Ray Fisher Thinks This MCU Movie Affected Whedon's Justice League
Of all the dramatic developments that have come out of Hollywood in the last few years, the feud between Ray Fisher and Joss Whedon has been the most ... insert a word that conveys respectful concern while also expressing confusion, preferably without unintentionally offending anybody — "bewildering" maybe? Even that feels like shaky ground. What's clear is that Fisher's accusations have been wide-ranging, Whedon's response has been minimal, and Warner Bros.' response following an investigation has been, to quote their own press release, "remedial."
Through it all, there's only one thing that everyone seems to agree on: Justice League didn't turn out the way that anybody hoped it would. Now Fisher, on top of allegations of "gross, abusive, unprofessional, and completely unacceptable" behavior on the part of the film's late-in-the-game substitute director, has added a new layer of shade to his depiction of Whedon, stating that the filmmaker is mired in resentment. More specifically, Fisher claims that Whedon spent his time helming Justice League working through his frustration with the perceived public response to his last superhero adaptation, Avengers: Age of Ultron.
It all bubbled up during the actor's recent interview with Poindexter Lounge, where he outlined some of his experiences working on the highly controversial project.
Age of Ultron's shadow loomed over Justice League, according to Fisher
Ray Fisher's description of Whedon's approach to the project paints a grim picture of a filmmaker who felt slighted by fans' reactions to his previous work, and an attempt at vindicating the less-beloved of his two entries in the Avengers franchise. "One of the things that I will say so far is, our experience in the creation of this is Joss brought a lot of his personal and professional, for lack of a better term, resentment into the Justice League process," Fisher recounted on Poindexter Lounge. "One of the things that (Whedon) had said in our first conversation was that people didn't 'get' Age of Ultron. There were certain things that were being said in that conversation where I was like, 'Oh, this is less about the work being presented and more sort of like an ego stroke.' To say, 'If you like it in this movie, you should have liked it in that one. Ha ha, joke's on you.' Right? And that's just creatively, that has nothing to do with any of the really egregious stuff, that's just on a creative level. It shows, you know?"
It's a well-documented fact that Whedon, who also wrote and directed 2012's The Avengers, faced more difficulties in the production of its 2015 follow-up Age of Ultron, with studio interference frequently singled out as the likely cause of the sequel's middling reception. Fisher's comments represent the first entry in the recently popularized Joss Whedon burn book which points to the Marvel movie's troubled creation process as a possible cause for issues on the set of Justice League.
On a lighter note, Batman says a bad language word in the Snyder Cut. So that's something to look forward to.