Review: Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths
- 3 hours ago
- 6 min read
By Matthew Kresal.
Parallel worlds. What ifs? Elseworlds.
Whatever you (or insert comic book company name here) might like to call them, there’s no doubt that the idea of seeing alternative versions of our favorite superheroes has a place among fans. Something that the long-running DC Universe Animated Original Movies series took advantage of with a number of their adaptations and productions. Among them was Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths which set the familiar members of the Justice League against their evil counterparts, the Crime Syndicate.
If the versions of the Justice League in the movie seem especially familiar for long-time viewers of DC’s animation, there’s a reason for that. Because, ironically enough for something that’s set an alternate Earth, there’s a “what if?” attached to Crisis on Two Earths. It started life as Fearful Symmetry, later re-titled Worlds Collide, a project that would have been a straight to video movie set between the animated Justice League and its sequel Justice League Unlimited in the early 2000s. Written by Justice League S2’s head writer Dwayne McDuffie, Worlds Collide was designed to act as the bridge between the two shows with the introduction of elements from the latter show as part of its plot.
McDuffie had written the script and a voice cast consisting of returning actors from the series and new performers was assembled when Warner Home Video decided, in the words of DC animation producer Bruce Timm, “We don't think we should go ahead with this.” McDuffie’s script was left on a shelf, though consideration was given both to having a PDF of the script included as DVD extra and to DC adapting it into comic form before that too was ultimately abandoned. With the advent of the DC Universe Animated Original Movies and the need to fill the first release slot for 2010, McDuffie’s script was revisited and would become Crisis on Two Earths.
Echoes of the original script remain thanks to the comparatively light rewrite. The Watchtower, the Justice League’s headquarters in Unlimited, is under construction as the film’s plot unfolds. Crisis on Two Earths also touches upon other elements such as the origin of Wonder Woman’s invisible jet, the instillation of a teleport system in the Watchtower, and the expansion of the League beyond its core members that would come into play with the latter series. It’s easy to imagine from the film how this could have very much been the bridge between the two much-loved series given that, as McDuffie told Comic Book Resources (now CBR) in 2010, most of the changes he made had to do with setting up elements for the eventually made series.
The film, however, is very much a standalone piece. Indeed, there’s more than enough differences (including an entirely new voice cast) that more informed fans than this reviewer had debated whether the movie is part of the “canon” of the two series and decided against it. Something that perhaps works in its favor as a movie for audiences picking the film up who might be familiar with the characters but not the specific series, something McDuffie acknowledged in that aforementioned 2010 interview that the film had “to be accessible for someone who doesn't know these characters well or doesn't know them at all.” But it remains an intriguing thought how a 2004 Worlds Collide might have turned out instead of 2010’s Crisis on Two Earths.
(Readers interested in the original script can read it online via McDuffie’s memorial website which has the script draft archived among his works.)
Crisis on Two Earth’s premise is simple enough: On an alternate Earth, the heroes and villains have largely swapped roles with Lex Luthor leading the Justice League and the Superman-esque mob boss Ultraman leading the Crime Syndicate. With the world’s leaders having been forced into reluctantly accepting the Syndicate’s unofficial rule, Luthor as the sole survivor of his league crosses universes to seek the aide of the Justice League. While Superman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, Martian Manhunter, and the Flash travel to Luthor’s world and face off against the Syndicate, Batman analog Owl Man is perfecting a device that threatens every Earth in every universe, setting the stage for a showdown with all of reality at stake.
Rewatching the movie for the first time in several years, it’s interesting to note how much world-building McDuffie does in very little space and within a 75 minute running time. The opening sequence, involving Luthor and the Joker (sorry, the Jester) plays with audience expectations that they’re normally villains before taking things in a different direction. By the time the opening credits arrive, viewers have not only met Luthor but had encounters with some short-lived characters before meeting the Syndicate members. From there, a quick introduction to the League as we’ll know them and a couple of scenes of exposition set the ball in motion. Alongside a couple of later scenes and quick lines of dialogue, that is essentially all the movie has to offer. It’s sparse to the point of economical, but immensely effective even if (as this reviewer was on their first viewing a few months after its initial release) you’re not deeply immersed in the DC universe beyond its most famous characters.
Yet, as with Elseworlds tales such as Superman: Red Son or Batman: Gotham By Gaslight, part of the fun of this sort of film is watching how familiar characters are reshaped. The Crime Syndicate especially with analogs such as super powered mafia boss Ultraman for Superman, the nihilistic Owl Man for Batman, a Superwoman instead of Wonder Woman (though, as hinted in the film and made more clear in McDuffie’s original script, she’s a counterpart of Mary Marvel), and so forth. The variations on the familiar extend into the supporting cast with President Slade Wilson (better known as Deathstroke) and his daughter Rose plus Jimmy Olson and members of the Shazam Family as the Syndicate’s henchmen. Crisis on Two Earth isn’t a particularly deep or serious attempt at an alternate history as often reviewed on this blog or released by Sea Lion Press, though like A Piece of the Action from Star Trek, it does offer an interesting look at how a world all but overrun by criminal elements that have superseded traditional government might operate. Like the Red Son graphic novel, it’s best viewed as a comic book story first and foremost.
Part of the movie’s enjoyability includes seeing versions of familiar characters facing off, often not with their direct counterparts, such as Wonder Woman facing off against Owl Man or Superman against Superwoman in the movie’s first extended action sequence. That they serve the plot is all the better and, despite the brighter color schemes and animation, the fact they do so highlights what has often gone wrong when such face-offs have occurred in live-action films. Though encounters between direct counterparts are rare, when they occur, such as between Batman and Owl Man in the climax, they highlight the differences between them. That sequence, where the philosophical differences between the two men are made apparent (including Owl Man’s view that in a multiverse where every decision that can be made has and will be made, destroying it is the only truly meaningful action one can take), is a particular joy and one aided in no small part by the performance of James Woods as Owl Man that stands in such sharp contrast with the flat performance of William Baldwin as the Dark Knight. With a voicecast that includes Mark Harmon as a solid choice for Superman to Vanessa Marshall as Wonder Woman (another version of which she’d voice in Red Son), and Gina Torres as Superwoman aided with solid animation and an appropriately driven score from James L. Venable and Christopher Drake, it makes for an enjoyable viewing experience.
And for 75 minutes, as familiar superheroes clash with evil versions of themselves, Crisis on Two Earths is well worth a watch. One that, in a different world, could have been a slightly different work. As it stands, it’s an enjoyable superhero “what if?” tale that’s better than it has any right to be.
Matthew Kresal is, among other things, the author of the SLP book Our Man on the Hill and short stories in the anthologies AlloAmericana, The Emerald Isles, and The Scottish Anthology.