New Justice League cut could receive an R-rating

Last Updated on August 2, 2021

When Zack Snyder unleashes his vision of Justice League on HBO Max next year, there's a very good chance that it could be saddled with an R-rating. While speaking with Entertainment Weekly, Snyder dropped the following tidbit: "Here's one piece of information nobody knows: The movie is insane and so epic and is probably rated R — that's one thing I think will happen, that it will be an R-rated version, for sure," Snyder told EW. "We haven't heard from the MPAA, but that's my gut."

As far as what might give Justice League an R-rating, Zach Snyder explained, "There's one scene where Batman drops an F-bomb. Cyborg is not too happy with what's going on with his life before he meets the Justice League, and he tends to speak his mind. And Steppenwolf is pretty much just hacking people in half. So [the rating would be due to] violence and profanity, probably both." When Snyder released his director's cut of Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice, it was also given an R-rating due to additional violence, so an R-rated Justice League isn't a huge surprise. Zach Snyder's Justice League will debut on HBO Max sometime next year, but Snyder is also pushing for Warner Bros. to release the film in theaters as well, which would go hand-in-hand with the studio's recent announcement that they will be releasing their entire 2021 slate simultaneously in theaters and on HBO Max.

I'm a huge fan and a big supporter of the cinematic experience, and we're already talking about Justice League playing theatrically at the same time it's coming to HBO Max. So weirdly, it's the reverse [of the trend].

Snyder added that although he thinks Warner Bros.' plan is "pretty bold," it's possibly that it wasn't 100% thought out when you consider the backlash it has faced from directors such as Christopher Nolan and Denis Villeneuve. "I feel like there's a lot of people panicking during COVID," Snyder said. "I hope that, in the end, that's what this was — some sort of knee-jerk to COVID and not some sort of greater move to disrupt the theatrical experience."