Sinister intelligence aunt Amanda Waller (Viola Davis) is once again assembling the Suicide Squad on a suicide mission of the utmost importance to the country. Colonel Rick Flag (Juel Kinnaman) will lead the squad, as before. To help him, they gave the gloomy killer Savant (Michael Rooker), Captain Boomerang (Jai Courtney), the really fucked-up Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie), Blackguard, the orange Mongal, Javelin with his famous spear, T.D.K. and Weasel, who is really straight upright. animal.
Their task is the following. There is a small island nation of Corto Maltese, located in South America. For the past hundred years, the Herrera family has ruled this state, but some time ago, General Silvio Luna (Juan Diego Botto) and General Mateo Suarez (Joaquin Cosio) carried out a military coup. The Herrera family was neutral towards America, but the whole family was hanged in public, and General Luna hates the USA.
But the US government is not concerned about the Moon itself. The island is home to the Jotenheim Scientific Experiment Center, which is studying an extremely dangerous project called the Starfish, which is rumored to be of cosmic origin. And the government fears that if the project falls into the hands of the moon, it could cause completely catastrophic consequences. The task of the detachment is to infiltrate Jotenheim and destroy all traces of the Starfish Project.
However, the squad does not know that Amanda is preparing another similar suicide squad to land on the island. It is led by hitman Bloodsport (Idris Elba), under his command are: The Peacemaker (John Cena), Shark King (Sylvester Stallone), Polka Dot Man (David Dastmalchian) and Pied Piper 2 (Daniela Melshior).
It turns out that it is the second detachment that has to complete the most important mission.
***
The first “Suicide Squad” with DC Comics characters was directed by David Eyre (by the way, the creator of such good and completely realistic films as “Cool Times”, “Street Kings” and “Patrol”). This film was expected, its trailer was peppy, but after the release of the screens, there was a lot of negativity towards the film, especially among critics. The plot there was too ridiculous even for a comic book movie, and the characters of the suicide squad had rather vague backstories.
Nevertheless, the picture showed quite a good TCC of 4.2 (from 3 – the picture at least paid off), won the Oscar for best make-up and hairstyles, and at the Warner Bros. studio. Pictures began planning a sequel with the same director. However, David Eyre, who was obviously offended by negative criticism, said that he would be directing the Gotham City Sirens picture, so he refused the sequel, and the studio began to look for a replacement for him.
Various candidates were considered. At some point, Gavin O’Connor was already approved as the director, but then for some reason O’Connor left the project, and then James Gunn, the creator of the excellent Guardians of the Galaxy film and its even more successful sequel, was suddenly released: Some of his ten-year-old tweets with bad jokes surfaced on the Web, and Disney and Marvel Studios, as part of the New Ethic, immediately fired Gunn from the Guardians triquel project, which plunged the fans of this more than successful film franchise, which is inseparable, into a terrible depression from the personality of James Gunn.
However, at Warner Bros. Pictures did not suffer from such idiocy, and when they heard about the dismissal of the director, they immediately invited James Gunn to their place. True, Gunn was originally asked to direct a new Superman movie, which he did not want to do, and then the studio offered James to take any characters or any DC Comics film franchise that he liked.
At the same time, it turned out that James Gunn at one time himself really wanted to make a film about the Suicide Squad, so the issue was resolved: he took over the work on the sequel to Suicide Squad.
(By the way, interestingly, literally the day after Gunn signed a contract with Warner Bros. Pictures, Marvel Studios realized what they had done in general, after which they began to strongly call Gunn back. He did not mind returning to work on the Guardians triquel, but, of course, after he makes a Squad sequel, and Marvel Studios had to shut up and wait, wait and shut up.)
With The Detachment, Gunn planned to make an almost independent work that would not correlate with the events of the first film in any way (but would not contradict it either). The studio really wanted Gunn to have Margot Robbie in the film, which he had no objection to, and he himself planned to invite Viola Davis, who played Amanda Waller in the first film, to the film.
The character of Will Smith (Deadshot) was also originally planned, but Smith did not have the same schedule, Gunn planned to introduce a more or less similar character named Bloodsport into the picture, and he initially considered Idris Elba for this role.
