Instead of at least improving the CGI, WB clearly had extra money at least in their marketing budget to give to Tom Cruise to say that this was one of the best movies ever made.

I was initially hesitant to share my thoughts on The Flash as I didn’t want diminish what the Creative Cinematic Collection is all about. The concept of this is to create healthy dialogue behind all outlooks of film. However, I believe this is a great example of what this is all about. While I can see where people enjoyed this, I found myself on the opposite end of that. While I do believe people need to be accountable of their actions, I went into this film with an open mind and void of the troubles of one particular actor outside of the film to enjoy it. My love for film stems from Michael Keaton’s Batman films. I used to carry the VHS tapes around with me instead of toys. So, seeing this was very important to me. I should have remembered that this is still called The Flash. That is not particularly a problem within itself, but it’s really how the film manages to juggle everything that isn’t the titular hero.

The film manages to start pretty unique from putting the audience into the hero’s perspective almost immediately to creative some unique fun. After Barry Allen starts to become The Flash in its opening sequence is where the film begins to lose me. There is a weird amount of focus in a sequence that involves falling babies. What could have resulted in some funny laughs resulted in a mess between the visuals, acting, and editing. I understand the director tried attempted to validate why the CGI was so bad, but I don’t believe that is actually the case. I believe he found a unique way to go about it in order to justify it. The opening sequence with these falling babies ends up as a mess as the editing tries its best to cover how bad the CGI really is and to establish the main character. Add a non-stop screaming nurse to the mix and you get what is one of the weirdest opening sequences for a superhero film I have ever seen. It also happens to really explain the nature of the rest of the film.

The set up for Barry Allen’s story is nice and relatable, but it never sticks the landing. To have his dad be accused of the murder didn’t make much sense to me and the story never explained who killed his mother in the first place and why it happened in the first place. This plotline helps Barry grow as a person. I can’t help but to think that I can understand the want of going back in time to fix things and I am sure others would agree. It’s when the present Barry meets the older Barry is where it loses me.

Not only does it begin to get messy here, but there is a lot of screentime dedicated to exposition that takes up a lot of the movie. It creates a weird dynamic between the two, even if the point is to show that the present Barry is growing. To me, this just takes up way too much of the film’s duration that I was just too eager for the film to get to its better moments.

The editing and bad CGI doesn’t just occur at the beginning, but gets even worse by the end. If I knew nothing about the DCEU, I would have easily been confused with the climax. The visuals continue to be lackluster, especially with its special cameos. The editing makes it all more confusing to make these cameos relevant. In the end, it’s clear that the film really shouldn’t have focused on the cameo’s so much.

The takes on Affleck’s & Keaton’s Batman’s are at the film’s best. It makes me confident that Any Muscheitti will do well with the upcoming Batman film. With the limited screentime he is given, Affleck gives it his all one last time. I enjoyed Keaton’s return; however, his introduction is quite strange and doesn’t quite feel like the much needed return for his character. Unfortunately, between his and Sasha Calle’s Supergirl, the film never knows how to properly handle them. By the film’s end, I questioned why they were needed in the first place and only concluded that they were there to attempt to make the movie better. Even the return of Michael Shannon’s character and bringing up the events of Man of Steel did absolutely nothing for the story.

Overall, this was a major disappointment. Michael Keaton & Sasha Calle are the film’s biggest highlights as Batman & Supergirl, but even then, the film doesn’t even know what to do with them and make them relevant to the film’s story in the end. Unfortunately, the film’s main plotline could have been good, but it felt like there were too many hands in the pot in order to make it better and did the complete opposite. There was a lot more potential to happen here and I genuinely felt the superhero fatigue settle in here. Even by the end, it never really feels like the movie knew what it was doing on a big picture and added way too many things to make the future of this franchise even more confusing.

VERDICT: 1.5/5 (Pretty Bad)