“The bell’s already been rung…and they’ve heard it. But in the dark, among the stars…ding, dong, the god is dead.” Lex Luthor’s (Jesse Eisenberg) haunting narration is the first sound heard as Diana Prince (Gal Gadot) stares in fear at a foreboding cave painting of Darkseid in the new teaser for Zack Snyder’s cut of Justice League. The director released this 34 second long sneak peek on his Twitter today, June 18, for the never-before-released cut of the film coming next year on HBO Max. The Snyder Cut promises a much darker take than the original, Joss Whedon directed version of the film.

Buzz about the elusive Snyder Cut has been on the Internet’s grapevine arguably since the original cut of the film came out in 2017. Fans dissatisfied with Whedon’s Justice League believed that a better version made by Snyder existed. For a long time, it was a modern urban legend, until Snyder revealed to the world that the cut did in fact exist back in March of 2019. Snyder described his version as “an entirely new thing” than the original theatrical cut, and “a new experience apart from that movie.” Whedon’s version didn’t even include Darkseid, the Justice League’s biggest and most threatening enemy in the comics.  Snyder’s sneak peek, however, kicks right off with Wonder Woman discovering proof that Darkseid exists, along with a shot of Darkseid standing with his hoard of soldiers. Clearly, fans are in for an entirely different movie of epic proportions.

First ever sneak peek at JL. Get ready for more at DC FanDome. @hbomax #releasethesnydercut #DCFanDome pic.twitter.com/WIWwFo4Xnt

— Zack Snyder (@ZackSnyder) June 18, 2020