MovieChat Forums > Justice League: The New Frontier (2008) Discussion > Started off good....ended bad....

Started off good....ended bad....

posted 16 years ago by jedinite-9
19 replies | jump to latest

I heard all the hoopla about this film, so I decided to check it out...

first - i was very disappointed that superman and batman hardly had any lines and superman did nothing at the end of the movie. It was blasphemous he was hurt so easily and rendered useless in the ending.

martian manhunter or whatever is his name took up too much of the beginning story and just disappeared at the end without any real help.

too much focus on green lantern and flash. although the take on those characters was very cool and much better than their portrayal in superfriends.

too many characters at the end that pop up without any names. the appearance of Arthur of Atlantis at the end carrying Superman was plain ridiculous and laughable.

the enemy sphere or whatever wasn't defined. i have no idea who or what they were fighing at the ened...just some prehistoric creatures.

movie would have been a lot better with focus on 4 popular characters and a villian that is well define. the sphere did nothing. i'd rather have seen the corny legion of doom at the end instead of that crap they put on screen.

BTW, Batman's voice sucked!

[–] jorgito2001 16 years ago

Thank you sir, which is why I can't understand the high rating. the movie has more POOR qualities than good ones. All the stuff you mentioned are very valid.

too much focus on green lantern and flash. although the take on those characters was very cool and much better than their portrayal in superfriends.

I too thought GL & Flash's potrayal was one of the high points of this feature, but not enough to save the poor final product. I hope future DC animated movies don't continue JLA: NF's trend.

***
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The Tripper: 6/10
Horton Hears A Who: 9/10

[–] 16 years ago

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[–] BrunoAntony 16 years ago

1) It's based quite faithfully on a comic. So your problem is with the original comic and not the film.

2) Some people like Green Lantern and Flash

3) Aquaman had a cameo. If they explained the background of every character in the movie it would run for 6 hours.

4) jeezus, how much more backstory did you want the island to have?

5) "BTW, Batman's voice sucked!" sigh.

[–] silver11 16 years ago

Batman's voice did suck

[–] ironsamurai666 16 years ago

to jake_anthony_watt-1, all of the op's concerns were quite legitimate:

1) regardless of what its based off of, it doesnt prevent the story itself from being poorly executed.

2) he was actually complimenting the characterization of flash and gl, so i've no idea what you're trying to say

3) the movie wouldnt run for 6 hours if they spent another 30 seconds talking about the character.

4) the island was indeed poorly defined as a bad guy. it had no clear motivation or purpose to what it was doing. all it was was a metaphysical concept. it gave no reason to want to annihilate the world

5) Batman's voice is his opinion and many others share it, for you to just shrug it off is disrespectful

[–] BrunoAntony 16 years ago

6) your mother is an average lay, ironsamurai666clicheooooh,i'mcooldudemcdudekungfu.

THAT is disrespectul. Your points were just argumentative internet cliches.

[–] 16 years ago

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[–] WilliBerg 16 years ago

I agree, that can be a problem with these team up movies- the writer/s decides who they want to focus on and who they favour and leave out stuff for the others. So no Clark Kent and no Bruce Wayne. And then obviously conveniently getting rid of Superman at a certain point so that others can do what he usually can do himself.

[–] clayjar_azn 16 years ago

I felt the ending was weak. I agree that we didn't get enough motivation for the Centre and what it was all about.

Actually I like the Green Lantern and Flash.

Aquaman coming out of nowhere and not doing anything about the big world threatening monster was laughable.

Since it was direct to video, it should have been longer. Everything felt rushed near the end. That is the problem, they just started throwing characters in just to have them there.

Me fail English? But, that's unpossible.
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[–] jasonmadrid 16 years ago

I wasn't crazy about it either. It had a decent buildup, probably the opening montage with that guy painting his pictures was one of the highlights, and I like how they presented the Martian and that Kyle Jordan guy or whichever Lantern he was supposed to be, but the buildup just took too long and it really didn't have anything to do with the end result. The Martian wants to go back to Mars...so he fights alongside them and gets mentally pwned by the "Centre." The GL guy wants to go to space...so he becomes a Green Lantern and (SPOILERS!)pwns the Centre where five bazillion other superheroes couldn't (END SPOILERS).

These DC features apparently have a time limit as to how long they can last...but 2 minutes, a minute, even 30 seconds more of explanation really wouldn't have hurt at all. Their main antagonist was...an island...that turns out to be..."yellow?" Alan Scott Fitzhenry the pilot was chosen as Green Lantern why? Because he flies good? Because he "values life"? There's probably a hundred million God-fearing Christians out there who fall under the category of "valuing life," so WHY him?!

The way I remember it, it was maybe an hour of character development, and then, "OMG, that island's attacking us all!!" I had my hopes up that it was going somewhere after that, but...

Oh, well. I suppose it beats the new DBZ movie, "Gohan May Need Glasses."

[–] TheLastDragonNRY 15 years ago

Hal Jordan was chosen because as Abin Sur said in the comics and this movie: You are a man without great fear.

And as for Batman and Superman being somewhat in the background, I love the World's Finest to death, but both characters have had so many media outlets. They had their pieces in this movie, it's time to let the other heroes shine. Now if they had more story in the book, then go ahead and complain. But stop and think about this: none of the other DC heroes have had live-action or animated movies.

