Ben Affleck's Animals Features A Mini Zack Snyder DC Universe Reunion

This post contains spoilers for "Animals"

"Animals" is Ben Affleck's latest Netflix thriller and it remains to be see how critics and audiences react to this one (we didn't like it). At the very least, fans of the erstwhile DC Extended Universe (aka the Snyderverse) will be glad to see two veterans of the now shuttered franchise working together, as "Animals" features both Affleck and his former Justice League colleague Ray Fisher.

Affleck, of course, played the DCEU's Batman while Fisher appeared alongside him as Victor Stone/Cyborg in "Justice League" and the 2021 restoration project that was "Zack Snyder's Justice League." Sadly, "Justice League" was the box office disaster that essentially doomed the DCEU and while everyone involved seems to have had a rough ride, Fisher had a particularly tough time, alleging on-set misconduct and accusing director Joss Whedon of "gross, abusive, unprofessional, and completely unacceptable" behavior. It resulted in an investigation by Warner Bros. which resulted in "remedial action," (per The Hollywood Reporter).

That was a sad conclusion to Fisher's time in the DCEU, which itself sort of fizzled out in 2023 with a series of flops that brought a similarly sad conclusion to the franchise. Since then, Fisher has appeared in Snyder's weirdo sci-fi "Rebel Moon" films for Netflix and 2024 drama "The Piano Lesson," which received mostly positive reviews. Now he's re-teamed with Affleck for "Animals."

Ben Affleck knows exactly what went wrong with "Justice League", pointing to the way in which the film was caught between a more light-hearted and darker sensibility as well as the fact Warner Bros. executives were trying to impose their will on Zack Snyder. After that misstep of a team-up movie, the DCEU continued to struggle, though it did deliver several more hits in the process. Ultimately, we never got to see more of Affleck and Ray Fisher together again ("Zack Snyder's Justice League" notwithstanding).

With "Animals," we don't exactly get to see them together on-screen, but it is nice to know they collaborated on the project. As well as starring as mayoral candidate Mark Kimball, Affleck also directed and co-wrote the thriller, so almost certainly had a hand in casting Fisher. In the movie the former Cyborg actor plays Ron Sperling, a UCLA teacher with whom Kimball's wife, Abigail Kimball (Kerry Washington), is having an affair. Sadly for Fisher, he's really only there to give Abigail a shocking secret to keep hidden from her husband and doesn't actually get much to do in the film. 

He does become a major presence in the Kimball household later in the movie when Mark discovers his wife's infidelity. But he's only physically present in one scene, which sees him meet Abigail in a parking garage to persuade her to leave Mark. After that he's only present in the form of texts sent to Abigail's phone. Had "Animals" been a tad more streamlined, Fisher might have had something more to do. Unfortunately, the movie has bigger problems than giving Fisher more screen time.

In 2024, it was announced that Ben Affleck and Matt Damon would reunite for the Netflix crime thriller "Animals". But after Affleck learned Spike Lee was working on his own kidnapping movie, which turned out to be his "High and Low" remake "Highest 2 Lowest," he shut down "Animals" two weeks before it was due to shoot. One wonders what the original version of this movie would have looked like, considering the version we got isn't exactly Affleck's finest hour. Would the movie have been better with him solely behind the camera? How would original stars Matt Damon and Jennifer Garner have fared with the material? And would we have seen more of Abigail Kimball's relationship with Ron Sperling?

As it stands, "Animals" is unlikely to become known as one of Affleck's best movies. It's an oddly unappealing little film that is frequently funny in an unintentional way and looks like so many other flat, lifeless streaming movies — an incredible development considering it was shot by Academy Award-winning cinematographer Robert Elswit of "There Will Be Blood" fame. That's to say nothing of the fact the film arrives under the shadow of Affleck's embrace of AI. The actor claims that the AI used in "Animals" is nothing like the ethically questionable generative technology that's proved so controversial in recent years, yet he refuses to say what he used it for.

In that sense, Fisher is probably glad he's not in the film more than he is. But it is at least good to see these two DCEU refugees teaming up after having been at the center of the debacle that was that ill-fated franchise. Let's hope Affleck pulls himself together soon, makes something decent, and casts Fisher in it again.