Frosty Reviews: "THE" Suicide Squad
What’s good squad, Frosty Phenix here! So outside of binging HBO Max’s Titans Series and questionable CW-verse with my girlfriend, the DC Movie universe has been somewhat lackluster. Yes, I mean even outside of Marvel’s conveyor belt of movies and tv shows, DC is playing the steady jogging game. I will say...it seems to be somewhat paying off. With 2020’s “Wonder Woman 1984” and the release of the Justice League Snyder Cut, you can tell they are feeling around for their pace in the movie development department. I will say I had doubts about 2021’s “The Suicide Squad” in comparison to 2016’s “Suicide Squad”, but I am happy to say I was not disappointed. Let’s get into it shall we?
THE FOLLOWING PARAGRAPHS CONTAIN SPOILERS OF THE SUICIDE SQUAD MOVIE, PLEASE COME BACK ONCE YOU HAVE SEEN THE MOVIE?
2021’s “The Suicide Squad”, directed by James Gunn (writer of Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy Trilogy...and the holiday special), is a smooth ride of fun, shenanigans, heartfelt connections and a GIANT SPACE SEA MONSTER! I didn’t feel like there were any weak points in their acting roster...not that this was supposed to be a masterpiece of “Oscar Winning Performances” either. I went into the theater with as little expectation as I possibly could have for a movie. When promotions for this movie hit the internet rotation, there was so much surprise and excitement for this wide roster of actors and actresses forming the well known collection of villain and anti-hero characters that are just meant to “die” in the end (expendable assets). There were a few character deaths that I was surprised about and others...not so much. There was even one character’s revival that caught me off guard, but with the way these movies carry themselves, it wasn’t too surprising either. I like to paint myself as a “ready for anything” type of movie watcher. Let me see if I can summarize the story to the best of my ability.
SAVE THE WORLD...OR ELSE
2021 Suicide Squad Roster (left to right): Peacemaker, Weasel, Harley Quinn, BloodSport, King Shark, Rat Catcher 2, Mongal, Javelin, Captain Boomerang, Savant, Colonel Rick Flag, T.D.K, BlackGuard, Polkadot Man
Synopsis:
We start off the movie seeing a collection of villains most of us have probably never heard of and two “TaskForce X” squad veterans, Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie) and Captain Boomerang (Jai Courtney), lead by Colonel Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman) as they are tasked by Amanda Waller (Viola Davis) to infiltrate the isle of Corto Maltese from a beach location. Unfortunately one of the new squad members, Blackguard (Pete Davidson), had sold out his squad before they even landed and expected to be saved and compensated. Just when you think your double cross will pay off for you...it doesn’t. Blackguard’s face is shot clean off by his “client” and the initial team is completely wiped out aside from Harley and Flag. but PLOT TWIST! Our camera turns to the REAL Task Force Team composed of Peacemaker (John Cena), King Shark (voiced by Sylvester Stalone), Rat Catcher 2 (Daniela Melchoir), PolkaDot Man (David Dastmalchian) and their assigned team lead, Bloodsport (Idris Elba).
We flash back to the beginning of the true team’s formation as Waller enlists the help of Bloodsport (AKA replacement Dead Shot...yeah I said it), via threatening to have his daughter tried as an adult even though her crime was petty theft. The rest of the team just seemed to hop on board since they didn’t really need any ultimatums other than Waller’s standard X-amount of time off of your sentence. The squad is tasked with destroying the Nazi-era laboratory Jötunheim, which holds a secretive experiment known as "Project Starfish".
PICKING UP HITCHHIKERS
(See above (left to right) Polkadot Man (Dastmalchian), Peacemaker (Cena), BloodSport (Elba) and Rat Catcher (Melchoir)
The team has a couple of side missions tacked onto their main mission of course. One of which is saving Colonel Flag from whom Waller believed to be the enemy. Making quick work of their adversaries, to a point where Peacemaker and Bloodspot turned it into a killing competition, they reach Flag… only to see him relaxing and coordinating with the leader of his “captors”, Sol Soria (Alice Braga). Turns out the team wiped out a portion of her team rebelling against the tyrannical anti-United States regime government leaders that took over after killing the “beloved monarch like family”…whoops.
Meanwhile, Harley Quinn is captured by the ACTUAL militia and handpicked by one of their leaders, Silvio Luna (Juan Diego Botto). He believes that Harley’s consistent opposition to “American Laws” is the exact type of partner he needs by his side. After having quite a fling and destructive sexual chemistry, Luna shares with Harley his dream of controlling the world with “Project Starfish” in a passive fashion…only for Harley to shoot him in the chest with one of the classic pistols that fell off the wall during their sexual encounter. As she gives the dying Luna her monologue about how she promised herself to kill the next man she started to fall for if he showed any maniacal tendencies (Of course she still didn’t get therapy for her time with the Joker), she is seized by the enemy (again) as the Major General Mateo Suárez (Joaguín Cosío) is now in charge.
