The DCCU Superman problem

Superman is my favorite superhero. Plain and simple. I am always on the side of Superman when it comes to a who would win in a fight argument and I also think he’s a great character that a lot of stories can be pulled out of if only he’s given the chance.

The unfortunate thing is, there haven’t been nearly enough really good Superman movies, at least not for a good decade or two.

I personally love Man of Steel and think it’s one of my favorite Superhero movies. I like the original movies (first two) enough, but I always thought they were a little boring and made for a different era. And at the end of the day I don’t hate Superman Returns, but it definitely wasn’t the movie that I wanted.

I talked a little bit about this in my Suicide Squad rant on the Joker and the same goes for Superman. We are lucky enough to live in a world where we can expect multiple outings with this character. In the past, Superman had one big movie every so often and yes, it was a spectacle, but it didn’t feel like he was a part of a larger world. With this DC Cinematic Universe (I know the official acronym is DCECU, but I’m always going to just call it the DCCU), we suddenly get the opportunity for Superman, and the rest of the DC heroes to interact and be heroes in a larger world.

Here’s the issue though… Batman v Superman happened.

Now I will probably be the first to jump to this movie’s defense. I don’t think it’s as god awfully horrible as everyone thinks it is. It definitely isn’t good, but I still have fun watching it, the ultimate cut helps it not be as much of a structural train wreck, and I can recognize the strokes of genius that were in it that weren’t fully realized.

But the biggest issue I see with Batman v Superman, regardless of whether or not you are watching the theatrical cut or the Ultimate edition, is that it wasn’t focused enough on Clark Kent/Superman. Batman v Superman had so many lofty goals that got in the way of actually developing Superman as a hero, Clark Kent as a person, and the entire character as just that, a character. They were so focused on the cash cow that is Batman, introducing Wonder Woman, hinting at the Justice League, doing whatever they did with Lex Luthor, and so much more that they forgot to develop the one character who started this all and the one we’re the most familiar with, Superman.  

Now we had some good news last week that DC is putting all cylinders forward to make a sequel to Man of Steel and actually give another movie dedicated to Superman again.

However, the previous movies do not exactly put Superman in a great position to be a good character, and it looks like this standalone film will be more of a way to take back some of the mistakes instead of actually making Superman a good character. It’s not impossible and I would hope that this all falls into the master plan of the execs   at Warner Brothers and DC. But here are a couple of reasons why Superman is at a disadvantage going into his standalone film.

1. He’s a bruiting alien instead of a conflicted but symbolic demi-god.

The first issue that DC shot themselves in the foot with is how they went about the creation of the character of Superman in this cinematic universe.

Now don’t get me wrong, I like the direction that they took with Superman in Man of Steel. It’s a good mixture of the Christopher Reeves Superman, who dealt more with the duality of being a man and an alien, and a newer approach where Superman is basically a demi-god and how will he deal with those powers.

DC wants to display the Justice League like a modern pantheon of Greek Gods which sounds awesome, but they also want to follow the model of the Christopher Nolan Dark Knight trilogy and make these heroes bruiting and conflicted. The reality is, you can do both.

I’m not one to think that Henry Cavil’s Superman needs to be a campy hero, representing Truth, justice, and the American Way of Life in every sentence he has. This is a different world and therefore a different Superman. But at the same time, you can have a conflicted demi-god not sure of how to deal with his powers, and you can have someone who brings hope, someone who people would look up to, someone who can have some fun figuring out who he is. I mean Damn, Henry Cavill has a fantastic smile, let him smile for once in these movies!

When he’s saving people in BvS, he looks like it’s both the most profound thing that has ever happened and also the world’s worst torture! I get that they tried to create this political debate of what Superman is, God or Demon, but why does he look so down trodden when he saves people in BvS?

Again, I’m not saying this Superman needs to be making campy jokes about flying is still the safest way to travel or winking to the camera as he flies by, but the entire political dilemma in BvS was whether or not Superman is a Savior or an Alien. They did a very good job at pointing out why he’s a dangerous villain, show why he’s a savior and why he inspires people.

But the biggest challenge with Superman in the future is, his experiences in these movies have not changed him at all. And one event in particular that should have been the crux of his character had absolutely no effect on anything.

2. Killing Zod didn’t have any impact on the character or on BvS.

I know a lot of people had an issue with the ending of Man of Steel where Superman is forced to snap General Zod’s neck in order to save some innocent people. I actually found this to be one of the best parts of the movie because it showed the resolve of General Zod and that he could not be stopped. It showed the struggle of Kal-El as saving humanity means turning his back on Krypton, putting consequences to his statement, “Krypton had its chance”. And finally, it made Superman a relatable character of having to deal with the calamity of his powers and making him decide what kind of hero he’s going to be. Can he kill those who get in his way? If he does what does that mean for him as a character? All these questions were posed to be expanded on in Batman v Superman and could have been used in tandem with how Kal-El wants to deal with Batman.

Unfortunately, that goes out the window for this…

While there is a little bit of personal struggle for Superman, especially in the Ultimate Cut where Clark must decide what kind of hero, if he’s going to be one at all, he’s going to be, BvS undercuts that development by not fully developing the reason Superman wants to fight Batman, and making it all about wanting to “SAVE MARTHA”.

Furthermore, Clark never mentions Zod, or the fact that he’s the last known Kryptonian, or any of the events from Man of Steel. Why? Because it didn’t matter. That scene where Superman is forced to

kill Zod and he cries out in anguish because of what he was just forced to do… yeah never mentioned again. Superman didn’t kill nearly as many people as Batman did in Batman v Superman, but there was no growth or signs  that having to extinguish the last remnant of his home world had any effect on him. And that’s a missed opportunity.

Of course it’s not all on the character of Superman. Showing how past experiences and having him actually inspired people is easy. Unfortunately Batman v Superman had other factors that hurt the character.

3. Jesse Eisenberg is Lex Luthor

I am in a very small minority that thinks that Jesse Eisenberg is not worst thing in BvS and instead is like 2^nd or 3^rd worst. I actually didn’t hate the performance and I understood his motivations more than other people did. But Jesse Eisenberg playing the character and how that character is written in Batman v Superman really under cuts not only the movie and the future of that character, but it also undercuts Superman.

Lex Luthor is the arch nemesis of Superman. He is the best known villain and he’s everything Superman isn’t. Superman uses his strength, Lex uses his mind. Superman fights for good, Lex fights for evil. Superman is a farm boy from Kansas, Lex is a business man from Metropolis. And I’ll be honest, I didn’t think Eisenberg was a horrible choice as it could only further that contrast where Superman is big and strong man, Lex is a… small and weak weasel?

