Out this week internationally, next week in the US and on HBO Max.
The Suicide Squad – SPOILER discussion
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Seeing it on Friday
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Shock news there that Todd is waiting for cable. The cinemas are all closed here, we don’t get HBO Max. I’ll probably have to find a torrent.
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Shock news there that Todd is waiting for cable.
In fairness, when it’s on cable the same time as it his cinemas…
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I’ll probably have to find a torrent.
But… but.. that’s pIrAcY!
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Great fun. Super-violent and very funny. It could have used a good villain though. Capaldi is fun, but doesn’t get much screen time. Elba is the best I’ve seen him in ages. Definitely his best lead performance in a movie.
I love how much the film hates Amanda Waller. She’s just the worst.
Maybe as I never watched the first movie, I didn’t have the strong reaction to Flag’s death that the movie wanted me too. It’s hard to kill so many SS folks, and expect us to care about this one more than the rest.
Looking forward to the Peacemaker TV series too now, which I didn’t expect.
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Well, it was indeed pretty much what I expected in terms of tone (GotG meets Deadpool, basically)… but holy shit did anyone else think this was actually pretty boring?? =/
I guess it’s a technically well made movie, the FX on King Shark is spectacular, probably the best thing in the whole movie, and sure, it’s well made overall but oh boy do I have some gripes:
Overall, it felt like Gunn was trying way too hard,
Yes… This for starters. The writing and the humour are pretty dull and unfunny and uninspired… and yeah sure, it’s violent… but meh. Maybe this would’ve been more surprising or shocking three years ago… but after two seasons of the far, far, FAR superior (in every single aspect) The Boys, this just feels like a derivative poor copy.
A lot of the editing choices just didn’t work… like those text bits all over the place. A bit too silly and unnecessary… like, I get it, I’m not a moron, I don’t need you to literally spell it out for me.
The songs were just too much. SQ1 is a prime example of how not to use licensed songs in a movie, but this one felt also like waaaaaaaaaaay too much, and unlike SQ1, this is not a studio fuck up, this is Gunn being incredibly excessive with the music, and the result is just as bad as the first one.
Some of this stuff feels like a random collage of cool ideas Gunn thought of, but that don’t fit the movie at all, like the Harley going Disney bit, or King Shark in the Aquarium… Actually that whole Harley subpolt with General handsome didn’t fit the rest of the movie at all… felt like contractual Margot Robbie filler, which I would normally be all for, but it was kinda stupid and pointless.
Same goes for the parts in the Task Force X HQ with all the office nerds… it wasn’t fun, it wasn’t interesting, the dialogues were painfully bad too. It kinda reminded me of that stupid-ass gag in Avengers 1 with the guy playing galaga in the Heli-deck.
As for the characters, yeah Bloodshot, Ratcatcher, Harley, Polkadotman, King Shark and Peacemaker were okay (although again, most of the dialogues and jokes were awful). Special shoutout to the costume dpt. people, they did a bangup job on that front, Harley looked phenomenal all the way through.
But I was actually mad about them killing Flagg and Boomerang, what a fuckin’ waste of two decent characters and actors… Specially Boomerang, since it would’ve been nice to see him go against the Flash at some point, and Jay Courtney was a pretty good CB.
And worst of all, they got Waller wrong and that’s like a huge no-no.
I’m kind of amazed at the excessively high score it’s got on RT (both critics and audience) because imo this is a pretty bland and derivative movie that somehow managed to disappoint me despite me going in with pretty low expectations and an almost pitch perfect idea of what I was in for.
I’m not sure I’d go as far as saying it’s as bad as SQ1, because obviously this one doesn’t feel like it was butchered by incompetent execs, but it shares soooo many of the things that went wrong in SQ1 (and on purpose!!!). The only thing this movie did is make me A LOT more interested in seeing the Ayer cut. But anyways, yeah this is exactly what WB were trying to squeeze out of SQ1… an MCU movie without the PG shackles
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It could have used a good villain though.
