DC Universe Animated Original Movies (Part 17): Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox

Hello, my friends.  Being quick and swift on its feet, it’s once again time for another entry in the series that aims to please.  Welcome back to…

The scarlet speedster himself has made appearances so far in this series.  While Wally West only had one lone moment to shine in “Justice League: Crisis On Two Earths”, our featured Flash has already struck twice.  After teaming up with the world’s greatest heroes to defeat an otherworldly being looking to wipe out humanity and a group of super-villains out to exploit the heroes’ weaknesses, it’s about time he gets a chance to take the lead as he looks to undo a huge decision across the continuum within the tale of…

Originally released on July 30, 2013, this film is based off the 2011 tale “Flashpoint”.  Originally written by Geoff Johns, drawn by Andy Kubert and inked by Sandra Hope & Jesse Delperdang, it served as a “reboot” of sorts in order to launch the “New 52” DC Universe, which has been going on since September 2011.  So, how does one adapt such a recent tale?  Let’s find out.

We open on a single moment in the past where Nora Allen and her son Barry Allen (both voiced by Grey DeLisle-Griffin) are stuck on the side of the road, due to her car breaking down.  An eager Barry demands for a passing vehicle to stop and help them, but Nora reassures her son by telling him of a prayer that she learned as a young girl: “Accept the things you cannot change.  Have the courage to change the things you can and have the wisdom to know the difference”.  Shortly afterwards, they head off to take care of their situation.

Some time later, Barry arrives back from school as he eagerly prepares to celebrate his mom’s birthday.  However, he enters to find that someone had broken into his home.  Even worse, the intruder has even killed his mom.  Despite a police investigation, the identity of the murderer was never discovered.

We then shift ahead to the present day as a grown-up Barry Allen (voiced by Justin Chambers of Grey’s Anatomy fame) visits his mother’s grave alongside his wife Iris West-Allen (voiced by Jennifer Hale).  He blames himself for not being able to save mommie dearest and wishes that he’d “ran a little faster” to order to prevent her death.  Iris then tells him that there wasn’t anything that he could have done and to also remember his mom’s saying about accepting things you can’t change.

Just then, he gets a Justice League distress signal.  After changing into his costume, he races off to the Flash Museum to see that it’s been broken in.  Just then, the Rogues begin their attack on him as Top (voiced by Dee Bradley Baker), Captain Cold (voiced by Danny Jacobs), Captain Boomerang (voiced by James Patrick Stuart), Heatwave, and Mirror Master attempt to take him down.  For the most part, the Scarlet Speedster is able to easily foil each of them.  However, one of the boomerangs disperses an adhesive that pins the Flash to the wall.  He’s then told that the Rogues were hired to help take him down.

Soon enough, their boss runs in who turns out to be Eobard Thawne a.k.a. Professor Zoom a.k.a. Reverse-Flash (voiced by C. Thomas Howell).  After stating that he’s going to blow up the Flash museum along with 10 square blocks of Central City, he also reveals that he attached miniaturized bombs to each of the Rogues’ belts as he dashed in and that unbuckling them will set them off quicker.  After placing one more bomb onto the Flash, Prof. Zoom prepares to take his leave.

Fortunately, the Flash uses his free arm to entrap Eobard Thawne in the thick adhesive in order to make him disarm the bombs.  Shortly after Prof. Zoom refuses to do so, the Justice League arrive to take care of the situation.  Even while under the Lasso of Truth, Reverse-Flash says that the bombs aren’t able to be disarmed.

As such, the Justice League splits up the Rogues in order to take them out of Central City and safely disarm the belt bombs.  After Nathaniel Adam a.k.a. Captain Atom (voiced by Lex Lang) takes them far above the Flash Museum, Victor Stone a.k.a. Cyborg (voiced by Michael B. Jordan) uses his personal tech to help out Captain Boomerang.