I’m not an expert when it comes to the comics, I don’t know every little intricacy of a lot of characters including Lex Luthor, but I do know that Lex was a suave charismatic businessman. He’s basically Batman except he trades in crime fighting vigilantism for influence and power. Yes he has gotten into the robot suit, but his style is more influencing others to defeat Superman for him. And that’s something that could have been utilized in Batman v Superman… except for the fact that Lex Luthor could have been left out of that movie and Batman still would have wanted to fight Superman. Sure there was a really complex plan orchestrated by Lex Luthor, but at the end of the day, I didn’t see Lex as a formidable foe to Superman, I saw him as a crazy, whiney little boy.

And it would be one thing if the only issue with Lex Luthor was the fact that Jesse Eisenberg, a small weasel like person is playing him. Performances can be workshopped and characters can be changed to work better in the future, but when the writing is working against this character and his ultimate comparison to the Man of Steel, suddenly it becomes a bigger issue.

At the end of BvS, He’s headed to Arkham Asylum raving mad about the bells or something, obviously referring to the coming of Darkseid and Apocalypse. But where does that put him as the arch nemesis of Superman. In the future, instead of fighting the suave businessman, Superman will more than likely fight against a raving lunatic. Instead of trying to fight a man who at one point runs for President like a Donald Trumpian super villain, he’s turning into the Joker or The Riddler behind bars in Arkham Asylum.

If Lex Luthor had been a charismatic character and kept his sanity at the end of BvS, sending him to Arkham could have been an interesting choice. He’s obviously not insane and instead of the inmates of Arkham being a horror for Luthor set up by Batman, he could have turned that around and been the king of Arkham, having a whole new rogues gallery to use against Batman and Superman in his grand scheme. But no, he’s just crazy and ranting about bells. If Lex had been a sane villain, I would have been disappointed he didn’t show up in Suicide Squad to manipulate the Squad or play manipulation games with Amanda Waller. After BvS, I’m glad he was nowhere near that movie.

And the worst of it all is, Superman suffers because his arch nemesis, the Mastermind of his rogue’s gallery, isn’t Lex Luthor. Its sniveling snot nose Jesse Eisenberg. And the unfortunate part is the solution for this one isn’t easy.

DC could recast but what would that say to Jesse Eisenberg who, regardless of whether you liked him or not, put all the hard work and enthusiasm into the project. And furthermore, how do you explain the sudden change in not only appearance, but demeanor. On the other hand, you could just leave Lex Luthor out of future movies. But how can you have a universe where Superman exists without Lex Luthor.

The best outcome we can hope for is the fact that this is “Lex Luthor Jr.” and Bryan Cranston appears as his father, or the real Lex Luthor to make that disappointment disappear.

4. Doomsday was in Batman v Superman (and died)

Doomsday is definitely the point in the movie where you know they jumped the shark. They

reference this science experiment gone wrong once in the beginning when Lex gets Zod’s body, and then it doesn’t show up again until the end when Zack Snyder thought we needed a big boss fight, as if the fight between Batman and Superman wasn’t enough.

On top of that, it’s something the movie should have kept hidden as it was a huge plot point that gave away the entire story.

But Doomsday being an issue for the future of the Superman character is more the fact that instead of any other possibility like Superman punching him to a different planet, or Lex holding onto him until the end credit scene, they decided to go full on Death of Superman with this monstrosity and Doomsday was killed.

Instead of being a monstorous Doomsday for the world and Superman’s greatest foe yet, Doomsday was a cave troll that was killed off faster than he was brought to life.

Of course there is always the possibility that this monster could be reborn, but like Lex Luthor, its going to come off as desperate to remedy mistakes of previous films and that is hard to do.

But it affects Superman because Doomsday is his ultimate foe. He is his Doomsday. And that’s not a villain call a Cave troll and throw him into the last 30 minutes of the movie. That is a villain that deserves time, effort, and his own damn movie! Maybe he’s not the main villain, but he at least needs to be developed more than he was in BvS.  

I don’t know DC’s plan. But the best solution is to keep Doomsday dead for quite a while, and IF you bring him back, you better have a really good explanation for this characters sudden reappearance as well as a convincing back story to make him the formidable foe that Superman deserves.

However, this is all makes not difference, as the real missed opportunity and the biggest misstep in the entire DC cinematic universe right now is…

5. Superman is Dead

I’ve talked about this before in my review of Batman v Superman but I want to double tap it, especially how it puts Superman at a really awkward spot when it comes around time to his standalone outing.

Not only is Superman dead, a hero who we never really got to know that well. But so is Clark Kent. The end of BvS shows a funeral for both Superman and Clark Kent and all I could do when that was happening was just be pissed off because of how badly DC screwed up.

Let’s talk about the death of Clark Kent. Now Clark Kent is not exactly the most intriguing alter ego for a super hero because in reality, Clark Kent is very much the secret identity of Superman, not the other way around. (See Bill’s monologue in Kill Bill Vol 2). So I can maybe understand the thought that Clark Kent isn’t that vital to the Superman storyline. However, this is not true and an incredible missed opportunity. Clark Kent is what humanizes Superman. He is an alien living in a human world and he must ride that fine line to be both a demi-god and a human. If they were going to extrapolate a little bit on the Superman story, why not develop Clark Kent more, make him a more intriguing character and let him have a little bit of a story as opposed to just being the Secret Identity for Superman.

But you can’t now because he’s dead. And yeah, bringing Superman back to life is easy, all you have to do is show a few specks of dirt rising from his grave and nobody is going to question a superhero like Superman coming back from the grave. But if Clark Kent suddenly appears alive, what’re people going to think? How’re they going to play that?

So maybe Superman just doesn’t have an alter ego. Maybe Clark Kent just stays dead. So you don’t want to see Clark Kent responding to danger, running out onto the street pulling his shirt away to reveal the S. Okay, you stay in your world of denial.

I just think Clark Kent is quintessential to the character of Superman, especially if you’re going to humanize him more and make Man of Steel 2 a solid sequel. And now that movie is at a disadvantage because someone thought it was a good idea to kill off Superman in his second movie…

THANKS ZACH!

But then let’s talk about the actual death of Superman. Putting aside the fact that you shoehorned in one of the best story lines of the Superman comics into a movie that was supposed to just be about Batman and Superman, killing off Superman now really negates any opportunity to kill him off again.

It negates any kind of emotional connection to the character and makes it impossible for the audience to feel any connection with any future deaths, because if he came back again, he can definitely come back again.

And that’s a web DC needs to avoid very quickly and it’s the web of death. If you kill off characters, give them very sad deaths, only to bring them back or point towards them coming back 10 minutes later, you’ve negated all the feelings I had when I watched them die.

