Suicide Squad

[bayonetbrant]

I could make a comment on each of your points (nothing bad or argumentative), but overall I can say I don't have a problem necessarily with anything you're saying. I'm just going to say that none of it really bothered me at all.

I can see how this would anger a comic fan, or someone a lot more familiar with the source material, but meh, it's a movie.

+1

So you're actually OK with the narration in Blade Runner?  I mean, it's just a movie, right? ;)  O0

[mirth]

Narration aside, Blade Runner is very, very different from 'Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?'. I enjoyed them both for what they were.

Suicide Squad the movie may be very different from the comics, but I still thought it was a decent movie and I enjoyed. Plenty of flaws to be sure, but still fun.

[bayonetbrant]

That was kind of my point - it's not a bad movie, but for those of us that are fans of the comic, there were a lot of missed opportunities.

Aside from the omission of The Wasp, I didn't feel like that at all about the Avengers movies, and that's the other book I grew up on

(My main books growing up were The Avengers / West Coast Avengers, Suicide Squad, Zot!, the Larry Hama-era GI Joe series, Elfquest, Grimjack, Mike Grell's Warlord, and regular forays into Marvel fandom with long runs of Amazing Spider-Man, Captain America, Iron Man, Sgt Fury & Howling Commandos, The Invaders, Dr Strange, The Defenders, and Nick Fury/SHIELD series, but not attempts at end-to-end collecting)

[mirth]

I look at it differently. Comics are constantly retconned, alt-universed, rebooted, whatever. There really is no continuity or canon in comics. So I don't necessarily need fidelity from movies based on them. If the movie is well done and enjoyable, that's good enough.

[BanzaiCat]

Mirth is right - I've learned to let go of my Iron Man obsessions after three IM movies and two Avengers movies.

The whole thing they did with Mandarin pissed me off to no end at the time, but now, it's grown on me and I see it as more of a creative license thing. I also pretty much limited myself to Iron Man, X-Men, and a few others. I didn't read much DC stuff, though I was into the Justice League reboot with the underlying humor it had back in 1990 or 1991 or so.

[mirth]

Mirth is right

It was bound to happen eventually  ;D

The whole thing they did with Mandarin pissed me off to no end at the time

That was dumb, but IM3 wasn't a great movie in general. Same with IM2. As I rewatch them over time, the less I like them. The first one was great, the sequels not so much.

[MetalDog]

but meh, it's a movie.

if everyone had that attitude, then no one would've had a problem with the Ralph Bakshi LOTR movie.

And until Peter Jackson came along, that's all us diehards HAD (crappy as it was)!  And that's my problem with ANY movie that Hollywood does that has source material.  And in some cases, beloved source material.  My beef will always be, if it became huge as a book, where does Hollywood get off thinking they know better how to tell the story by adding/subtracting/ignoring the original story?!?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

I get that there are time restraints.  I get that there are elements in the real world that need to be satisfied in order to get the movie made.  But, if those things make the movie less than the source, then don't make the movie.  I would much rather have no LotR than have Arwen be a character in any way, shape, or form until Aragorn marries her in Return of the King.  I would much rather have no LotR than have Frodo send Sam home at Gollum's behest as they climb the stairs to Cirith Ungol.  Or any number of atrocities Jackson foisted on us. 

But I get the point that B_C and mirth are making, too.  My kids LOVED LotR and they had no idea what the story was about.  So additions, subtractions, outright crap that made me furious, went right over their heads and they couldn't WAIT for the next one to hit the theaters.  And that's ok.  Because they didn't do all those things for me, they did them for people who don't know the source material or don't care.

I just wish Hollywood, FOR ONCE, would take a book I love and make a completely faithful adaptation. 

[bayonetbrant]

I just wish Hollywood, FOR ONCE, would take a book I love and make a completely faithful adaptation. 

