'Justice League Snyder Cut' movement was driven by bots, says Warner Bros report

Remember the fan-driven campaign called the Snyder Cut by the fans of Zack Snyder that forced a mighty studio to bow down before it? Itwas reportedlyfuelled by fake social media accounts. A report in Rolling Stone says that at least 13 per cent of accounts that were part of the campaign were bots. Usually, only 5 per cent of accounts in online campaigns are bots.

"One identified community was made up of real and fake authors that spread negative content about WarnerMedia for not restoring the 'SnyderVerse', concluded WarnerMedia's report.

This report, for all intents and purposes, ensures that Warner Bros and Snyder will likely not work again.

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Also Read:'Zack Snyder's Justice League' teases two big DC superheroes absent from 2017 version

The production of 2017's Zack Snyder directorial Justice League was marked by successive setbacks. There were reports suggesting that the higher-ups at Warner Bros were unhappy with the direction the film, and also the DCEU (DC Extended Universe), was going. Snyder's last two DC films, 2013's 'Man of Steel' and 2016's 'Batman v Superman', were decent box office successes, but nowhere near the success characters like Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman deserved. Also, the critics were not impressed with either of the movies.

The execs reportedly expressed displeasure at the first cut of 'Justice League' Snyder showed them of the movie. And then Snyder's teenage daughter Autumn died by suicide. He had to leave the project midway, although many believed he was fired from the movie.

The film then was finished by Joss Whedon, the director of the first two 'Avengers' movies. While Snyder's version was metaphorically and literally dark, Whedon tried to inject his trademark humour and a brighter colour palette and also reshot several scenes. The result was a mish-mash of competing visions that was panned by critics and proved to be a box office disaster. On a hefty budget of $350 million dollars, it could gross a little more than $650 million.

Soon after the film released, the Snyder Cut movement began. Snyder fans accused Warner Bros of interfering with his vision and urged the studio to release the so-called 'Snyder Cut' of the movie, which was what Snyder was originally making. As the movement gained momentum, Warner Bros repeatedly scoffed at any plans of the Snyder Cut.

Also Read:Ben Affleck on 'Justice League' filming: 'It just was the worst experience'

That was until 2020. Then the studio probably saw an opportunity to cash in on Snyder's fan base and garner subscribers for its fledgling streaming service HBO Max and spent $70 million, more than most feature films, to finish Snyder's original vision. The film was four hours long and was called 'Zack Snyder's Justice League'. It received much better reviews, but then a new movement called 'Restore the Snyderverse' began, asking the studio to continue the DCEU as it was running under Snyder.

After the failure of 'Justice League', WB has branched off the DCEU into smaller, self-contained cinematic universes that may occasionally crossover with each other. But there is no overarching cinematic universe like the Marvel Cinematic Universe.