Zack Snyder’s Justice League is now just around the corner, meaning DC fans will finally get to witness the director’s original vision for the team-up movie and not the studio-mandated mess that was released in 2017. But while Snyder retained creative control on this new edition, headed for HBO Max in March, there were a few ideas that he pitched early on in the film’s development that still never made it in, like a romance between Batman and Lois Lane!
Vanity Fair has shared an eye-opening look at the Snyder Cut’s long, winding journey to the screen, including insights from the filmmaker himself. In the piece, Snyder revealed that Ben Affleck’s Bruce Wayne was originally to have fallen in love with Amy Adam’s reporter, resulting in a conflict over his understanding that the world needed Superman but also wanting to pursue a relationship with Lois himself.
“The intention was that Bruce fell in love with Lois and then realized that the only way to save the world was to bring Superman back to life. So he had this insane conflict, because Lois, of course, was still in love with Superman. We had this beautiful speech where [Bruce] said to Alfred: ‘I never had a life outside the cave. I never imagined a world for me beyond this. But this woman makes me think that if I can get this group of gods together, then my job is done. I can quit. I can stop.’ And of course that doesn’t work out for him.”
Unfortunately, Snyder’s idea never made it into the movie, as this was one of his concepts that was nixed by producers Geoff Johns and Jon Berg. It’s unclear why the studio didn’t go for the romantic subplot, but it probably would’ve confused audiences anyway, seeing as the Clark/Lois love story has always been emphasized since Man of Steel and Bruce kind of had a thing with Wonder Woman in Batman v Superman.
Bats and Lois being a couple has been played around with before now, though. For instance, a crossover between the Batman and Superman animated series in the 90s had Bruce and Lois dating for a while, before she found out he was really the Dark Knight. It’s unlikely that Lois would’ve reciprocated Bruce’s feelings in Justice League, however, and Snyder was only trying to add another tragic but noble angle to the Bat’s character. It might’ve been interesting to see explored, though.
Zack Snyder’s Justice League is out on HBO Max – and on VOD internationally – from March 18th.