The Suicide Squad (2021)
The Suicide Squad is an orgy of colorful irreverence on par with the most edgy graphic novels.
Directed by: James Gunn
Starring: Idris Elba, Margot Robbie, Viola Davis, Peter Capaldi
4.5 out of 5
The Suicide Squad is a colorful whirlwind of violence, swearwords, and tragedy. Helmed by James Gunn, the notorious director of Guardians of the Galaxy, it is a crowd-pleasing, action-packed wonderland, barely pausing for breath before unleashing the next round of thrills. It's also a good character film, getting us invested in its characters and desiring their fulfillment. And on top of that, it's a black, black comedy, leveraging its tagline - "dying to save the world" - for every ounce of dark humor. At some points it might go a little too far with its premise, but it still remains a world-class production far surpassing its predecessor.
The premise is simple - the Suicide Squad has been called upon. Comprised of the world's most renowned super-criminals, it is deployed on behalf of the U.S. government on missions with high mortality rates. If they survive, they get years taken off of their considerable prison sentences. If they deviate, their handler Amanda Waller (Viola Davis) detonates the bomb implanted in their necks. And if they get killed by something else in the crossfire, well, small loss for the U.S. And this mission's a doozy. The small island nation of Corto Maltese has undergone a violent military coup, its new leaders salivating for violence. And if they get their hands on Project Starfish - a mysterious Corto Maltesian government department - they'll get a lot of it. The Squad has to destroy it first at any cost.
Leading the charge is Bloodsport, played by Idris Elba, who hospitalized Superman with a kryptonite bullet. Raised by an assassin father to be the best, he's a cold man, but not without humanity. He agrees to join the Suicide Squad to help his teenage daughter, whose been caught committing petty crimes and could catch a bad rap in the wrong circumstances. He's joined up by several mainstays - the straight-laced Rick Flagg (Joel Kinneman) and the chaotic Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie). And the trio are joined by some new people: the crazy Polka-Dot Man (David Dastmalchian), the sweet Ratcatcher II (Cleo Cazo), the idiotic King Shark (Sylvester Stallone), and the brutish Peacemaker (John Cena).
The film is packed with action; from campsite shoot-outs to armored truck takedowns. A stand-out sequence features Harley Quinn breaking out of captivity scored to Louis Prima's "Just A Gigolo". The characters are wonderful; hateful and relatable in the same moments. Every moment is deliberate; making us ponder the morality of who we're facing and "who the real bad guy is", so to speak. Corto Maltese, an obvious derivation of Cuba and other South American dictatorships, gets a surprising amount of nuance; its dictatorship is not a straightforward evil, and the Squad's interference actually risks making things worse. And indeed, the spectacular finale - when the giant alien Starro is released - makes the argument that this particularly American intervention did make things worse. The film's approach to this real topic shows once again that superhero films, like any other genre, can discuss serious issues when they feel like it. The Suicide Squad - which upon examination looks like an exaggeration of the United States prison labor system - is deadly adult in its own way, and the film examines what that really means.
And "adult" describes a lot of the movie too. Perhaps it's because the creative team have been making PG-13 films for so long. Perhaps it's because James Gunn was upset about his very public firing from Marvel before he was rehired. Perhaps it's because DC decided to give the newcomers carte blanche. But The Suicide Squad is an adult-rated storm from the start. Violence, swearing, male and female nudity, scenes of mutilation; the film has everything superhero films usually haven't had. The film seems to be "trying to include everything", as if the rating will be wasted if every extreme isn't shown. Most of it feels comparatively restrained; a lot of the film harks back to classic edgy '90's comics, which made edgy content an end in and of itself. In contrast, The Suicide Squad's is at least often story-relevant.
And while it certainly lends flavor, there are perhaps one too many moments of "adult" humor, in truth juvenile humor: a shot of a character's large jockstrap; a gruesome murder that's later revealed to be pointless; a shark-on-man devouring by King Shark. The film seems to revel in its newfound lack of limits by doing things it doesn't have to. But that brings the film's quality down just a smidge. It's harder to discern an overall theme when the film is so desperate to throw another corpse at you. But that's not too big of a complaint overall.
It's unclear where the Suicide Squad will go from here; with the upcoming Black Adam and Shazam II projects, DC definitely has stuff in the pipeline. With this film's likely success, it's likely to get a sequel greenlit. But it's not likely to be for a few years. The upcoming Peacemaker series set to premiere on HBO Max in 2022 will likely set up some future threads. But for now, we just have this. And perhaps that's enough. Overall, The Suicide Squad is a raucous, well-paced, exciting story, well-deserving of viewing by the audience it's made for.
The Suicide Squad is showing now in theaters and is available to stream for free on HBO Max.
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