The Suicide Squad (2021) UMR Stats

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UMR Review of The Suicide Squad (2017)

What is this one about? Supervillains Harley Quinn, Bloodsport, Peacemaker and a collection of nutty cons at Belle Reve prison join the super-secret, super-shady Task Force X as they are dropped off at the remote, enemy-infused island of Corto Maltese.

Why I watched it? My second oldest son wanted to watch this with me. The reviews were pretty stellar and the trailer looked interesting.

My thoughts on this one? First of all, I enjoyed it a lot more than I did 2016’s Suicide Squad. I actually have a hard time remembering what the first Suicide Squad’s mission was.

This is the closest a DC movie has felt like a Marvel movie. James Gunn, the director of the Marvel Guardians of the Galaxy movies, moves to DC to direct this one. I noticed a lot of Guardians of the Galaxy and Marvel influences in this one. Gunn’s uses lots of pop music in this one (just like he does in Guardians), uses some Guardian cast members, uses Marvel regular Idris Elba, borrows heavily from Deadpool 2 and has a fun tone versus the normal heavy handed tone of DC movies. Heck it even has two characters that seem like Rocket (called Weasel in this one) and Groot (called King Shark with Stallone as the voice).

So is the movie any good? I liked most of the movie. There are lots of funny scenes in this one. For the first time for me, Margot Robbie as Harley Quinn, was fun to watch. Elba shines as the leader of the group. John Cena for most of the movie was a blast to watch. So lots of good stuff here. My biggest complaint was the final 20 to 30 minutes of the movie. To me the movie goes completely off the rails. Granted we have to have a big CGI finale but turning the movie into a Ghostbusters, Godzilla, zombie movie was more boring than exciting.

Final thought: I liked the movie, I would watch it again…..but I think it could have been a great movie with a better conclusion.