Rewatching Justice League on HBO...

...because there's not a lot going on.

Anyway, I find myself wanting to like it more than I do, and despite sometimes wanting to hate it.

The start is awful- funny-looking Superman mouth, then we get the incredibly pathos "everybody knows" intro song. Ok you've set the tone, I'll just go off myself in the bathroom now.
Why SO miserable a tone to set? We get it, Superman is dead; but we live in a world that's never had him (or Batman, Wonder Woman, or the rest) and we're doing ok. So my first impressions are that I may just go outside and cut the grass instead of watching this over.

Getting outside that intro, the rest is spotty.

I actually like the new heroes, and wish we'd have had films to introduce them.

Aquaman is a rowdy, hard-drinking dude who avoids the spotlight. Wants nothing of either publicity or recognition, instead would hang out in a rough bar and share a couple drinks with the anonymous hard-working poor folk he helps. Actually was putting up a good fight against Steppenwolf one-on-one: his last bit he threw his trident into him and knocked him down, prompting the villain to start a monologue. In the right setting I think he'd have taken him. I kinda get a Conan-like anti-hero take on him, there's no talk of hope and love. Just "I'm gonna kick your arse, because you messed with me".
BTW, I loved Mera/Amber Heard, and the whole Atlantean suggestion. That could be fun.

Cyborg was also good, I enjoyed the parts where he was just behind the scenes devouring the internet and all things tech. I guess prior to this film, he just wanders around with a hoodie anonymously, but if there's a wifi hotspot, he's actually controlling everything. I get the impression he doesn't physically fight much (if at all) prior to this film... but he might be doing some high tech ghost shite.

Flash- I know the TV show established a version, but I like this one too. Got a similar vibe to the latest MCU Spiderman, but a little older. Geeky nerd, runs around fast, "pushing people and running away" as he says it. I like the fact that he's alone, and not the Cisco squad running with him.

Steppenwolf, on the other hand- just bad. It's like he wandered off the set of a Power Rangers episode and into this movie. Couldn't they give him a deeper, more menacing voice? Couldn't they put some malice into his tone? Hell, couldn't they spend a little time designing things like his helmet, so it doesn't LOOK like paper mache'? And make him more formidable- heck, I think the Witch chick in Suicide Squad (who was doing about the same things btw) could take him.
Along those lines, the terraforming scene (is all DCU now going to be terraforming threats?), I suppose the graphics were better than a first-gen Nintendo. Maybe on par with a Playstation 1, definitely not matching XBox levels of detail. I mean, purple tentacle-vines weaving around... couldn't they refine that more? I guess judging from Superman's mouth in the beginning, there weren't high standards demanded from the effects crew.

Where the movie really suffered, is in the obvious comparison to Marvel. It doesn't match up to the first Avengers film (mostly due to lack of backstory on the other heroes, due to their not having prior films), and doesn't have the same visual impact.
That would be bad enough, but the fact that Infinity War is now the new standard, it's hugely lacking. I get that Infinity War is a later development storywise, but the films are hitting the market about the same time.

There's some potential in DC, but we need to see better efforts. The villains need to be more impressive, and we need something other than another terraforming attempt.