Of course, Gunn wanted to invite some of his “Guardians” actors into the picture: Michael Rooker and Dave Batista (he was supposed to play the Peacemaker). Rooker got his role, and Batista could not participate due to filming in Zack Snyder’s Army of the Dead, and here John Cena finally got his chance, who had previously made several attempts to join the DC Comics universe, but he had everything didn’t work at all. And Gunn, as it turned out, saw John Cena in the comedy “Girl without complexes” and had long planned to work with him, so Cena received an invitation to the picture and played the same Peacemaker, where he was able to demonstrate his outstanding muscles (he really, or rather – unrealistically powerful man) and touching little white shorts.
If with the selection of actors, the concept of the sequel and the script in the studio, James Gunn did not fix any obstacles, then real battles began with the rating of the picture. Of course, the studio wanted the rating to be “PG-13” (viewing is undesirable for children under 13), like the first “Squad” (which, we note, ruined the picture to a certain extent, although not in terms of money).
And this is an old joke: the studios believe that teenagers bring the main profits and that if the blockbuster is rated “R” (those under 17 must have an adult present), then, they say, this will have a catastrophic effect on the box office, because the picture will lose a large part of audience.
But, however, after Ryan Reynolds convinced 20th Century Fox to allow an R rating for Deadpool, with Deadpool showing a completely crazy GCC of 13.4, it became easier for directors to convince studio management to allow such an R rating for big-budget comic blockbusters.
Gunn firmly stated that he would direct the sequel only if he was initially allowed an “R” rating: the studio at first categorically stated that they could not do this in any way, but in the end they nevertheless agreed to an “adult” rating.
By the way, the original name of the sequel is The Suicide Squad (the first film was called Suicide Squad), that is, “The same suicide squad”, and this whole “mission through” is the invention of Russian distributors. The original name was suggested by James Gunn rather as a joke, but the studio management liked the name and the sequel was named that way.
Well, you ask, what did Gann get as a result?
As you know, I’m a big fan of Guardians of the Galaxy: I really like the director’s style, his humor, his certain crazyness and, by the way, his choice of music. I was almost sure that the sequel would be better than the first film (by the way, I even liked the first one, albeit with strong reservations: but I was so delighted with the character of Margot Robbie that I forgave the film for all other unconditional shortcomings).
Fortunately, I was not mistaken. The sequel is not just better, it’s actually an order of magnitude better, because it is a very coherent work with a well-thought-out script, with excellent characters, each of which has its own story, with excellent acting, with great jokes and completely crazy, and excellent staging.
Gann was no longer limited in anything, and he, of course, pulled off with might and main! The first film was like a video version of some kind of computer game. But the sequel is a pure comicsoid, and obviously a parody. Many events in it occur extremely unexpectedly, and it looks great.
The sequel seems to start as usual: Amanda gathers another squad of criminals with superpowers to perform a terribly dangerous task, but the director quickly demonstrates to the audience that everything here will be very cool and really crazy.
The script here, on the one hand, is completely comicsoid and fundamentally comicsoid, but on the other hand, it is really well thought out: it is in the very parody paradigm in which Gunn planned to shoot this film.
All the main acting characters are very interesting, and there are no passing characters here, which were many in the first film. (Suffice it to recall the Joker, who was supposed to become a completely infernal character, but in fact he was a complete failure.) Here, each character is at least interesting and plays a certain role, and besides, the director managed to tell a certain background, and in the picture, the action of which develops very dynamically.
I’ll also say that some plot twists are very witty here, there are really good jokes and even jokes about members and all that fit perfectly into the concept, because what else can the hired killer Bloodsport and the dumb bumpy Peacemaker joke about – about unified field theories or something ?
Harley Quinn, who was the brightest character in the first film, has reached a higher level here, and here we pay tribute to the actress Margot Robbie herself, who played her heroine with the right level of madness, mixed with completely boundless irony, and the skill of the director, who, of course, Well, from Harley Quinn he made just a masterpiece! In the episode “Elvis Left the Building” where Harley decided to leave the Presidential Palace, Bublik the cat and I just got teary-eyed, sir, because it was absolutely luxuriously choreographed and well acted.