With Diana Prince a.k.a. Wonder Woman (voiced by Vanessa Marshall), she flies Captain Cold to a nearby forest where she uses one of his freeze guns to form a chunk of ice over the bomb.  Afterwards, she rips off the piece of his belt and throws it into the air where it safely explodes.

After throwing Top into a river, Arthur Curry a.k.a. Aquaman (voiced by Westley himself, Cary Elwes) then uses his echolocation to summon a million microbes to the area in order to eat away at the bomb’s wiring.

After taking Heatwave to a cliff miles outside of town, Kal-El a.k.a. Superman (voiced by Sam Daly, son of famed Superman voice actor Tim Daly) simply closes his hands around the bomb as it safely blows up within his mighty grasp.

Finally, Green Lantern (voiced by The Holy Avenger himself, Nathan Fillion) takes Batman (voiced by Kevin Conroy) high into the Earth’s lower atmosphere (the Troposphere for those scientifically inclined) as he removes the bomb from Mirror Master, allowing it to fall from them and safely detonate many miles above the surface.

Back at the Flash Museum, Barry is able to safely disarm the final bomb by using his free hand to form a concentrated energy ball and strikes the mini-explosive with enough force to deactivate it, foiling the Reverse-Flash’s plans.

A short time later, the police arrive as they take all five Rogues back to jail.  As Professor Zoom is being escorted out, he taunts the Flash by saying that he won’t be able to save every person, at least “not the ones that matter to you”.  After Barry recognizes that the phrase is referring to his mom, Superman flies off to drop him off in a special holding cell at S.T.A.R. Labs.  Semi-distraught from Thawne’s message, Barry speeds off and takes his leave.

Following the title card, we then cut to the Central City Police Department where Barry is waking up from a nap.  However, it’s not too long that the police scientist starts to discover that some things aren’t adding up.  There’s a murder mystery on the Elongated “Kid”, “Citizen” Cold has his own museum and there’s also the double whammy in that he doesn’t have his super-speed nor the ring that houses his Flash costume.  After stumbling outside, he shockingly sees that his own mom is alive.  Not only that, he even finds out that his love Iris West is married to another guy.

Over in Gotham City, casinos are plentiful within the town.  Up on the rooftop, Batman is fighting an athletic femme fatale named Yo-Yo (voiced by Hynden Walch a.k.a. Harley Quinn from ‘The Batman’).  However, this version of the Dark Knight is fighting back with hand guns.  It turns out that he’s hunting the Joker in order to rescue “Judge” Dent.  After getting little to no information, he then proceeds to throw her off the building to her death.  Fortunately for Yo-Yo, Cyborg is able to rescue her as she immediately surrenders.

Afterwards, he meets up with Batman.  It turns out that Cyborg is working for the U.S. President as the National Security Advisor.  He has come to recruit Batman as he displays various super-powered figures who’ve formed an authorized resistance (since there’s also no Justice League) to combat an impending war.  He explains that Aquman and his Atlantean forces killed over 100 million people when they flooded all of Western Europe under the ocean.  Meanwhile, “Queen” Wonder Woman and her Amazons have overtaken the United Kingdom and renamed it New Themyscira, slaughtering 32 million in the process.  The mission is that they need to bring both leaders down before their gigantic clash brings about the end of the world.  However, Batman’s not up for it, especially when he states that Captain Atom tried and disappeared in the general area.  Apathetic about trying to prevent Armageddon, the Dark Knight takes his leave.

Wanting to make sense of this world, Barry drives out to Gotham and in particular, stately Wayne Manor.  Shortly after making his way into the Bat Cave, Batman promptly beats him up for intruding on his hide-out.  Barry tries letting Bruce know who he is, but the Dark Knight says that he’s dead, since he saw him get killed.  Suddenly, Barry realizes which Wayne it is under the cowl.  He discovers that it’s Bruce’s father, Thomas Wayne (voiced by Kevin McKidd, also of Grey’s Anatomy fame).

