Review of Suicide Squad (2016) by Jeffrey H — 05 Mar 2017

It pains me to say this, but this is one of DC's worst films. While not nearly as bad as, say, Steel, Superman IV, or Catwoman, it is still a bad film. The sad thing is, there really is good stuff in it.

The villain, Enchantress and her brother, is the worst thing about this film. This cliché "destroy the world" type villain is horrible, and the motivation behind their intentions is juvenile at best. Every line she and her brother had was either forgettable, eye-rolling, cringe-worthy or clichéd. Also the "wiggle dance" was beyond stupid, and didn't belong in the movie. The CGI around them was atrocious.

The tone and cinematography are both terribly inconsistent, and this is extremely jarring. It reeks of studio intervention.

The rather annoying soundtrack feels like someone shaking an iPod shuffle non-stop. Though a few of the song choices are classics and are fun to listen to, none of them match the scenes.

The pacing and story structure are both atrociously executed.

With a few exceptions from Will Smith, the comedy all falls flat and is corny at best and really painful at worst.

When it comes to the characters, there are several throwaways. Not just the obvious Slipknot, who had a minute of screen time.

The Joker is barely in the film, with about 10-15 minutes of screen time, and has no affect on the main story. His character is only a tiny taste of his full potential, but in what he is in, he is mediocre. Leto plays a mix of old and new versions in what is definitely a different take of the Joker, in an overall okay (but not more than that) performance. The writing and direction around this Joker, however, is horrendous. All of the dialogue from him that isn't forgettable is just cringe-worthy. Also the tattoos are quite unnecessary and extremely distracting.

Captain Boomerang is a mediocre character whose main purpose is to be used for cheap jokes and useless boomerangs. However, he is a believable villain, is unlikable when not being used for jokes (which sadly isn't very often), plus the fact that this was Jai Courtney's first good performance. Sadly, that's not enough for him to be a good character.

Killer Croc was the character I was the most excited to see. Sadly, he barely says anything at all (16 lines, all short), was under-utilized, and was mostly used just to make bad jokes and stand in the background. He only shines in the action scenes and one underwater scene. Also, his cannibalistic tendencies were only hinted at from his reputation, which wasn't reflected in his personality. However, the makeup job on the actor is excellent, and I like his voice.

The least of all of the squad is Katana, who should have never been in the film at all. She only had 9 lines, and 6 of which were in subtitled Japanese. She had no bearing on the story, her backstory is so insignificant, and she interacts with the squad so little that she is by far the most forgettable character in the film.

On the contrary, here are the things I enjoyed:

Viola Davis as Amanda Waller was so many flavors of awesome. She nailed the persona, and her interactions with the other characters and the way she manipulated them (even Bruce Wayne!) to get her twisted way felt right out of the comics.

Will Smith's Deadshot was great and though Will Smith practically played himself a lot of the time, the character had a very emotional story arc involving his daughter. His emotional pull is what made the character more relatable. He Only real problem is that his role as an assassin is really toned down, and his father figure role is overplayed.

I cannot imagine anyone else portraying Harley Quinn besides Margot Robbie. She embodied the character perfectly, just like Ben Affleck was to Batman. Robbie gives her all in something unlike anything I've ever seen in a comic book movie. In a sentence said in the film, her performance can be described as "a whole lot of pretty in a whole lot of crazy.".

El Diablo and Rick Flag were both part of very good story arcs. Flag's was very relocatable, considering that Kinnaman did a great job in the role, and El Diablo's story arc was honestly heartbreaking!

The street action scene was fun to watch.

There are some unique visuals, including a few legitimate jump scares, a rarity in a comic book movie, throughout the film.

The cameos from Batman and Flash are very comic-book-like. They aren't forced like in Batman v Superman, do affect the plot, and are just long enough to get the audience hyped.

The bar scene is very well done. It's one of the few scenes in the movie that I would willingly watch again.

While it's not good, I did enjoy the idea behind editing style in the first 40 minutes as well as the idea behind the character titles in the beginning. It's very unique and comic-book-like, and I enjoyed it as a guilty pleasure, although it's not exactly that great objectively.

Overall, I did enjoy a bit of this film, though it is still a failure overall.