Suicide Squad is a terrible film. It’s poorly directed, it’s poorly written, it’s poorly acted (some of the bad acting is the fault of the script, which doesn’t have a good moment in it, some of it’s just the actors), it’s terribly photographed, edited, it’s got lousy special effects, it’s this kind of bad, it’s that kind of bad.
Suicide Squad is the pits of mainstream motion pictures–though, you take a movie about a bunch of comic book supervillains and give them lame, pseudo-edgy back stories, and try to entertain the eight year old boys seeing it, with director Ayer and his risibly inept crew, what else could it be? From the first few minutes–outside a couple decent flashback sets (not shots, not scenes, just the sets)–it’s clear the film’s terrible. Once it’s clear Viola Davis is going to have a terribly written role and be terrible in it–you can see the pain of accepting the role in her eyes–there’s nothing to look forward to in the film.
Almost every performance is either bad or awful. Scott Eastwood has about four lines and is background scenery the rest of the time, but he’s far better than most of the other actors. Cara Delevingne is easily the worst performance in the film, followed by Joel Kinnaman as her love interest and the guy who bosses all the supervillains on their lame mission (Ayer’s script is crap at exposition, it’s crap at character development, it’s crap at plotting).
You know, let’s go through the performances bad to best. I might be able to handle that approach, because otherwise the reaction to Suicide Squad is to never want to see another film again. It’s such a disservice to the medium.
Worst is actually Jared Leto, not Delevingne. Delevingne’s awful, but Leto’s far worse. His Joker isn’t crazy, just a blinged-out crime lord who doesn’t so much commit crime as fetishize committing crime. In clubs. Where girlfriend Margot Robbie pole dances. She used to be his psychiatrist. Robbie seems way too young to have gone from clinical psychologist to deranged “queen of crime,” but there are far more obviously deficiencies as far as her character goes. Director Ayer relishes objectifying her; along with the casual violent misogyny and occasional but consistent racist jokes, Robbie betrays Ayer’s target audience: immature male viewers stupid enough to think his movie is cool. Because Suicide Squad isn’t even chilly. Not at its most outlandish moments does it even approach chilly, Ayer’s really bad at directing his bad script. His photographer–Roman Vasyanov–is incompetent at shooting it. His editor, John Gilroy, can’t cut it either. Though Gilroy gets the closest to a pass because it’s not like there are any good takes or setups.
Back to the actors. Leto’s the worst, then Delevingne, then Kinnaman. At that point it starts to get a little confusing. Robbie’s not good. Her part’s lousy, Ayer’s direction of her is lousy, but she never gets a good moment across either. Maybe because Ayer really enjoys victimizing her throughout. Oh, Adam Beach. He likes to hit women. Though he’s convincing in the role. He doesn’t do anything else really.
Maybe sorting the performances isn’t a good idea. There a lot of crappy supporting ones too.
The least embarrassed actor is Jai Courtney. He doesn’t have enough material and his “manic” character is barely around enough to leave an impression, good or bad. He’s trying though. Jay Hernandez is also trying. He’s got a lot of terrible material, but he does try. Will Smith isn’t as bad as he could be. He’s got some bad dialogue and a dumb character arc, but he’s better than most of his costars. Ike Barinholtz is terrible. Sure, his part of abusive sadist is thin, but he’s still bad.
Suicide Squad is an abject waste of time. It’s not well-made in any way, its only surprises come from Ayer’s constant inabilities to direct any of his crap screenplay. The saddest thing about the film is its existence at all. It’s embarrassing it could get made. Any Warner Bros. executives with their fingerprints on this piece of excrement should take the Long Walk as an act of contrition.
Given “The Banana Splits” were a thing in the late sixties, some dated references in Suicide Squad/The Banana Splits Special might make sense. But writer Tony Bedard doesn’t go for sixties or seventies jokes; instead, it’s mid-nineties racial jokes. The Banana Splits reinventing themselves gangsta rap is far less problematic than when the cops are shooting at them because cops don’t care about “Animal Americans.” The editors of the book, who work on the far better Hanna-Barbera books, clearly don’t bring anything to those better books if they let that kind of crud through. Otherwise, it’s lame with mild amusements. Harley Quinn and the Elephant are cute. Ditto Killer Croc and the monkey (almost). Ben Caldwell and Mark Morales’s art is fine, but it’s not like it needs to do much.