We then cut to New Themyscira where a resistance fighter named Col. Steve Trevor (also voiced by James Patrick Stuart) is trying to call for help while being pursued by the Amazons.  With no sign of rescue coming, he’s ultimately captured by Wonder Woman who wraps her Lasso of Truth around his neck.  She learns that he was trying to rescue fellow resistance fighter Lois Lane, who’s been hiding out here for the past three months gathering intel for Cyborg.  After ordering her Amazons to hunt down Ms. Lane, the Queen of the Amazons promptly uses her lasso to strangle Steve to death.

Back at the Bat Cave, Batman continues his interrogation as he snaps Barry’s fingers.  After getting kicked, a certain ring flies out of his jacket pocket.  After letting him know that it can help prove his case, the Dark Knight gives Barry the ring in order to access his costume.  However, it turns out that only the Reverse-Flash’s outfit was in there.  Barry explains to Batman about Eobard Thawne and that they both have access to the Speed Force, the energy field that gives him and Prof. Zoom their super-speed and allows them to bend the laws of physics with their great swiftness.  It also allowed Thawne to travel through time.  Batman suggests that an event in the past was changed in order for this reality to exist and that leaving the costume in the ring was Reverse-Flash’s way for letting him know that he’s the one behind it all.  Barry proposes that they capture Thawne, find out which part of the past was altered and change it back before the Atlantians and the Amazons end all life as they know it, even assuring Thomas that Bruce is alive (as well as being Batman) back on his reality.

Miles away on the Atlantic Ocean, the U.S.S. Ravager is on a mission to retrieve Aquaman’s doomsday device.  Heading the operation is Deathstroke The Terminator (voiced by Hellboy himself, Ron Perlman, reprising his role from the ’03 Teen Titans show), while Lex Luthor (voiced by Steven Blum) tries to locate the advanced WMD (weapon of mass destruction) by locking onto its power source.  The drawback is that its located within Aquaman’s territory.

Suddenly, they find themselves under attack by the Atlantean armada.  Deathstroke, Lex Luthor and company do their best to defend themselves, but they start to get easily picked off.

Things continue to go south for the humans when the Atlanteans have additional help from their most athletic combatants: Garth, Kaldur’ahm, and Tula.

Not even the fierce might of Clayface is able to withstand the mighty onslaught as he’s taken down by Ocean Master (again voiced by James Patrick Stuart).

Deathstroke and Luthor manage to fend off their aquatic foes, but are unable to score a hit on Ocean Master, who uses his trident to create a protective field around himself and his nearby allies.

Things go critically south when Black Manta duels with Deathstroke and ultimately kills him with a laser-eye blast to the chest before Aquaman officially comes on board.

With the remaining human soldiers slaughtered, Lex sends out a secret message via his wrist-watch before the King of the Seas ends his life via a vicious stab from his Trident.

Back at Wayne Manor, a stormy sky hovers overhead as Barry has set up a way to recreate the event that gave him his super-speed in the first place.  With certain chemicals nearby, he straps down to the chair as the connecting lighting rod reaches upwards to the fierce sky.  With a striking bolt, Barry begins the painful process.

However, the experiment fails horribly as the chemicals burst from their containers, land on Barry and ignite him in flames.  Batman is able to use his cape to extinguish the blaze, but Barry is left in critical condition with brutal third-degree burns.

Over in Washington, D.C., Cyborg is told by the President (voiced by Kevin Michael Richardson) that since he failed to recruit Batman onto the resistance team, military forces will be sent in to take care of the WMD.  Cyborg says that it’s pointless since the Atlanteans will see them coming from miles away, but the President will have none of it as he relieves him of his duties.

What follows next is a series of certain events.  Instead of a familiar rocket landing in a quaint midwestern town, it ends up crashing into the heart of a city.

However, the next event proves to be very vital.  It depicts Aquaman and his Atlantean forces arriving on Themyscira where they forge an alliance with Wonder Woman and the Amazons.

However, the unionship wasn’t meant to be as Arthur engages in an adulterous affair with Diana.  Naturally, his wife Mera manages to find out.

