Ben Affleck on the chaos behind Justice League: "Doesn't work well"
Ben Affleck is cracking open the Justice League days again, zeroing in on the tensions that surrounded the movie’s production.
Asked to guess one of his own lines during a Variety video, Ben Affleck landed on a quote from Justice League and immediately drifted back to the film ’s rocky making. He praised Zack Snyder’s original vision and feel for DC ’s mythology, then talked bluntly about the tug-of-war he says played out between the director and the studio.
“It ’s a very bad way, in my opinion, to make a movie because it doesn’t work well by committee.”
Affleck said the friction around the project weighed on the production, but credited Snyder for steering through corporate pressure. He also called it gratifying to see Snyder finish the movie his way years later with Zack Snyder’s Justice League, which arrived in 2021 on HBO Max.
He took a moment to tip his cowl to the Batman lineage, saying he’d be flattered if his time as Bruce Wayne is eventually spoken of alongside past caped crusaders he admires. Among the names he called out:
- Christian Bale — The Dark Knight trilogy
- Robert Pattinson — The Batman
- George Clooney — Batman & Robin
- Michael Keaton — Batman, Batman Returns
Who’s Batman next?
DC Studios is casting a new Bruce Wayne for its connected DCU while keeping Robert Pattinson’s Gotham in a separate “Elseworlds” lane with filmmaker Matt Reeves. Co-CEO James Gunn has reiterated that Pattinson’s saga sits outside the main timeline.
The new Batman is set to debut in The Brave and the Bold, focused on Bruce and his son Damian Wayne as Robin. Despite online speculation and fan-casting (yes, even the Jensen Ackles rumors), Gunn has pushed back on claims that anyone is locked in; the film remains in early development without a finalized script and no casting announced.