Alas, "The Flash"

Minor spoilers ahead.  

It's a little weird when a film's strongest section is its second act.  The second act is usually what gives many screenwriters trouble, since it has to show the hero actively struggling with a problem that doesn't get solved until the climax.  This is especially the case in a blockbuster film, where you'd expect the big opening and closing setpieces to be the highlights.  However, in the case of "The Flash," which shows every sign of being severely rushed and mishandled behind the scenes, those big action setpieces didn't really come off well.  Also, the second act is when the Flash, played by Ezra Miller, has to cede some of the spotlight to other characters, and I could almost pretend that he wasn't the lead of this movie.

Ezra Miller's Flash was introduced in the 2017 "Justice League," and worked decently well as a supporting character.  Six years later, after many delays, he finally has his own film, directed by Andy Muschietti and written by Christina Hodson.  It's an ambitious, overlong, way too interconnected film that's trying to do concepts that the MCU did in recent "Avengers" and "Spider-man" movies.  It puts The Flash front and center for the first time, and he's very mediocre as a lead.  He's sympathetic, sure, as the low man on the Justice League totem pole, who is obsessed with exonerating his wrongfully imprisoned father (Ron Livingston).  However, Miller's hyperverbal, self-aware Gen Zer performance is a lot, and he comes off as more obnoxious than funny.  Then we reached the second act and I realized he was still essentially a comic relief sidekick masquerading as a hero.

To be fair, there are plenty of interesting things going on here, and the basic ideas and story structure are pretty sound.  The execution, however, is frequently a mess.  It's all well and good to want to make a big crossover movie where you have multiple versions of familiar superheroes showing up.  However, you actually have to have the resources and the access to the talent to do that.   As you'd expect, there are a ton of actors from other DC media making appearances, notably Michael Keaton reprising his role of Batman from the Tim Burton movies.  Keaton is fantastic in this film, and I was happy every moment he was onscreen.  High marks also go to Sasha Calle, who plays a new, darker version of Supergirl.  However, it's also noticeable who doesn't show up in "The Flash," and who is clearly reused footage that doesn't interact with the other characters, and who was probably a last minute replacement when the actor they really wanted turned them down.    

The VFX work is noticeably subpar, and I suspect a lot of it may be placeholder animation that was never finished.  There are a lot of visuals in "The Flash" that would have probably looked really impressive if the artists had the adequate time to do them right.  Instead, there's a lot of uncanny valley going on, a lot of shortcuts, and a lot that looks cribbed from video games.  The big action sequence of the first act involves Flash rescuing a group of babies from a collapsing hospital, and I have to wonder if anyone involved ever saw a real baby in their lives.  The finale with all the cameos doesn't look much better than the "Crisis on Infinite Earths" special that the Arrowverse did a few years ago with a TV budget.     

Then there are the tonal problems.  "The Flash" has a lot more goofy and subversive humor than "Justice League" or any of DCEU's major superhero titles.  It often feels much more like a "Suicide Squad" film, and I wasn't suprised that "The Flash" has the same screenwriter as "Birds of Prey."  For the first hour, "The Flash" almost felt like a parody of a superhero movie, with Miller non-stop quipping like a wannabe Deadpool, and getting himself into some truly cartoonish situations.  When it's time to get serious, the slapstick often undercuts any tension or gravity, and these hijinks are allowed to go on for far too long.  That said, Miller's performance instantly improves with the more staid Keaton and Calle as his scene partners, and his Flash is perfectly capable of pathos and sincerity when he's finally allowed to show it.  He does become the hero of his own movie, eventually.

As for the third act, the best thing I can say about it is that it feels like it could have been much worse.  There's a big action finale that doesn't really work.  There's a big emotional finale that is fine.  Then everything ends on a couple of gags, and it's really up to the individual viewer as to whether the humor plays.  "The Flash" is pitched toward a nerdier, more well-informed DC fan, which means it's much more niche than its creators think it is.  And it's more dependent on the good will of a devoted audience of DCEU fans that, frankly, just doesn't exist.  

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