Written by: Kevin Berge
Deadshot will kill anything in sight with ease. Harley has incredible athleticism that allows her to smash and shoot with the best of them. Captain Boomerang... has some boomerangs. (Image Courtesy of: youtube.com)
Quick Take: Suicide Squad is a messy blockbuster with frantically flashy direction and a bland central plot that wastes much of its characters and actors. Save two enthralling performances from Margot Robbie and Viola Davis, the movie is too bland for its fascinating background.
***Beyond a plot synopsis, this is a spoiler free review of the 2016 blockbuster Suicide Squad. Those who have not seen the movie yet should feel safe reading ahead though potential allusions to character roles could spoil the mystery of the story to new readers. If you are at all afraid about spoilers, feel free to wait until you have seen the film to proceed.***
We now live in the comic book adaptation world. Just this year, every other month, a new superhero movie is coming out from Marvel, DC, or Fox. While Marvel has made an empire off their Marvel Cinematic Universe, DC has struggled to get their DC Extended Universe off the ground.
Beginning with the dark, overlong, and logically flawed pair of Man of Steel and Batman v Superman, the DCEU has been partially a critical failure and a middling commercial success by blockbuster standards. Suicide Squad is the latest installment in the franchise and again not the film set to change the DCEU's fortunes.
In fact, Suicide Squad is the first DC film in a while that is truly bad thanks to poor construction in terms of direction, writing, and editing. The movie is closer to older comic book movies such as The League of Extraordinary Gentleman and Fantastic Four that suffered from a bloated cast and generic plotting.
The concept of the Suicide Squad is not truly in question here. The story follows a group of villains including Deadshot (Will Smith), Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie), Captain Boomerang (Jai Courtney), Killer Croc (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje), and The Enchantress (Cara Delevigne) forced to work for the government by Amanda Waller (Viola Davis) and Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman).
Collected into Waller's Special Task Force X, these supervillains are forced to work together to save the world from a dangerous threat while The Joker (Jared Leto) attempts to ruin everything to serve his own nefarious means.
That is a who's who of talent in Hollywood all collected together, and it's still not mentioning other characters in the story from Diablo (Jay Hernandez), Slipknot (Adam Beach), and Katana (Karen Fukuhara). Already you can see how bloated this film gets quickly.
We now live in the comic book adaptation world. Just this year, every other month, a new superhero movie is coming out from Marvel, DC, or Fox. While Marvel has made an empire off their Marvel Cinematic Universe, DC has struggled to get their DC Extended Universe off the ground.
Beginning with the dark, overlong, and logically flawed pair of Man of Steel and Batman v Superman, the DCEU has been partially a critical failure and a middling commercial success by blockbuster standards. Suicide Squad is the latest installment in the franchise and again not the film set to change the DCEU's fortunes.
In fact, Suicide Squad is the first DC film in a while that is truly bad thanks to poor construction in terms of direction, writing, and editing. The movie is closer to older comic book movies such as The League of Extraordinary Gentleman and Fantastic Four that suffered from a bloated cast and generic plotting.
The concept of the Suicide Squad is not truly in question here. The story follows a group of villains including Deadshot (Will Smith), Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie), Captain Boomerang (Jai Courtney), Killer Croc (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje), and The Enchantress (Cara Delevigne) forced to work for the government by Amanda Waller (Viola Davis) and Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman).
Collected into Waller's Special Task Force X, these supervillains are forced to work together to save the world from a dangerous threat while The Joker (Jared Leto) attempts to ruin everything to serve his own nefarious means.
That is a who's who of talent in Hollywood all collected together, and it's still not mentioning other characters in the story from Diablo (Jay Hernandez), Slipknot (Adam Beach), and Katana (Karen Fukuhara). Already you can see how bloated this film gets quickly.
It's good method acting now can help Jared Leto pass the time on set. Not that he needed it to play an OCD mob boss, but he did need to do something with how little he is actually in the movie. (Image Courtesy of: metro.co.uk)
The performances of the top billed duo in this film are a microcosm of the film's more generic issues. While Will Smith (Men in Black) doesn't phone it in, he too often feels like action hero Will Smith rather than a unique character in Deadshot. He's charismatic and can make any one-liner stick while selling his character's moral dilemmas, but he just feels too often like he's playing the same character as every other movie.
Jared Leto (Requiem For a Dream) is not in the film much, making the overuse of him in marketing odd, but he is inconsistent when he is, best alongside Robbie (the two have excellent chemistry) and, at his worst, trying to sell Joker's manic energy. Both men would likely be better served working solo films as purely Batman villains.
The real stars of the film are the leading ladies. Margot Robbie (The Wolf of Wall Street) announces her presence as a star in this film, stealing almost every scene with a captivating charismatic performance. While she certainly seemed like perfect casting, she quickly becomes the definitive rendition of Harley Quinn on screen.
Viola Davis (The Help) continues to cement her legacy as one of the best actresses in Hollywood today as she just is Amanda Waller from the moment she comes on screen. Playing the movie's most complex and well-written character, Davis has such a frighteningly powerful presence that she towers over the charismatic cast. Both make the film better when they are on screen and should be used liberally by DC going forward.
The rest of the cast get about equal chance to shine which is very little. Jai Courtney (Divergent) is a lot of fun to watch in a character actor role but seems only to be around for others to bounce dialogue off him. Cara Delevigne (Paper Towns) is given a role so generic and CGI heavy any actress could have played it with none ever standing out.