Usually the downfall of super hero movies. The villains are not often the best antagonists in the story.
With Suicide Squad, it does feel like the obvious choice would be to make the villain an actual hero. Someone that you might root for if the tables were turned a little bit. Someone that the squad might actually side with if they weren’t forced to fight them.
Someone like The Authority. They’d be a helluva tough opponent to the Squad both dramatically and just in the plain sense of overwhelming power. It really would be a “suicide” mission, but I think antagonists like that would make for a very compelling story. Especially if the fact Amanda Waller is targeting these idealistic powered vigilantes is what forces them to band together into an even greater threat.
Also, it would be cool if WB just casually introduces the Authority in a Suicide Squad movie.
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Todd wrote:
This was basically an R-rated GotGand that is a bad thing? Maybe you should go watch a Scorsese film because if you went into this film not expecting a R-rated Gotg, then maybe you should have done a little research first. This is James Gunn we are talking about. btw, imo, there is no trying too hard with Gunn when it comes to CB movies.
I love the Boys but I don’t compare TV shows with movies. Apples and Oranges category.
An R-rated GotG is not a bad thing if done well. This was done just okay.
In this case, I believe the comparison between TSS and The Boys is absolutely fair. They both have an over the top, anything goes quality relating to superheroes. I think Jon is right that this movie would have been something more had it come out before The Boys. But if you want to compare it another movie, I’d say it’s a weak version of the Deadpool flicks. Maybe that’s why it didn’t completely work for me. This movie feels like it should have come out a few years ago. It didn’t feel unique or special. TSS feels a bit late to the game. And as much as I enjoyed the Deadpool movies, I think The Boys is better than them.
Everyone has different tastes and opinions. You obviously liked it more than I did. I’m glad you had a better time than I did. I still had a decent time though I doubt I’d ever watch it again.
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Everyone has different tastes and opinions. You obviously liked it more than I did. I’m glad you had a better time than I did. I still had a decent time though I doubt I’d ever watch it again.
You’re doing it all wrong, Todd. You need to keep battering your opponent until he finally agrees with you, or throws up his hands and abandons The Carrier altogether!! This….this….compromising…. It’s just wrong!!
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This….this….compromising…. It’s just wrong!!
It’s Okay njerry. You have all the right in the world to disagree with Todd. If you feel the
need to keep battering
Todd about this, you have the perfect right. We understand your need and validate your feelings on the subject.
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To quote Starro:
I was happy in space, looking at the stars…
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Everyone has different tastes and opinions. You obviously liked it more than I did. I’m glad you had a better time than I did. I still had a decent time though I doubt I’d ever watch it again.
It’s a middle of the road sort of movie. I think Deadpool 2 is a good comparison – a sequel that had a lot more to support it but in the end just didn’t feel very fresh. I’m not really sure I’d say SS2 is significantly superior to the first one on the whole. For me, the jokes were funny in theory, but they rarely landed. The timing was always off. Edited just a bit more tightly and I think it would be a completely different experience and a lot funnier.
I still like Amanda Waller in this as well. The rest of the casting is good, but she’s still the most perfect actor for that character.
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‘The Suicide Squad’ Tanking At Weekend Box Office With $25M+ Start – Deadline
Here’s the unfortunate hard truth despite Warner Bros.’ best intentions to get a vibrant, zany, and fun filmmaker like Gunn to resuscitate the Suicide Squad brand: For weeks, many read the tea leaves and saw that The Suicide Squad was destined to have a bad time at the B.O.; that the movie had bigger inherent problems: It’s hard to rebound a franchise, even with an installment that has excellent reviews and a great director, after the first 2016 film wasn’t received well by fans, and the follow-up Birds of Prey even significantly less-so.
Gunn’s Suicide Squad arrives with a B+ CinemaScore, the same grade as David Ayer’s Suicide Squad and the 2020 spinoff Birds of Prey. Posttrak at 83% positive was higher than the first Suicide Squad which was 73% positive, and it nabbed four stars and a 62% recommend like Birds of Prey.
