Saturday, August 20, 2016

Suicide Squad - Why it was worse than Batman v Superman

Ugh, I just saw Suicide Squad and it was awful.  Far worse than Batman v Superman.

Why was it so bad?  There are reasons that I'm sure most people are going to bring up.  The introduction of so many fringe characters into a movie at the same time, not enough back story, not enough character depth/motiviation.

But there was something deeper.  These are the reasons I could come up with.

Needless to say ...

SPOILERS WARNING
SPOILERS WARNING
SPOILERS WARNING 

1) Worthless Characters Added

Not only were there too many character introductions, but some are so unfleshed that I'm not even sure why they were included in the movie.  Katana was introduced about a third of the way into the movie.  It felt like they added her into the middle of the script after it was completed.

Why was she added?  My assumption is it was add a bit more diversity into the team (an additional female and Asian character) and to add a "sword" person amongst a bunch of people with guns.

Because other than hacking a bunch of people with a sword a few times, she appears to have no appreciable purpose in the entire film.  During the "what do you dream of that would make you happy" sequence before the final battle, she's not even included.

Reading a bit online to get other fans opinions, I realized I had completely forgotten about Slipknot.  The guy they barely introduced and just killed off right away.  So sort of like Katana but even worse so.

2) Too much for Suicide Squad to handle?

So I'm not the biggest Suicide Squad knowledgeable person in the world.  But one of the subtleties is that I felt that Suicide Squad teams were supposed to go on more "black ops" missions.

Instead, they go after and battle a supernatural demon?  This makes no sense.  Black ops missions make way more sense.  That's why you would put together a team of criminals that are assassins (Deadshot) and thieves (Slipknot, Boomerang)?  You throw in Killer Croc for some muscle and maybe Harley Quinn because she's good in hand to hand combat.  This is the team that is supposed to go after the next Superman?

Looking on wikipedia, it appears this is some of the history of Suicide Squad in the comics.  They go kidnap people or steal things.  Ugh ... stealing the weapons book from Tehran would have made a bunch better film instead.

3) Everyone becomes friends and "good"

So maybe it's just me, but I hate the typical "bad guys become good" storyline.  These are supposed to be the worst criminals out there.  Yeah, certain characters will try to be team players and work together (Deadshot), but it's mostly for self-service to meet some personal self interest.

It would have been better if the team was constantly trying to figure out how to escape or take Flag's detonation tablet and reverse engineer it to remove the neck-bombs.  Nope, they are just good guys eventually.

4) Captain Boomerang is a bit cheapened

Before the movie came out, I wondered how they would portray Captain Boomerang.  In the comics and DC animated world, I think he's wonderful.  After all, he's a badass assassin that throws boomerangs for a living.  It's tongue and cheek silliness that makes the animated versions of him so awesome.

While Captain Boomerang plays the comic relief in the team real well, he feels really cheapened while fighting.  I just can't recall a moment when he was really that badass in the movie.

5) What was the purpose of the Joker in this film?

Why was the Joker even in this film?  His entire goal is to rescue Harley Quinn, which seems so unlike the Joker and a waste of his character.  The Joker is supposed to be some psychopath.

Here's a much better idea for the movie.  The Joker is going to do something crazy and Amanda Waller needs a black ops team to stop him.

Oh, and why would they add an equally psychotic Harley Quinn to the team?  Only because she understands the Joker and can help.  Otherwise why bring her along?

6) Too much jumping around

I felt the film "jumped around" too much, especially as they give back stories or flashbacks to prior events.  During 1 or 2 scenes my girlfriend was like "What's going on?" which I had to explain only b/c I have some knowledge of the comics universe.  One particular case was the flashback when Harley Quinn jumps into the vat of chemicals to become like the Joker.  It seemed to segue to that out of nowhere.

Conclusion:

Watch Batman: Assault on Arkham.  It features Suicide Squad, is wonderful, and everything I said above is not the case in that animated film.  Katana is replaced by Killer Frost in the film and has a strong role in it, so you can't even say they didn't diversify the cast.

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