever going to be comfortable with and then the DC people showed up and looked around and they were like this is farther than more comfortable but we love it and you can do whatever you want and then it just went even farther Superman's iconic red underwear and boots are also notably absent and if I'm being candid the costume seems a little low budget but it's possible that the intention was to convey a homemade aesthetic perhaps implying that Martha Ken was responsible for crafting the

3:03 outfit it's also possible that this was an earlier test version of the costume and not what the final version would have looked like because if we look at Wonder Woman's costume by comparison in these publicity Stills her outfit looks pretty solid and Polished in this script there are also several jokes at the expense of her skimpy outfit with flash at one point suggesting she consider wearing pants which DC would try it a few years later in the failed TV pilot for NBC Aquaman would have had a prosthetic water hand and at one point in the script as he's complaining that he's come to the aid of mankind several times points to his hand and says I've given my pound of Flesh and speaking of costumes the film would have opened with all of our heroes in Black versions of them as they attend the funeral of a Fallen Hero Batman would have been notably absent suggesting this may be his funeral while Superman watches the

3:48 coffin lowered into the ground from high above the city of metropolis the story flashes back to two days ago we quickly learned that the many humans had been around for years but most are inactive as Earth has become safe and peaceful under their watch Batman has mostly retreated to his cave where he monitors the world's metahumans with the use of a satellite brother I learning about everyone's powers and weaknesses so that he can defeat them in case they ever turn against humanity Alfred enters the cave and informs Batman that Bruce Wayne has a birthday party to attend so Batman shuts down brother I in heads upstairs but moments after he's gone brother I reactivates around the world Our Heroes begin to have their powers disrupted in mysterious ways starting with Martian Manhunter who burst into flames and accidentally sets everything he comes into contact with on fire Barry Allen

4:34 donza's Flash costume and races to hell where he meets Wonder Woman here buries a local crime fighter and a fanboy of all the metahumans and this meeting with Wonder Woman is the first time he's teamed up with any of them together he and Wonder Woman are able to subdue Manhunter and submerge him in water but it's not long before other metahumans have similar experiences Aquaman contracts aquaphobia a fear of water you know what I don't want to die and Green Lantern loses his eyesight and control of his Green Lantern ring back at Bruce's birthday party he's greeted by rival businessman Maxwell Lord who has catered the party via his superhero themed restaurant called Planet Krypton Talia al Ghul also shows up before Lord tells Bruce the story of how Talia betrayed her own father Raz al Ghul to help Batman defeat him and how afterwards without him standing in their

5:20 way Batman broke her heart embracing Solitude instead of committing to a romantic relationship with her we eventually learned that Italian Lord have joined forces to systematically destroy the metahumans and they're the ones disrupting each of their powers by targeting their weaknesses with the use of Nanobots and the reason they know each member's weakness is because months ago tally exploited Batman's confidence to gained access to the bat cave where she provided Lord with a link to Batman's surveillance satellite brother I which Lord has now taken control of giving him a detailed profile of each meta-human haunted by his past Lord holds a deep seat of resentment towards the many humans for failing to protect him as a child when he was subjected to cybernetic experiments by the government's omac project which tried to create super soldiers Lord is the last survivor of these experiments and fueled

6:07 by revenge is now determined to destroy the metahumans and Gotham Batman tries to stop a biker gang from torturing a couple of cops when one of the bikers transforms into a huge armored super soldier known as an omac who easily defeats Batman afterwards licking his wounds Batman returns to the cave and tries to access brother I but the satellite tells him he no longer has control of it the flash returns home to do some research and finds his nephew Wally West has come to visit who would have been played by Anton Yelchin just like Barry Wally also possesses the gift of super speed very asked Wally to help him with his research as they learn about the olmac project the heroes decide to regroup and travel to the Fortress of Solitude where Batman who is now forced to wear high-tech braces due to his injuries sustained during the battle with the omac reveals to the

6:52 group that he used brother I to spy on all of them to learn of their weaknesses but someone has taken control of the satellite and is using the information collected against them enraged Wonder Woman punches Batman once our heroes learned that they've been affected with Nanobots which are responsible for disrupting their powers they each use their unique abilities against one another in order to rid themselves up the Nanobots it's at this time that Lord orders brother I to initiate phase one as people all over the world begin transforming into omax Lord then uses his psychic abilities to telepathically convince Superman that Lois Lane has been murdered by Wonder Woman turning an enraged Superman against her the two fight in an epic Clash that reaches outer space with Wonder Woman throwing Superman into the moon before he recovers and throws her back to Earth as the group tries to fight off Superman

