Be aware there are major spoilers for Justice League; enough spoilers to power a Mother Box (that's how those work, right?), so unless you’ve seen the film, proceed with caution and maybe bookmark this one for later.

How many directors does it take to screw in a Justice League? The latest DC superhero epic is the product of a fascinating, flawed production that saw original director and DCEU co-architect Zack Snyder walk away from the project before Avengers director Joss Whedon stepped in to try and recapture his ensemble superhero magic. The result is a fascinating, deeply flawed film that has left audiences divided(you can read Matt's review hereDave's counterpoint review here, and more of my thoughts here,) or worse, disinterested, earning a disappointing debut box office tally.

No matter what you think of the finished film, there's no shortage of elements to investigate, from the story choices to what they mean for the future of everyone's favorite DC heroes, and the future of DC films at large. Let's break down some of the biggest lingering questions about Justice League below.

What in the World Is Going on with the Mother Boxes?

justice-league-steppenwolf-social
Image via Warner Bros.

On the scale of things that don't make sense in Justice League, the Mother Boxes might just take the cake. We're told that the Mother Boxes were dormant for thousands of years, until Superman died and hope retreated from humanity, leaving the world ready for conquest by Steppenwolf once again. There are two big problems with that. First of all, Supes only came to Earth a few decades ago, so why were the Mother Boxes chillin' for the thousands of years before that? Furthermore, as we saw in Batman v Superman and was repeated in Justice League, Victor Stone's father Silas Stone used the Mother Boxe to save his fatally injured son, transforming him into Cyborg. He did that before Superman died. So they weren't exactly dormant at all, if one of them was creating life itself. The film didn't even bother trying to explain what they were beyond the basic concept of reality-altering WMDs that also somehow bring people back to life, so basically none of it makes a lick of sense.

When it comes to the Mother Boxes, there's one other major problem; nobody seems to have any interest in keeping an eye on the damn things. Distracted by Pet Sematary Superman, the League literally leaves one of the Boxes just laying around on the roof of a car like a forgotten cup of coffee, no mind that it's the last piece of the puzzle Steppenwolf needs to end the world. Then, at the end of the film, the Mother Boxes just kind of disappear without really clarifying the plan for keeping them safe and separate. We can assume they will be divided again, and maybe it will be further discussed in Aquaman, but it's kind of a cheat not to wrap up your major MacGuffin.

What Has Wonder Woman Been up to Since World War I?

justice-league-gal-gadot
Image via Warner Bros.

One of the greatest missteps in Justice League is how it bungles Diana's arc and characterization after the pitch-perfect work Gal Gadot and Patty Jenkins gave her character in Wonder Woman. When Diana laments the world without Superman and the way he inspired humanity (which, by the way, what? That's not at all how humanity treated supes in BvS or Man of Steel, but I digress...), Bruce reminds her that she is an inspiration -- or at least she could be if she'd get off her Amazonian ass and leave behind the mopey bubble of art history and grief she's apparently surrounded herself in after Steve Trevor's death.

Except that description fundamentally makes no sense, betrays her very character, and fumbles a beautiful handoff from Wonder Woman. Steve Trevor's death is a major part of what unlocked Diana's full potential and her love for mankind, despite its faults. That it should prevent her from becoming the hero she's meant to be, not only doesn't track, it undermines and unravels her arc in that film. Further, in a particularly potent bit of stupid, Bruce's tirade is completely contrary to what we see established in Justice League. The very film that's trying to tell us Wonder Woman has been failing as a hero opens the latest chapter in her story with a grand display of heroics when she saves a group of hostages from execution.

Patty Jenkins has also hinted she plans to set Wonder Woman 2 in another time period from the past, which would be pretty boring if Diana was just sulking around about Steve. No doubt, that film will answer plenty of questions about how wonderful Wonder Woman has been in the years since she left Themyscira, so for now, let's just take Bruce's weird tirade as him being an asshole.

WTF Has Aquaman Been Doing This Whole Time?

justice-league-jason-momoa-4
Image via Warner Bros.

You won't find me complaining about Justice League's trim running time, but if there's one character that really got completely boned by the narrative cuts, it's Jason Momoa's Aquaman. It makes sense that they would save the story space considering his solo film is next up on the release slate for the DCEU, but on the flip side, they've given us very little motivation to even want to see a whole film to a character that was traditionally so goofy Entourage made a running joke out of the idea of him even having a film in the first place.

In Justice League, we learn that Arthur Curry hasn't even been hanging in Atlantis, let alone ruling it. His brief scenes in Atlantis (which are woefully flat, please James Wan save us) and his muffled conversation with Mera reveal that there's no overabundance of love for the would-be king in his would-be kingdom, but it doesn't give us any hints of why or what happened.

Turns out the original cut of the film would have included more details, which were likely slashed for pacing and narrative economy. Remember how Willem Dafoe was set to play Vulko? That was cut (he was going to give Aquaman his armor), along with some explanation for Arthur's weird relationships in Atlantis. Momoa explained to GameSpot, "I think what Zack [Snyder] and I did, we were kind of trying to establish that he was taken down there as a boy, and he was an outcast, he was a half-breed, and he was built up as a young boy, because he was fed all these ideas by Vulko--that he was the rightful king. And he gets down there, and he's a half breed, he's impure, and I'm just made to feel like I'm this disease. So after that, I was like, 'f*** you, f*** you, I'm on my own.'" My man.

So Clark Kent Is Just Alive Now? Can They Do That?

henry-cavill-clark-kent-man-of-steel-2
Image via Warner Bros.

You tell people that Superman came back from the dead and sure, they're gonna believe that, no problemo. He's Superman; normal rules don't apply. You tell them that reporter at the local paper came back from the dead? That's gonna raise some eyebrows and probably gonna blow your cover no matter how thick your glasses frames are. So how are Lois and Clark pulling off this whole return from the grave thing?

