Review of Suicide Squad (2016) by Cork B — 21 Oct 2018

Hmmmm... well, it was fun to watch, but I knew it wasn't going to be great when it became clear who the villian was. Superpowered witch. Gonna get another 'stuff blows up real good' DC movie... but it didn't play out quite as bad as Superman and Zod beating each other with buildings.

Like Venom, I was a bit skeptical about the anti-hero thing. They didn't go a horrible job, but some of the main characters didn't work: Joker was a wasted distraction, and Deadshot never comes off as a villian in any sense. There were a few throw away characters like Boomerang that clearly had no scruples, but I kept wondering why they were even in the movie since they didn't add anything. Maybe Flagg was supposed to be heroic or something, but his story arc seemed bland and ineffectual compared to all the crazy around him.

Waller puts in a good strong performance, but she is clearly as disturbed and evil as the bad guys (which is maybe the point), but it leaves you with little to root for other than the characters themselves. You want to root for Deadshot - he really isn't a 'bad guy' at all. Diablo is going for the redeem... KINDA want to root for Quinn, but not really, and her in and out Brooklyn accent was super distracting.

I kept thinking they could have saved themselves a TON of trouble if they had just called Flash or Wonder Woman or even Batman. Why did none of THEM show up? But it is the bad guy's story, so let them at it. They did a decent job bickering on the way to the fight site. Final battle - meh, but better than Superman.