Biggest and baddest, Netflix made a mockery out of Snyder’s vision as Rebel Moon collected a spectrum of comments, from a ‘’B-Grade’ Star Wars to a mediocre attempt; things weren’t adding up. But there were some barriers as Netflix wanted two versions of it.
See, on paper, it was Netflix’s largest production last year, as both combined shy of $170M. With that big bucks on the line, Netflix went with a PG-13 route, but they had a plan B prepared. They wanted an R-Rated director’s cut for later release.
But there are some major flaws here as well. Both parties state that Snyder was given full freedom of his vision, so there was really no necessity for such a director’s cut. In the case of Justice League, it was necessary, as Joss Whedon made a nightmare out of Snyder’s dream. And the fans wanted to see Snyder’s vision, making Justice League Snyder Cut one of the best superhero films of all time.
Now, Netflix is making a cheap stunt to redo this event.
As the first part was hit by abysmal reviews, Rebel Moon Part One: A Child of Fire was slapped with bad remarks, scoring 5.6 on IMDb and 21% on Rotten Tomatoes. The fans were already losing hope, so delaying the Director’s cut was not a wise decision.
Plus, the most villainous strategy was that both parts were shot simultaneously. Both Netflix and Snyder were aware of the fact that there would be a director’s cut. This does look like a cheap publicity stunt in general.
As the second part, Rebel Moon Part Two: The Scargiver, is dropping on April 19th, there are talks about the progress of the franchise. Snyder, just to build up the hype, narrated his vision for the director’s cut.
“The way I like to talk about it is that I think the two cuts that are coming are almost like alternative universe cuts more than an extended version. Like we call it the Director’s Cut. But they’re just like another movie.”
He even confirmed that Snyder was shooting both versions simultaneously, which does look like a hotchpotch decision. “We knew that we were almost doing a foreign language version. You know, you actually knew as we were filming, like, okay, that’s for the R rated.”
Talking about the major changes, Snyder said, “The tone of the film changes tremendously because it’s more over the top in like, and purposely over the top [in terms of] the sex and violence.”
“It actually colors the movie, as it becomes more of a, I don’t wanna say like a parody, but it’s more self-aware, you know, because the violence is so insane that you’re now like, oh, like it, this is the thing that’s that shouldn’t exist in the sci-fi movie at this scale.”
Now, the quality of Part one was really questionable, and if Netflix and Snyder think that sex and violence will save it, it’s a massacre. Especially with such clickbait tactics, people will not only lose hope in Netflix, they will lose hope in Snyder as well.
From the beginning, fans have been the biggest asset for Snyder, and if he messes it up, if he loses them, the future of Snyder does look a bit dim.