Suicide Squad (David Ayer, 2016) Movie • Page 25

Like wut. Why so much dancing haha

 

Enjoyed this movie. A good popcorn flick for the summer for sure, but definitely leaves me wanting a whole lot more of these iterations of The Joker and Harley Quinn, along with Batman.

 

Loved this movie trailer

 

everyone needs to rewatch it really

 

That entire climactic battle is cringe-worthy tbh

Messy first act, good second act, disastrous third act.

 

Jai Courtney went from being the most annoying actor to being p cool. So that's a plus.

 

Courtney was probably the best part of the film in all honesty

 

I thought it was odd that large chunks of the fight was done essentially in silhouette with close ups being clear.

 

Considering seeing this even though Joker & Harley Quinn were the only characters I was familar with. Is this as bad as the Indepedence Day sequel, which is the only summer movie I felt I wasted money on?

 

this movie is about as bad as it could possibly be considering all the factors.

 

Anyone listen to the soundtrack at all? It's really fucking weird, but works oddly well.

 

i think the soundtrack bothered me the most. fifteen songs in the span of like the first 40 minutes was pretty obnoxious.

 

I'd say first, the movie doesn't know what it's about. It thinks it does, it thinks it's about embracing your identity and finding your place in the world, but it doesn't really back that up in a meaningful way. Clark spends the whole film questioning whether or not he should help people, but he's helping people anyway his whole life, so the movie is really about whether or not he should do that publicly. That's a boring conflict. It's about Clark Kent becoming Superman in the most surface level possible. When he puts on that suit for the first time and finally lets loose with his powers, it plays triumphantly because Zack Snyder is a talented filmmaker and Henry Cavill is good casting for the part, but it doesn't lead to anything. It's not a triumph in service of anything that happens later in the film. I actually think most of the first half is pretty good, and while some people make fun of Pa Kent's "Maybe you shouldn't help people" mindset, I actually think it's a pretty interesting starting point as a conflict for Clark. Unfortunately any warmth or sense of morality mostly comes through in Kevin Costner's performance, rather than in the writing itself. Pa Kent having a sense of duality, that he's a good person who of course wants his son to help people, but also a father worried about how the world will react to his son, is great. But the movie doesn't service that. It tries to, bringing in Zod as the representation of the ultimate fear of what Superman might be, but it doesn't really work because no one knows who Superman is. If Clark had come out as Superman, you had people debating whether or not it's a good thing, some people love him, some people afraid of him, and then introduced Zod, the action with Zod would be meaningful. You would have Clark, having already been Superman and been out helping people, representing hope and the best of us, then Zod representing the flip side, the contrast, us at our most base and selfish, driven by our worst impulses. But rather than be about something interesting like that, the action in Man of Steel (action that takes up way too much of the runtime) is about Clark vs. Zod, but even then it's really about Jor-El vs. Zod, since the movie opens with their conflict, telling us this is what the movie is about. It automatically makes Clark less a character and more a representation of an idea, an idea of Jor-El's that contrasted with Zod. What does that fight actually mean to Clark? If it means finding his place in this world, like the film is trying to say, then he absolutely should care a lot more about the overwhelming destruction of that world that he's an active participant in. He should be helping a lot more people, maybe even ceding momentum in the fight to Zod because he's so caught up with helping people out of harm's way. Hell, the movie has a scene where three citizens are trapped in rubble... and they help each other out of it. Superman has no idea it's happening and doesn't seem to care, because when he finally gets a moment of levity, he kisses Lois in the most tone deaf romantic moment I've maybe ever seen in a superhero movie. Their first kiss happens seconds after he's torn apart buildings and thousands of people are probably dead. Not to mention the clunker "all downhill" line right afterwords. Instead of a sincere moment of sensuality or romance between the two, it's a bad joke. Then he goes and fights Zod for like, twenty more minutes.

Then there's the killing Zod. I don't exactly think that Superman should never be portrayed killing someone, but if you're going to do that, you need to really address it. He's the ultimate superhero. He's supposed to represent morality and goodness. If he's going to take a life, it has to have weight. Weight beyond a pained scream that Cavill sells well. It should be felt in the rest of the film. This was Superman's debut to the world, and he blew up half a city and directly killed his enemy. He should feel that. Those consequences should weigh on him in this film, they shouldn't be left for a sequel to address. But minutes after that dark killing scene where Superman is so clearly anguished, I think we next see him taking a drone out of the sky and cracking a joke to an army general or something. Any consequences that massive sequence should have had aren't even given another mention.

There's other stuff, mostly that I think Lois should have been a little more fleshed out independent of Superman, rather than be this reporter whose been hung up on him for years. I think Clark and Lois should have had moments of levity, of actual chemistry, which I know they can have because Amy Adams is one of the best actresses on the planet and Henry Cavill is otherworldly gorgeous and can be charming and warm. Instead all they talk about is him, and what he should do, and it's all serious. They never connect or do anything that actually clues into why they like each other in the first place.

