SHANG-CHI AND THE LEGEND OF THE TEN RINGS

SUICIDE SQUAD (2016)

WARNING: MILD SPOILERS!

Well, guys. This is it. The Big One. Arguably the most anticipated film of the year. Suicide Squad. This film has had massive hype for the past year. The trailers looked cool, the cast was interesting, and most importantly, this looked like the ultimate palette-cleanser after the disappointment that was Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, signaling that DC could pull off their own cinematic universe. Does it live up to those expectations? Well….

Now, wait a minute! Don’t click out of this review just yet. I actually liked the film. Sure, it has a lot of problems and probably isn’t very good at the end of the day. But, I’d be lying if I said that I wasn’t entertained by it. I guess I’m more disappointed than anything else. I came across this project when I was looking up DC’s future films. And when I saw the premise, I said to myself, “This could definitely be DC’s answer to Guardians of the Galaxy. I mean, a film about a bunch of unknown comic book villains (save for Harley Quinn and the Joker) operating as a black ops team, being written and directed by the same guy who gave us Fury and End of Watch? This practically writes itself!” So, yeah, I’m definitely let down. But again, there are a lot of things in the movie that I liked.

Story: Government agent Amanda Waller (Viola Davis) proposes putting together a team of super-humans just in case somebody with the same powers as Superman wants to destroy the world instead of protect it. So, she enlists the help of a bunch of hardened criminals, including sharpshooter Floyd Lawton/Deadshot (Will Smith), beautiful nutcase Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie), troubled pyrokinetic Chato Santana/El Diablo (Jay Hernandez), human reptile Waylon Jones/ Killer Croc (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje), Australian boomerang expert Digger Harkness/ Captain Boomerang (Jai Courtney), grappling expert Christopher Weiss/Slipknot (Adam Beach) and witch-possessed archaeologist Dr. June Moon/Enchantress (Cara Delevingne). But soon, the Enchantress takes over Dr. Moon’s mind and causes her to summon her brother, Incubus, so they can take over the world. It’s up to the Suicide Squad (or Task Force X, as they are called in the film), along with the guidance of Waller, Col. Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman), and his body guard Tatsu Yamashiro/Katana (Karen Fukuhara) to stop the Enchantress and save the world, while dealing with the crazy antics of the Joker (Jared Leto).

As an old friend of mine always said, “Eat your veggies first, then get to the good stuff later”. So, I will metaphorically eat my veggies and discuss the things I didn’t like about the film. My biggest problem with Suicide Squad is the editing, especially in the first half. When the characters’ origin stories are explained by Amanda Waller, a lot of the scenes feel as if they belong in some weird music video. For example, in the origin scene for Harley Quinn, a lot of the scenes speed up and then slow down, and are also shot through some odd purple filter. It actually reminded me a lot of the wonky editing in Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance. The editing also succumbs a bit to what I like to call “ADHD Editing”, where a lot of the shots go by very quickly, and no shot lasts more than one second.

Also, the editing in the first half makes it feel very out of order. For example, the squad comes together right after the Enchantress goes rogue, and it’s been a little while since they’ve been introduced. It feels like it was supposed to go like this: the squad comes together, Enchantress goes rogue, THEN they go to stop her. Now, there are a lot of rumors going around that there were two separate cuts of the film, one that pursued Ayer’s original vision and the other one that Warner Bros. did themselves (you can read the full story here and draw your own conclusions: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/suicide-squads-secret-drama-rushed-916693). So, maybe we can attribute the out-of-order editing to studio interference, “maybe” being a keyword.

