Fans have been treated to an eyeful of Steppenwolf from Zack Snyder’s extended Justice League project. Snyder’s forthcoming cut of the 2017 film, which he had to abandon after a family tragedy, will be released in several parts on HBO Max in 2021, and is set to cost around $70 million to fully complete.
Joss Whedon famously took the directorial reins from Snyder after he left Justice League, and some fans were unhappy that Snyder wasn’t able to realize his original vision for the film. A successful campaign to get the alternate cut out into the world then ensued, and the phrase “release the Snyder Cut!” eventually entered the geek lexicon, for better or worse.
The villain of either version of the film was always intended to be Steppenwolf, an acolyte of Darkseid, ruler of Apokolips. Created by Jack Kirby in 1972, Steppenwolf is a cosmic warlord who in the film comes to Earth as a kind of advance man for Darkseid and his forces’ eventual invasion. The version in the theatrical cut of the film was a fairly uninspired mo-cap and CGI baddie, and it seems that Snyder has something more extreme in mind for his vision.
The latest glimpse of what we can expect from the reshaped Justice League included both a new trailer, and a closer look at its redesigned villain. Inevitably, the internet responded to Steppenwolf 2.0 in the only ways it knows how – enthusiastic praise, dunking, and scorn.
While some compared Steppenwolf’s new design to a ‘glitch gif’, others seemed to think it was a marked improvement over the 2017 version…
The jokes were flowing freely, of course, and understandably. We’ve not had that much to enjoy online since Sonic the Hedgehog’s human teeth and Judy Dench as a sexy cat last year.
Some comments stated that neither Whedon or Snyder’s Steppenwolf really encompass what the fans deserve.
An important thing to note is that in the Snyder Cut of Justice League, Steppenwolf will apparently be buck naked for reasons that aren’t entirely clear at this time.
Make of all this what you will. The Snyder Cut, or Zack Snyder’s Justice League as it seems to officially be called, will be released on HBO Max in early 2021.