Suicide Squad: At least it wasn’t as bad as BvS?

At the time I’m writing this, it’s been about an hour since I walked out of the theater after watching Suicide Squad. On a scale of Batman Vs. Superman to Deadpool, I’d rate this movie a solid Green Lantern live action movie. Maybe a small step up from there because of how much of their budget seemed to be spent on getting rights to some well known music.

Friends, we are in a golden age of studios making comic book movies right and left. This is what I wished for when I was a kid reading the “who would you cast in the comic book movie” articles of wizard magazine! But that comes with the drawback that there are so many different interpretations of the characters that you end up with things like a Batman who has to go to Amanda Waller for information rather than being the world’s greatest detective, and a Captain Boomerang who is apparently a Broney but doesn’t get a chance to unpack that so he carries around a pink unicorn for *reasons*.

Suicide Squad: This is a terrifying world

Here’s what really struck me at the end of this movie. I was profoundly sad for the people of this world. I get that Suicide Squad is a team of villains or anti-heroes, but that shouldn’t take away fundamental things like empathy. Most characters are haphazardly given some backstory, and while the viewers are feeling empathetic to the characters (poor Deadshot – he was taken away from his daughter who had a bad mom, or poor Harley Quinn – she just loves her puddin’), aside from one act of kindness (read: Deadshot not shooting Harley Quinn when she escapes – something he had wanted to do himself), no one in the film seems to care about anyone else or act outside of their own self interest.

Another scary part of this world is that there is never ending escalation. I’m not talking only about tension between characters or continuation of plot, but how everyone seems to double down on the violence, the anger, and the stakes.

Don’t get me wrong – these are bad people. They are the villains of the capes and cowls comics for a reason. But even they deserve a world better than this. Gotham is a dark place, but it feels like the real monsters were there long before Enchantress summoned them.

With that said, I’m ready to go watch Deadpool – The anti-hero movie we all wanted.