In the Death of Superman comic arc, Clark is only "missing" after the Doomsday attack, leaving opportunity for them to lie and say he was trapped in a bunker, but Justice League makes it very clear -- Clark is dead. He had a grave, and it's hard to miss that fact because they fucking dug it up. In 2017, all your favorite superheroes do creepy crime. He's dead and buried. Clark also had an obit at the Daily Planet in BvS, a publicly grieving mother and girlfriend, and as far as Justice League tells us, absolutely no cover story for suddenly strutting his stuff back through the streets of Metropolis.

What Was Superman's Original Arc?

man-of-steel-henry-cavill
Image via Warner Bros.

With Justice League, we finally got to see Henry Cavill go full Christopher Reeves, Big Blue Boy Scout without the oppressive Ayn Randian ethics riff. His suit even looks proper colorful; a far cry from the traditional Death of Superman black suit fans were expecting to see after his resurrection. This Superman takes time to talk to kids, he has good-natured races with The Flash to save civilians, he has... a truly horrifying upper lip, and that's exactly how you know his original arc was going to be something very different.

Cavill's mustache CGI is one of the most iconic pieces of cinematic fuckery I've ever seen; a visible, sloppily stitched scar on the fascinating Frankenfilm and it's a dead give away to which scenes were affected by Whedon's reshoots. Which is to say, unless they applied the CGI effect to some non-altered scenes for consistency (and that would be a bad idea), almost every single scene involving Superman was reshot in some capacity. Even moments that were almost certainly in Snyder's version according to early footage -- Supes battling the rest of the League and his field-side chat with Lois -- were modified in reshoots. Justice League finally lets Cavill be a true blue Superman, but his uncanny valley cupid's bow is a constant reminder that that wasn't the original plan. So the question remains, what did Snyder have in store for his draft? 

How Will Ben Affleck Make His Bat-Exit?

justice-league-ben-affleck-bruce-wayne
Image via Warner Bros.

Forget about Ross and Rachel. Mulder and Scully can take a hike. The great will they/won't they of our time is Ben Affleck and Batman. The actor has been dodging rumors that he's not long for the cape and the cowl ever since he dropped out of writing and directing The Batman, and despite suggesting Batfleck was still the way of the DCEU during his Comic-Con appearance, Affleck's recent comments indicate the actor has had just about had his fill of superhero shenanigans. “You don’t do it forever," he told USA Today, "so I want to find a graceful and cool way to segue out of it.”

Ok, a couple things. Batman v Superman literally came out last year. It may feel like an eternity, but Affleck has been the reigning cinematic Batman for a whole year and eight months so "you don't want to do it forever" is a pretty blatant piece of PR spin. We also know that, while Affleck says returning for Matt Reeves' The Batman is "something [he's] contemplating," Reeves has been taking meetings with possible new actors for the role, and THR reported earlier this summer that Reeves' Batman movie may actually be disconnected from the DCEU narrative. Even if Affleck ends up sitting out the standalone film, it's still possible that he could continue to pop up in the shared universe films, especially with Suicide Squad 2 and a number of other Harley Quinn-centric movies in the works.

Warner Bros. and DC have put also the wheels in motion on a Nightwing movie with The Lego Batman Movie director Chris McKay, so that could offer a prime opportunity for Affleck to pass on the mantle gracefully. What it really comes down to is how the studios react to Justice League's tepid box office reception and how they opt to move forward with their turbulent superhero universe. Speaking of which...

How Will the DCEU Course Correct Now?

justice-league-ezra-miller-7
Image via Warner Bros.

The question now is, what do the powers that be at Warner Bros. and DC Films want to do with their cinematic universe after their big event movie disappointed at the box office? We'll probably have to wait a bit before the shoes start to drop, depending on how Justice League performs overseas and if it finds strong legs heading into the holiday weekend, but the fact remains that the DC film universe is a bit of a hot mess right now. They have a truly insane amount of films in development and with Zack Snyder's vision for the DCEU essentially dissolved, it's a pivotal moment for the franchise's future. Without that unifying vision, what lies ahead for DC Films?

Reports have rumbled that they're developing a new branch of films separate from the shared continuity of the Justice League-verse, which is a clever and wise decision that allows for endless iterations of their most beloved characters and sets them apart from Marvel's shared universe model in an exciting way. But when you have star power performances like Gadot's Wonder Woman and Margot Robbie's Harley Quinn, you don't just want to hard reboot the whole franchise. So what's next?

Justice League is a bit like watching a train trying to change tracks at full speed, and while it significantly shifts the tone of the franchise, it's not enough to give the universe a carte blanche fresh start. However, if the developmentally turbulent Flashpoint movie ever gets off the ground, it could be exactly the right opportunity to reinvent the universe without breaking it.

In short, the Flashpoint comic run sees Barry alter the timeline and change the universe around him: Aquaman and Wonder Woman are at war, Thomas Wayne is Batman, and all kinds of other kooky alt-universe shenanigans ensue. After Flashpoint, the DC Comics universe went through a so-called soft reboot known as the New 52, where core characters were reimagined and reinvented while some key bits of continuity were maintained. Basically, Flashpoint is a blank check that the folks at DC can cash however they want, recasting and rewriting the cinematic universe as they see fit. Not to mention Ezra Miller's Barry Allen was the breakout from Justice League, making him a natural fit to help usher in a new era on the cinematic front. We'll have to wait and see if the head honchos use the Flashpoint reboot button to their advantage, but consider Geoff Johns, the man who wrote the arc, is running the show at DC Films, you can bet it's on the table.

Sound off with you Justice League questions, theories, and DC musings in the comments and for more on the film, check out the links below.