Yesterday, Vanity Fair published an in-depth article on the manufacture of Zack Snyder’s Justice League which suggested that the end of the remake of the four-hour project will contain “a special appearance that will blow the minds of the most radical fans”. Naturally, fans immediately started speculating about what this cameo might be, with Ryan Reynolds’ Hal Jordan – aka Green Lantern from the 2011 WB live-action film – gaining traction as a possible candidate. Reynolds went on Twitter and denied that he was on the project, but the fan community has been burned by denials before, so I imagine some stubborn people are still wondering if that answer was just a smokescreen to hide a surprise appearance from Reynolds before the credits rolled.
Now, the cameo has been revealed. If you would like to start from scratch, come back now – there will be spoilers forward.
When I first saw that Vanity Fair phrase circulating, a small part of me wondered if the cameo could be J’onn J’onzz, the shape-shifting alien known as The Martian Manhunter, played by the actor Harry Lennix. The reason my mind went there immediately was because last week, Lennix spoke openly about being contacted by Snyder and being asked to return for reshoots (more on that in a minute).
According to a report by io9, it turns out that, yes, Martian Manhunter is the new Zack Snyder Justice League cameo that was being praised by Vanity Fair.
This boils down to a classic case of semantics: the formulation of the VF article seemed implies that special participation was a secret, but I never explicitly said it was. In addition, I bet that “radical fans” are the type of person who is constantly scouring the Internet for details about Snyder’s cut and therefore would already know about Lennix’s role in this film. Oh well. I apologize to the fans who were waiting for something that would shake the world.
In October 2019, Snyder revealed on social media that, in his ideal cut, a scene between Martha Kent (Diane Lane) and Lois Lane (Amy Adams) would have ended with Martha walking away and changing form to Martian Manhunter before eventually leaving. transform into the form of General Swanwick of Harry Lennix, a character who appeared in the 2013 Snyder film Steel man. And just five days ago, Lennix was interviewed by Variety and talked about appearing in this new cut of Justice League. “The next call I got from Zack was, ‘Hey, when can you come in and shoot?'” Said Lennix. “So that was great. I found out it was a possibility, or at least that Martian Manhunter would be in it, when he revealed through the storyboard that Martha Kent is coming to visit Lois, and after she leaves, she reveals that she is, in fact, Calvin Swanwick, or the Mars Hunter. That’s how I heard about it. “
I was wondering if this was a version of the scene that went into the theatrical cut where Martha comes to the Daily Planet to visit Lois, but since this Mars Hunter revelation is supposed to be part of the end of the film, it’s probably entirely different creation.
Zack Snyder’s Justice League debut in March 18th, 2021 on HBO Max.
Interesting posts from around the web: