Last month one of the most hotly anticipated event films of
the year adorned our screens after a year long build-up of titillating trailers
and sickening on-set stories. However, instead of becoming another saving grace
to the world of repetitive superhero films, like Deadpool, it instead has become shrouded in controversy as a very
vocal Mexican stand-off has ensued between critics and DC fans. So was the film an undeniable flop like its
dreary predecessor Batman vs Superman
or is it the beginning of a series of DC success stories?
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| The Squad. Image Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7N2zqCPMN0 |
From the film’s very title, there was a tall order to fill.
In a single movie they had to create an entire ‘squad’ of colourful characters
all with intricate back stories that required nurturing and developing like a
new born child. In some cases, this was executed fairly well. Take characters
such as Will Smith’s Deadshot and Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn, who received a
lot of screen time in an attempt to show that ‘the worst of the worst’ do have
emotional motivations and meaningful relationships like the rest of us. This
was more successfully done with Deadshot’s young daughter than Quinn’s ‘puddin’
the Joker where their sadistic love came dangerously close to making arguably
the two most interesting comic book characters a little one-dimensional. However,
despite a telling reveal about El Diablo’s (Jay Hernandez) backstory, most other
characters were left a little under-cooked as the only development they received
was part of the opening string of systematic set up sequences. Something hard
to label as anything but a lazy expositional technique.
Another lazy element of the movie was certainly the plot.
The main villains, Enchantress (Cara Delevingne) and Incubus (Alain Chanoine),
very quickly establish themselves in one location to destroy the city in classic
bad guy style but then do very little else. You can’t help but reminisce about
Heath Ledger’s Joker in Nolan’s The Dark
Knight who, rather than becoming a statue villain, was unpredictable,
scheming and thus highly elaborate. The contrast to Suicide Squad is all but too stark. This leaves the story arc for
the squad to descend into a very linear journey where any twists and turns
budding fans were hoping for were cordoned off by uninventive writing. You
could summarise the story in a 3 step checklist; 1) Create Squad 2) Find
villains 3) Defeat them. Hardly the stuff of superhero innovation!
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| Taking centre stage, the 'villain' The Joker in a promo poster. Image Source:http://collider.com/suicide-squad-posters-promo-video/ |
Here also, we have tapped into one of the main flaws with
the film; the villain, or more accurately, the wannabe villain The Joker. Now,
this doesn’t necessarily mean that Leto’s version of The Joker was an
unmitigated disaster, in fact, it was hard to judge either way due to his much
mocked 8 minutes of screen time. The real issue lay in the marketing, or
mis-marketing, of his character and indeed therefore the film. The trailers,
for example, with their playful comic book style were very effective and
stylish but they advertised a different version of the film. One where The
Joker took centre stage as the villain rather than Enchantress who, in the
trailers, could easily have been mistaken for a member of the Squad! While The
Joker’s presence was still necessary for the character development of Harley,
this is all he was needed for rather than a forced attempt at having his own storyline.
His inclusion therefore is more likely to hinge on his appearance in future DC
films (cough cough Justice League) where he’ll likely be a go to bad guy. It
would be nice if DC could focus on making each film individually credible
instead of wasting years of film fans anticipations on half-hearted 2 hour long
trailers for future films.
Despite these rather glaring negative comments, it feels all
too easy to criticise, which in truth does ignore some of the brighter elements
of the film which many critics are side-lining. To begin on a technical note,
the editing was spectacularly done in order to time its cuts with the music
which kept the action fast paced and engaging. Similarly, the special effects
couldn’t be faulted as CG characters held their own against others produced by
the genre this year. Performance wise, the acting while not Oscar worthy,
matched the average standard set by other superhero films (despite Robbie
occasionally making Harley seem a little false). It is also worth praising some
of the moral questions the film attempted to raise by inverting the role of
villain and hero. The demons of all characters are laid bare showing that
sometimes we can all be the good or bad guy depending on the choices we make
and values we hold. Above all this though, there is the simple fact that the
film was fit for purpose. A summer blockbuster such as this is supposed to
entertain and for the most part it certainly did. This doesn’t excuse some of
the ill thought out failures of the film but it does go some way to explaining
them.
Indeed, this makes the film neither a masterpiece like
Nolan’s trilogy or futile like Batman vs
Superman, but rather a brief piece of fun escapism. Thus, instead of being
sided with blood thirsty critics or rage filled fans, I personally cut straight
through the middle. I believe that although Suicide
Squad has its problems and is certainly not worth the critical acclaim some
were hoping for; it is worth watching just once.
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