Many have found it immensely disappointing that we have not been able to see Zack Snyder’s vision of the DC Extended Universe play out. Love them, or hate them, the first few movies in the DCEU had a straight forward vision of where they were going but it seemed to fall apart when Zack Snyder had to step away from Justice League.
Kevin Smith has shed some light on Snyder‘s plans for not only a Justice League sequel, but also the eventual Justice League 3, which would have taken place in a ‘Knightmare’ setting as Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice teased.
The first change that Kevin Smith brought up was how the ending to Justice League had changed. We all know how the movie played out, but the original storyboard showed the villainous Darkseid making his presence known to Earth and the members of the League.
Justice League 2 would have shown the team going down a more cosmic route as they take the fight to Apokolips. This would have served as the introduction to the Green Lantern Corps, and possibly the addition of a permanent Green Lantern as a member of The Justice League.
The infamous scene with Alfred, which was shown at the end of the trailer for Justice League, where he claims “Let’s hope you’re not too late”, was apparently originally directed towards a Green Lantern, not Superman.
Justice League 2 would have ended in a very dark form with the entire team being defeated and Darkseid returning to Earth to completely decimate it, or as Kevin Smith put it “levels it”.
This would have continued on in Justice League 3 where the League would return to Earth to fight Darkseid and take Earth back from the ‘Knightmare’ realm it had been turned to. This chapter would have presumably featured time travel from The Flash and possibly the evil version of Superman we had seen.
It’s a huge shame that we will never see these original plans fully realised on screen. This Justice League trilogy would have told an incredibly epic story featuring some truly awesome characters. However after the financial failure of Justice League, DC and Warner Bros have had to massively change up their plans and instead now focus on stand alone stories.
Will we ever see a Justice League sequel? It seems like Warner Bros really wants to focus on telling standalone stories and once they regain some ground with both fans and critic (which they already have begun to do with Aquaman), then they may begin to start considering reforming the Justice League.