[–] ulver666 15 years ago

I really reeaally liked the first half of the movie... it has some serious mature stories that i wasn't expecting.... so i was blown away with a 15 inches smile in my face saying to myself.... (I must get my friends together to watch this)

But somewhere around the middle of the movie... WTF everything went to hell!!!!! ridiculous fight with prehistoric/alien monsters, repeated animations, nameless heroes comming out of nowhere and an incredible "WE ARE THE BEST COUNTRY IN THE WORLD" feeling with lots of north american flags.

It was sadly ridiculous...

But then again... i really think the first half of the movie is incredible.

[–] jasonmadrid 15 years ago

Alan Scott Fitzhenry the pilot was chosen as Green Lantern why? Because he flies good? Because he "values life"?

Oh, I totally forgot about the part in the beginning where Hal Jordan shoots the guy in self-defense and then ends up being committed because he'd never shot anyone before. Yeah, that was totally my bad. I had to watch it twice to see what they were really getting at.

Man, they had some pointless heroes. "HAWK-AHHH!!!"

[–] Neoblackdragon 15 years ago

Well everyone has their own opinion. I liked Sisto voice as batman, I saw nothing wrong with it. But hey one tone for one guy doesnt bother him while for another it drives him up a wall.

1) Batman and superman had plenty of lines but the key thing is that they werent the focus. The idea was not to turn this into Superman/Batman guest starring the justice league. BLASPHEMOUS about superman being owned.......Please, Damn if he's too powerful, damned if a very powerful force knocks him into the other for a few hours. It was a very powerful energy blast. I could understand if someone like Batman took out the thing with his batarang, but the being was just very powerful.

2) The idea was not that Martian manhunter was going to be the go to guy. He was just a guy who got stranded on earth and decided to fight for it. He fought for it and that was that. The theme of this movie is a new beginning. Also maybe you need to watch the film again but Martian manhunter was action even up to the last 10 minutes. Maybe it just seemed long because everyone else had stuff.

3)Again the point of the movie was not the other leaguers. They chose 3 characters to focus on. Martian manhunter , green lantern, and the flash. Maybe they arent your top choice but Superman,batman, and wonder woman sure as hell have had their time on the screen.

4)I dont understand what was wrong with the ending. The people who defended the planet against the centre were 2 groups(green arrow and some ww2 team). The ending ending was just and ending. I dont think thats what you were reffering to though. Again the focus was on the three I said earlier. Everyone else was to show that theme of a changing world. I also dont understand why everyone is dissing the Aquaman bit. Superman got saved by an unknown hero. This hero was aquaman who will have be important in the future. All he did was state who he was. What was laughable, what was ridicules?

5) The centre i srota concur that it wasnt well defined. Just seemed like big show and we got a dino island.

6)"movie would have been a lot better with focus on 4 popular characters and a villian that is well define. the sphere did nothing. i'd rather have seen the corny legion of doom at the end instead of that crap they put on screen. "

No you mean they should have done Superman/Batman/Wonderwoman and not Flash/Green lantern/Martian Manhunter. You did not understand the plot and you have certainly seen little to no animated movies.

[–] AlexTheGreyWolf 15 years ago

I've watched every episode of Justice League and Justice League: Unlimited and loved them, and I agree with the OP this movie was awful and I think it's a disgrace that it has "Justice League" on its title.

The pace is completely wacked out, it starts out like if it's going to be a three hour movie introducing us to all of these interesting characters and then all of a sudden it forces an ending when only an hour has gone by. Completely inappropiate. It almost seems like if they had planned to do a traditional two-hour movie and at the last minute were forced to cut the movie by half.

The villain, the Center. What the heck is that? Even after having watched the movie I still don't understand who the villain is. What does a spaceship from space have to do with dinosaurs from our planet? Whose idea was this?

The movie itself looks horrendous, with "Justice League" in its title I expected the movie to look like the Justice Leage animated series but not only does it not look anything like it the artwork had me cringing in pain.

This movie was a huge disservice to Superman. During the entirety of this 60 minute movie Superman, perhaps the greatest superhero ever, only managed to defeat a single giant flying dinosaur before being rendered completely useless by a single heat blast. Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster must be rolling in their graves.

[–] Otaku-sempai 15 years ago

Darwyn Cooke's DC: The New Frontier was an 8-issue miniseries and, you're right, it ought to have been adapted as a longer film. The 70+ minute running time was imposed from above by executives at Warner Bros. Animation and/or Warner Premiere. The look of the movie is very faithful to Darwyn Cooke's art--which is in the style of many Silver-Age artists.

If you pay attention, it is made fairly clear what the Centre is in the opening seconds of the feature: A primordial life-form from Earth's distant past that sees humanity as a pestilence that must be cleansed from Mother Earth before the Centre leaves to explore the rest of the Universe.

The movie was very much about the beginning of a new era. Superman, Wonder Woman and Batman represent the Golden Age in this story and take a back seat to the upcoming Silver-Age heroes--in particular, Green Lantern, the Martian Manhunter and the Flash.

"If I'm going to have a past, I prefer it to be multiple choice!" - The Joker

[–] 15 years ago

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[–] d-walsh4911 10 years ago

Actually I liked that it focused on the Green Lantern, Flash, and Martian Manhunter, because most of the justice league animated movies come down to either too much Batman, or too much Superman, or both and no one else. So it was nice to see a different focus.

[–] 10 years ago

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