Well, let’s note that Margot Robbie was beautiful here in every episode, and her short romance, let’s say, with a high-ranking officer, Bublik and I have already named the “Best Romantic Scene” of 2021. And 2022 too. And most likely in 2023 too.
A good actor, Idris Elba, is usually, in my opinion, too serious for comicsoid action films – I immediately remembered the movie Fast and the Furious: Hobbs and Shaw, which, although not a comicsoid in terms of source, is, of course, a pure comicsoid in terms of the style of production. But here his character absolutely clearly corresponds to the concept of the project – a hired killer who was put in charge of the detachment by pure blackmail: Idris played his Bloodsport very well, he also added the necessary emotions at the appropriate moments, and in the end he really liked it.
John Cena (we recently saw this famous and, of course, outstanding wrestler in the blockbuster “Fast and the Furious 9”) quite well portrayed the Peacemaker – a slightly blunt hero with a “toilet lid on his head”, similar to a completely stubborn Captain America. It seems that John has some interesting prospects in DC Comics – well, it’s nice, he’s more than a colorful man.
Colonel Rick Flag in Joel Kinnaman was clearly more cheerful here than in the first film, The Polka Dot Man in David Dastmalchyan was very interesting (“I start killing effectively when I remember my mother”), the Portuguese Daniela Melshior played really great Pied Piper 2, especially since Pied Piper 1 was very succinctly portrayed by Taika Waititi himself, and Pied Piper 2’s pet rat was a noticeable and very cool member of the squad. (By the way, before filming, Daniela was forced to take an interaction test with real rats – for reliability.)
Peter Capaldi played the same Thinker – a scientist working with the Starfish project. The character turned out to be interesting and bright, and fans of the “warm tube sound” will appreciate the radio tubes that are plugged into the Thinker right into ISKCON in order to properly stimulate this brain and tune it to the appropriate functioning.
Also, the Shark King, voiced by Sylvester Stallone, is a special and very cool character, comparable to the legendary Groot from Guardians of the Galaxy.
Viola Davis portrayed Amanda Waller well, but, as I wrote in a previous review, she looked like a slightly brutalized Oprah Winfrey, so it would be cool if Oprah Winfrey herself played Amanda after all – this would clearly fit into the concept of what was happening on the screen of mild insanity.
In general, Bublik and I are simply delighted. Of course, we believed in James Gunn, but we did not expect that it would be even cooler than Guardians of the Galaxy, but it turned out to be really cooler! In addition, Gunn remained true to himself, so there is also an amazing musical accompaniment.
Watch, be sure to watch!
But, of course, the film is not for everyone, as some reviews attest. Some viewers do not understand that they are watching a parody comic action movie, and make some claims to the plot (to the plot, Bagel!). The second say that there is too much blood. Still others are not sure that a huge alien starfish (in fact, the project is called so) is a good choice for the main bastard that the squad is fighting.
But here, as they say, to whom watermelon, and to whom pork cartilage. This genre is not suitable for everyone, and what genre is suitable for absolutely everyone?!! “Except for the seals,” Bublik the cat remarked, lobbying for whose interests it was clear. Well, except for the cats.
And we haven’t received such a wild and cool comics for a long time.
PS By the way, one excellent and in some ways even a cult actor, whom Bublik and I also dearly love, also starred here. But you will find out that he is here at all only by reading the list of actors. And in this Gann, of course, also pulled off. Has every right!
Suicide Squad: Mission Through /
The Suicide Squad movie review
Producer: James Gunn
Cast:
Idris Elba, Margot Robbie, John Cena, Joel Kinnaman, Daniela Melshior, Peter Capaldi, David Dastmalchian, Sylvester Stallone, Viola Davis, Alice Braga, Michael Rooker, Jai Courtney, Juan Diego Botto, Joaquin Cosio, Taika Waititi
Fantastic action movie, 2021, 132 min.