Justice League Star Calls Snyder Cut "Unprecedented Experiment" in Film

Almost four years after Zack Snyder officially left the production of Justice League, HBO Max has unveiled Zack Snyder's Justice League, with star Joe Manganiello noting just how unprecedented the event feels for the industry. The advancements in home video have previously allowed filmmakers to release alternate or extended cuts of their films, with the major difference with this situation being that Warner Bros. seemed almost entirely uninterested in releasing Snyder's original vision for the project, with fans pleading with the studio for more than three years to release the project that Snyder spent years building up to in the DC Extended Universe.

"Well, I'm really excited. Number one, I want to give a big shout-out to Zack Snyder for including me as a part of Justice League this time around," Manganiello shared with ComicBook.com. "Four years ago or when it was released, I wasn't a part of Justice League. I was the villain in Batman and we shot a scene that was going to be tacked on to the end of Justice League to debut my character and then preview what was going to happen in Batman. So I wasn't really a part of Justice League, it wasn't my movie, so getting a call from Zack four years later to put the suit back on and be a part of his 'SnyderVerse,' if you will, that was really cool and I'm glad that Zack had the opportunity to come back."

He added, "And that's due to the fans and their support, so this is really an unprecedented experiment in the history of film, where the fans' voice was heard. And here we have this epic superhero movie as a result."

In the original Justice League's post-credits scene, Manganiello meets Lex Luthor, teasing that Deathstroke would be the antagonist of the planned Batman movie that would have been written and directed by Ben Affleck. Whatever plans might have been in place for that project have since been scrapped, as Affleck first announced that he wouldn't be writing or directing that solo film, only to then confirm that he wouldn't be starring in it either. Instead, filmmaker Matt Reeves developed The Batman starring Robert Pattinson, which doesn't appear to have any connections to any other DCEU projects.

Luckily, fans were given a bit more of Deathstroke, as Zack Snyder's Justice League also included an all-new epilogue that Snyder shot specifically for this release.

Zack Snyder's Justice League is now streaming on HBO Max.