If you want to say that the most popular movie recently, then DC's "Justice League" director's cut version must be counted.
Due to the fiasco of the 2017 theatrical version of "Justice League", many fans were indignant, believing that the filmmaker Warner Bros. interfered with director Zach Schneider, so the film sucked.
Now, the "original" Zach Schneider version of "Justice League" has also come out, and in terms of heart, it does have an advantage over the theatrical version, but it is still not a god work overall.
In order to facilitate the difference, the following will divide "Justice League" into a guide cut version and a theatrical version to compare.
First, let's talk about where the guide cut version is better than the cinema version.
First, adjust the strength positioning of the BOSS Steppenwolf.
The theatrical version of Steppenwolf appeared invincible, easily destroying the Amazon female warrior regiment without injury, crushing a group of Atlantean fighters at the bottom of the sea, and easily taking away two mother boxes.
Before Superman was resurrected, the Justice League confronted him, except for Wonder Woman who could barely pass a few moves, the rest were basically hanged.
However, after Superman's resurrection, this Steppenwolf was immediately pressed to the ground and rubbed, so it caused many viewers to feel split before and after, and this boss had so many plots in front of him that he was strong, and the result was this?
The steppenwolf's strength in the guide cut version dropped too much, and he almost suffered when he fought the Amazons.
At the time of Atlantis, it was an advantage, but it was not the kind of complete crushing of the theatrical version.
Wonder Woman, Aquaman, and others also have a battle against Steppenwolf.
Moreover, due to the appearance of Darkseid, the real boss behind the scenes, Steppenwolf is set to be the outcast who made a mistake and was expelled by Darkseid.
So Steppenwolf posed very low in the villain team, and even gave his colleagues a kneeling down to ask their colleagues to help intercede for their way back to Darkseid.
This is also in line with Superman's "bug" positioning.
Second, several new heroes are portrayed.
Such as The Flash, Steel Bone, and Aquaman have more scenes than the theatrical version, especially Steel Bone, which tells the story of the three in great detail in the plot (Aquaman is slightly less, because an independent movie was already prepared at that time)
In the cinema version, these heroes are basically tool people, and the guide cut version is much better.
Third, the battles are more exciting.
The guide cut version adds some combat scenes, although not much, but the overall is OK.
And there are also adjustments to the original battles, such as the final showdown, which is no longer a Superman one-man show.
Including Wonder Woman and Aquaman, there are scenes of Fat Beating Steppenwolf.
And Superman is even more ferocious after putting on black, Steppenwolf has been beaten, Superman is still beating and grilling with hot rays, like a whip, and Batman upstairs is shaking his head.
Finally, Superman, Aquaman and Wonder Woman triple-attack Steppenwolf returns to the West.
Fourth, some unnecessary plots, shots, and lines have been deleted.
For example, the theatrical version of Batman's sentence "He is very tall", and the plot of Superman hitting twice during the decisive battle and running to the Flash to save people and so on.
These are undoubtedly more brilliant places than the theatrical version.
However, there are still drawbacks.
First, the general framework of the story is exactly the same as the theatrical version.
In other words, the two versions of the story are actually not different, the difference is only that some of the details are different.
The story is that Batman feels that aliens are coming, so he looks for teammates, and later finds that the enemy is too powerful, so he wants to resurrect Superman, and Superman wins after resurrection.
If you think that the cut version of "Justice League" is a children's shoe that tells a completely different story, you don't have to watch it.
Second, it is still the shortcoming that Zach Schneider has long criticized.
The film rhythm of the directed version of "Justice League" is still very poor, up to 4 hours long, but there are many literary dramas in it, and there is no balanced distribution with action scenes, which is still Zach's old routine.
It's a bunch of literary dramas, a bunch of action plays.
There are many literary scenes in the first part of the movie, and although there are two action scenes, they are all appetizers, not climactic scenes.
Introducing the experience of the sources of each hero in the middle is supposedly an advantage, but the problem is that the length is very long, and the steel bone is not popular or pleasing at all, and this character that the audience does not like at all dominates the entire plot direction.
For example, in "Aquaman", only a small detail is used to portray the protagonist's image, Arthur accompanies Merah to eat roses, and all of a sudden the image of the character is plumped up, where there is a need to do so much.
And an important point is that the literary drama is honestly not too brilliant.
Fans are definitely interested in watching it, but if it is an ordinary passerby, it is easy to look at it and want to sleep.
After all, this is a commercial film, and it takes more than 2 hours to see the action scene, if it is in the cinema, it is estimated that a large number of audiences have already left.
Of course, because the guide cut is a streaming media online, even if everyone feels bored, you can also 1.5 times the speed or directly pull the progress bar, but if this version is released in the cinema, it is definitely a disaster.
After all, in the history of cinema, the only films that lasted more than 3 hours and were successful in the cinema were the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy and "Titanic".
Other films with a duration of more than 3 hours, including the 05 version of "King Kong", are all on the street.
The directed version of "Justice League" obviously cannot be compared with films of the same level as "The Lord of the Rings" and "Titanic".
Third, Superman still crushes sentient beings.
Although steppenwolf's positioning was weakened in the guide cut, the point of "Superman came out, so the problem was solved" did not change, and even because of the lengthening of the battle between Superman and justice league, the feeling of Superman being above everything was even stronger.
You should know that this is actually the point that the theatrical version is criticized by the most audiences, just because Superman is too strong, so the whole movie does not have any sense of crisis at all.
The audience knows that Superman will be resurrected, and the audience also knows that once Superman is resurrected, he can do anything.
To solve this problem, either pull out a more powerful villain or weaken Superman.
But the more powerful villain Darkseid is the final boss and cannot appear, so he also shows his face in the guide cut version.
Weakening Superman will directly lead to the complete collapse of the storyline behind it, and the entire script must be torn down and restarted.
Therefore, there is still no way to solve this biggest problem.
Overall, the directed version of "Justice League" is much more perfect in story than the theatrical version, but the price is to make the whole movie more provocative.
Due to the time spent to improve the plot, resulting in too many literary dramas and uneven distribution of action scenes, it can be said that the friendliness to passers-by is even less than the theatrical version.
But thanks to the fact that this version is online for streaming media, everyone can fast forward and rewind at any time, so the disadvantage at this point has been reduced.
For Zach Schneider fans, as well as some DC fans, this version is certainly worth watching, and it is a different matter for ordinary passers-by.