Snyder Cut: Zack Snyder Addresses Henry Cavill’s Superman CGI Mustache Removal in Justice League

There's no digital shave on Zack Snyder's Superman. Before Snyder returned to the DC Universe to [...]

By Cameron Bonomolo

There's no digital shave on Zack Snyder's Superman. Before Snyder returned to the DC Universe to restore and release the Snyder Cut of Justice League, his four-hour director's cut featuring the black-suited Superman (Henry Cavill), CGI was used to make a cleanshaven Man of Steel in the theatrical version of Justice League completed by Joss Whedon. Because Cavill had started work on a new movie by the time he was called back for extensive reshoots on Justice League 2017 — he played the mustached villain in Mission: Impossible - Fallout — expensive "digital makeup" was used to remove Cavill's facial hair from his red-and-blue-suited Superman.

"I've only seen it in memes," Snyder told MTV News about the digitally-erased mustache from the Justice League theatrical cut, a version of the movie Snyder has never watched. "It was funny because part of me is happy that we were able to have that not be the total legacy of the hard work that he had done over the last ten years, you know? It's sad to think that that could have been the last view that people had of Superman was with that, whatever that is."

Snyder's Superman had no such issues because the filmmaker refused to use even a single frame of footage shot by someone else in Zack Snyder's Justice League. Snyder did, however, consider giving his newly-resurrected Clark Kent the bearded and mullet look of the Black Suit Superman from the classic '90s comic books.

Zack Snyder's Justice League Superman Henry Cavill mustache
(Left: Justice League 2017. Right: Zack Snyder's Justice League. Photo: Warner Bros. / HBO Max)

In 2017, Cavill explained how digital tools were used to give Superman a digital shave in the theatrical cut of Justice League:

"What we do is we try to put it back on the top lip as much as possible. So they kind of wax it up. And then I had dots all over my face," Cavill told FOX 5 DC at the time. "And they try to put dots, which are barely visible, sort of in the various points on the face where you would see them during normal… not face replacement, but whatever CGI aspect they may be applying to a face. And yeah. I was covered in dots, and had a big mustache. It was definitely a new look for Superman."

Days after the March 18 release of the Snyder Cut, HBO Max released Zack Snyder's Justice League: Making the Snyder Cut featuring Cavill in behind-the-scenes footage from the making of Snyder's Justice League. Watch it here.

Starring Ben Affleck, Henry Cavill, Gal Gadot, Jason Momoa, Ezra Miller, Ray Fisher, Ciarán Hinds, Ray Porter, Joe Manganiello, and Jared Leto, Zack Snyder's Justice League is now streaming on HBO Max.

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