OT: 'Justice League' - how did this happen?

While 'Justice League' is by no means the worst film of the year, it is seriously lacking compared to other 5 comic book films of 2017.

Let's take a look into those 5. First, we have 'Logan', which is by far the most "out-there" comic book film of 2017. The vibe I've got from here is that the film didn't feel like a superhero film for the most part. Now that I think of it, this was a very emotional neo-western drama film that happens to have elements of superhero films. It was an incredibly visceral film with gritty action scenes, which was reflected in the film's horror film-style action scene scores. Compare that to action scene scores in 'The Wolverine' (which felt like a legit action drama film compared to this) and you'll notice a lot of differences.

Then we have 'Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2'. Admittingly, this was probably a weaker film out of 5, but that doesn't take away the film's overall greatness. Like the first film, this one also felt like a space opera film with superhero film elements. It's also probably the most gorgeous-looking film out of 5, with beautiful sceneries and mostly outstanding CGI. I would go as far as saying that when it comes to technical aspects, this might be the best out of 6 comic book films of 2017 with its colorful aesthetics and fantastic cinematography that involves the opening credit sequence that is almost entirely shot in one take.

Next film we have is 'Wonder Woman'. In some ways, this is return to a classic superhero epic - well, superheroine epic in this case. This is a film that portrays the birth of a superhero incredibly well with strong theme of hope and love for humanity despite all the hardships and despair that is called World War I. The film was appropriately dark without going into gloomy and depressing territory and had just enough lighter moments to balance the tone. Most importantly, this is the first legitimately good superheroine film ever and, for all its fault, DCEU finally has at least one good film after one incredibly polarizing film, 1 bad film that managed to improve somewhat thanks to the R-rated cut, and 1 gigantic editing mess (remember how 'Ice Age', 'Pirates of the Caribbean', and 'Transformers' series started out with a good-to-great film respectively? DCEU truly succeeded with its 4th film. In that regard, shame on you, 'Twilight' series).

After that, we have 'Spider-Man: Homecoming'. After seeing 15 straight action films in MCU, I'm pretty sure that some people were starting to burn out by MCU having one massive action film after another. Thankfully, this film came to the rescue as it became the MCU's 1st non-action film. Now, here's the thing. When a comic book film lacks action scenes, they usually don't go well (think 'The Amazing Spider-Man 2' and especially 'Fant4stic' ). This film proved that you can make a good comic book film without a lot of action scenes if you execute it well. Not only that, this was also a surprisingly relaxing film compared to 5 other comic book films with pleasantly low stakes overall. As a matter of fact, I think the only guy who died in this film was the first Shocker - and that was because Vulture made a mistake! With its overall relaxing tone and mood, the flim manages to focus more on Peter Parker as a everyday teenager dreaming to join the Avengers.

Last, but not least, we have 'Thor: Ragnarok', which turns out to be by far the best film in 'Thor' trilogy. This was a delightful throwback to the 80s in many regards. Score, aesthetics, visual styles, and many more show a lot of influences from films that were made in 1980s. Also, for a film that is supposed to be more comedic, it also has some social/political commentary on things like colonialism, making it the only comic book film of 2017 to cover social/political topics. Not only that, unlike 'Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2', the third act barely contains any jokes and does arguably becomes one of the darkest moments in MCU. Not to mention that this probably has the most downer ending out of 5 I talked about so far since the ending feels like they lost a lot more than gained with their victory coming with a terrible price. Sure, other 4 films also had some sad notes in their ending, but at least those films felt like the sacrifice made in those films really meant something while in here, it's quite questionable whether it was worth it in the end, which is actually quite refreshing.

If I have to compare these films with 4 elements ('Logan' is excluded since it's way too "out there"), this would be the closest:
-Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (fantastical, light)
-Wonder Woman (grounded, dark)
-Spider-Man: Homecoming (grounded, light)
-Thor: Ragnarok (fantastical, dark)

Then... 'Justice League' came in to ruin the fun. In all fairness, this film certainly had enjoyable moments like some of the action scenes and character interactions, but the film was incredibly problematic. The CGI was quite lame overall, the score was disappointing (Danny Elfman, what happened?), the villlain was lousy, the story felt somewhat unfinished, and biggest of all, the film felt like it had lower stakes than 'Spider-Man: Homecoming', which isn't a good thing in this case since this film deals with a world-ending event. I honestly think 'Man of Steel' was a lot better than this now that I think of it.

Seriously, after 5 great comic book films in a row this year, how did this end up becoming such a meh film?