So, what to say about Suicide Squad, the newest course-correction implemented by Warner Bros. in its fledgling DC Comics cinematic universe? Seemingly always chasing Marvel Studios and its ability to turn even the most ridiculous characters into smash hits, it’s become abundantly clear the DC-WB braintrust simply do not know what they’re doing. It’s not only a significant misunderstanding of the core appeal of these decades-old comic book characters (although it isn’t not about that either), it’s that the cinematic adaptations thus far have just been plain bad.
This all started back in 2013 with the release of Zack Snyder’s brooding Superman reboot, Man of Steel. In the wake of Christopher Nolan’s “The Dark Knight” trilogy, which for all its faults is looking increasingly brilliant by the year, Snyder decided to use the dark and gritty Batman template and apply it to the world’s most selfless, uplifting, heroic character. Audiences and critics skewered Man of Steel for its oppressively dour tone, overabundance of violence, and lack of heroism. Then, seemingly unaware of their miscalculation, Snyder and Warner Bros. doubled down, as if to challenge everyone: “You didn’t like what I did with Superman? Then let me show you Batman fighting Superman!” Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice was an even bigger mess not simply because it further proved no one in charge understood the core ideals of its DC characters, but because it offered an even grittier, self-serious tone than Man of Steel. More rain; more violence; less heroics. What’s that quote about doing the same thing and expecting different results? Maybe Snyder should pick up a book of the non-comic variety.
So now comes Suicide Squad, the third installment in this new DC Comics cinematic universe. It’s an appealing concept on paper: take a motley crew of odd, lesser-known villains and turn them into heroes, all while further expanding the DC universe with knowing nods and winks. So high-ranking government official Amanda Waller recruits “the worst of the worst” to do her bidding. There’s a guy with a boomerang; there’s a guy with ropes; there are multiple dudes with guns; there’s a woman with a baseball bat; there’s a woman with a sword; there’s a guy with a serious case of eczema. If they disobey, she kills them. If they die, no one will miss them. It’s all pretty dark and serious stuff.
I’d be remiss if I didn’t pause here to talk about the marketing for Suicide Squad. The marketing department at Warner Bros. deserve some major kudos because, frankly, they made this movie look much better than it actually is. They are the real winners of this debacle. Let’s examine their work.
Here’s the first teaser for the movie from way back in June 2015:
This all started back in 2013 with the release of Zack Snyder’s brooding Superman reboot, Man of Steel. In the wake of Christopher Nolan’s “The Dark Knight” trilogy, which for all its faults is looking increasingly brilliant by the year, Snyder decided to use the dark and gritty Batman template and apply it to the world’s most selfless, uplifting, heroic character. Audiences and critics skewered Man of Steel for its oppressively dour tone, overabundance of violence, and lack of heroism. Then, seemingly unaware of their miscalculation, Snyder and Warner Bros. doubled down, as if to challenge everyone: “You didn’t like what I did with Superman? Then let me show you Batman fighting Superman!” Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice was an even bigger mess not simply because it further proved no one in charge understood the core ideals of its DC characters, but because it offered an even grittier, self-serious tone than Man of Steel. More rain; more violence; less heroics. What’s that quote about doing the same thing and expecting different results? Maybe Snyder should pick up a book of the non-comic variety.
So now comes Suicide Squad, the third installment in this new DC Comics cinematic universe. It’s an appealing concept on paper: take a motley crew of odd, lesser-known villains and turn them into heroes, all while further expanding the DC universe with knowing nods and winks. So high-ranking government official Amanda Waller recruits “the worst of the worst” to do her bidding. There’s a guy with a boomerang; there’s a guy with ropes; there are multiple dudes with guns; there’s a woman with a baseball bat; there’s a woman with a sword; there’s a guy with a serious case of eczema. If they disobey, she kills them. If they die, no one will miss them. It’s all pretty dark and serious stuff.
I’d be remiss if I didn’t pause here to talk about the marketing for Suicide Squad. The marketing department at Warner Bros. deserve some major kudos because, frankly, they made this movie look much better than it actually is. They are the real winners of this debacle. Let’s examine their work.
Here’s the first teaser for the movie from way back in June 2015:
And here’s the final trailer from a couple months ago:
The overall tone is lighter, more colorful, and with an upbeat cover of “The Ballroom Blitz” blasting, screams fun. There are way fewer words spoken, quick cuts throughout, and basically no slow-motion shots that, thanks to Zack Snyder, has now become #sodramz. Even the movie’s font and logo are brightened up to look more splashy and exciting:
I’m not one to usually complain or critique a movie’s marketing efforts; it’s hard enough to stand out and get people to see your movie as it is. But this is interesting because its marketing efforts so clearly telegraph this movie’s flaws.