Also, many will argue that marketing dropped the ball here in not distinguishing the pic’s title: Is it a sequel? It is a reboot? What message are we trying to transmit to the consumer? Even if the number ‘2’ wasn’t in the title, add some more words in the title to indicate a purely different film in the series, i.e. ‘The Suicide Squad Goes To The Jungle’. Anything. If Warners was looking for a reboot, then that would have entailed switching out all the characters in the movie, which would have meant leaving Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn out.
Box Office: ‘Suicide Squad 2’ Gets Tomb Raider-Trapped With Poor $12.2M Friday (forbes.com)
While most folks don’t think Joss Whedon’s Justice League ($658 million) is aggressively “better” than Zack Snyder’s Batman v Superman ($873 million), it suffered for the sins of Dawn of Justice. And now we can add James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad to this list, as frankly I’ve been worried about for years.
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While the Internet may fan-cast Idris Elba in every vaguely commercial property they can think of (arguably because he’s one of the few Black actors they can name off the top of their head), and he’s very good as Bloodsport in this one, he’s not and has never been a big-budget opener.
He couldn’t open The Losers (another DC Comics flick about desperate anti-heroes on a suicide mission), he and fellow “not an opener” Matthew McConaughey couldn’t open The Dark Tower and he barely helped open Pacific Rim ($411 million worldwide, but on a $190 million budget). He’s a viable added value element in the likes of Hobbs & Shaw and has a few studio programmer successes (Obsessed, Takers and No Good Deed) to his name. Variables notwithstanding, making a mega-budget sequel to Suicide Squad without Will Smith was arguably as commercially perilous as Men in Black: International and Independence Day: Resurgence.
Bloodsport did feel a little hamstrung as it felt like he was basically Deadshot, but since they couldn’t get Will Smith they made some superficial changes… but really, he’s just Deadshot.
Nevertheless, that point about Elba is still interesting, but I do have to admit that he probably will never be an opener. His window may be closed.
At the same time, I felt the same way about Tom Hardy, but he carried VENOM. Nevertheless, Venom is possibly the real star of that franchise. If Elba got cast as a lead in some franchise that is already popular, it’s just as likely to be a hit. Though I can’t really think of one that would be perfect for him.
Though, he could make for a good villain.
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I think Idris Elba will have a long career because he is very talented but it may not be as the lead of a major summer blockbuster.
Until he becomes the next James Bond.
Fingers crossed.
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Well it doesn’t even seem to have generated that much chatter in here, so… it’s weird.
The praise it’s getting is a bit weird considering most of the same people shredded the first one for things this movie does too, doesn’t really make sense, tbh.
Also, people keep saying it’s a “sort of sequel/soft reboot/yadda yadda”… uhm… no, it’s very clearly a sequel. I don’t know why people are being confused by it =/
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Deadhsot: “So that’s it, what, we’re some kind of suicide squad?”
vs
Thinker: “That’s suicide!”
Rick Flagg: “That’s kind of out thing”
Yeah, no you’re right… such an improvement on the dialogue front. I guess I’m just too dumb to appreciate the comedic gold of something like:
Bloodsport: “You’re wearing tightie-withies”
Peacemaker: “That’s racist”
the Romantic montage.
Oh and by the by, there was a Harley romantic montage in the first one too… just saying…
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The movie delivered exactly what I expected and was entertained. If you’re someone who didn’t enjoy Gunn’s GotG movies then there’s no reason to think you’d enjoy an R-rated version of his Suicide Squad, though.
It wasn’t a brilliant movie by any means. It was even downright lazy at times. Bloodsport and Deadshot were basically the same character right down to their core motivation. But I still enjoyed the absurdity of it. Especially seeing a giant Starro smashing a city. Ridiculous, silly nonsense. I didn’t want anything more.