A prime example of this is Loki from the Thor movies.

In both Thor 1 and 2, Loki has these very touching moments where you think he dies. In the first Thor movie, it’s the moment when Odin denounces him and he lets go falling into the abyss because he realizes he’s the villain. It’s a sad moment, especially with the brother and brother, father and son

dynamic going on in that movie... but then 10 minutes later he’s alive again. Then in Thor 2, he sacrifices himself bravely to save Thor, finally getting his redemption before dying in Thor’s arms… and then 10 minutes later he’s alive again, and not only that, he’s looking like he’s pulling off some evil plot, negating any feelings I had of him being redeemed.

Nick Fury is another example. In Captain America: The Winter Soldier. Nick Fury seemed like the right person to be killed off and his death put stakes on the mission ahead of Cap and his friends… until he’s suddenly alive. Nick Fury wasn’t even fake dead for that long. And that could have been its own movie, Sam Jackson as Nick Fury off the grid! But no, he just comes back in Age of Ultron as if nothing had happened.

So DC, now that Superman has been killed off and is definitely coming back, how am I supposed to connect to that death in BvS when I know he’s coming back in Justice League, how am I supposed to feel any stakes to any future fight Superman is in, when I know he can just come back. You already have a superhero which people think is too OP. You already have a superhero who people think is a trump card. How can he be relatable when he can’t be killed?

I’m not saying it can’t be done, and I’ll talk about some possible solutions to this problem but I’m saying BvS shot Superman in the foot and told him to run real fast. It’s not impossible, but it’s going to be very difficult for it to be a good run. (this is in a world where Superman is human and shooting him in the foot would actually do something).

That’s a lot of issues, and they’re all really given an exclamation point with this last reason why the standalone Superman movie is screwed from the start…

6. DC doesn't know what direction they want to go with Superman.

Or at least that’s what it seems.

I will give them a little bit of slack, there are a lot of possibilities. There have been so many comics, so many iterations of Superman that the sky is really the limit (and that’s not even the limit as Superman can go in space so there’s a whole other possibility).

But while there are a lot of possibilities, DC hasn’t convinced me that they have an actual plan to make those possibilities work for them. Superhero movies have the advantage and disadvantage of being a little bit predictable. On top of that, they’re pulling from comic books so you can look into original material and predict what storyline is going to be used. This works for them in the way that the audience can identify and enjoy these films because they feel like they possibly know what’s going to happen and predict how their favorite storylines are going to be used. But they are also unpredictable because you don’t really know what kind of plans studios have up their sleeve so while Superhero movies are fun to predict, you’re never one hundred percent right. Even if they use a well-known comic book story, they’re going to adapt it for a movie. Days of Future Past has a similar set up than the actual comic but in reality is nothing like the comic.

The issue is, I have no idea what direction DC is headed. And for a while, that was exciting to me. I didn’t know what BvS was going to be about because it wasn’t pulling directly from a particular source. I’m not familiar with the Suicide Squad comics so I have no idea what kinds of stories they were trying to tell. The problem is, I’m not sure DC knows what they’re going to pull from next. It almost seems like they’re pulling random comic titles from a hat and saying, yeah let’s throw that on their. BvS is a good example of that because it has elements from The Dark Knight Returns in it, but it’s also a pseudo sequel to Man of Steel, but it’s also starting the Justice League, but it also pulls from the Death of Superman, but it also is a Wonder Woman introduction, and all the while its BATMAN versus SUPERMAN, which should have been the singular focus the entire time. These story lines weren’t good in the comics because they were all connected (which they weren’t), they were good because they were individual stories that were developed and sound stories that people really enjoyed!

One of the big issues with both BvS and Suicide Squad is that both movies feel very edited and cut. BvS needed a 3 hour long version just so all the stories made sense. Suicide Squad feels very edited and there are tons of scenes they cut from that film, so much that Jared Leto is kind of pissed right now because they filmed so much of him and he’s barely in the movie. The thing is, a lot of these scenes that are being cut out contribute to story lines that could be their own movie. The origin of Harley Quinn and the story Mad Love could be its own movie. The Death of Superman should have been its own movie. But for some reason, DC feels like they need to cram as much into these movies as humanly possible and its hurting them because their movies feel sliced and diced and need directors cuts to make them feel complete.

So how does this relate to Superman? I will discuss that, and some solutions to all the problems that create problems for a Superman standalone film in my second part as this rant has gone on way too long.

But did I miss anything? Do you think there are some other issues that make a Superman standalone movie difficult? Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as your requests for movies I should review in the future, as well as things I should discuss on this blog. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates of future movie news and reviews that I post in the future.

I'll leave you with this. Just to show the vast history of this character, here's a video they made during the 75th anniversary of the character. Enjoy!

Suicide Squad: What did I think of the Joker?

In many ways, Jared Leto as the Joker was a bigger deal than any other casting news that ever came out of Suicide Squad or any of the DC movies, save Ben Affleck as Batman. As much as I am a huge Superman fan and I want this new DC cinematic universe to center around him (and believe me, I am going to do a post on Superman in the DCCU), I understand that a lot of DC’s fandom comes from one character and his rogues gallery, and that character is definitively Batman.

There is a reason why every Batman movie there has ever been has been more about his villains than about him and that’s because the villains in the Batman universe are absolutely spectacular. They epitomize the criminal psyche and they’re not just bad guys, they’re psychological representations of the worst of the worst in our world. And front and center is the crown prince of Crime, the Joker.

There’s a great video that was put out recently on Youtube done by the Film Theorist (Link to his Youtube Page here). He does a great video on the different representations of The Joker throughout all of his cinematic outings. In a Cliff Notes version, here’s the basic breakdown.

In the comics there have been three versions of the Joker. Those versions correspond with each era of comic books (Gold, Silver, Bronze, and Modern) that that particular Joker appeared in.

You have the Joker from the Golden Age of Comics which portrayed the Joker as a criminal mastermind, interested in money and expanding his criminal enterprise while broadcasting his evil plots on TV and still making practical jokes out of his otherwise brutal killings.

Then you have the Joker from the Silver Age of Comics when Comic books were subject to censorship rules and in turn were more kid friendly and less violent. The Joker also took a more kid friendly turn and became more of a practical joker as opposed to a criminal. He played actual jokes on Batman and never killed anybody.

And then you have the Bronze and Modern Age Joker which, after the censorship laws were overturned, turned into a Psychotic agent of chaos. Instead of being interested in money like his Golden Age counterpart, The Joker is instead interested in causing chaos and seeing himself as the ying to Batman’s yang.

