A review the new movie “The Suicide Squad”
I’ve enjoyed many, many superhero movies and I’m sure I’ll delight in a few more, but some of them are becoming a bit ridiculous and this is one of them. Following the original “Suicide Squad” (2016) and the spin-off “Birds Of Prey” (2020), now we have a kind of reboot of the first movie with another eclectic list of tough-guy characters, over-the top-violence, fouled-mouthed tirades and a thumping soundtrack (I saw it in IMAX).
As with the first two films, the best in the team is Harley Quinn played by the wonderful Margot Robbie. The characters portrayed by Idris Elba and John Cena have a certain charisma, but other characters – notably Polka-Dot Man who sees his detested mother in the faces of all his enemies and T.D.K. who has detachable limbs – are just plain silly. Worst of all is the main opponent, a giant starfish that has the ability to spit out smaller starfish which cling to the faces of people like the face-hugger in “Alien”. This is the least evil-looking villain since the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man in the 1984 version of “Ghostbusters”.
Writer and director James Gunn of “Guardians Of The Galaxy” fame clearly had a lot of fun with this blood-spurting, body-ripping, head-exploding orgy of violence and mayhem and some of it is entertaining and funny, but overall this is a limp addition to the often-sparkling superhero genre.