Most of the other issues I have are personal preferences for how a Superman story should feel, and those are more my taste than something that I'd really argue are requirements for a Superman story (though I definitely think they'd have made the movie better). And again, I like the movie more than most. I love Henry Cavill in the role, and wish a filmmaker with any sense of warmth or goodness got to handle him as Superman (Snyder is good at a lot of things, warmth and a sense of radiating goodness aren't really in his wheelhouse). I really enjoyed Russell Crowe and Kevin Costner as Jor-El and Pa Kent. The action is unmatched in visual quality. There are threads of things I think could have been really great (I enjoyed Clark's wandering around anonymously helping people, I enjoyed him as a kid struggling to manage his powers). A few rewrites or outside, non-Snyder/Goyer perspectives could have really helped the film be something special. I think it's a mostly flawed movie that I enjoy aspects of.

 

I haven't seen the movie yet, only listened on Spotify. My opinion might change after seeing it though, haha.

 

oh, yeah i think the original songs they got were pretty great. i usually hate 21P but even that song felt pretty good tonally.

 

Every bit as bad as BvS. Maybe slightly worse? But absolutely more fun to watch, so it technically wins that comparison game that no one asked for. Though, I don't want to watch it again.

HATED Joker, Harley Quinn, and Killer Croc. I want to trust Margot Robbie to spearhead a Harley Quinn spinoff with female writers to redeem her character, but I don't know that I can. And, my gosh, I am absolutely dreading Ben Affleck potentially using this Joker in his Batman film. Also, the film flowed terribly, and the random songs were really distracting.

Let's do some compliments. Amanda Waller was the best character and needs utilized more in this universe. I loved her so much. Captain Boomerang was probably the next best character. I enjoyed Deadshot and wouldn't mind more of him. Katana was super cool in her very limited appearances (though the abrupt moment of her crying was weird and dumb). I'll probably be the only person with this opinion, but I thought Cara Develingne as the dark, creepy version of Enchantress (not the stupid green version), while not a "good" character, was sometimes really cool to watch on screen.

Worth noting: I'm impressed with how misogynist this film ended up being. My audience laughed when Batman punched Harley Quinn underwater, which made me uncomfortable.

Overall, I have no regrets seeing it. The theater experience was a lot of fun, as was talking about the film afterwards. It helped that my expectations were lowered immensely beforehand. Thinking back to how I felt after the first teaser video leaves me so disappointed, though. Honestly, if Wonder Woman (my second most anticipated upcoming comic adaptation after only Black Panther) isn't good, I won't see Justice League. Geoff Johns, save us.

 

God the hyperbole from some people is too much.

 

Wanted to like it, but it was just plain bad. Get it together, DC.

 

FWIW it's worth I think it's a lot better than BvS, not nearly as flawed. (Still a lot that's not great, but there are more redeemable moments and characters here).

 

I genuinely really enjoyed this. It's a mess, but it's a fun mess. Will Smith is great, Margot Robbie is great and I even really liked Jared Leto's Joker. Also like George said up there, Jai Courtney is actually tolerable here.

 

100% my thoughts exactly

 

"For what it's worth its worth" is almost as good as the writing in this film.

 

This was indefensibly bad... It makes Ghost Rider look like The Dark Knight.

There are some sprinkles of goodness but they're lost in the massive convoluted mess. Jotted down some thoughts, nothing really spoilery I think...

- All of the "situation room" scenes with government agents were laughably bad; I lost it when one of them yelled "I thought this was contained!"
- The Joker using a tablet to show the lady he had hostage was hilarious.
- They managed to make awesome songs sound annoying. I cringed at Seven Nation Army.
- What was that stupid font they used for the subtitles? Seriously who were the target demographic for this movie?
- Eminem... Seriously?
- El Diablo spelling BYE with fire. Why?? Just why?????
- The narrative was disastrous. Katana came out of nowhere halfway into the movie and we got her backstory all in like less than a minute.
- The Joker texting with Harley was ridiculous. Almost expected them to start using Snapchat.
- I hope they find a way to scratch this Joker for future films. Just terrible and embarrassing to watch. Also that performance did not call for an on-set therapist. None of the performances did.
- Why did Enchantress dance while she did... whatever it is she was doing? Also found it funny how she switched to British accent once she became really evil.

Also, very interesting to see DC finally succumbed to using a post-credits scene. For what it's worth, it was the best part of the entire movie. It was actually good. It's blatant how straight out of Marvel's playbook it was and how similar they're making Bruce Wayne's role in the universe to Tony Stark's in the MCU, but still good. That and the references to Superman's death at the very beginning of the movie were probably the only things I enjoyed.

 

Lol I forgot about the on-set therapist thing

 

Unfortunately, none of the movie kept my interest. I kept thinking to myself that it was going to get better as we progressed through the film and it just didn't happen. Whenever I watch a Batman film, it is always the villains that stand out to me, this one just didn't have that same affect. It was just super boring. And I really wanted to like it, was excited to finally sit down and watch, just didn't work for me.