As such, she confronts Diana as the two of them engage each other in combat.  The fight ends with Wonder Woman decapitating the Queen of Atlantis and taking the crown as her prize.

As such, Aquaman and his fellow Atlanteans have declared war on the Amazons.

The final key event comes in an alternate version of the famous Batman origin.  In this universe, it was the young Bruce Wayne who was shot and killed by Joe Chill.  Thomas Wayne is able to punch the living daylights out of the murderer as Martha grieves for her dead son.  Becoming completely distraught from the event, she starts laughing manically, implying that she became this reality’s Joker.

It turns out that Barry was starting to remember events from this reality.  He tells Batman about it, yet also mentions how he still remembers his own timeline.  However, his original memories are being replaced with the new ones the longer he stays here.  As such, he dares to try the experiment again.

Deep within the Atlantic Ocean and aboard a certain submarine, Aquaman demands that they use their WMD again, even though using it the first time resulted in Western Europe getting flooded.  Dr. Vulko (voiced by Peter Jessop) tells him that using their fiendish device on a higher setting would pretty much wipe all lifeforms off the face of the planet, prompting Arthur and his armada to take the island by force.

After leaving to prep the Atlantean army, we find out that their WMD is actually Captain Atom.  He was captured and strapped inside to serve as their greatest weapon.

Back at Wayne Manor, Barry gives the experiment another go.  This time, he and Batman tape down the openings of the various containers.  After another bolt of lightning strikes Barry, one of the electrical cords manages to unplug itself.  Batman notices it and gets there in time to plug it back in.  At that moment, a huge force of energy knocks Batman off the balcony’s edge.  At the same time, Barry’s able to notice that the experiment is working as he regains his super-speed and saves the Dark Knight from getting impaled on the fence below.

Back in New Themyscira, we come across Daily Planet reporter Lois Lane (voiced by Dana Delany, reprising her role from “Superman: The Animated Series”) who’s on the run from the Amazons.  Wearing a technological head piece, she reports (once finding a place to hide) that the Amazons captured some of the Atlantean scouts and were forced into brutal interrogation.  They learned that one day from now, Aquaman will be leading an army through the English Channel in order to use their WMD.

Suddenly, Lois is surrounded by the Amazons and their gigantic Cerberus dog.  As she’s about to accept her grim fate, a yellow streak comes in and single-handily strikes down the opposing group before disappearing altogether.

Shortly afterwards, the Resistance arrives as Lois is greeted by the team’s leader, Cole Cash a.k.a. Grifter (also voiced by Danny Jacobs).  Not only that, but he also brought the rest of his team, Godiva, Mrs. Hyde, Canterbury Cricket and Etrigan The Demon (both voiced by Dee Bradley Baker).  When she asks which one of them is the speedster that saved her from the Amazons, Grifter tells her that they don’t have a super-speeding ally amongst them at all.  With Lois now part of the group, the Resistance proceeds to head out.

Back in the Bat Cave, Barry’s third-degree burns have completely healed, due to his access to the Speed Force.  Afterwards, he uses his reacquired super-speed to alter the Reverse-Flash costume into his more appropriate outfit.

Under Batman’s suggestion, the Flash heads out to try and access the Speed Force in order to travel through time and correct the chronological stream.  Unfortunately, no matter how fast he runs, he’s unable to reach that dimensional boundary.

At a military air base, Capt. Hal Jordan is briefed by Lois’ father, Gen. Sam Lane (voiced by Danny Huston, a.k.a. Col. William Stryker from “X-Men Origins: Wolverine”) on a specific mission.  He was recruited by the President to pilot an alien spaceship that arrived on Earth eight years prior.  Hal learns of the craft’s original pilot named Abin-Sur, who was discovered before his Green Lantern ring flew off into space.  It turns out that he’s going to be using the spacecraft on a suicide mission, since its advanced cloaking device gives him the best chance of reaching his target.