Joel Kinnaman (The Killing) has good moments of emotion but is trapped in the generic soldier trope. Jay Hernandez (Hostel) manages to make Diablo immediately interesting and sympathetic, but his great backstory seems to only function as an emotional hook in the story. Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje (G.I. Joe), Karen Fukuhara, and Adam Beach (Flags of Our Fathers) almost seem to around for the inside joke of how little they matter.
None of the actors are at fault for the film's failure, but the man behind the camera certainly is. David Ayer (End of Watch) has made a career of inconsistent filmmaking, following up successes with failures. Suicide Squad quickly feels like his big blockbuster experiment gone wrong.
Jared Leto (Requiem For a Dream) is not in the film much, making the overuse of him in marketing odd, but he is inconsistent when he is, best alongside Robbie (the two have excellent chemistry) and, at his worst, trying to sell Joker's manic energy. Both men would likely be better served working solo films as purely Batman villains.
The real stars of the film are the leading ladies. Margot Robbie (The Wolf of Wall Street) announces her presence as a star in this film, stealing almost every scene with a captivating charismatic performance. While she certainly seemed like perfect casting, she quickly becomes the definitive rendition of Harley Quinn on screen.
Viola Davis (The Help) continues to cement her legacy as one of the best actresses in Hollywood today as she just is Amanda Waller from the moment she comes on screen. Playing the movie's most complex and well-written character, Davis has such a frighteningly powerful presence that she towers over the charismatic cast. Both make the film better when they are on screen and should be used liberally by DC going forward.
The rest of the cast get about equal chance to shine which is very little. Jai Courtney (Divergent) is a lot of fun to watch in a character actor role but seems only to be around for others to bounce dialogue off him. Cara Delevigne (Paper Towns) is given a role so generic and CGI heavy any actress could have played it with none ever standing out.
Joel Kinnaman (The Killing) has good moments of emotion but is trapped in the generic soldier trope. Jay Hernandez (Hostel) manages to make Diablo immediately interesting and sympathetic, but his great backstory seems to only function as an emotional hook in the story. Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje (G.I. Joe), Karen Fukuhara, and Adam Beach (Flags of Our Fathers) almost seem to around for the inside joke of how little they matter.
None of the actors are at fault for the film's failure, but the man behind the camera certainly is. David Ayer (End of Watch) has made a career of inconsistent filmmaking, following up successes with failures. Suicide Squad quickly feels like his big blockbuster experiment gone wrong.
It's good to see the occasional Deadshot cameo when Will Smith isn't leading the Suicide Squad with one-liners. (Image Courtesy of: screencrush.com)
Being both the writer and director of the film gave Ayer the chance to make his own brand of comic book movie. The opening act of the movie feels less like a movie and more of a music video with wild montages, a loud modern rock and rap soundtrack, and frantic cuts in the editing.
We get wild color flashes that feel like Ayer trying to capture the art style of a comic book on screen. Despite being disconcerting, this section of the film is at least unique with the second act beginning by losing much of that flair.
Once the action in this film begins to roll, this movie devolves into video game level action with generic close combat fighting that makes the unique characters seem to have been collected at random. Rarely do the action or the set pieces stand out. By the third act, the action devolves into beating up hoards to reach the big boss at the end.
The writing has its bright moments. Ayer hits some of the comedic moments perfectly. However, he rarely sells the drama. Much of the character motivations boil down to flashbacks and generic backstory. Everyone that matters has their love against all odds that humanizes their struggles.
Nothing feels genuine in the movie because this never feels like a movie. The pacing is frantic. There are too many protagonists to care about most of them. The antagonists are bland. The editors seem to have cut apart shots to save time, leading to a jarring experience.
At its core, Suicide Squad feels like a movie that failed when it passed the concept stage. Instead of exploring the idea of an amoral government forcing a series of dangerous bad guys to do dirty black ops work, we get the generic group of not-so-good guys forced to find their inner hero in the wake of a nondescript evil threat.
But hey, at least it introduced the world to Margot Robbie's Harley Quinn and Viola Davis's Amanda Waller who should be bright spots of the DCEU going forward.
We get wild color flashes that feel like Ayer trying to capture the art style of a comic book on screen. Despite being disconcerting, this section of the film is at least unique with the second act beginning by losing much of that flair.
Once the action in this film begins to roll, this movie devolves into video game level action with generic close combat fighting that makes the unique characters seem to have been collected at random. Rarely do the action or the set pieces stand out. By the third act, the action devolves into beating up hoards to reach the big boss at the end.
The writing has its bright moments. Ayer hits some of the comedic moments perfectly. However, he rarely sells the drama. Much of the character motivations boil down to flashbacks and generic backstory. Everyone that matters has their love against all odds that humanizes their struggles.
Nothing feels genuine in the movie because this never feels like a movie. The pacing is frantic. There are too many protagonists to care about most of them. The antagonists are bland. The editors seem to have cut apart shots to save time, leading to a jarring experience.
At its core, Suicide Squad feels like a movie that failed when it passed the concept stage. Instead of exploring the idea of an amoral government forcing a series of dangerous bad guys to do dirty black ops work, we get the generic group of not-so-good guys forced to find their inner hero in the wake of a nondescript evil threat.
But hey, at least it introduced the world to Margot Robbie's Harley Quinn and Viola Davis's Amanda Waller who should be bright spots of the DCEU going forward.