(This is copied from my blog, Thoughts In D Minor)
Today I saw one of the small handful of films I have really been looking forward to for 2016, Suicide Squad. Before the film had even been widely released the online critics did the en vogue thing to do these days and shit all over it, undoubtedly influencing a lot of casual movie-goers into either not bothering or going into the session with an influenced perception. Was the movie any good?
You’re damn right it was good.
It just wasn’t a 2 hour long advertisement for toys.
The film introduced those who didn’t spend a chunk of their youth reading the late 80s John Ostrander comic series (or the more modern runs) to the who and what of the film.
Viola Davis is Amanda Waller. Not the New 52 ex-Team 7 mini-skirt wearing Amanda Waller. Viola Davis is The Wall. Hard as nails, more villainous than any of the Squad, and a bureaucratic force to be reckoned with. She sells the idea of Task Force X to the US top brass, a team made up of empowered or otherwise enhanced criminals with bombs in their head sent on black ops missions that the US can’t officially get involved in.
We’re introduced to Floyd Lawton, Deadshot to his friends and employers, an assassin who never misses his shot. Harley Quinn, the psychiatrist turned Joker’s main squeeze; El Diablo, an LA gangbanger with a lot of fire power; Rogues scoundrel Captain Boomerang, Killer Croc and Enchantress. All of the main players get little vignettes that introduce them to the audience and show how they ended up where they are (ie Belle Reve Prison), which I thought worked pretty well. Even background characters like Tatsu Yamashiro (Katana to you and me) got great backstory, right out of the pages of the books. Even Slipknot lived up to his character, which if you know the books says everything you need to know.
The pacing was quick, and not a lot of time was spent dwelling on all the nuts and bolts of the plot, which is where I think a lot of the hate is going to be focused. Which I find to be really unfounded. Exactly enough information about the where and when and who and how of the plot is delivered. I compare this to Deadpool in mechanics, as both films were straight up simple A to B plots. It is basically The Nightshade Odyssey (minus Doom Patrol and the Justice League International) with a Harley/Joker B line wrapped around it. Only much more streamlined. If an extra 20 minutes of expositional backstory was used, critics would be slamming the film as laborious and complaining that it was too complicated to follow (like they did with BvS). As was the case with Batman V Superman, the target audience for this film isn’t the toy buying school kid, so there is also that “negative” to contend with. The thing with DC is that they seem to consider their books and their live action media to be equal, yet separate entities, not using the printed media as a means of advertising the film/tv/toys. So you get more “straight outta the books” moments here than you will with a Marvel movie.
The performances were great, too. Jared Leto’s Joker frankly makes all prior incarnations look like cosplayers (which is interesting given his visual aesthetic, but he absolutely nailed the character). There will be a lot of comparison between him and Heath Ledger, but that is like comparing an apple to a psychotic orange. Nolan didn’t give Ledger the character, David Ayer seems to have conjured The Clown Price of Crime right from the pages of the past 77 years of comic books. There was a touch of Caesar Romero in the mix, too, which was a bit surprising. Margot Robbie is perfect as Harley. A little more flashback to her as a psychiatric intern would have been nice, but what we did see was effective and really set the scene for the abusive rollercoaster of a relationship she has with her Puddin’. Will Smith didn’t steamroll over his scenes, and Jai Courtney really makes me look forward to seeing him cross paths with The Flash (again). He’s not really stuck out to me in anything since his role in Spartacus, but here is a great Digger Harkness. I really liked Katana, too. She got me thinking how cool a Batman And The Outsiders type of film could be. El Diablo is obviously the character the producers were pushing for the audience to like, but he was just the standard gangbanger who knows that he’s a piece of shit. He does come in handy towards the end though. And Killer Croc… If you told me 25 years ago that I’d see a movie that had Killer Croc in it I would not have believed you. He wasn’t used much, but I really want to see him tangle with Batman in the future.
Overall, I recommend you see the film and make up your own mind. If, like me, you live and breathe DC, you won’t be disappointed. I would imagine someone who only had a cursory idea of who was who will also get a kick out of the film (people raved about The Raid, and that is as basic a plot as you can get, and things aren’t much different here). The action is fun, the humour is definitely there (Harley got the biggest laugh from me, but that was because I can relate to being off meds, but Boomerang and even Deadshot got some quips). There is even a great mid-credits scene that gives a bit of foreshadowing to the future DC films, and shows just how switched on a particular character is.