The Film Theorist’s theory is that each representation of The Joker in film corresponds with a particular version from the comics. Jack Nicholson’s Joker is more of a gangster with a psychotic twist, therefore he is the Golden Age Joker. Caesar Romero is a prankster with a kid friendly twist so he’s definitely the Silver Age Joker. And Heath Ledger’s Joker is the psychopath, or the Bronze/Modern Age Joker. The last video left us with a cliff hanger ending, waiting for MatPat to tell us where Jared Leto’s Joker falls into. I’m linking that video at the end of this post and do check out The Film Theorist’s videos as well as his Video Game Theories.

The reason I bring this up is because there is a rich history of the character. The film theory video only touches on the cinematic interpretations of The Joker when there have been multiple people who have played the character in video games and the animated shows. But these  versions of the character didn’t just have great talent behind them, they were incredibly written and a lot of thought was put into them. While I’m not sure how intentional each distinction was, it has blended incredibly from Romero to Ledger.

My long winded point is that Leto had very, VERY big shoes to fill. So how did he do?

And the answer is… I don’t really know.

Really, I can’t be one hundred percent certain on whether or not I liked this version of The Joker. Its mainly because he was really only in three or four scenes of the movie.

And I guess when I first saw the movie, besides really not knowing what to think about this interpretation of The Joker, I felt a little bit cheated. The trailers had him front and center, Leto was given top billing, the marketing of this character pushed the idea that he was a quintessential part of the movie, if not the main villain. And while I never thought he was going to be the main villain from what I read about the movie, I was still a little shocked on how little he was in the movie. On top of that, if you read stories about the production of this movie, you’ll find out that Leto went really method on this movie and never broke character.  He would send dead rats and used condoms to his co-stars. All that for 3 scenes in the movie?

Now, if you read more into the production of this movie, especially with recent news from its release, you’ll find that this is a heavily edited movie. According to Leto, there were enough Joker scenes to “make his own Solo Joker Film”. Now I don’t know if that’s necessarily true, but thinking back to the movie, suddenly all those moments where I said the editing was shotty and some of the movie feels a little disjointed, suddenly that makes a lot of sense. The problem I have with this is, this is the second movie in a row that DC has put out that has seemed like an incomplete film. And while David Ayers says that this is his directors cut, hearing news about more scenes just makes me want to get the Blu Ray of Suicide Squad right now so I can see all the deleted scenes and extras if not to get a clearer picture of what I think about Jared Leto’s Joker.

But based on what I saw of the Joker, what did I think?

I’m going to be honest, I’m a little worried. I didn’t hate it, but I also didn’t really love it.

The first thing to say is that I think a lot of people are biased and are going to directly compare jared Leto’s Joker with Heath Ledger. In many people’s minds, especially millennials who experienced Ledger more than Nicholson, Ledger is going to be the quintessential Joker. Ledger was just able to create a character that was terrifying, made you think, and was just an agent of chaos and anarchy that he was a phenomena in himself. Ledger’s untimely death only solidifies a bias I think a lot of people have.

I think, with the limited amount of screen time Leto was given, that is an impossible comparison.

But just based off of his performance in general, I really didn’t know what to make of him. On one hand, he has moments of absolute insanity and you can see how he has the potential to be a dangerously insane individual who would be a formidable match to Batman in future outings, possibly the Batman solo film. But at the same time, there are other scenes where his dialogue comes off as too silly or not menacing enough. On top of that, seeing the Joker as a sort of Godfather character where you kiss his ring and he definitely has some kind of enterprise going for him doesn’t

really blend with the conventions I’ve been used to the Joker as being an agent of chaos. Whereas Ledger’s Joker is like a dog who chases a car and wouldn’t know what to do with it if he caught it, Leto’s Joker catches the car and makes a criminal enterprise out of it. And I’m not sure I’m a fan of that. And his look is included in that. I’m not sure I like the tattoos and gangster look of this Joker. The Wikipedia page of Suicide Squad says the inspiration for the Joker’s look came from Mexican Cartel bosses and the work of Alexander Jodorowsky. I've never put Mexican Gangster and The Joker on the same plane. 

However, what I do like about the tattoos is the idea that there is a story going on there. Both David Ayers and Jared Leto have commented on the possible story that the tattoos tell, I just hope that they point towards future films where we can see those stories be carried out. And regardless of whether or not they have a story, I still think having Damaged tattooed on your forehead is really dumb. 

But that part that doesn’t really work for me with Leto is unfortunately a comparison between him and Ledger.

When Ledger was announced as the Joker and the first pictures came out, I legitimately could not tell that it was Ledger. Maybe it was the scars, maybe it was the makeup, but I could not and sometimes, still can’t pull Heath Ledger from that costume. Leto on the other hand looks like himself but with green hair and clown makeup on. And I thought that could be outweighed by the performance, but again, it was only three or four scenes. It wasn’t enough time to really lay down what kind of Joker Leto is going to be and when he does something, you can’t grasp the direction he’s heading.

Going back to the Film Theory video, it’s a little bit difficult to really figure out where Leto falls in the three interpretations of The Joker from the different ages of comic books. My initial thought is that he’s more of a Golden Age Joker where he’s interested in a criminal enterprise and a psychotic gangster. But at the same time, he’s laying there laughing like a psycho in the beginning of the film. His first scene with Harley telling the story of how he converts her to Harley Quinn paints him as an insane agent of chaos similar to the Bronze/Modern Age. My bets are still on the Golden Age Joker but MatPat, if you’re reading this, have fun developing that theory.

So is there anything that works with this Joker? Yes, there definitely are a couple of things.

First off, while he has moments where he maybe uses the same voice as Ledger (emphasis on

moments), this is a very unique version of The Joker. As many moments that don’t work, there are as many moments that do. Like I said in my spoiler review, I really liked the scene where the Joker hijacks the helicopter to save Harley. Him laughing while spraying bullets around seems like the joker I know and love. Having a purple lambourghini and his costumes are very akin to the Joker I know and am familiar with, pointing towards a more comic book lore based Joker. And hell, even some of the scenes where he’s a gangster were kind of fun and different.

But the part that still gives me hope for Leto’s Joker is his relationship with Harley Quinn.

Their origin story and how they met was one of the most rushed things I have ever seen. I thought they were going to have a grand opening for a really beloved and revered character like The Joker, but instead he just shows up looking like Jared Leto talking to Harley Quinn. However, I did really like the scenes showing their relationship in the beginning. It just makes me want there to be a Harley Quinn movie even more so that meeting can be fleshed out even more! I didn’t necessarily need to see all of the story of Mad Love (Harley Quinn’s origin episode of Batman the animated series) but I want more of how she made that transition from a psychologist to the Joker’s Queen.    

