The Suicide Squad (2021) - Violence bloody violence!

It’s been 5 years since DC’s first offering of the famous Suicide Squad on the big screen, with audiences being divided on it, thanks to Warner Brothers taking the reins away from the creative team and forcing reshoots upon them. But now they’ve managed to borrow him from MARVEL, can James Gunn gives us a more pleasing film for these villainous misfits.

And as it’s clear from the responses so far from critics and audiences alike, the answer is obviously yes. This film is what we should’ve got back in 2016, and it only needed the crazy mind of James Gunn to bring it to life. From start to finish, this film oozes fun, chaos and violence. So… much… glorious violence! It’s great to see a comic book film making use of the higher age ratings. Not every comic book film needs to target kids to be successful. As has been clear with the success of Deadpool, these comic book franchises have finally began to let characters linked to bloody violence and strong language finally have film ratings that give them the freedom to do just that. And with this film, it’s been very beneficial. You’ve got blood, guts, carnage and enough glorious swearing that will make the average “road rager” blush

Some may call the gory violence to be extreme overkill, but these people are far from the truth. True, there is a lot of scenes of people being shot, decapitated and ripped to shreds, but the way it is presented is the fun and goofy kind of gore. You don’t sit there cringing at the horrific action on screen, instead it brings a big goofy smile to the faces of its audiences, while they are busting their guts from laughter. If you can’t watch a crazed lady in red stab a giant starfish in the eye and laugh, you probably just lack a funny bone.

The cast are first class, with Margot Robbie and Idris Elba being excellent leads to the film. Margot continues to embody the lovable insanity that makes Harley Quinn such a fun character to watch. This is by far her stand out performance as the character, and it just makes me want to see more of her. Idris Elba also has a lot of fun with this story and his character, while embracing the material very seriously. He’s given more to do here than what MARVEL gave him when he was part of the Thor franchise. He’s got more range and depth, and I actually feel invested in his character. I also want to give a lot of praise to Viola Davis and John Cena as Amanda Waller and Peacemaker. While they weren’t the stand outs for me, they still gave excellent performances, and each had stand out moments, which demonstrated that they were perfect for their respective roles.

An additional moment of praise should go to 24 year old Portuguese actress, Daniela Melchior, who’s performance as Cleo Cazo, also known as Ratcatcher was exceptional. It goes to show how much the up and coming young talent can stand up when alongside some of Hollywood’s biggest names. Giving performers like Melchior the chance to shine will mean we always have more exciting talent to discover and follow. This is an even bigger achievement for Melchior with this being her first English-language theatrical film role, which just goes to show how much talent she has to show off to the world. I can’t wait to see what she does next.

The production design and cinematography is so unique to this film. Not just because it’s well lit and colourful, something DC hasn’t had the greatest track record of in the last 10 years, but because the colour pallet has it’s own unique look to it. I in particular love the way in which the colour white was utilised by cinematographer, Henry Braham. Most films in general try to avoid too much bright white as it’s usually a resulting of over-exposing the camera lens, but here it’s a beautifully unique aspect of this film’s look. The design of the costumes and the creatures in this film is just as bright and goofy as you’d want it to be. The music is primarily built upon a trope Gunn used on his two previous Guardians Of The Galaxy films for MARVEL, mainly consisting of a jukebox musical style, with various pre-existing songs being used in particular parts of the film. This was also done in the previous attempt at a Suicide Squad film, but here it works much better, as it matches the lively and colourful way the film is presented, unlike the 2016 version, where the drab and uninteresting look couldn’t be saved by throwing these random and uninspired songs at us.

It’s great to finally have an amazing film about The Suicide Squad. Gunn gave this film everything he had, and it goes to show how talent within this industry can expand across studios, genres and even franchises. Had James Gunn not been temporarily sacked by MARVEL, we would’ve missed out on this exceptional film, and I wouldn’t have my new favourite superhero film. You heard me, Sod off Into The Spider-Verse!

SCORES

Story - 5/5

Characters - 5/5

Production - 5/5

Acting - 5/5

Music - 5/5

TOTAL - 10/10