“Suicide Squad” (2016) is a Crazy Ride

imageDavid Ayer’s Suicide Squad (C) does a good job introducing and humanizing an ensemble of D.C. Universe villains. Each gets his or her own visual fact file, akin to a baseball card or Pokemon pop-up stats, which is a helpful entree into some potential future adventures. Alas the story in this origin film, a mission in which the antagonists are temporarily released from prison to defeat a witchy villain, is rather perfunctory. And dimly lit. Will Smith is solid as deadly hitman Deadshot, and Margot Robbie is a delight as Harley Quinn, the coquettish one liner-dropping former psychiatrist girlfriend of The Joker (Jared Leto, in a small bit). Viola Davis is also notable as the badass government official who gets the gang together. The effects are only ok. The jukebox of rock songs on the soundtrack are recycled from better sequences in better films. And there’s little in the save the world storyline that hasn’t been done better before. The spare moments of inspiration and flourish simply make viewers wish there were more of them. All in all, the sum of some pretty interesting parts is a bit underwhelming.

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