Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox (PG-13)
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This is based on a graphic novel miniseries that I haven't read. The movie came out in 2013, but I didn't see it until 2021. It's the first film in the DC Animated Movie Universe. And it is hella dark.

It begins with a couple of scenes with young Barry Allen and his mother. In the second of these scenes, he finds her murdered in their home (on her birthday). We then flash forward to the present, with adult Barry (now the Flash) visiting his mother's grave (on her birthday), along with his wife, Iris. He has to leave when he receives a notification of a break-in at the Flash museum, where he finds pretty much all his enemies. But then the Justice League shows up to help him out.

Later, Barry wakes up at work, and discovers the whole world has changed. He no longer has any powers, and no one's ever heard of the Flash. But his mother is still alive. And Iris is married to someone else. Meanwhile, both Wonder Woman's Amazons and Aquaman's Atlanteans are at war against the world. They seem to be allies at first, but eventually something happens that turns them against each other. Cyborg works for the American government now, and has a plan to stop both enemies with a team of superheroes, but he gets shut down by the President, who wants to let the regular military handle things.

Barry goes to Wayne Manor and the Batcave looking for Batman, but the man he finds there is very different from the one he knew. Things don't go well between them at first, but eventually Barry convinces Batman to help him recreate the accident that gave him his powers. He believes Professor Zoom had caused this alternate timeline, and he needs to fix it by going back in time. Unfortunately, even once he gets his powers back, he finds that he can't tap into the Speed Force enough to allow him to do that. Meanwhile... lots of other things are going on with lots of characters. I don't want to get into all of it. I will say it seems like the original timeline is restored in the end (though Wikipedia says it's another alternate timeline; I'm assuming that's something that gets revealed in a future movie, because I saw no indication of it in this one). And there's a brief post-credits scene that apparently sets up the next movie in the series.

I don't know what else to say, except I thought the movie was pretty great because of how intensely serious it all was. So I look forward to watching the rest of the series.

Followed by Justice League: War