Furthermore, this movie started to develop something that I’m not totally sure other mediums have delved into before when it comes to the relationship between Harley Quinn and The Joker. This is the idea that The Joker actually cares about Harley. In past interactions, whether they have been video games or the animated series, the relationship between the Joker and Harley seemed to always be a one way street. Harley always seemed in love with The joker while the Joker always saw Harley as a means to an end or a way to make the joke funnier. While both those relationships and the one in Suicide Squad are toxic and without a doubt abusive relationships, Suicide Squad at least starts the idea that the Joker has a soft spot for Harley and is going off to save her, not because he wants to keep a toll in his psychotic tool box, but because he legitimately cares about her.

This of course is exemplified in the flashback where he tells Harley to jump into the vat of acid. While he starts to walk away as if the joke is over and he’s just going to let her die, he instead turns around and saves her because he legitimately cares about her. This is an interesting approach and I really hope they develop that more in future movies.

And that’s going to be the real test of Jared Leto’s Joker. Both Nicholson and Ledger’s Jokers ended up being one offs and it made it impossible for them to reprise their role. Leto is being set up to

appear in multiple DC universe movies from here until the end of time. If Margot Robbie gets a Harley Quinn standalone film, I have no doubt the Joker will be a huge part of that. If there is a Batman Standalone film, DC would be stupid not to at least give the Joker an appearance if not make him the main bad guy. Then you have an always expanding DC cinematic universe with all members of the Justice League having their own problems and stories that Leto has the opportunity to be apart of. While he hasn’t been confirmed for any future movies yet, I have no doubt in my mind that we will see Jared Leto as the Joker again and I will be able to give a better analysis on the character and tell you if I like him or not. But the point is, I want to see more.

I may not have been impressed by him in this film but there’s so little to go off that I don’t think anybody is saying this interpretation is horrible yet. The great thing is that this character can be work shopped from the critical response being given and both Leto and the screenwriters can shift fire as needed.

So overall, I think Leto’s Joker needs work. I want to see more of him, and this movie got me excited for future outings with him, especially him and Harley Quinn. But at the same time, I am nervous.

But those are my in depth thoughts on The Joker and that concludes my Spoiler review of Suicide Squad. What do you think of The joker? What do you think worked and what didn’t work for him? Comment and Discuss below! You can also give me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as send me your requests for films I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I’ll leave you with this. Here is the video I was talking about. Check out some of Mathew Patrick’s work as he does a lot of videos on film/video games and some wacky yet intriguing theories on both. Enjoy!

Suicide Squad (Spoiler review)

It’s really interesting how divisive the DC Cinematic Universe movies have been. Man of Steel is personally one of my favorite superhero films, but a lot of people really don’t like it. Batman v Superman is a little less divisive because even hardcore DC fan boys can see the structural issues with it and while I can appreciate the great elements about Batman v Superman, I know it has its problems. And now, Suicide Squad is either loved or hated by fans. I personally really enjoyed it. I realize it’s not a perfect movie, but I had a lot of fun with it and it points towards a really fun future of DC movies coming out soon.

If you look back at Phase 1 of the Marvel Cinematic Universe today, you might realize that in comparison with the kinds of movies that Marvel is putting out now, they really fail in comparison. You have to look at those movies with history’s perspective and realize we were living in a time when good superhero movies were very few and far between. Even the for sure bad ones like Iron Man 2 managed to give us a spectacle that we couldn’t get from movies like Batman and Robin. This is phase 1 of the DC Cinematic Universe. We’re still getting to know new characters and the fans want the Justice League. I’m not saying there isn’t some blame to be cast on directors and producers, but let’s cut them some slack in our critique, because Marvel was in the same boat, we just had a different lens on in 2008.

However, since this is a Spoiler review, I can rip into some glaring issues this movie has without worrying about spoiling anything. And there are some issues with this film.

The first thing worth mentioning is to continue the conversation I started about world building. And that can be talked about with the Batman and Flash cameos at the beginning. My thoughts, Batman’s cameo was great, The Flash’s was weird. Like I mentioned before, Suicide Squad made you feel like there was a criminal underworld of Gotham being tapped into with this movie. And when Amanda Waller mentioned she made a call to the vigilante of Gotham, that’s creating relationships between the government and Batman, the police and Batman, and its creating a weird dysfunctional family between Batman and his criminal underworld that we really haven’t seen yet on the silver screen yet, at least not as expansive as I think they want to make this universe. So I really liked that.

The Flash cameo didn’t really work for me since I still have no idea what Ezra Miller’s Flash is going to be like. If this is going to be a huge character later, why would you have this be the first time we see him? Especially for people who don’t follow the trailers and even the comic, all they saw was a guy in red standing there and making a quick quip. A Jpeg was not a good enough introduction to that character, we need more set up. On top of that, it would have made more sense to have Batman taking all these guys down because that sets up a vendetta against the Bat with all the characters. The Flash was a pandering fan boy ploy and it felt forced and didn’t fit.

Cameos aside, I did like the first half hour of this movie where they introduced each member of the squad. While I would have liked a little bit more story with characters like Killer Croc, Captain Boomerang, and especially El Diablo, I think they did a good job doing a streamlined introduction of the squad so they could get right into the action. El Diablo especially because he turned out to be a really cool character, I would have just liked to get to know him a little bit more so when he sacrifices himself at the end, I’m more connected to him.

The unfortunate part is, characters got attention and development based on their profitability for future movies. Harley Quinn, Deadshot, Amanda Waller(/Rick Flag), and Joker all got a lot of attention because you're more than likely going to see these characters again. Captain Boomerang, Killer Croc, and Diablo (probably not Diablo though), its 50/50 on whether or not you will see these three ever again so they got less. And Katana, Enchantress, and Slipknot... yeah you're not gonna see those characters again so who cares about their backstory.

First off, poor Adam Beach. He shows up for a hot minute and then gets his head blown off... I'm sure there's deleted scenes with him but again, profitability, screw those developing scenes. EVERYONE called that Slipknot was going to die. And honestly, with the exception of Diablo... I'm actually kind of surprised nobody else bit it.

But what the hell happened with Katana? I honestly forgot she was in this movie because she left so little of an impact. This is a character who obviously has some kind of backstory with her husband being killed and the man who killed him used a sword that steals the souls of its victims (when Flag said that, I thought he was joking or that he was telling a myth about Katana to make them afraid). That in itself is an interesting movie that I really don't think we're going to see. This isn't a huge issue for me as the other characters were done better, I just don't see why they would introduce such an interesting character just to throw her to the side. And then randomly at the end give her something to make it seem like they gave a crap. At least give her the Slipknot treatment and give her a crazy ass death.

