The Suicide Squad (2021): Written and directed by James Gunn. Starring: Idris Elba, Margot Robbie, John Cena, Joel Kinnaman, Sylvester Stallone, Viola Davis, David Dastmalchian, Daniela Melchior, Alice Braga, and Peter Capaldi. Running Time: 132 minutes. Based on the comic series by DC Comics.
Rating: 3/4
As soon as the word dropped that James Gunn (at that time, still sitting under a cloud kicked up by alt-right ratshits) would be heading the attempted resuscitation of the Suicide Squad franchise, my immediate reaction was to get all the hype. The first film had a note-perfect trailer that promised so much, but the film itself delivered so little and is now considered one of the biggest failures in a DC movie universe filled with them. The lone exception, of course, was Margot Robbie's Harley Quinn, which is so far and away the best creative decision to come out of current DC franchises that it's practically in its own universe. At any rate, the very concept of the Suicide Squad remained so promising and Gunn's specific skill sets such an ideal fit that I couldn't be anything other than excited.
And now it's here, and boys, they did it. The Suicide Squad immediately papers over (and in one case, literally kills off) the shortcomings of its predecessors to deliver the hard-R, black-humor-filled joyride this year had been lacking. With all due apologies to Will Smith, who just didn't have anything to work with, Idris Elba steps in wonderfully as Bloodsport, the more-or-less lead character/team leader and a MacGyver-esque weapons expert. In conjunction with a second suicide squad of secondary characters- which gets slaughtered in the funniest ways in a banger of an opening sequence- he and returning "regular" soldier Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman) head a new lineup (new aside from Quinn, that is) consisting of John Cena as Peacemaker, Daniela Melchior as Ratcatcher 2, David Dastmalchian in a quietly-brilliant turn as Polka-Dot Man, and a not-so-quietly brilliant turn by Sylvester Stallone as the voice of Nanaue, aka "King Shark," a literal giant shark that eats everything in sight and seems nigh indestructable.
Returning as well is, of course, Viola Davis in pure Ice Queen form as Amanda Waller, the utterly ruthless head of the secretive government agency that organizes the Suicide Squad missions in the name of "protecting US interests." Using every means of emotional blackmail available, she strong-arms Bloodsport into leading an expedition to the fictional, Caribbean Island nation of Corto Maltese, which recently saw its dictatorial ruling family executed in a military coup. Their goal is to kidnap a British scientist called The Thinker (Peter Capaldi) and force him to lead them into a secretive research facility used for something known only as Project Starfish, which Wallace believes the hostile new regime will use in an attack on the United States. Once there, they are to inflict as much chaos as possible and destroy all evidence of the project. I will not spoil any details regarding Starfish here, because believe me, it's worth the wait.
Now, if the notion of a covert unit of superkillers sent by the US to infiltrate and possibly destabilize a small, non-white nation suffering from crushing poverty and brutal autocracy evokes some, ah, uncomfortable feelings, that is very much the point. Gunn is not afraid to get political and maybe even a little anti-imperialist, a decision which, given the leanings of those who tried to wreck his career, I wholeheartedly favor. And it certainly isn't superficial; one of the standout sequences of the entire film is a dick-measuring contest between Bloodsport and Peacemaker to see who can kill the most people in a camp without alerting anyone. It starts as just another darkly comic, "Hoho, look how gruesomely we can kill people while being blithe about it," bit like any other in the film, only to be completely turned on its head in seconds by a revelation that they were actually slaughtering freedom fighters seeking to overthrow the country's military dictators. In other words, the good guys.
Granted, James Gunn is a White, American male, so it's not like he's going to be the one to drop the most thorough deconstruction of US foreign policy into mainstream laps. And while the movie does follow through with the liberation subplot- Alice Braga really shines despite relatively little screentime as the leader of the freedom fighters- it's only a small part of the whole, never allowed to distract too much from the wacky kill-times. That this storyline is as prominent as it is and is clearly resolved without any direct influence by the main characters or their superiors is a feather in the film's cap to be sure, but this is not anywhere close to the sociopolitical level of, say, Black Panther.
Nonetheless, where the film unhinges itself the most is when it shines the brightest. We were promised James Gunn Unleashed, and we got it. From everything surrounding King Shark to the hilariously twisted, psychosexual backstory of Polka Dot Man (and the absolutely nuts payoff it builds to, which, again, not spoiling), there is a lot of insanity to revel in. The highlight for me (and, I suspect, for most viewers) is the caper Harley ends up getting into on her own that actually allows a window into the long-running emotional development Robbie has been able to work into the character. It even involved a call back to the first Suicide Squad movie that actually felt rather empowering for Quinn, which, given how much of a mess that film was, should have been impossible.
True, it comes at the cost of the film's momentum and any sense of narrative cohesion. However, as I said before, Robbie's Quinn is practically in her own dimension, so whatever Robbie decides the character needs in a given project, the rest of the production crew should just shut up and listen. And the narrative getting choppy or sluggish at times are among the bigger criticisms of the film that people are likely to have; the film easily clears two hours and that length very much is noticeable. However, for the most part it's such a good time, I will not be the one to complain.
All in all, this is definitely one of the most fun times we've gotten from the movies so far. The DC film universe stumbled in spectacular fashion out of the gate, but with Wonder Woman, Shazam, Birds of Prey, and now this, they just might have found something of an approach that works.
-Noah Franc
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