After getting back to Wayne Manor, Flash tells Batman that due to the fact that the Reverse-Flash is co-opting the Speed Force within this reality, it prevents him from going through time.  He states that the only other hero who could possibly go fast enough to time travel is Superman, but Batman tells him that he doesn’t exist in this time frame.  Fortunately, Barry’s new memories allows him to remember a “meteor” crashing into a city around the same time that Superman arrived back in the main reality.

That city is Metropolis.  As such, they head over to the crash site as they wait for Batman’s contact to arrive.

Sure enough, Cyborg arrives as Batman tells him that he’ll join the Resistance as their strategist, but only if he’s the one assembling members and that the Flash is part of the group.  Barry then tells him that they must also get the alien that’s currently being held by the government, even though the information on it is beyond what Cyborg is authorized to know.

After breaking into the secret government facility, our three heroes ultimately make their way to the holding cell.  Shining only red sunlight, they’re shocked to see what the Superman of this reality looks like: scrawny and frail-looking.  After he accepts their friendship, our heroes make their way back through the sewer system and out into the open.

Unfortunately, government agents were waiting for them.  Soon, they start opening gunfire on them as the heroes are forced to fend for themselves.  Flash does what he can by using his super-speed to quickly take apart the agents’ guns.  While he, Batman and Cyborg do their best to fend off the wrath of the government, Superman begins to regain his strength thanks to the yellow sunlight.

He gains enough energy to save Cyborg from a sneak attack, but soon finds himself fired upon.  With his comrades getting surrounded, Superman unleashes his Heat Vision and inadvertently kills the government agents.  Distraught by what he’s done, he flies off from the scene.  Shortly afterwards, Barry’s head is racked with pain as he sees more of his original memories continue to get altered into the current reality.

Meanwhile, Hal is on his suicide mission as he vastly approaches Aquaman’s submarine.  However, not even the ship’s advanced cloaking tech can protect him from Arthur’s sight as he uses a sea creature to eat the spaceship, sacrificing itself as the spacecraft’s bomb blows up with Hal dying in vain.

Later, our three heroes meet up with the Shazam kids as they learn about Jordan’s failed mission and that the President’s coalition fleet to New Themyscira got wiped out by the Amazons.  With the Atlanteans and the Amazons ready to engage each other in final battle, Batman starts giving up hope.  Fortunately, Flash convinces them that they’re super-powered beings united and that there’s still hope for humanity.

He even convinces Batman to reconsider as they begin their trek towards what used to be London.

During the flight, Batman tells Flash that he’s been scanning the government’s intel ever since he joined Cyborg’s alliance.  He accesses Lois’ video recording and sees a yellow blur saving her from the Amazons, confirming that Reverse-Flash is on this plane of reality.  Suddenly, they find themselves under attack by Atlantean fire as one particular blast hits them enough to get knocked out of the sky.  Using his super-speed, Flash uses his arms to generate enough of an air cushion to lessen the crash.

As such, Aquaman and his Atlantean armada begin their assault of New Themyscira.  However, the Amazons unleash a surprise attack on them as their final battle begins.

Suddenly, Etrigan The Demon makes an explosive entrance, helping to lead the charge for the Resistance as Grifter and company turn the final battle into a three-way tussle.

Sure enough, Aquaman and Wonder Woman come across each other as the two of them begin their own duel to the death.

Not too long after their tussle moves into a desolate building, our main heroes put their plan into motion.  While Flash, Batman and Cyborg try to subdue Aquaman, the Shazam kids use their magic word to become this reality’s version of Captain Marvel, Captain Thunder (also voiced by Steven Blum) in order to properly fight Wonder Woman.  However, Arthur recovers just enough to have Cyborg unintentionally blast Batman out onto the streets in time for Black Manta to try and laser blast him out of existence.

Fortunately, Grifter comes to his rescue as his gunfire gives Batman enough time to reach his ally and use a grenade to blast enough of Black Manta’s mask off.

