Zack Snyder’s cut of Justice League is confirmed to have featured an Ares vs Darkseid fight that was ultimately cut. When Snyder was originally brought aboard the DC Universe, he was given almost complete creative freedom to do as he pleased. But, when audiences did not respond overwhelmingly positively to his vision, Warner Bros. stepped in to change Justice League before it even began filming.

That was not the only tinkering that was done to Justice League though, as major reshoots and rewrites happened while Snyder was still attached and after Joss Whedon took the reins. We’ve previously ran through all the known differences between the competing cuts of the film, and one major change that was made is the elimination of Darkseid. The ruler of Apokolips was set to appear during a flashback in an earlier attempt to conquer Earth. We previously revealed that a fight with Ares was part of the sequence, but this was completely removed from the theatrical cut of the film.

Actor David Thewlis from Wonder Woman was actually credited as playing Ares in the final cut of Justice League, but he’s barely noticeable. However, thanks to a recent post by the Instagram account dc_last_stand that reshared a completely different version of Ares, it’s been confirmed that Snyder’s cut featured an Ares and Darkseid brawl. Actor Nick McKinless confirmed our report of a Darkseid and Ares fight being removed from Justice League in the comments (as seen below), where he says he shot an entire fight scene with Darkseid that wasn’t included in the film.

One of the most important details here is that this fight sequence was, in fact, shot during production. This means that the Darkseid and Ares fight is not among the scenes that was scrapped before filming began. It was previously thought that this was the case based on the apparent switch that was made for Ares and Steppenwolf to fight, but even this version was never completed. Since the Darkseid and Ares fight was filmed, completing the visual effects is the only thing that would stop it from being included in the Snyder Cut of Justice League, should it ever be released.

This is the latest detail to come out about this cut scene too. Snyder just recently confirmed that he also had cast someone to play Darkseid during production, so it would appear that Ray Porter and Nick McKinless were the ones who got to bring this epic clash to life on set. As incredible as a Darkseid and Ares fight sounds, it’s still incredibly unclear if we’ll ever get to see it in a completed form. The plan may never have been for Darkseid to be the main villain of Justice League, but he would be established as a looming threat for the future with this setup and a tease of his future at the end of Snyder’s cut. If the footage never is released, fans should be able to piece together most of Darkseid’s original role with all this information.

MORE: Darkseid’s Arc in Zack Sndyer’s Justice League Was Way Bigger Than We Thought

Source: dc_last_stand

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