I tried to watch this with an open mind but the film was barely two minutes in before I started rolling my eyes.
Christ, where do I start with this thing? Okay, the music. The audience response to James Gunn's Guardians Of The Galaxy and the reaction to the trailers for Suicide Squad clearly informed the decision to cover this film with random popular songs. But in Guardians, the music had a purpose. It was linked to the story and the characters and it was thematic. The music in the trailers for Suicide Squad help sell a style and you end up with a snappy, memorable teaser. But in the context of the film, they don't work. At all. If their aim was to make me hate these songs, then congratulations, they succeeded. What's worse is a new song starts every few minutes with every new scene or character introduction. They distract from what's going on on-screen.
Secondly, the structure. There's little to none. We have around 20 minutes of introductions to various members of the Squad in which Viola Davis explains their purpose about three different times to the same people. We get it, they're bad, they're disposable. They're a SUICIDE SQUAD! The clue is in the name. And then, when you think they're done introducing characters, more turn up! Too many characters. Most of them have next to no purpose. Following that they're off to some battle and that's it. That's the film. Introductions and climax. Sounds like bad sex and that's what it is. All promise and no pay-off. Any character development is reserved for flashbacks, full of obvious dialogue and repeated tropes of dead loved ones and disappointed children. I assumed the film's length was to accommodate all the characters but in actual fact the film could have been shorter by half an hour based on the fuck all that actually happens. One thing you could have removed was any scene with the Joker in. They clearly chucked him in because he's a popular character but he added nothing to the story. You could argue that he's integral to Harley Quinn's backstory but they barely used him for that. Then there's a side-plot where he's trying to rescue Harley from her fate as part of the Suicide Squad but that's over so fast that it's meaningless. He adds absolutely nothing to the story, and to be frank, I hate every scene with him in. Which leads me on to the performances.
Just about everyone was awful. Everyone was doing an imitation of these characters but I've seen better performances from cosplayers and I'm not even kidding. Jared Leto, who we know is an incredible actor, was just terrible. It was like he was trying to combine every Joker performance ever but from some notes someone gave him. What the hell was going on with Cara Delevingne's character? A God with some sort of incredible power but she needs to know how to stop earth's armies? And what was with her weird dancing at the end as she delivered her monologue? And who was doing the voiceover for her at that point? It sounded like Cate Blanchett in Lord Of The Rings. I don't understand. On the slightly more positive side, Viola Davis did a decent job with the script she was given, as did Will Smith but it must have been a struggle for them because the script might be the worst thing about this film. The dialogue is obvious, repetitive, expositional. My favourite being the army guy saying "We have to cut out her heart, then we can kill her." Then two minutes later when the heart is out, "Her heart is out, we can kill her now." Brilliant. Cheers.
I'm ranting. I know. But I don't care. It's an ugly film. There's no significant shots. I always try to find an interesting image to put in with my reviews. I put time into it. But I couldn't find anything decent so I had to go with an image everyone is using. Speaking of imagery, the CGI is appalling which is significant when so much of the film is CGI. It's a mess and I think the filmmakers know it. They seem to try and appease the audience with cameos and references to other DC products but they were uninteresting and made no impact.
Whether you like comic book movies, are a big fan of DC or indifferent to it all, there's denying this film is bad. And if you're fan of comic book movies and the characters from DC then you should be upset that the stuff you love is being handled this badly just to make a profit. Stop defending these filmmakers and the studio. Stop giving them your money. They don't care about you or these characters.