As such, the two gun-wielding heroes combine their firepower to put a permanent end to one of Aquaman’s allies.  However, Ocean Master delivers a wounding blast onto Batman as the Flash gets him and Grifter out of his sight.

Ultimately, Reverse-Flash shows up as the two of them speed off to engage in a flurry of fisticuffs.

They ultimately race to the top of a devastated building where Prof. Zoom starts to get the upper hand and acquires it by jabbing a piece of rebar into Barry’s leg.  Due to the wound, the Flash is unable to keep up as Thawne easily smacks him around.

As the death toll continues to pile up around them, Reverse-Flash reveals a startling piece of information.  Barry finds out that the person behind the creation of this reality was HIMSELF!  It turns out that it stems from when he went back in time and saved his own mother from getting killed.  When this happened, it left repercussions throughout the time stream and changed events that originally happened.

Meanwhile, things continue to get worse for our heroes.  Wonder Woman manages to overpower Captain Thunder and is able to make him transform back into the Shazam kids.  She takes advantage by capturing and killing one of them.

Meanwhile, Aquaman ultimately overwhelms Cyborg as he defeats him by ripping his robotic body apart.

Before Arthur is able to deliver the death blow with his trident, Superman arrives and uses his Heat Vision to slice off the Atlantean’s arm, followed by a blast of super-breath to blow him into a nearby desolate building.  However, the damages were too severe as Cyborg succumbs to his injuries and dies.

After discovering that Ocean Master has also died in the conflict, a wounded Aquaman is stabbed by Wonder Woman.  Before she successfully delivers the finishing blow onto him, Arthur activates his Captain Atom-powered bomb.

With the resulting explosion starting to reach the former city of London, Reverse-Flash feels overjoyed on the fact that a battered Barry is unable to stop him now.  However, Batman manages to sneak up and lands a successful headshot, killing Eobard Thawne.  Before he succumbs to his injuries, Thomas Wayne tells the Flash to head back in time to prevent this reality from happening and hands him a letter signed to his son, Bruce.

With the blast radius greatly expanding, Barry manages to gain enough momentum to access the Speed Force in order to travel through time.  He then sees his past self en route to saving his mom from being killed.  He ultimately catches up and tackles himself as the scene dissolves into a bright, white light.  (Side Note: This is the moment when The New 52 DC Universe was created.)  Waking up back at his police desk, he sees that he apparently managed to restore the timeline.

Later, he arrives at the Bat Cave where he tells Batman of his recent venture.  Barry then hands Thomas’ note over.  Upon reading it, Bruce actually cries a little from the touching message from beyond death, time and space.  After being thanked for the letter, the Flash takes his leave as we end with him heading out via super-speed.

Following the end credits, the film closes out with a certain portal opening above Earth as an alien army emerges, foreshadowing what’s to come in the next film.

Since I’ve only read from the main five-issue series, it’s possible that some elements featured in the film are further explained within the various tie-in materials.  Instead of trying to find differences between the movie and its source material, I’ll jump right into my own character analysis.  Starting off with the villains, we have Aquaman and Wonder Woman.  Both are similar in the fact that both of their races are the strongest of this reality and their own armadas have little to no trouble in taking down any human forces that manage to come remotely within their territories.  Because they’re both secondary villains, it’s hard to really gauge these two since they used to be a pair (in more ways than one) and would love to see the other get slaughtered in this war.  Other than that, they’re the complete opposite of their hero selves in this reality.  However, how the feud started to begin with did feel semi-stupid.  So, the King of Atlantis and his people have declared war on the Amazons since their main queen killed in wife Mera in a scuffle and the main thing that led to her death was that she confronted Queen Wonder Woman after seeing her with her husband having an affair.  Why didn’t his wife confront him first, since he was technically cheating on her?

