All In with the Most Memorable Movie Poster Ever

With the recent release of Zack Snyder’s Justice League and full digression of that film on my podcast Entertaining the Idea, I decided to share an unpublished essay from a few years ago that matches up nicely as a companion piece.

While the theatrical release of Justice League had issues, there were good bones to it that allowed me to enjoy it more than most (but still craved a remodel 😏). But what I think was in a class all its own was the print marketing campaign for the film. Here are my thoughts and feelings about it at that time. It still (mostly) holds today.

I liked the Justice League movie. I LOVED the Justice League marketing campaign. The movie I thought turned out fine and enjoyed myself when I saw it in theaters. It isn’t perfect and has many issues, but does its job of offering an entertaining experience.

But that ad campaign… utterly amazing. These Alex Ross inspired posters are probably the greatest movie posters I’ve ever seen. That sounds like hyperbole, (¹and it is) but I can’t remember a more memorable and delightful set of posters.

They are striking.

They exercise remarkable constraint while offering so much visual eye-candy. From the pitch-black background, to the up lighting, to the posing and positioning of the actors/characters, it’s a beautiful piece of commercial art. I just break out in a giant smile each time I pass one on the streets.

They made these characters look like action figures, which is perfect for a superhero movie, while having realistic depth and vitality.

This is in contrast with all the Marvel films which are generic and bland, and have movie posters that express this blandness. They throw a bunch of characters and scenes together on the one-sheet with no context or care for detail. I have no idea what I am looking at with these posters. It doesn’t stand out, it has no direction, it doesn’t offer anything.

DC and the WB get dinged a lot for their movies being too dark, too serious, but I’d say that Marvel is too cookie cutter. It’s the same stories, with the same bland characters, music, and posters, that makes them completely forgettable (sans Guardians of the Galaxy, which are the exception that proves the rule).

There are problems with the Zack Snyder DC universe for sure, but I at least appreciate having a specific and unique vision that is pushing itself to be something different. And you can see that come out in the posters and other parts of the marketing of the movie, like its tagline- ‘All In’ and ‘You Can’t Save The World Alone (with character logos)’. The focus of the campaign was on the characters themselves and them having to join together.

And in this poster, they all look like badasses.

There are other nice touches like not having Superman included in the pre-release posters, but (SPOILER WARNING!) after the release and resurrection of the Man of Steel, they added him to the posters to complete the grouping. That is dedication and synergy to your source material that I applaud and admire.

Now this wasn’t the only aspect of the full marketing campaign, they still had more standard, and you could say generic ad graphics. But to have this selection of posters is when all I feel lucky to realize and witness true talent.

It is a shame that the movie did not live up to expectations because the film in the end is what is the purpose of the supporting marketing push.  And because of this the appreciation of this ad campaign surrounding this movie is truly great. I, for one, am ‘All In’ on this marketing campaign which is in a League of its own.

1. Jaws is the greatest movie poster ever made. But I wasn’t alive when that was released. ↩