But again, these issues aren't that big when you have good interesting characters. The bigger issue with characters isn’t so much how they were individually, its more how they interacted as a team. The thing that bothered me about El Diablo the most wasn’t that he was underdeveloped, it’s the line at the end when he says, I lost one family already, I’m not going to lose another one, referring to the members of Taskforce X… even though they really only met for the first time that day and barely talked enough to be considered even friends.

The same can be said about Deadshot and his relationship with Harley Quinn. There’s the moment when Harley escapes with the Joker and Amanda Waller tells Deadshot to kill her and he misses on purpose. Now at first I thought the moment was bullshit because Waller offered him his freedom and his daughter and Deadshot would never give that up. However, after more thought, I think this was more Deadshot’s distrust of Amanda Waller than it was his friendship with Harley. However, the movie made it seem like Deadshot suddenly had an issue with shooting Harley because they were good buddies after one day of walking around in a city.

Speaking of Amanda Waller, let’s talk about how much of a badass and an asshole she is. Damn. Like I’ve heard of Amanda Waller’s character and I’ve seen her in Arrow, but Viola Davis really pushed it to a whole new level. Like I knew Amanda Waller was bad but I had no idea how bad she could actually be. She is by no means the main villain in this movie but she is an antagonist of the Squad and she is cold. I think Viola Davis was a phenomenal choice for Amanda Waller and just killed it all around.

And if we’re talking about villains, I thought the Enchantress was a decent choice for a villain. The trailers pointed towards her being the villain in a way but at the same time I wasn’t one hundred percent sure of the way they were going to use that character and I think she was marketed very well. I’m don’t think the Enchantress is going to go down as one of the most memorable villains in a superhero film, but I was intrigued by her character and I liked the direction they went with her.

I suppose my one complaint about the Enchantress, besides he weird belly dancing delivery of dialogue, is that they didn’t necessarily need to go as drastic as they did. All the movies in the DCCU have had villains who want to destroy the world and end humanity as we know it. I think it would have maybe fit the movie better to have a more self-contained story with lower stakes and let us get to know the squad better. That of course would require a whole reworking of the script and I didn’t hate the direction they went, but that was a big complaint a buddy of mine had and the more I think about it, I think that probably would have worked better, especially for the first outing of the Suicide Squad.

I don’t think June Moone is a character as she really only has like 4 lines of dialogue, half of them being her just saying, “Enchantress” but I did like the character. I feel like I want to see more of the Enchantress. I’m not sure how likely that is being that she is pretty much dead at the end of the movie, but who knows, they have brought people back like this before. I thought it was very convenient that June Moone just happened to live at the end but hey, Rick Flag needs his love interest.

Speaking of Rick Flag, I thought they handled him very well. They made him a lot more vulnerable of a character than I thought they were going to and to be honest, I’m kind of surprised that he survived the movie. I definitely thought he was going to bite it half way through the movie and surprisingly he didn’t. He was also more interesting than I thought he was going to be. Like I said, he was vulnerable. While the relationship he developed with June Moone was very forced and felt artificial, it didn’t pull away from him as a character. Thinking about it now, I’m picking up on one of the plot holes of the movie. Why did the Enchantress want to capture Rick Flag. They kind of mention that she’s afraid of him… but why? Because he was in love with June Moone? It didn’t make a whole lot of sense but its one of those plot holes that you can kind of look past if the characters and the story is decent enough and I thought that this one was good enough to look past that plot hole.

Like I said in my non-spoiler review, this is Deadshot and Harley Quinn’s movie and I think they were both phenomenal. I really liked the story of Floyd Lawton and his daughter. And from his opening line, Will Smith just brought on the charm and made him one of my favorite characters of the movie. He is however, the real reason I would call this movie a good video game movie. When he’s action posing on the car just shooting faceless minions of the Enchantress, all I could think of was, I wouldn’t mind playing this video game and playing as Deadshot. I do think that Smith brought a lot of heart to a character, even one that kills people for a living. I thought the relationship between Deadshot and Rick Flag was actually pretty good and it just was made better when Flag hugs him at the end and Deadshot is just like, I don’t do hugs dude!

I’m going to do a full post on The Joker and I think I’ll put an in depth look at Harley Quinn with that too, but it should be really clear that I loved Harley Quinn in this movie.  I think her introduction as Harleen Quinzel and the beginning of her relationship with The Joker was done very well because you see the love between the two of them and how the relationship is toxic. I’ll talk more about that in my Joker rant.

But as an individual character, it should be pointed out that Harley is not a bad guy (or gal) who is only dependent on the Joker. She is a very capable and deadly antagonist on her own and I think the relationship with the Joker only strengthens her character. While I would prefer to see a movie with

both the Joker and Harley Quinn because I do like the possibilities that relationship brings for future films, I could see an entire movie being Batman or another villain against Harley Quinn.  She plays crazy well but not to the level where she’s not a sympathetic character. While Harley is by no means a victim, her story is pretty tragic and I am looking forward to them exploring that in the future. This goes for the entire cast, but Margot Robbie in particular is too good of an actress for this to be a one shot deal for her, you will see more of Harley Quinn in future DC movies, mark my words.

Again, I’m going to do a whole post on The Joker, but that will mainly be on his character, how he was written, and the way that Jared Leto decided to play him. As far as spoiler discussion goes, I think Jared Leto was utilized perfectly as the Joker. Like I said in the non-spoiler review, he’s like the wildcard mini boss you fight in the middle of the game who really doesn’t have anything to do with the main story but he’s an obstacle, and The Joker provided a fantastic obstacle for Taskforce X. In this movie, the Joker is more of a gangster with criminal and monetary thoughts in mind. He’s like if Scarface dressed up like a clown and decided to take meth instead of cocaine, and with that in mind, he does have a lot of assets at his disposal that it doesn’t seem like Heath Ledger’s Joker had. Instead of being an agent of chaos, Jared Leto’s Joker is a crime boss. But at the same time, he is psychotic and toxic, especially with his relationship with Harley Quinn that he does these fantastic stunts and jobs in order to save her from her fate.

I loved the scene where they are getting to the pickup helicopter and it’s actually been hijacked by The Joker. His buddy opens up on the squad with a mini gun and Joker calls Harley to join him.  Regardless of any thoughts I have on the performance or how the Joker was written, where he was written into the script was done really well. I was always very pleased when the Joker showed up and it made me wanting more.

Overall, how does Suicide Squad affect the larger DC cinematic universe and what can we expect to happen in result of this movie? DC gave us our first DC end credit scene and it just showed Bruce Wayne getting The Justice League together. It really wasn’t a great scene and its not really worth talking about. The one thing worth talking about is the possibility that the Justice League will one day go up against the Suicide Squad. There’s a couple of points in the movie that could point towards that crossover and I think that would be a lot of fun, especially how dangerous of an individual Amanda Waller is.