Another big problem with the film is that there are a lot of characters and plot-threads that feel like they were supposed to be a big deal, but really aren’t. Again, this is a byproduct of the editing in the first half. For example, there’s this little side-plot with Col. Flag and Dr. Moon being romantically involved, which would have made for an interesting story, i.e. the “killing somebody you love because they’re an evil monster” story from The Fly. But, it really doesn’t go anywhere and adds very little to the story. By that same token, the twisted camaraderie between the Squad feels very rushed and forced. We don’t see many scenes of them interacting with one another, save for the bar scene at the end of Act 2, which feels like it should have taken place a lot earlier. For example, there’s a scene where Harley Quinn calls Deadshot her “friend”, but because they shared only one or two exchanges, I was constantly asking myself:

One of the reasons that the camaraderie feels forced is because a lot of the characters in this film aren’t developed very well. The worst of the lot is Enchantress, who only serves as the incentive for the Squad to save a big city and has no other purpose. Captain Boomerang is funny (nice to see that Jai Courtney can have some charisma) but doesn’t get a lot of moments to shine, Killer Croc is pretty boring, Katana is also very underdeveloped, and Slipknot may as well be absent since (SPOILER ALERT) he gets killed off pretty early on.

And speaking of unnecessary characters, holy cow, is the Joker awful in this. When they announced that Joker was gonna be in this film, I was mentally preparing myself to not be disappointed if this performance wasn’t as good as Heath Ledger. And truth be told, I wasn’t a huge fan of the punk-rocker vibe they were going for with him. But, they chose an award-winning actor to portray him, so as long as he had charisma, what could go wrong? Well, unfortunately, Murphy’s Law won this round. Everything that could go wrong with this character has gone wrong. Not only is he completely unnecessary to the plot – he spends only a total of about ten minutes in the entire film – but the portrayal is just terrible. He has absolutely no charisma and it feels like he’s just half asleep or drunk most of the time. In other words, he is basically Apocalypse from X-Men: Apocalypse.

OK, so I’ve eaten my veggies. Now, for the good stuff. Well, my five favorite characters in this movie are Waller, Flag, Harley Quinn, Deadshot, and El Diablo. Will Smith does a good job at playing a sardonic hitman who wants nothing more than to come home to his daughter. He delivers the comedic dialogue with ease, and when the film decides to have him interact with other people, he does that very well, too. Viola Davis is also great at playing the cold hearted government agent who rules over the squad with an iron fist. As Will Smith says in the movie, “[she’s] gangsta”. Joel Kinnaman does a nice job of playing a no-nonsense colonel who finally comes to accept the squad as more than just “bad guys”. Margot Robbie, unsurprisingly, is charming as Harley Quinn. She’s not quite the live-wire show-stealer that we were all anticipating her to be, but she does well enough for people to be charmed by her. She’s got the New-Jersey Drescher-esque accent down pat, and she also does a nice job at balancing her crazy side, her funny side, and her emotional side (she’s surprisingly good at the last one).

But my favorite out of those five is El Diablo because he had the best character arc, in my opinion. He starts off not wanting to fight because he’s afraid of what his power can really do, thanks to a past tragedy. Throughout the course of the film, though, he finally comes to realize that he can use his powers for something good, namely saving the world from a witch. And the final scene where he realizes his full potential is just awesome. I won’t spoil how, but I will say that it’s worth the price of admission.

And the best thing that I can say in this movie’s favor is that it’s trying to have fun. Unlike the last two DC Extended Universe outings (BvS and Man of Steel), which were packed to the brim with preachy dialogue and superficially philosophical ramblings, this film doesn’t take itself too seriously and is just trying to be a fun ride. And I give it full marks for that. There are even times when this movie is legitimately funny. And not in the Marvel way, but in its own sick, twisted way. I don’t know if DC quite has its style of humor down yet, but we’re still a year away from Justice League, so maybe they’ll have time to perfect it.

So, objectively speaking, Suicide Squad is not that good, and it does kind of leave me wondering if DC even knows what they’re doing anymore. But, I can’t bring myself to say that I didn’t enjoy it. For me, it’s a guilty pleasure at best and a disappointment at worst.

As for whether or not you should go see it? Well, that really depends on what you’re looking for. If you were really disappointed by Dawn of Justice and you think Suicide Squad is gonna be the savior that convinces you that there’s hope for the DC Extended Universe, this probably isn’t the film for you. But, if you’re looking for a dumb, fun summer movie, then I’d say it’s worth a matinee. So, take that for what it’s worth and see for yourself!

Well, those were my thoughts on Suicide Squad! Stay tuned for my next review!