Before he let his Snyder Cut of Justice League head to HBO Max, Zack Snyder committed to additional photography (which he told CinemaBlend’s ReelBlend podcast that the studio didn’t want him to do). One of his reasons for doing this was because he wanted his SnyderVerse versions of Batman (Ben Affleck) and Joker (Jared Leto) to properly interact… and they did! But Snyder apparently had multiple takes, because he just dropped a new one -- and it features the “we live in a society” line that some fans missed. Watch it now!
The black-and-white nature of this clip indicates that Zack Snyder included it in his Justice is Gray edition of Justice League, which is available now on HBO Max. It’s mostly the same scene that we saw from the Knightmare sequence at the end of the film, except that when Bruce (Affleck) mentions Harley Quinn to Joker in the original cut, Joker hesitates just long enough to indicate to Batman that he’s still capable of getting under the lunatic’s skin.
I actually prefer this version. I don’t think that after all of the shit that they have been through, Joker WOULD let Bruce get the upper hand. I don’t need to see him get temporarily rattled. I prefer a Joker who immediately fires back with a savage dig that references the death of Batman’s ward, Robin, by asking the Caped Crusader who screamed louder, Harley or Dick Grayson? Seriously, these two have been tearing away at each other mentally and physically for decades, and that line delivery is the first time that I felt Jared Leto’s version of The Joker ever could have been a match for Batman.
Zack Snyder has talked at length about the fact that he knows how Robin died at the hands of The Joker. He even said that he had a plan in place for a scene in Justice League 2 that would have been a Last Supper kind of confessional sequence where the members of Batman’s team -- believing they are going to die on their final mission -- tell short stories. And Joker and Batman would have told the story of Robin’s death, from their duelling perspectives.
Who the hell doesn’t want to see that?
We know the answer to that question, but let’s not dive too far into that swamp for now. This scene suggests that Snyder has a few more versions of Justice League that are at his fingertips, though more than likely, the alternate takes are limited to the additional photography that he shot to get the Snyder Cut prepared. One thing that I know we would like to see is his original scene from the lakehouse at the end of the movie, where Bruce Wayne speaks with Green Lantern Corp member John Stewart instead of Martian Manhunter. Drop that one on social media, Zack! Let’s cause a riot.