First, it’s common knowledge now that at some point in its development, the movie was seriously seriously rejiggered. There are multiple forces at work here and they’re all equally terrible. The first half of the movie feels like a repurposed jigsaw puzzle, reconfigured at the behest of studio heads who wanted a sleeker, cooler, faster, anything-er pace. It’s basically one music video after another after another after another, all edited in hyperspeed and all equally odd (and likely extremely expensive). That the studio supposedly hired Trailer Park, a company that cuts trailers for movies and video games, to re-edit the film is no shocker here. This is what handing your $150 million Ferrari to a kid with his learner’s permit looks like.
The second half quickly dissolves into yet another anonymous CGI villain who must destroy humanity for no discernible reason. And for safe measure, there’s also a giant electrical storm that shoots a blue laser into the sky. Just like this one. And this one. And this one. As if that wasn’t enough of a stereotypical ending, the movie introduces a third act villain with CGI so bad, it makes CGI The Rock in The Mummy Returns look positively human. Not much works. The real question here isn’t if Suicide Squad is better than The Avengers, but if it’s worse than last year’s Fantastic Four. The answers are no and yes, respectively.
Second, the marketing campaign is classic bait-and-switch advertising, mostly because it doesn’t know what it wants to be. But more than that, it’s selling something oddly similar to what Marvel tried (and accomplished) two years ago. Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy, also about a group of lesser-known criminals banding together, was celebrated for its offbeat humor, charm, and light hearted fun. Suicide Squad pretends to be light and odd and charming, but really it’s just unbalanced. It’s actually very dark and oppressive and exceedingly violent. There are sporadic jokes that land -- mainly all from Harley Quinn -- but even more moments of sheer “huh??” There’s simply not much to grasp here; it’s all so manufactured to a teflon sheen, perpetually at war with itself. Warner Bros. clearly saw the success of Marvel’s Guardians and wanting some of the off-kilter mojo for itself, sought to replicate it by blending what it already had -- dark and edgy -- with what it wanted -- light and fluffy. It’s not only shameless, it’s unimaginative, boring, and cowardly.
Third, the story just simply doesn’t make any sense, which is why as subsequent trailers were released, less and less story beats are revealed and more and more mindless violence is highlighted. This could be another case of the story making sense at one point but then studio interference fucked it up. There are plenty of continuity errors and pacing issues and what feels like entire chunks of the story either significantly rearranged or just excised. But I think this movie’s flaws go deeper than that. Take for instance, Amanda Waller’s motivation. After seeing what Superman and General Zod did to Metropolis in Man of Steel, she feels that the world is not prepared to handle another extraterrestrial threat. This is why she assembles a group of the most notorious villains. But what exactly is a boomerang and a baseball bat supposed to do to someone like Superman? What are bullets going to do to something, and I’m guessing here, that will surely be bulletproof? Furthermore, the real threat in this movie is none other than Enchantress, one of the villains Waller originally assembled as part of her task force. So in essence, to protect the planet from the next threat, Waller creates the very threat she was tasked to prevent. Not great logic. This could have vague political analogies in the real world, such as when the US supplied the Taliban with weapons to fight the Soviet only to create a new, worse enemy. But Suicide Squad is either too dense or too shallow to draw any satire out of the setup; it's too busy punching women in the face and fetishizing guns to care.
I’ve resisted talking about the Joker, mainly because there’s not much to talk about. He’s in the movie for what amounts to a glorified cameo. But worst of all, his presence has no impact on the story. Zip. Nada. Although dedicated, Jared Leto’s take on the Joker amounts to little more than a flamboyant pimp with an asthma problem. It’s odd to shoehorn a character as iconic as the Joker into this movie without giving him any memorable lines to chew. In the 1989 Batman, Jack Nicholson’s Joker has this scene to ham up; in Nolan’s The Dark Knight, Heath Ledger’s Joker is introduced with a magic trick that instantly grabs our attention. In Suicide Squad, there is no such scene. The Joker is just there, an afterthought not worthy of our attention.
Suicide Squad was written and directed by David Ayer, a filmmaker I actually quite enjoy. He has a visceral and oftentimes tragic ability to examine shades of criminality (Training Day, End of Watch) and brutality (Fury). But in this instance, he's in way over his head. I don't doubt he had a distinct vision for this movie at one point -- the brief scene of the group chatting in the bar and namely, El Diablo’s character arc are evidence of his touches -- but virtually everything else in this movie is bland, empty corporate brand management. Despite hiring Ayer for his unique outlook on criminals, it seems Warner Bros. would rather compromise the final product to appease corporate partners, merchandisers, test audiences, and studio execs. Instead of shepherding a creative environment in which artists are celebrated for their voice, Warner Bros. clearly prefers to dilute individuality in favor of commerciality. Stasis is rarely ever a good look on an entertainment company.