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Oh and by the by, there was a Harley romantic montage in the first one too… just saying…
A romantic montage that leaned into the absurdity and ridiculousness of the situation. Whereas in the first one, we were supposed to take gangster Joker seriously.
You don’t have to like every joke in the new one, but if you can’t see the fundamental differences between what wants to be a hardboiled gangster action movie (and somebody tried to spray some jokes onto it because of Deadpool’s success) and what’s more of a comedic splatter action movie, I don’t know what to tell you.
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I do believe they have a somewhat different approach. Not completely far off from each other though. I can’t really argue that SUICIDE SQUAD was really in the crime movie genre. It’s obviously a superhero action movie, but it does take itself as seriously as any other DC movie at that time and there was very little comedy other than some sarcastic dialogue in the context of the story. It’s certainly more serious than Lethal Weapon or Die Hard – – and that’s an understandable approach when it’s about murderers recruited by the government to perform illegal and definitely immoral operations “for the greater good.”
THE SUICIDE SQUAD, on the other hand, is absolutely a comedy. Far more a comedy than Lethal Weapon or Die Hard (or even Die Hard 3 which was hilarious) and more like DEADPOOL. Much more a comedy than the Harley Quinn & The Birds of Prey movie or any of the Guardians of the Galaxy movies were.
I personally didn’t feel either the original or the sequel actually achieved whatever they were trying to be, though. I didn’t really like either film better than the other — but I didn’t think either film was really very good. Objectively, though, I understood what the sequel was going for much more than what the original was. The premise of the films actually leans much more toward the nihilistic, film noir approach while Suicide Squad ends up going for the triumphant “save the world from a sky beam” finale common to almost all superhero movies at the time. The Suicide Squad goes for a more absurd “save the world from a giant space starfish” finale, so points for a bit of originality.
However, most of the jokes didn’t land for me – – the timing was usually off – – though conceptually I could see why they’d be funny. Also, of course, the real world timing of the release was terrible. It’s a movie with adolescent humor that adolescents can’t see in the cinema, and to be honest, I think this really is a time where people do want escapism that the whole family can enjoy.
Maybe FREE GUY will make more of an impact as far as people actually going out to see a movie.
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Speaking of sky beams :)
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Maybe FREE GUY will make more of an impact as far as people actually going out to see a movie.
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Just saw it.
I agree with most of the postings here and this won’t be a rehash.
All my phobias of huge objects, being flooded with rats, gory blood were all there in their glory.
Somewhere in the movie is a political commentary of how under handed the US is, the government involvement with lesser developed countries, covert operations, use of disposable people, how nonchalant the US office is in conducting such operations, what else?
I can see some of it taking after GotG with that shark thing being like Groot.
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Like Deadpool (and even moreso with Deadpool 2), the movie is a desperate risky move by WB and that encourages throwing every damn thing against the wall. At the same time, the movie itself seemed fairly pedestrian exactly because… Deadpool already went there. And Guardians, for that matter. At a time when the argument for actually going out to see a movie in a theater is literally — well, potentially — life-threatening (if you pay attention to the news, at least), SUICIDE SQUAD doesn’t quite get there.
I’m sorry to say it, but I’m pretty sure that movies where the main characters are not only likable but are also objectively “good” people are what people will be willing to see… and maybe some horror movies because the fake scares of film are much more enjoyable than the real terrors of real life in a plague. Suicide Squad members are rogues — and not very committed rogues actually – – and few of them are actually funny. Ryan Reynolds at least has his timing down. As good an actress as Margot Robbie is, she is not a comic. They don’t have the funny bone.
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Finally watched this today as it started streaming on NowTV here.
I thought it was tons of fun, really dynamic and colourful and visually captivating. One of the few comicbook movies that’s really like a comic come to life. Idris and Robbie were great as expected but I also thought John Cena was really good, and very funny – the first time I’ve really liked him in anything.
This was a good Boxing Day watch, very silly and light (despite the graphic violence) and far removed from the overly serious vibe of some of the DC movies.
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