7:39 Wonder Woman lasso's Lord and asks of how she can free Superman from Lord's mind control Lord tells her that the only way is by killing him which would break the link something she refuses to do Superman then gets a hold of Wonder Woman and is about to kill her when Batman swiftly swoops in and kills the Lord in an instant by snapping his neck putting an end to his control over Superman and liberating him from Lord's mental manipulation Talia then merges with the brother-eye computer becoming a living breathing cybernetic monstrosity with the voice of Lord whose mind has jumped to her Lord then reveals that he used his Planet Krypton restaurant chain to infect people with the Omak virus as he activates his new Army of omax cyborgs around the world Batman tries to rescue Talia from the clutches of the computer but she dies before Lord's mind

8:24 departs in search of a fresh host eventually choosing Barry Allen who had previously eaten at a Planet Krypton restaurant to refuel infecting him with the Nanobots and allowing Lord to take control of his body Barry then transforms into Omak Ultra before Superman fights to subdue him while the rest of the team battles the Omak Army as Barry wrestles to regain control of his mind he realizes that the only way to defeat Lord and stop the Olmec Army is to sacrifice himself so he runs around the world faster and faster until he reaches the speed of light finally he slams into the speed barrier described as a cosmic wall of light killing himself and destroying Max will Lord and the omags Wally West ends up adopting his uncle's moniker becoming the new Flash which brings us back to the funeral at the start of the film which we now learn is for Barry Allen not

9:10 Batman who refused to attend as he was too ashamed to show his face feeling responsible due to the creation of the brother I satellite after the funeral the team soon reconciles with Batman and decides to officially form the Justice League just as star of the Conqueror descends on Earth from space teasing the sequel so what went wrong well a few things the first was a writer strike which would delay production the writer strike was looming so what we did is we all sat down at a table before we knew it was going to happen I mean almost like we're like we have two hours they're like so just throw every idea we can into the script because we can't write the script once it starts and everybody just sat around spitballing with George and Nico and all the whole creative team down there and we ended up with a script that was almost 200 pages long and then someone goes okay five four three all right guys that's the

9:57 writer strike pens down no one can write anything else but once the strike ended production resume with plans to shoot down in Australia to take advantage of their massive tax breaks we were down in Australia for you know like a month two months doing you know prefab we're doing like shoots doing like rehearsals in the suits all the characters in their suits and then we got a call one day from uh from the producers and they go we need everybody to come in however the Australian government felt that production had not hired enough Australian actors despite the film being helmed by Australian director George Miller the crew being composed of Australians and three of the major stars of the film also being Australians Miller was Furious and complained that Australia was throwing away a hundred million dollar plus investment into the local economy as a result production was moved to Vancouver and filming was

10:42 pushed back to July 2008 which just so happened to be when The Dark Knight came out becoming a cultural phenomenon it was at this point that Warner Brothers realized that it may not be the best idea to release another Batman film to compete with their Nolan Batman series concerns arose that have Justice League received a negative reception it might inadvertently impact the box office of Nolan's future Batman films additionally there was apprehension that audiences might not Embrace Army Hammer as Batman having already developed an attachment to Christian Bale's portrayal so in the end Warner Brothers decided to cancel the production of George Miller's Justice League to avoid potentially harming or undermining the reputation and popularity of Nolan's Batman movies actor Adam Brody who would have played The Flash joked Warner Brothers just didn't want to cross their streams with

11:29 a whole bunch of Batmans in the universe instead Warner Brothers decided to focus on developing individual films featuring the main Heroes with the plan to do a Justice League film down the road still Justice League mortal remains an interesting what if and has left many wondering if it was released would we have ever gotten the dceu we know today or would Warner Brothers still be creating spin-offs and sequels derived from this particular Justice League film on the other hand had it come out and bombed would Marvel have had second thoughts about creating a cinematic unit service of their own furthermore would George Miller have had the opportunity to direct a remarkable Mad Max Fury Road if he had been occupied instead with a Justice League franchise obviously nobody will ever know the answers to these questions but that's what makes Justice League mortal and intriguing

12:14 what if in the realm of superhero Cinema thanks for watching everybody and don't forget to like And subscribe to bullets and Blockbusters for more great content [Music]