Like I mentioned before, Deadshot and Harley Quinn are the center of attention in this movie. I’m convinced one or both of them is going to get their own standalone film and based on how much I enjoyed those two, I am one hundred percent fine with that. And if they don’t get their own standalone films, like I said, this is not the last time you are going to see these characters. Whether they are in their own standalone film or they reappear in the standalone Batman film.

And that’s going to be the movie effected most by this movie, The future solo Batman film. This movie made me excited to see a solo Batman film because lets face it, Batman has the best villains of any superhero ever. Harley Quinn, Killer Croc, Deadshot, these are the B-list Batman villains, so I can only imagine what is going to happen when Ben Affleck finally gets that solo Batman script done and we get Batman going up against this Joker and Harley Quinn, or up against Deadshot. Or if he ends up going against all the other villains that are possibilities in a solo Batman flick that we haven’t seen before. If they can make these B-list characters interesting in Suicide Squad, I can’t imagine what they can do with larger villains being the villains in a solo Batman film.

When I figured out that Batman was coming back into the universe set up by Man of Steel, I wanted him to take a little bit of a back seat because I wanted them to focus on other characters. And don’t get me wrong, I still want more expansive movies on the DC universe, Aquaman, the Flash, Wonder Woman, I want all those movies, but this movie has made me really want a new Batman film.

And that kind of goes into the point I was making about how much exposition is in Man of Steel and Batman v Superman and how Suicide Squad is trying to break that mold. One of my favorite parts of the first 30 minutes of this movie was seeing Batman round up these villains and do his street level crime fighting. That is something we haven’t seen yet and we only saw a little bit of it in Suicide Squad. The DC Cinematic Universe needs to tone back the impending apocalypse that is definitely going to happen and bring it back to the basics. I want to see these heroes doing some regular old crime fighting. Sure they can save the world from impending doom, but that doesn’t always need to be the threat.

On top of that, there doesn’t always need to be these existential crises or questions of humanity. Sometimes you can just have some fun and have the good guys fighting the bad guys. And this fight doesn’t need to have huge political repercussions, sometimes they can just happen because one person is a bad guy and one person is a good guy. I don’t know, maybe that’s too simple of a thought, but Suicide Squad is an example of DC trying to break the mold of overly complex story arcs. These complex story arcs and questions were done well in Man of Steel, overthought in Batman v Superman, and now Suicide Squad still is a slave to them, but wants to break free. Let’s follow Suicide Squad’s example and break free and have some fun with the DCCU. I’m looking at you Justice League and Wonder Woman!

And I think they can do that, especially with one character in particular. And that's the Joker...

But that will wait for another post. Those are my spoiler thoughts on Suicide Squad. What did you think of the film? How does it rank within the DCCU? How does it rank among other superhero films? Comment and Discuss below! I want to know what you liked and what you didn’t like. You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as send me your requests for movies I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter you can also get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I’ll leave you with this. One great thing about this movie is that it showed me that Will Smith can have fun making movies still. Here's his thoughts while making the film. Enjoy!

Suicide Squad

Suicide Squad at first was not a movie I was incredibly interested in. When I heard about a team movie centering around Harley Quinn, Deadshot, Killer Croc (or King Shark, it wasn’t clear) and no real headline heroes, I was a little bit worried. However, when the first trailer dropped for Suicide Squad, I was on board one hundred percent and was getting excited for this movie with everything that came out promoting it. And what I also liked about this movie was that, while it gave a lot of things away in the trailers, you still didn’t have a real idea of what the story was going to be until the movie came out. You knew there was going to be a threat that would require Amanda Waller to form the Suicide Squad, but you didn’t know what that threat was and what the end result would be. So right up front, I do have to give the movie some credit, I wasn’t totally sure what the plot of this movie was going to be from the start.

Suicide Squad starts with a government agent, Amanda Waller (played by Viola Davis) trying to get the green light on forming a team of “very bad people who can do some good”. This team consists of a handful of minor DC villains who Waller has locked away on a secret island prison. This team include Harley Quinn (played by Margot Robbie), Deadshot (played by Will Smith) and some other minor characters.

I put it that way because the reality is, this movie is centered on Deadshot and Harley Quinn. This is their movie. Which makes sense, because if they’re going to make spinoffs of these characters, it’s not going to be a spinoff movie on Captain Boomerang (played by Jai Courtney), its going to be of either Deadshot or Harley Quinn (or both). Side note though, I didn’t hate Jai Courtney in this movie.  I didn’t think he was really good, but I didn’t think he was bad. I got a couple of laughs out of him and I didn’t walk out of the movie thinking, that movie would have been better if Jai Courtney hadn’t been in it, which I have done before (Terminator: Genisys).

But anyways, a team made up of criminals like Deadshot, Harley Quinn, Captain Boomerang, El Diablo (played by Jay Hernandez), Killer Croc (played by Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje), and Slipknot (played by Adam Beach) come together, under the supervision and leadership of Rick Flag (played by Joel Kinnaman), to be the team the United States uses to fight the growing threat of meta humans. Some other characters who play interesting roles in the film include The Enchantress (played by Cara Delevingne) and Katana (played by Karen Fukuhara).

First and foremost, the thing I will say to best describe this movie is, it’s a really good video game movie. I say this because you have a few quick cut scenes, introducing the “playable” characters, and then they are thrown into action very quickly and with little explanation. They fight through waves of faceless bad guys until they get to the boss. They even throw in a mini boss here and there and a secondary boss before the big boss to complete the game.

Now a movie structured like a video game is not exactly an Oscar winning movie and that is definitely not the case with Suicide Squad. Suicide Squad is streamlined, getting your into the action and not really wasting time with real in depth character or story development. This is both good and bad. Its bad because you have a lot of under developed characters and suddenly when characters start making decisions that have weight to them, it doesn’t exactly make a lot of sense why they would do those things. Now, some directors can develop characters like this in a short time and some need more time, I would say that David Ayer somewhere in between. And this movie is somewhere in between. Sometimes it’s enough, sometimes it isn’t.  The good part about the streamlined nature of this movie is that it can make for a very entertaining movie. This movie has a lot of issues and maybe its not the cleanest movie I’ve seen in a long time, but damn was it fun.

And it also doesn’t hurt that this is a really fun cast. I was skeptical of how Will Smith was going to play with an ensemble cast and he actually was one of my favorite parts. I was also skeptical that Deadshot was the right choice for an actor with the star power of Will Smith. Deadshot is a B-list Batman villain and Will Smith was a really good choice for him. And I think the part that sold me on

his character was the moment when I felt like he was playing a hitman in Gotham City. You feel the universe they are trying to create with this film and its done in a really organic way. When I saw Deadshot, a hitman in Gotham instead of Will Smith playing Deadshot, I knew I was going to like this casting choice. And luckily, that happens pretty early on. 

