Justice League Dark

Justice League Dark didn't disappoint any of my expectations, being another good entry for the DC animated universe.

It was entertaining to watch and it had a nice animation and designs. It was also nice to see some often overlooked characters from DC comics (Such as Deadman) getting some spotlight, and honestly more of these lesser know characters deserve their own opportunity to shine.

And honestly I don't know why this got an "R", taking into consideration how The Flashpoint Paradox got only a PG-13 rating despite being far more violent than this movie.

There are some good to excellent animated superhero/comic book films out there. 'Justice League Dark' is not one of the best of them, but it is nonetheless a worthy effort. People will either love it, be disappointed in it or find a lot to like while finding things that didn't work, there's a bit of all three going on here.

'Justice League Dark' is somewhat too short, 75 minutes doesn't seem anywhere long enough for a film with so many characters, rich themes and a very densely structured story. As a consequence, some of it is a little rushed and there are instances of parts in need of more exploration or characters having nowhere near the amount of screen time they deserved (Swamp Thing is one of the biggest wastes).

Most of the voice acting is fine, others not so much. There could have been more variety in some of the female voices and while good as Brand Nicholas Turturro's voice doesn't fit Deadman's personality or look. Oh and the villain Destiny is underwhelming, too underwritten, weak motivations and defeated too easily.

However, to me, the animation was not a problem. The atmospheric colours and fluidity are simply remarkable. The music is haunting and beautiful at the same time, giving intensity to the action scenes and giving weight to the more emotional and dramatic scenes.

Dialogue is smart and intelligently written and while the story isn't perfect it's absorbing and thematically interesting, with intriguing use of mythology and mystery and celebrating in a fun way the supernatural elements. Constantine and Zatanna, and their chemistry, are particularly well done.

Not all the voice acting works, but most of it does just fine. Matt Ryan and Jason O'Mara (filling in giant shoes with aplomb) are perfect as Constantine and Batman. Roger Cross, Enrico Colantoni and Rosario Dawson are also very good fits. Whatever reservations there are with Destiny, Alfred Molina's voice work is not among them.

In summary, falls short of being great but has a lot of impressive elements that make it worthy. 7/10 Bethany Cox

Only writing this because there's no other reviews listed at the moment. A basic summary - We're introduced to the backstories of each character as the generic story/villain plays out in the background until we get a more focused conclusion at the end, with a few connections to protagonists like the etrogan/sorcerer(villain, ritchie,), tho that felt a little thrown in as fan service, it worked. I know ritchie is a old school character from the hellblazer series. So its a great animation to watch it you're interested in learning more about dc characters you were unaware of or didn't know well before. And for avid comic fans i'm sure seeing less appreciated characters on screen, and not done poorly, would be a satisfying thing to watch. Tho i don't know the characters in depth so perhaps they were done poorly to the astute comic fan. But for me, it seemed more fleshed out that other DC films in there treatment of backstory and context for each character. Except batman.. Who was thrown into this film for the sake of it and almost takes this rating down to a 7 for that sake... But his role ended up working. So i can forgive that DC cash grab/afraid will fail without batman approach.

Ultimately, this is the next big DC film to come out since the Klling joke.. Both of which i had high hopes for. And for me, This is the better film of the two by a bit. Perhaps because i expected the killing joke to be really brilliant and it was a mix of batgirl and pretty good. This film fit my expectations allot more. So i expect allot less people to be let down by it, especially DC comic fans.

7.5/10

Regular people are committing crimes after hallucinating demons as the people around them. The Justice League is out of their element in this world of magic. Batman gets possessed by Deadman and given a message, Constantine. He recruits Zatanna to find Constantine to battle the mysterious new evil. With the help of Swamp Thing, the group fights Destiny.

The start is nice and it shows the JL unable to deal with magic. It gives a good reason to assemble a Justice League Dark. The secondary need is to present compelling characters. The JL characters are household names but these other ones are generally not. Constantine is great and Zatanna provides a good foil possibility. I'm not sure Batman is the natural bridge. It may be more compelling to send Superman and have him overwhelmed by magic. It would show that physical power is useless in this realm. There is a lot of explosive action which is like a crutch for this movie. It needs to set a different tone from the JL. Overall, it's a good start and time will tell if this goes anywhere good.

"Beings with supernatural powers join together to fight against supernatural villains. This team of supernatural beings include John Constantine, Zatanna and Jason Blood also known as the demon Etrigran."

Directed by Jay Oliva, Justice League Dark brings a new story with different characters. It started off well, intriguing and different, but ended being a cliché movie. Still entertaining and fun to watch, but a bit disappointed at the end.

The actors were all great. Got to love Matt Ryan as Constantine, he's perfect, and he has a really good chemistry with Camilla Luddington who portrays Zatanna.

I feel like Batman was not needed and put in the movie for the sake of it, but I understand why DC wanted him in there, so that people have more interess in this film.

The film is rated R, but it could have been even darker... Anyone 13+ will have no problem with it, I don't see it as a 18 years old type of movie. But it's still more mature than other DC Animated movie.

Overall it's pretty enjoyable. I would recommend to take a look at it if you are interested in new characters and a different vibe. Worth a watch !