DC fans who prefer the work of Zack Snyder in the universe were not happy the other day because they believed that marketing and promotion for the new movie The Flash suggested the film was a sequel in continuity with Joss Whedon’s butchered Justice League… also known as the Josstice League. The evidence connecting the two was thin.
Now, having seen The Flash twice, I can tell you there are two scenes in The Flash that very clearly point to things that happened in the Snyder Cut, but were not found in the dreadful theatrical cut. Thereby proving that in the current slate of DC Movies, Snyder’s cut of Justice League is canon. We're about to jump into spoilers, so please be forewarned!
This is important to Zack Snyder’s fans because they literally had to fight tooth and nail to get the Snyder Cut of Justice League released. Warner Bros. acknowledging its existence, and making it part of The Flash narrative, is an outstanding step toward making Zack’s work on the DC trilogy canon. There have been some outliers on social media making the claim The Flash wipes away Snyder’s Cut, when in fact, the opposite is true. There are two very distinct moments in The Flash that prove that this movie is canon to The Snyder Cut, and not Josstice League. Let me break them down.
Barry And Bruce’s Conversation
Shortly after Barry runs fast enough to access the Speed Force, peering backward into events of the past that just happened, he turns to his chief confidant, Bruce Wayne (Ben Affleck). Bruce seeks clarification, and basically asks Barry if him running back in time is similar to what he did in Russia. And Barry confirms that yes, it’s just like that. Only in Russia, he only traveled back one minute. And in the instance that we watched in The Flash, he traveled back a full day.
The running sequence in The Snyder Cut looked like this:
Here’s the thing. Barry never traveled back through time in the Josstice League cut. He races to protect that dreadful Russian family (who were only included for pathetic comic relief), but Superman (Henry Cavill) was able to help Cyborg (Ray Fisher) separate the Unity, stopping Steppenwolf’s attack. Do the math, and Batfleck referring to the time travel moment from Zack Snyder’s Justice League (which doesn’t occur in Josstice League), that seemingly confirms The Flash is canon with The Snyder Cut.
You need more? Sure, this one really solidifies it.
Iris Remembers Meeting Barry
One of the reasons DC fans were so furious with Josstice League is that it appeared actors of color were removed from the original footage. That included a long sequence with Kiersey Clemons that didn’t make it into the theatrical cut but was restored into Zack Snyder’s Justice League. During the sequence, Iris is involved in a serious car accident, and Barry uses his incredible speed to rescue her mid crash. She spots him when the two of them land in the street, but then he speeds off.
Flash forward (no pun intended) to the first time Iris (Clemons) meets Barry (Ezra Miller) outside of the courthouse in The Flash. She mentions remembering seeing him recently, but can’t recall when. Barry awkwardly jokes that they haven’t seen each other since school, trying to brush past this scene:
This interaction does not happen in Josstice League. So, if Iris West mentions remembering it in The Flash, then she remembers a scene from The Snyder Cut, strengthening the connections between Andy Muschietti’s movie, and Snyder’s magnum opus.
Do you agree? And how much does it matter to you? Either way, it seems like The Flash is closing the door on DC’s past, with Blue Beetle serving a unique position of being a major start of DC’s new beginning. History is being made, by the day.
