You know what, this movie isn't worth the time, but I have to vent.
Like I said above, I saw Suicide Squad a second time today. Sometimes novelty distracts me from flaws, so I thought I'd pay extra attention to the weaker aspects of the film this time around.
And... it's worse than I thought. Let me just dump this out in bullet point format so I don't waste too much more of my day here.
- The movie's main problems, from greatest to least: Editing, writing (this covers character motivations and storytelling through dialogue and visuals), music, and action (both choreography and visual clarity).
- This movie is edited like a rambling conversation about an early draft of a mediocre script. We should have spent more time with the characters before their captivity. Then their capture, additional backstory, and mission should have been presented with adequate buildup and transitions. Their team bonding needed considerably more screen time as well, or at least much more effective establishing moments if we're to believe they care about each other near the end.
- Half baked doesn't begin to describe the writing. Everyone's logic is broken.
- It makes no sense that Waller would recruit people like Harley, Boomerang, and Slipknot for a team intended to defend the US from hostile metahumans. They have no qualifications.
מדויק.
- It likewise makes no sense to send this ill-equipped team to fight an ancient superpowered witch with an equally strong brother. Waller's extraction is understandable, but then why did she murder the colleagues she must have personally selected to work with her in the first place? You'd think she would have ensured they had clearance to know about the Suicide Squad and the Enchantress situation before hiring them to staff her center of operations.
- Why did Waller's rescue chopper take a low flight path when she had excellent surveillance and would have known how Enchantress's soldiers were armed? The chopper even deploys decoy flares, so she must have anticipated anti-air munitions. But no, she lets the pilot go low enough not just for RPG, but within swatting range of Incubus's tendrils. Good job.
- Enchantress tapping into Waller's mind to find military targets should have been clearly explained. It's very easy to miss this point amid everything else that's going on. I'll take this opportunity to mention that the visual storytelling in this movie is sorely lacking. The principle of "show, don't tell" is violated in every scene. Army guy often blurts out info like a precocious 9-year-old explaining plot points to his little sister.
- Why did Enchantress build her genocide machine in the middle of Midway City? She is a teleporting witch who can go to a vault in Tehran and back in under a second. She wouldn't have had to contend with the Suicide Squad if she'd simply zapped herself to a remote location.
- Why would military guy let the Suicide Squad walk into a bar when he still has the neck bomb detonator and Waller is in need of rescue?
- Why the hell would army guy smash the neck bomb detonator and say the Squad is free to go? It makes no sense whatsoever. He endangered his mission and his life, and let the worst of the worst walk free just to punctuate a sentimental moment between killers. Wow. Waller should have had his head on a pike for that.
- Why in the world would Deadshot choose to help army guy find Waller, the one person who can keep him and his new friends (???) under her thumb. He literally walked himself right back into prison, just like everyone who followed him. Also, his daughter never thought he was "a piece of shit" in the first place, so his explanation is nonsense. Plus, this came right after army guy revealed that Deadshot's daughter's letter has been withheld. Which came right after army guy destroyed the one thing keeping the Squad from killing army guy and running off.
- I liked the bar scene quite a lot the first time I saw it, but the second time I was agitated by how out of character the whole situation was, for everyone. The Squad hadn't bonded nearly enough to act so buddy buddy with each other at that stage. I'm going to repeat myself a little here, but if you recall, they were forced to cooperate under threat of death, and no sooner do they rescue the woman who holds their leashes, than they're chatting like old war buddies and choosing to stick together on second mission to rescue Wallee that will result in death if they fail and years of prison if they succeed.
- Why did Harley pal around with the Squad after Joker deactivated her neck bomb? She said they had nothing better to do than help Deadshot save Waller, but clearly she did. They all did. Why not go find Joker's crash site? Why not get the hell out of dodge?
- In the final confrontation, Enchantress went dark mode again (her depowered state? Weird strategy) and fought everyone hand to hand, but not before trapping them all in illusions long enough for Incubus or herself to take them out with tendrils or teleportation. Which they didn't. Then she disarms them all at the same time after the pointless fight, which she could have done before. Then she offers to let the Squad join her because they fought well, when they were totally ineffective the whole time, and have absolutely nothing of value to offer the soon-to-be queen of the world.
- After Enchantress's heart gets ripped out by Harley due to her own inexplicable carelessness, and Killer Croc tosses the bomb at her machine, she has several long, very drawn out moments to watch the bomb and create an illusion of Deadshot's daughter to convince him not to shoot the bomb. There was ample time for Enchantress to teleport around the world three times over, yet she just lies there and watches the bomb while Deadshot was distracted. She could have retrieved it whenever she wanted, or moved it the same way she disarmed the Squad earlier, but nope.
- The action in this film is terrible. Just so very bland. No sense of style in the moves or framing, very few standout moments or interesting use of abilities. Utterly pointless slow motion that last for too long and rarely highlights anything special. Compare the action scenes to literally any Marvel film and the contrast could not be more obvious. I couldn't believe how bad the action was when I took the time to really look. Talk about crushingly dull fighting. Suicide Squad was in dire need of a competent action director. How WB could let this stand with Marvel as their competition is completely beyond me. Even BvS's fights are much better, especially Batman again random thugs.
- The use of popular music is so artless and cynical that it actually pisses me off. I looked at the cinematography and performances and saw fragments of a decent movie with a grounded tone. I realized Suicide Squad's setting is not actually grimdark like I was saying in earlier posts. It's simply lit and framed like a serious film. The setting actually could have worked with very different editing and an appropriate score. But no, WB paid out the ass for a dump truck full of tracks dripping with flash and swagger, and had them staple-gunned over scenes that were clearly designed to strike more subdued tones. Guardians of the Galaxy uses classic song to craft moods that match the tenor and energy of each scene. Suicide Squad's music imposes itself like paintballs splattered across the Statue of David's junk. It's either painfully literal ("You don't own me..." "Don't tell me what to do..." as Harley is defying her guards) or crowbarred in at random because it's a classic (Bohemian Rhapsody in that ending montage of everyone settling back into prison life). Bugger off.
- All that said, the first credits song is perfect. Sounds real cool with the theater's bass.
Suicide Squad is put together so ineptly, it's a wonder the final cut was ever approved for release. My second viewing snapped the movie's issues into focus, and yeah, it's one hell of a mess. Fundamental problems with editing, writing, and tone, with laughable action and an insulting parody of Guardians' jaunty soundtrack, there an extension of the impish tone shared between all its well matched parts, here a garish Instagram filter on every scene that wants to be earnest.
I don't need to see this movie ever again now. I can only hope an alternate cut surfaces at some point, because I'd like to experience what could have been.