The Maltese Falcon
(seriously - watch it some time with a copy of the book in your lap and just follow along)



But if they shot LOTR scene-for-scene, you'd be wasting your time with the Tom Bombadil sideshow

[OJsDad]

1) I understand why they needed the front-loaded exposition of who the bad guys were and how they came to be. But none of the Marvel movies had comparable obvious introductions for any of their characters in either the main Marvel universe, or the X-Men universe and we still figured out who everyone was just fine

Do you think DC should have gone the Marvel route and had a few stand alone movies that would have helped define the hero's and villain's before they tried Dawn of Justice or SS.  I remember someone posted on one of the Marvel threads, Marvels master movie plan.  Does DC have anything like that or are they just making it up as they go. 

I was never a serious comic book guy, so not an expert of these things. 

[bayonetbrant]

1.  DC totally winging it.  Even if they say they have a plan, it's all subject to approval from the Department of Zach Snyder's Whims Of The Day

2.  It would've been a better long-term play to at least introduce a few of the Suicide Squad characters to a more mainstream audience beyond having a white guy playing Deadshot on Arrow.  We needed to see more about the bad guys (to really make them bad) from Boomerang, Killer Croc, Slipknot, and Enchantress.  We also needed more on Rick Flagg, whose family has been a DC mainstay for 75 years.

3.  Still wouldn't fix some of the internal issues in the movie

[Centurion40]

Great review brant. The writhing Enchantress comment was spot-on.


Still, I'll go and see it again.

[bayonetbrant]

I will caveat everything with this - given everything going on in my personal life right now, the dour outlook might need to be taken with a grain of salt

I stand by everything I said, but I'm not oblivious to the fact that I might only be looking for negatives at the moment

[MetalDog]

I just wish Hollywood, FOR ONCE, would take a book I love and make a completely faithful adaptation. 

The Maltese Falcon
(seriously - watch it some time with a copy of the book in your lap and just follow along)



But if they shot LOTR scene-for-scene, you'd be wasting your time with the Tom Bombadil sideshow

LotR is the culmination of all the history he wrote about Middle Earth.  Bombadil has his place in the fabric.  Not a scene for everyone I admit.

[BanzaiCat]

I'll be the first to say I'm perfectly fine with the range of opinions on this flick. I totally get the nerd rage some would feel over it not meeting their expectations. Hell, I've had it myself many times over the last ten or so years.

The major issue is, there's so little actual talent in Hollywood these days, on both sides of the camera, that my expectations for literally everything being regurgitated from its gaping, pus-filled maw are rather low. I think it's actually an advantage, as a movie-goer, to have zero idea (or very little idea) of backstory or existing canon when it comes to movies like this, as I was with the DC universe in general and the Suicide Squad in particular.

I've had my own nerd rage over Superman Returns and Man of Steel, both positively awful films. But, I grew up with Christopher Reeve blowing me away with Superman and Superman II. Supes vs Bats wasn't a let down, but neither was it impressive at all. It felt more like the studio went, "Hey! Let's do this. Because we can! Not because we have a good script, or director, or producer, or...or...or..." etc.

I don't call myself an actor (I only play at it, I don't make a living at all by it, unlike a lot of my friends on FB) and I know there's others in these forums that could attest to it, perhaps (Starfury for one) as to how f'ed up the movie/television business really is. Not just from an outsider's/moviegoer's perspective, either. Just from my VERY MINOR time involved at such a low level, and from the people I've met and talked to that are actors here, locally that are now doing things like CSI episodes and having screen time in major films, to know that for every piece of crap movie that comes out, there's easily 10,000 scripts that go unnoticed by the studios. Of those 10,000, it stands to reason that a small percentage are actually damn good stories that just might need a little polishing to make them great. But we'll never know, since most of them are not touched. It's all about who you know in Hollywood, and if you don't know anyone important, your stuff isn't getting read. Hell, it might not even make it out of your mailer...it'll probably get shredded without seeing the light of a California day.

Hollywood is a chaotic, mad jumble of insanity, debauchery, one-uppance, and insanity. (Yes, insanity is in there twice on purpose.) Everyone is rushing around to find that 'next big idea' when truthfully, there's plenty of them flying under the radar that they all miss because they're too busy looking like hipster douchebags on Ventura Blvd or Rodeo Drive and air-kissing each other at parties. It's not about the art anymore, even though the Academy will continue to fool itself into thinking that it is.

[JasonPratt]

Daniel's actual reviews at HISHE continue with Suicide Squad: