Almost like the Flash had smashed time and space, for a moment, March 8 jumped ahead and became March 18: Zack Snyder’s Justice League was on HBO Max. Then, just as quickly, it was gone.
At 4:24 p.m. EST on Monday, March 8, Twitter user @ThenDougSaid pressed play on HBO Max’s Tom and Jerry only for…Zack Snyder’s Justice League to start playing. His tweet included an image of Zack Snyder’s directing credit from the film as proof. (Gizmodo has confirmed that the image was, indeed, from Snyder’s upcoming version of the film.)
About 90 minutes later, at 5:52 p.m., the Hollywood Reporter’s Ryan Parker duplicated the feat and posted on Twitter. Fans were rightfully sceptical of the glitch, so Parker replied with an image of the first chapter title of Snyder’s film, “Don’t Count On It, Batman,” proving its legitimacy. Here’s another example.
[referenced id=”1677045″ url=”https://gizmodo.com.au/2021/03/the-chapter-titles-of-zack-snyders-justice-league-are-here-speculate-wildly-about-them/” thumb=”https://gizmodo.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/04/p15je2wk9sdjkqlshmcl-300×168.jpg” title=”The Chapter Titles of Zack Snyder’s Justice League Are Here; Speculate Wildly About Them” excerpt=”While we have a pretty good idea of where things start and end in Zack Snyder’s Justice League, the four hours in between remain more mysterious than not. Snyder has said that more than half the movie is never before seen footage, and that the film is broken down into six…”]
Gizmodo attempted this around 6:10 p.m. only to find Tom and Jerry had temporarily been taken down and an error message was in its place: “Can’t Play Title: We’re having trouble playing this video. Please try again later.” Five minutes after that, Tom and Jerry was back.
In both of these documented cases, only the first hour of the four-hour film played, according to the Hollywood Reporter.
Gizmodo reached out to HBO Max for comment and, after initial publication, got the following response. “Zack Snyder’s Justice League was temporarily available on HBO Max, and the error was addressed within minutes.”
Snyder’s version of the film, a four-hour extension and reimagining of the 2017 theatrical release, will be available (for real) on March 18. In Australia, it will launch on Binge. We’ll have more on that soon.
Update 9/3/2021, 11:10 a.m. AEDT: We added HBO Max’s statement which came in after publication.