[Review] Suicide Squad (2016)

Suicide Squad was one of my most anticipated films of the year and I am happy to report that it is a very enjoyable film, but it does have some weaknesses. For the most part, it is a fun ride that will keep you entertained for a couple of hours.

Suicide Squad (2016) is the story of intelligence officer, Amanda Waller (Viola Davis), when she decides to assemble a team of dangerous, incarcerated supervillains for a top-secret mission. Figuring it has nothing to lose, the U.S. government supplies weapons to Deadshot (Will Smith), Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie), Captain Boomerang (Jai Courtney) and other despicable inmates. Dubbed the Suicide Squad, the united criminals must defeat a mysterious and powerful entity while contending with the antics of the diabolical Joker (Jared Leto).

For the majority of people, the draw of this film is the great cast and the eclectic characters. Everyone delivered in their roles for the most part. The highlight for me was Margot Robbie's Harley Quinn; she is a beautiful and very likable psychopath. My only complaint with Harley Quinn was that she wasn't crazy enough: I would have liked to see some more lunacy written into the character. Jay Hernandez as El Diablo and Will Smith as Deadshot also really stood out to me. They both had great back stories that made me invest in their characters. One scene that was particularly remarkable for me was a moment when Deadshot was standing on a car just mowing people down with his guns while the rest of the squad just watched in awe at his insane abilities.

Jared Leto's Joker was marketed heavily with this film and based on what I saw, I was not a huge fan of his character. While Jared Leto's performance was solid, I felt like the script didn't provide enough of an opportunity for me to form a solid opinion of him. I also had a couple of issues with Enchantress (Cara Delevingne). While I didn't dislike Delevingne's performance, I felt the character as a whole was a slight miss because of the story and the somewhat cheap-looking special effects directly associated with the character.

Most of the issues with this film occurred with the script. The first 20 minutes of the movie is dedicated to back stories of the squad members. While I did like most of the back stories, I felt that they were rushed and a bit out of place. They could have been more creatively integrated with the rest of the story. The story was pretty basic and straight forward on the whole, but there was one area where things got complex and that is about the main villain's backstory. Without spoiling anything, I will say that the back story was sprinkled throughout the entire film and came across as choppy, which caused some confusion and made it hard to follow.

To compare, one of my main issues with Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice was that the tone and story of the film were far too serious. And it looks like the team at DC Comics has learned from that mistake: Suicide Squad has a very fun, enjoyable tone that is set against beautiful visual elements and a phenomenal soundtrack.

The marketing for the film was pretty spot on, but I feel that they showed a bit too much of the movie in the promotional material.

Overall, Suicide Squad is a fun film. The story does have some issues, and a couple of different aspects of the film seem choppy and slightly out of place. If you walk into Suicide Squad expecting to have a fun ride with some very eclectic characters and some nice action, you won't be disappointed. I give Suicide Squad a 7/10.