Now “tasked” with assisting the local rebellion force to overthrow their current government (the enemy of my enemy, right), the team begins strategize on capturing “The Thinker”, who has been identified as an ally of the local government and is the key to getting into the Jötunheim facility. After some heartfelt connections amongst the team and a few drinks and clubbin' at the bar Thinker frequents, they bump into and capture Thinker. One team escorts Thinker out of the club while the other team (Bloodspot, Col Flag and Peacemaker) distracts the local military and gets captured…for about 20 minutes (movie time, not REAL time) before they killed their captors and escaped the flipped vehicle in an awesome armored car flipping scene. With the team reunited, they learn they have one more teammate to pick up
MOVE ON JOTUNHEIM
(Harley as she frees herself from the militia prison)
As the team works out a plan to free Harley, she ever so gracefully breaks out herself…but does thank the team for thinking about her. Finally assembled with the Thinker in tow, they move on to Jötunheim as the rebellion waits at the capital for TaskForce X to create the diversion needed to lighten the security there. While placing the bombs as instructed, Flag, Rat Catcher 2 and Thinker move to where “Project Starfish” is located. The group meets “Starro, The Conqueror”, a giant starfish capable of spawning countless underlings of itself to take over appropriate host bodies and enact its will upon them. They see all of the experiments conducted with the creature and the many innocent subjects taken for its understanding. The Thinker reveals that it was all a 30 year American Science Project kept on the low and that he was kept on the payroll because he could control the creature. Flag is hurt by this betrayal from Waller and wants to reveal this secret to the world…but Peacemaker was secretly tasked by Waller to take any means necessary to keep that from happening.
As Polka-dot man sets off one of the bombs too early and the plan falls sideways, Starro gets its flippers on Thinker and kills him immediately. Peacemaker and Flag have a scuffle over the drive with the information needed about the project. King Shark is almost eaten by these strange creatures called the Clyrax that were released as the bombs went off (I KNEW THEY WANTED TO EAT HIM! ITS A SUICIDE SQUAD MOVIE! Of Course you don’t trust anything “CUTE”! They CREEPED ME ALL THE WAY OUT). Flag is killed by Peacemaker but the drive that slid away from them was grabbed by Rat Catcher 2 as she watched him betray Flag. Peacemaker catches and almost kills Rat Catcher 2 as Bloodspot arrives in the nick of time after “taking the long way down” as the building collapses. As the two men lock eyes, a standoff takes place and shots are fired! Bloodspot's bullet goes through Peacemaker’s, destroying it and hitting him in the neck, leading him to collapse as we presume he is dead. The remaining members of Task Force X escape the collapsing building…as does Starro.
SAVE THE WORLD, YOU ASSHOLES!
(Harley, Rat Catcher 2, Bloodsport, King Shark and Polkadot Man facing off against Starro)
As Starro begins to stretch its fins, it releases its offspring to begin taking over the city…and probably the world if it could get that far. Waller reconnects with the squad via radio as the signal jammers were destroyed (they were probably in the facility they just destroyed…convenient). Waller tells the team to evacuate as their mission is complete but they decide to stay to help fight off the evil space fish. Waller does not like this and is about to kill the team with their implanted skull bombs, but before she can make an example of Bloodspot one of her subordinates knocks her out to allow the team to save the day uninterrupted. King Shark attempts to eat Starro (one bite at a time) as the rest of the team is fighting off the Starro Zombie Army. Bloodspot loses all his weapons and Polkadot man is crushed under Starro’s fin as he attempts to use his power to destroy him (he had the best shot at doing so…especially when picturing the creature as his mother…you’ll have to see the movie yourself to understand this). As all was almost lost, Rat Catcher 2 summons all of the rats in the city to overtake Starro and eat it from the inside out (…yes it was pretty gross but pretty cool too).
In saving the island and blackmailing Waller with the drive holding the information on America’s true involvement with Starro, Bloodspot, Rat Catcher 2, Harley and King Shark are all pardoned of their crimes and allowed to go free into the world as they are picked up by one of ARGUS’ planes.
(SECRET ENDING: Peacemaker survived his encounter with Bloodspot and was extracted by ARGUS to a hospital, where he will recover and be sent on other missions...Peacemaker TV Show Teaser...DUN DUN DUN!!!!)
THOUGHTS!
I have to say AGAIN, this movie was quite fun to watch. A couple twists in the story I didn’t expect but overall enjoyable. Shout out to James Gunn for putting together such a creative display of storytelling in my opinion. Everyone in the movie held their part and contributed to the movie's overall story and pace as a whole. I can’t say I really had a favorite part as most of it was really good. I’m upset they killed off Flag like that but…it is what it is.
Honestly if the DCEU became a collection of individual stories told in movie form...I would not be mad. There isn't enough movie continuity right now to create a streamlined story like Marvel has (Sorry to say this but it is true). DC's video content, such as their animated movies and tv shows, have always been scattered. From the DC Animated Universe (DCAU; also referred to as the Timmverse by fans) to the CW-verse to the HBO Max platform, telling stories in their own spheres is perfectly fine. I'll use an example, the CW-verse had a somewhat clear line of story telling for it's continuity, except it didn't START that way. "Arrow" and "The Flash" were connected from the gate as The Flash spun off FROM Arrow. Super Girl on the other hand started on a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT CHANNEL (it was initially on CBS then moved to CW around season 2 or 3). This along with Black Lightning (which was on it's own "EARTH" before Crisis) up to now with "Superman and Lois" (fans are still confused at a surface level for which earth this show takes place on) and Star Girl. My point is that even though these universes are scattered and come together at points, it is good story telling for setting up individual stories so if you ever want to bring them together you know where they are and/or where they have come from. When you have a niche, stick to your niche.
Overall Score:
8 out of 10
As stated at the beginning of this article, it was a great ragtag team up film that followed up from the other “Suicide Squad” Movie. I would definitely recommend watching this film...unless you are afraid of rats, space starfish, shark men, shark-eating jellyfish-creatures and decent amounts of gore and blood...in which case… don’t watch this movie. “The Suicide Squad” can be seen in theaters and on HBO Max. The movie was released on August 6th, 2021. This has been Frosty Phenix! Until the next article or IG Live or new podcast episode, peace!
Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Suicide_Squad_(film)
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6334354/?ref_=nm_flmg_wr_7
https://dcextendeduniverse.fandom.com/wiki/King_Shark