Justice League x RWBY: Super Heroes & Huntsmen
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| ♥ | This article is dedicated to Monty Oum, the creator of RWBY (June 22, 1981-Feburary 1, 2015.) |
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Genuine question for Rooster Teeth. Whats the point of this crossover if most of the DC characters are heroes who dont fit just for you to tone down to -11?
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Justice League × RWBY: Super Heroes & Huntsmen is a 2023 two-part American direct-to-video animated superhero crossover fantasy film loosely based on the limited crossover comic book series RWBY × Justice League and DC/RWBY written by Marguerite Bennett. A co-production of Rooster Teeth Productions, DC Entertainment, and Warner Bros. Animation, the film centers on several members of the Justice League mysteriously turned into teenagers and teleported to Remnant while teaming up with Team RWBY to defeat a superpowered Grimm and a group of supervillains, including an old enemy of RWBY.
It was also the last RWBY project made by Rooster Teeth before its closure by Warner Bros. Discovery, who later sold the IP rights for the franchise to Viz Media in 2024.
Synopsis
In Part One, The Justice League are Transported into Remnant and transformed into Teenagers and must help Team RWBY escape a digital world. In Part Two, Team RWBY are summoned into the DC Universe when Grimm invade it.
Why This Crossover Is Unjustified
- While the concept of a RWBY movie is pretty exciting, it would have been better off as its own thing instead of a crossover.
- Similar to Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe, this crossover with DC characters is not a good idea to make atemped to involve.
- While the animation is decent like RWBY does, the animation is noticable downgrade compared to the RWBY series.
- While Rooster Teeth provided the animation for these films in-house, their logo doesn’t show up in the opening credits, only WB Animation and DC. This makes it that WB did all the work themselves, which is rather ironic as we see later in the list.
- In Part One, All of the Adult Justice League members are aged down, which makes one wonder, why couldn't they use either the Teen Titans or Young Justice?
- Poor Romantic Subplots: Part One tries to strike up the romantic relationships between various DC Heroes and the other RWBY cast, but because of how some of them were adults back in their own and Team RWBY and JNR are in their 17-19's, it comes off as creepy.
- Speaking of which, Batman/Bruce Wayne is out of character in Part One, as he wants to stay in Remnant because he has super powers, which means he is willing to abandon not only his duties as Gotham City's protectors, but also leaving behind the Batfamily and the others, as well as leave the city in the mercy of his rogues gallery like the Joker.
- In Part 2, Team RWBY gain new super hero designs when they enter the DC Universe, but two stand out the most negatively, Blake and Weiss.
- First off, Blake Belladonna, a cat faunus, loses her cat ears on Earth, essentially making her human. This is seen as a betrayal to her character, as she is seen as being proud of her faunus heritage in the main show. Even more hypocritical is the presence of Killer Croc in the film, who still retain his animal traits.
- Weiss Schnee, who unlike the other girls that traded their semblances an auras for superpowers, gets none, something that even she acknowledges.
- Even worse the films ends with the girls returning back to their own world, but the film never shows them reverting back to their own original forms, and since this is the last we see of them before the hiatus, they all ended up like corporate sell-outs.
- Plot Hole: The main villain of both films is Arthur Watts, a character who Team RWBY has never met in the real show at anytime, yet here they recognized him on the spot as if he's a recurring villain to them. They also say that he's solely responsible for the fall of Atlas in Volume 8, where it was established that it was Cinder Fall, a villain with a deeper familiarity to team RWBY than Watts, did.
- Salem, the real main villain isn't even involved here, as even the DC/RWBY comic, of which Part Two is based on, has her involvement.
- Unfortunate Implications: According to "RWBY" showrunner Kerry Shawcross, these films are "Canon-Adjacent" meaning that while the events of the films did happen off-screen, they would never be brought up in the main show. This causes some problems both in-universe and real life:
- Since it's now known that Remnant is part of the DC Universe, this puts it in the mercy of the Anti-Matter waves as scene in the Justice League: Crisis on Infinite Earths animated movie trilogy, which was released the following year.
- Likewise, if RWBY get rebooted were to get rebooted in the future and has its story retold, then the events of the films would be forced to be glossed over due to copyright issues with DC and Warner Bros.
- Continuity Lockout: These films were made to introduce newcomers to RWBY, but because of the films' placement in the main show's timeline, with Part One being set between Volumes 6 and 7, and Part 2 set shortly after Volume 9, meaning that it ruins the main show's twist of initially starting off as another "teens go to a special school and learn how to fight against monsters"-type show, before spiraling off into a drama about a secret war between two immortal factions, was ruined for said newcomers.
- Also didn't help that at the time of the films' release, RWBY was exclusive to both Rooster Teeth's website and Crunchyroll, as opposed to to Max, WB's main streaming service, meaning said newcomers would have to pay for a new subscription to those services, or they could just buy the DVDs.
- Blatant Cash Grab: It's clear that Rooster Teeth pitched these films to Warner Bros. in a attempt to appeal to DC Comics fans, as opposed to additional funding for future volumes of the show, as well as to their corporate overheads at Warner Bros Discovery as an attempt to keep the studio afloat, seeing as this was released a year after RT was caught into a deep controversy surrounding a toxic work environment within its animation department back in 2022, but given that the films failed to create an uptake in Rooster Teeth First subscriptions, it was deemed a financial failure in both studios' eyes.
