By Matthew Moorcroft

Screw This

• Directed by Andy Muschietti
• Starring Ezra Miller, Sasha Calle, Michael Shannon, Michael Keaton
• PG-13

When I was a kid, there were three superheroes that I really connected to instantly. Spider-Man, Batman, and The Flash. The former two were mainly through movies; Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man and Tim Burton’s Batman being some of my earliest memories of watching, and falling in love with, movies. But it was The Flash that was a unique outlier. Sure, he was in animated shows like Justice League Unlimited, but he was a character I mostly knew through osmosis and the occasional comic that I picked up and read. And as a kid who was a hyperactive mess half of the time and a science whiz for much of his grade school years, it’s no wonder The Flash connected with me quickly and almost instantly. And I continue to love The Flash into adulthood, even if now I love him for his unique stories within the DC Universe, the character of Barry Allen at large, and his extensive Rogues Gallery that rivals that of the other two heroes I mentioned.

I also happened to graduate grade school when The Flash movie, in it’s current form, entered development. It has since been 12 years since then, and The Flash, having gone through 3 different directors/director teams, several writers, numerous iterations, several delays, a star who has had numerous controversies spring up in the time this had shot and released, and an entire nine-season television series based on the same character start, finish, and have it’s own fucking Flashpoint and Crisis on Infinite Earths events. And now, we have The Flash limping it’s way to theaters on the end of a dying DCEU just in time for the entire universe to get reset once James Gunn gets his hands on Superman.

The Flash is putrid dogshit. You probably knew this, but it’s important to clarify that now just so my words don’t get twisted later. It’s the kind of superhero film that makes you hate superhero films – corporate sludge dressed as some kind prestige event picture without any of the kind of actual thought, or even some kind of interesting idea, put into these things. And the worst thing about is that it mostly tricks into thinking it isn’t, with a solid enough first act with some inspired visual trickery and finesse that almost makes you think “damn, they might pull it off”.

Too bad once the time travel stuff happens it loses a ton of steam. Even beyond the controversies, I’ve never been huge on Ezra Miller’s take on the character and while they aren’t bad here (they are definitely trying and I think they excel in the more emotional moments involving his family), whatever mangled form this final film is in gives them no favours. You can tell that there is likely a version of this film that is laser focused on Barry Allen, one that actually tackles it’s central thematic question – that of whether or not to save his mom – with more nuance or depth. Unfournately, as we know, executives instead saw this angle as an easy excuse for retcons and redos, so it’s time for Barry Allen to meet the Tim Burton Batman instead!

And once it hits the third act, with it’s PS3 era video game desert looking “set” and incomprehensible action setpieces it becomes clear that nothing has been learned from the prior era of DC. The climaxes of both Batman v Superman and the theatrical cut of Justice League suffered from similar issues in being just nonsense for the sake of nonsense, and this film now has the audacity to be the same but now with even worse, more garish CGI that attempts to be stylistic but clearly didn’t have the time to do so. Andy Muschietti is a director with a clear eye for interesting camera and visual stylings, and The Flash has brief moments, particularly in it’s first 20 minutes, that reach near brilliance in how they try to portray the world view of Barry. But in the midst of the big world ending stakes, laser beams in the sky, and explosions, suddenly everything is muddied and nigh impossible to follow. The only thing that stays entertaining is everything having to do with Sasha Calle’s take on Supergirl, who is a genuine talent and star here, and it almost makes you wish the movie was about her instead – though it wouldn’t have saved it.

The only one who likely comes out of this unscathed is writer Christina Hodson, who deserves credit for at least putting together something resembling a working script out of this. But it’s meaningless when the actual content of the film, one that lingers on deepfake cameos of old Supermen in the same way that you would explore a wax museum, fails to support it. She can certainly write the emotional beats well, it’s just a shame that WB and DC can’t see it as anything more then fluff for the inevitable brand management that they so want to do with this.

I don’t know if The Flash is the worst film the DCEU has put out – the theatrical cut of Justice League and Suicide Squad are both more obviously bad – but The Flash is certainly it’s most irreconcilable. It will certainly find it’s fans, as it’s just weird enough at points and interesting enough that it’s clear Muschietti had some kind of vision in place for this (even if that vision is at odds with the clear corporate nature of the rest of the film). I am not one of them however, which is a damn shame as I have been waiting for this film for a good chunk of my life. Guess I’ll just have to wait another 20 years for another one of these so they can try again. Good lord.