Next, we have our primary villain in the Reverse-Flash.  He’s hardly here, but he makes up for it by having an omnipresent state in the reality, making himself appear briefly to guide Barry along sort of Riddler-like, wanting the Flash to ultimately find out about his devious plan.  Having the same super-speed powers as our main hero, he does everything in his power to see Barry get broken down in every way, shape, and form, even if he has to die alongside him in order to do it.  C. Thomas Howell turns in a nice performance, giving Prof. Zoom here a creepy undertone in his speech delivery and making us believe the insane level that he’s on in order to make his plan work.

As far as our heroes go, the Flash and the Thomas Wayne version of Batman are the most interesting here.  Not to get left out of this is good ol’ Victor Stone.  Like Beast in X-Men: The Last Stand, he’s a hero who has a key position in the U.S. Government, helping the President deal with the handling of super-powered beings that threaten mankind.  He strongly believes in the goodness of others, becoming Superman’s best friend after helping him escape.  Michael B. Jordan does a good job with the material that he’s given, but since this is a doomed reality, there not much of a character-defining moment for him before the King of the Seas rips him to shreds.

Next in line, the Thomas Wayne version of Batman.  From the looks of things, he seems to have a basic knowledge of hand-to-hand combat skills, though not to the extent of Bruce from the main universe.  Because he runs casinos in his civilian disguise, it’s most likely the reason why this Batman didn’t travel the world to further hone his skills and is also why he resorts to carrying firearms.  He and the Flash help complete each other, since Barry’s determination to fix the timeline and get back to his universe helps Thomas Wayne push towards a reality where he knows that his son is alive and well.  I enjoyed Kevin McKidd’s performance, giving this Batman a more semi-broken down and grizzled Dark Knight who seems far more disdained about the world’s glimmering hope before the Flash helps reinvigorate him for the better.

Finally, we have our main hero.  For the most part, Barry goes through the same notions that he faced in the source material.  Like before, his biggest moment as a scientist comes when he tries to reacquire his super-speed.  He learns what went wrong the first time around before the experiment is a success as his powers helps him heal from his grave injuries.  The action that got him in the alternate reality serves as a cautionary tale as to why screwing around with the past, especially for your own personal needs, should never be done and why time machines will never be technologically feasible in humanity’s existence.  One plot hole that I realized though: If Barry’s action of saving his mom is the result, why didn’t he remember doing so?  I don’t think that there’s an explanation as to why he doesn’t remember that bit early on in either the source material or the film.  That way, he wouldn’t have been surprised when he saw his mom walking around.  Other than that, I dug Justin Chambers’ performance.  After all, this is more of a Flash movie than it is a Justice League movie.  Even when he gathers other heroes to stop Aquaman and Wonder Woman, it’s his problem that he must overcome.  Although, it is a bit of a disappointment that in both the source material and here, he’s not the one who defeats Reverse-Flash, it’s the Thomas Wayne Batman who does.

The action scenes continue to be thrilling.  They serve their main purpose and continue to build with each passing brawl.  Once we reach New Themyscira, then the film unleashes its ultimate fury.  Only the final battle has the most epic feeling, while all of the previous fights are serious, yet none are as big in scale.  The animation, for the most part, is fluent and effective.  A few moments (especially from the beginning) look semi-chicken scratch, while Superman of the main universe looks semi-hedious with a over-muscled body with a tiny head.  Other than that, there’s not much to complain.

Overall, this one is OK.  It’s dark and grim with a lot of death, but this flick (which isn’t entirely for the faint of heart) is still enjoyable.  The characters are engaging, the animation is mostly fluent, the action scenes build on top of each other and it sets up the groundwork for some of the upcoming films in this series.  I recommend this for those who are old enough for the more adult-kind of films and those who can handle bleak, apocalyptic moods.  Give it a watch if you’re up for this kind of superhero film.

Next Time: The DC Universe has begun anew, but our costumed crusaders are facing a massive invasion from another world.  They better start learning on how to work together, or else all hope for humanity is lost.  The world’s greatest heroes get their baptism by fire as we dig into “Justice League: War”.

Barry Allen (created by Robert Kanigher & Carmine Infantino), the Justice League (created by Gardner Fox) and all related characters are owned by DC Comics.