Margot Robbie, on top of being incredibly attractive, as per usual, did a really good job with the character of Harley Quinn. So much that I now want a standalone film with her. She probably gets the most character development out of the entire cast and I really had fun watching her. You really do believe that she is crazy and in love with the Joker, two quintessential elements of Harley Quinn's story line. Going back to the idea of creating a world with these villains in it, Harley and the Joker's relationship is really fun to see play out in the criminal world. Again, I actually want to see a movie either focusing on Harley Quinn and The Joker, or I want to see a Batman film where those two are the main antagonists because Margot Robbie is just having a grand old time with this character and it would be a shame if this was the only outing she had. 

I actually want to talk about The Enchantress a little bit. Cara Delevingne has never really stood out to me as being an incredibly good actress. She has never impressed me is all. The Enchantress is a fun role because its got a duality about it. On one hand, she is an archaeologist in Dr. June Moone but she is able to turn into the Enchantress, an ancient being with supernatural powers. I think Delevingne did a lot of good things with the role but also made a couple of... interesting choices. I mean, Dr. Moone kind of falls into the category of a lot of the other members of the squad as her character is not really developed and barely has any lines. But The Enchantress is a more interesting and powerful character. The one gripe I have with her is that whenever she talks, she sways like she's belly dancing and it just looks awkward at times, especially when she's saying something very serious. I think The Enchantress was marketed very cleverly. I'll talk more about her role in my spoiler review, but I think her character was fascinating. While I had doubts about Cara Delevingne in this movie, I actually enjoyed her quite a lot in this film. 

I liked Joel Kinnaman as Rick Flag a lot more than I thought I was going to and he was actually more developed as a character than probably 75% of the rest of the cast. I liked how he interacted with the rest of the cast, especially Deadshot. There's a point where you see the relationship change between Flag and the rest of the team and its a pretty genuine moment.

Overall, I thought the entire cast was pretty good (with an exception or two). And while I thought characters like Killer Croc, El Diablo, and Captain Boomerang were underdeveloped, I think the actors did a good job with what they were given and again, since it was so streamlined, I couldn’t help but be entertained by the action they provided and what they brought to the team.

Now you may be asking why I haven’t talked too much about the Joker (played by Jared Leto). I think everyone is curious to figure out how Jared Leto compares to previous Jokers, and for a lot of people my age, how he compares to Heath Ledger’s Joker.

I kind of want to do an entire post on Jared Leto’s Joker and where he falls in the grand scheme of Jokers and how he compares because there is a lot to talk about. However, at the same time, there is not much to talk about because The Joker is really in like 3 or 4 scenes in the movie. He’s more of a wildcard in the movie trying to rescue Harley Quinn. Going back to the video game analogy, he’s like

the mini boss that you fight in the middle of the game just to get another fight in. He’s not the main villain, he just pops in every once in a while. Now I think he was utilized in the story really, really well and he popped up right when he needed to.I also think that he peaked my interest about the character. While he was utilized very little in the film, I'm now excited to see The Joker be the main villain in a future Batman movie.

 I just can’t say with a precise answer whether or not Jared Leto’s Joker is good or not because there wasn’t enough of him to really say yes or no to that question. There were elements I liked about him, and there were elements that I didn’t like about him.

Again, I'm planning on doing a whole post on Jared Leto's Joker to explain the good and bad parts about him in depth. But if you’re going to this movie just to see The Joker, you’re going to be a little bit disappointed with how little he is in the movie. 

There's a couple other things worth mentioning about this movie. The editing I feel was a little bit off at times. For example, there's a part where Harley is looking down a staircase and suddenly she's randomly in a flashback with little to no transition. This movie does have a couple of flashbacks that are quick cuts and coming from a limited background of how movies are edited, if a regular audience member can be set off kilter by the editing choices, then you're doing something wrong. It doesn't have to be pretty, I mean you could have had Garth and Wayne going across the scene to set up a transition and it would have been better than some of the transitions in this film.

The last thing I will talk about is the universe expansions made in this film. i mentioned it a little bit with my thoughts on Harley Quinn and Deadshot, but what this movie did really well was creating an environment of the criminal underworld that Batman and in a larger sense, The Justice League, will be fighting against in future movies. There are a couple of good cameos in this film that were a lot of

fun to see in live action, especially with how absurd these characters can be. The DC cinematic universe is going to be a little more absurd and little less realistic than the Nolan Universe and I think that's something that people can get excited about when they see Suicide Squad. 

The one caveat is the environment already created in Man of Steel and Batman v Superman. I love Man of Steel and I probably like Batman v Superman more than most people do. However, one part about these movies is the fact they have created a more realistic, gritty superhero universe. Yes its not as realistic as the Nolan Batman movies were, however its trying to inject wacky superheroes into our world as well as trying (I'll concede, not very well) to bring in ideas. For example, in Batman v Superman, the big idea is: what would the world be like with a Superman? This includes long winded explanations of what the government response is, senate hearings, and lots of exposition. And I don't really mind exposition and I don't mind ideas, but Suicide Squad showed how those things can hinder a movie like this. 

The whole set up of Taskforce X is a really good example of this. There's so much bureaucracy and explanation as to why this group needs to form. And in a way they bring up an interesting point, would the government support a covert team like Taskforce X if it meant protection from people with powers, or meta humans? But when it all boils down, those questions and exposition about the ethics of that team don't matter. We want to see this in action and we want to have fun with them. And that's something Suicide Squad did well. They didn't beleaguer the movie on too many ideas and drown out the fun, they just form the team, give them all the background, and then the action comes. 

I'll talk more about this in my spoiler review, but I thought the Suicide Squad started to break the mold DC has created for itself in getting too bogged down in world creating and just having fun with wacky heroes, anti-heroes, and villains in the DC universe. Use the comic books, and have fun!

Last note: Really fun music all around. 

I do think there is enough in this movie to really have some fun. As long as you don’t think too analytically about this film and embrace the absurdity David Ayer and the rest of the cast is embracing already, I think Suicide Squad is a good time despite some of the technical issues that go along with it.

But those are my thoughts on Suicide Squad. I’m definitely going to be doing at least one spoiler review (it might be a two parter actually based on my thoughts on The Joker) but what did you think of the film? Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as sending me requests for movies I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I’ll leave you with this. Speaking of the good music, here is Panic at the Disco playing Bohemian Rhapsody from the soundtrack. I personally love it, what do you think? Enjoy!