76.
Title: [Suicide Squad: Trial by Fire]
Author: John Ostrander
Genre: Comic
Medium: Hardback
Acquisition: Library Book
Date Completed: August something, 2016
Rating: ****

I liked the movie.  Honestly, I thoroughly enjoyed it - I left the theatre smiling and giggling and overall pleased with what I had seen.  I enjoyed the comic-like dialog, thought the music was well paired, and enjoyed the creative representations of most of the characters.  I hated the Enchantress plotline, but thought it clever and engaging that the true antagonist of the film is the industrial military complex of an American system devoid of checks and balances. As a scholar deeply involved in identity studies, I appreciated and followed the subtle discourse on villainy, its meaning and meaning makers, and its denoters. And I especially like Harley Quinn - yes, really. I know that there are many "fans" who love to hate Margo Robbie's presentation, but the arguments seem so shallow - I have a good friend, for example, who only wants HQ in her "real" Jester suit, when she hasn't donned the hideous thing in ages. Someone has been avoiding anything but the 1990s cartoon, methinks. The film recognizes that even in insanity Dr. Quinzle is a highly educated woman, who loses her sanity but not her intelligence. It also clearly recognizes that her actions are very much so a conscious performance, explicitly engineered to enable her a specific social and group standing.  I won't go into specifics, but I'll point to the car in the rain - there's a lot of depth in that scene. I also think it adds an interesting element to the Joker/Quinn romance, actually allowing them one, and making space for Quinn not as an abuse victim, but a willing participant in a nonnormative relationship. I think there's more there.

I have plenty more to say about the movie, but so does everyone else in the US right now, and mine is just another shout in the wind. What's pertinent here is that these detractors lead me to actually read the comic which inspires the film, and I equally loved it.  And the comic is everything the movie haters love to criticize about the film.

One complaint about the film was awkward exposition, which I'll say is entirely fair - and completed grounded in the comic, which does exactly the same thing. Boomerang and Enchantress are equally weak characters, and some of the awkward dialog and assertions of self are right there in the pages.  The first comic describes the building of the team, Amanda Waller's motivation and the consequences of her actions, and the murky morality of everyone involved. It's an interesting premise, believable in the world in which it takes place, and makes great space for a creative reintegration of well known villains.  Worth a read, I say.