- These films are, in a sense, were the final nail in the coffin for Rooster Teeth as whole, which was already struggling because of the hostile work environment and nearly killed the RWBY franchise as a whole as five months after Part Two's release WBD began to shut down RT and put up the RWBY IP for sale instead of inheriting it and continuing the show in-house.
- Even more damning is that according to Kerry on Twitter/X, he pitched the films to WB in order for RT's contracted workers to have some more work on, only to be rewarded with the studio completely shutting down so afterwards, which begs the question on why WB agreed to these films if they didn't have any intertest in RWBY or RT in the first place
- Didn't help that this these films were released at a time where other independent animated works started to overshadow RWBY such as Vizziepop's Hazbin Hotel and Helluva Boss, and especially Glitch Productions/Gooseworx's The Amazing Digital Circus, the latter which premiered the same month as Part Two's released, and has gotten more attentions towards the general public than these films.
- In fact, following Rooster Teeth's closure, Glitch Productions CEO Kevin Lerdwichagul has stated that their company would never work with Warner Bros, or be sold to them, which means that someone at DC Comics could possibly kiss that hypothetical Justice League X The Amazing Digital Circus crossover movie goodbye.
- In short, these films nearly ended Rooster Teeth on a low note if it weren't for Red Vs Blue: Restortation, which was their final work altogether.
- Thankfully, this franchise is now resurrected by Viz Media, allowing the franchise to make new series.
- In fact, following Rooster Teeth's closure, Glitch Productions CEO Kevin Lerdwichagul has stated that their company would never work with Warner Bros, or be sold to them, which means that someone at DC Comics could possibly kiss that hypothetical Justice League X The Amazing Digital Circus crossover movie goodbye.
- Didn't help that this these films were released at a time where other independent animated works started to overshadow RWBY such as Vizziepop's Hazbin Hotel and Helluva Boss, and especially Glitch Productions/Gooseworx's The Amazing Digital Circus, the latter which premiered the same month as Part Two's released, and has gotten more attentions towards the general public than these films.
- Even more damning is that according to Kerry on Twitter/X, he pitched the films to WB in order for RT's contracted workers to have some more work on, only to be rewarded with the studio completely shutting down so afterwards, which begs the question on why WB agreed to these films if they didn't have any intertest in RWBY or RT in the first place
Redeeming Qualities
- Out of all the Chemistry between the Justice League and RWBY cast, Jaune Arc and Jessica Cruz seem to be the one that many RWBY fans like, even spawning the ship "KnightLight".
- For the DC side of things, the use of C-List villains like Weather Wizard, Mirror Master, and especially Kil%ore as the main villain as oppose to more well known villains like Lex Luthor, The Joker, or Darkseid seem like a nice touch.
- As stated above, the films at least kept the RWBY animators on work for a bit longer until their contracts expire, which was a nice gesture, even if WB wasn't impressed with the final result.
- The comic of crossover is better than this movie.
- While the animation is noticable downgrade, it's still decent like RWBY does.
- The voice acting is good. Some of them reprised their roles and this is the debut role of Chandler Riggs, Travis Willingham, Natalie Alyn Lind, Laura Bailey, Nat Wolff, Troy Baker, etc.
- Also, the voice acting of America Latin and Brazil (as well Japan) are also good, which makes the first (and only) RWBY media to have an international voice acting since after almost 10 years doesn't have plans for the dub.
- The music by David Levy is pretty solid, even if it isn't just as good as Jeff Williams' score for the main show.
- it was nice seeing the interactions between Superman and Ruby, as well as the Flash and Yang in Part Two.
- At least the RWBY franchise will continue under Viz Media, as opposed to being ignored by Warner Bros at best, or worse, completely written off for taxes. Plus there's the possibility of these film's being no longer canon.
Reception
While the films received mixed-to-positive reviews from the few critics [1] it got, it was more on the negative side by both DC fans and RWBY fans alike. For the former, many DC fans felt that several characters felt either underpowered or poorly understood, RWBY fans, on the other hand dislike the films for being seen as a corporate sellout and unnecessary for the franchise, though their hatred towards the films was raised even more after the announcement of Warner Bros. Discovery shutting down Rooster Teeth in March 2024 and selling off the RWBY IP instead of keeping it, which many suspect was a result of the films not meeting their expectations and having no interest in RWBY at all. Most of, if not all fans feared that WB would write the entire franchise off for taxes if it didn't find a buyer similar to the Cancellation of Coyote vs Acme, though thankfully Viz Media would buy the rights to RWBY from WBD in July 2024, though the main show is still on a hiatus due to the new owners finding a new animation studio to work on the show.
Trivia
- These weren't the first films made by Rooster Teeth. That honor goes to the live action film Lazer Team back in 2015. JL x RWBY is the studio's first animated movie, though.
- RWBY was previously referenced in other WB movies prior to these films, such as Crescent Rose appearing in 2018's Ready Player One, and in Doctor Sleep (2019 film), supporting character Abra Stone is shown owning RWBY merchandise. Ironically, there was no reference to RWBY in any shape or form in 2021's Space Jam: A New Legacy, and even that film nearly had worlds based on Pokemon and Akira appearing in the film.
- In April 2024 it was once rumored that had if the Justice League X RWBY movies were successful, than both WB and Rooster Teeth would make another another animated RWBY crossover movie, but this time with Scooby-Doo instead of DC Comics, though this was later revealed to be a hoax made by a fan on Reddit.
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