Suicide Squad: Real Life or Just a Fantasy?

[Veltigar]

33 minutes ago, Corvinus said:

So you haven't seen SS yet?

Nope, that's why I haven't written a longer post on it, because I can't really judge it. Although I have no trouble believing it sucked. Which is sad really, I was kind of looking forward to it, but then the rumours about reshoots, the new trailers coming out and the review embargo (which pretty much guarentees that the movie under embargo is utter crap) made me wary. The reviews just sealed the deal really, there is to much good stuff out there to waste my time on something like this.

36 minutes ago, Corvinus said:

I agree with you that DC/WB are not obligated to use the exact same formula as Marvel, but I think what they should do is make the movie, tone-wise at least, to the character(s). So Batman - dark and broody, Superman - eh, not so much. Suicide Squad - fucked up. It looked like they were trying, and decided, no lets make it lighter because of BvS, so they ended up with a clusterfuck. It is in fact, fucked up, but not in any good way.

WB made a critical mistake with their cinematic universe. I can't say I'm a fan of superheroes in general, but even I know that DC has quite a catalogue to pull from. Instead of going the Marvel route and churning out similar conveyer belt products, they should have played to that uniqueness really. Not just by having different tones, befitting the characters, but also by just allowing their directors more freedom to explore the material. That would have given their movies a more artistic flair instead of the one size fits all of the MCU. That would have differentiated them from Marvel and probably helped to prolong the longevity of their products in the long run. Personally, I though they had understood that and were trying to course correct when they gave David Ayer the reigns of SS. Apparently they did not, what with all the meddling and stuff, but that's a real missed opportunity.

44 minutes ago, Corvinus said:

On a slightly similar note, everyone was impressed with the Wonder Woman trailer, but now there are fears that it may also suck. After all, the MoS trailer was brilliant, BvS trailers were okay, but not special, and the SS trailers were pretty good.

The WW trailer is really good, but given their trackrecord, you'd be daft not to be sceptical imo  

34 minutes ago, Channel4s-JonSnow said:

being some of the best of the genre.
 

Aside from the Dark Knight and Unbreakable, that's a really low bar to clear.

 

[sifth]

I love most MCU movies, they seem so dam colorful and full of life. The DCU films have been one mess after the other. Heck I'm not even sure I want to watch Wonder Woman now, since I'm worried the WB will find some way to screw it up. Batman is already acting like a completely different person in the Justice League trailer. It's like the studio can't even decide on a tone and is just freaking out.

[Jasta11]

8 hours ago, Channel4s-JonSnow said:

Marvel have created a 'universe' and a number of properties sit within it. Its been very successful because all of those films can feel interconnected and you can then do something like Avengers where you bring them altogether. That doesn't mean there aren't differences in their movies, and I like that they tend to play with genre on some level, Ant man being a heist movie, Iron Man 3 being a smaller scale buddy movie in some ways, Thor an sci fi space opera.. 

But they are mostly all bound by Superhero tropes and formula, I will agree on that. However it works and works really well almost every time. Almost all of their movies are better than average IMO and the last two Cap movies were actually excellent, being some of the best of the genre.

Plus the Marvel TV universe is much darker and more adult, and has been mostly excellent.. Netflix mainly I'm referring to.. lets ignore SHIELD.

DC's problem has been trying to find its tone and transplant it onto a wildly inappropriate universe. It saw the success of Nolans movies and thought that could be its anchor. Who knows when they made the decision but I guess it was after Man of Steel, and by that point they'd already cast their dice. 

I agree with this.

As much as I can recognize the Marvel formula in almost all of their films, it's a formula that works, and they toy around enough to keep the illusion going during the movie, if not after. At least most of the time. Formulaic doesn't always mean bad. It's certainly better than trying to mash different tones and ultimately create a jumbled, directionless mess, like DC tries to do.

Also, I saw SS, and I'll echo the most common criticisms. This movie has no idea where it's going. It tries to make those characters a bunch of bad guys, then have them behave like budget Avengers by the end, complete with a few sappy moments that feel grossly out of place. It tries to be quirky, then jettisons the humor halfway through for a bad plot that takes itself far too seriously. Jared Leto barely appears, and while his performance isn't bad it's not that memorable either. The villain is so laughably underwhelming they make most Marvel antagonists look like the Ledger Joker.

It's like they tried to mash The Dark Knight, Deadpool, and the Avengers together. And it doesn't work very well at the end of the day. I'm a bit sad, because the trailers made this look like it would be decent enough, but as it is I think I enjoyed BvS more honestly. As much as I disliked that for many reasons, at least it tried to keep a tone, even if said tone was simply not fitting for a movie featuing Superman and Wonder Woman.

[The Anti-Targ]

The Monday to Wednesday takings on Boxoffice Mojo make it look like Suicide squad is in for a pretty rapid drop off in box office. With -56%, +8.5% and -31% those percentages are significantly worse that the other movies in those daily top 10s. It's still the #1 daily movie by a wide margin. But that record breaking opening weekend, for August, is not likely to translate into any other records.

[Channel4s-JonSnow]

19 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

The Monday to Wednesday takings on Boxoffice Mojo make it look like Suicide squad is in for a pretty rapid drop off in box office. With -56%, +8.5% and -31% those percentages are significantly worse that the other movies in those daily top 10s. It's still the #1 daily movie by a wide margin. But that record breaking opening weekend, for August, is not likely to translate into any other records.

Isn't August traditionally a 'dump month' for studios to release films not expected to do that well. All this talk of records makes me curious as to what movies SS is supposedly beating. 

[The Anti-Targ]

46 minutes ago, Channel4s-JonSnow said:

Isn't August traditionally a 'dump month' for studios to release films not expected to do that well. All this talk of records makes me curious as to what movies SS is supposedly beating. 

Guardians of the Galaxy was the previous August record holder. And $135 million opening weekend is a big opening in any month. For some odd reason August seems to be the release month for the Bourne movies, though this time round Bourne came out at the end of July. But outside of Bourne and GotG August does not have a very impressive list of releases. And I suspect GotG2 probably won't be coming out in August of whatever year.

[sifth]

21 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

Guardians of the Galaxy was the previous August record holder. And $135 million opening weekend is a big opening in any month. For some odd reason August seems to be the release month for the Bourne movies, though this time round Bourne came out at the end of July. But outside of Bourne and GotG August does not have a very impressive list of releases. And I suspect GotG2 probably won't be coming out in August of whatever year.

Nope it's coming out next May. Marvel knows it has a hit and is giving it a prime movie month this time.

[Howdyphillip]

This is awesome... If you haven't got a chance to watch any of  Comic Book Girl 19, you really should go back and check out her takes on things. She does reviews and history for Game of Thrones, and ASoIF also.

 

She has a meltdown talking about how bad the DCEU is... I fully understand.

[Corvinus85]

A pretty brutal open letter from a former WB employee addressed the CEO http://www.vulture.com/2016/08/this-open-letter-annihilates-warner-bros-execs.html

I just put the whole thing in quotes, and in bold my favorite parts:

Quote

When I left my screening of Suicide Squad last week, I was angry. I was annoyed and let down and frustrated as well, but mostly I was just angry.

Look, I'm a big dork. So of course I thought this trainwreck of a movie did a major disservice to the characters, concept, cast, and crew, but that wasn't why I was mad. Yes, it is unfathomable to me that Warner Bros could mess up a movie starring Will Smith, Margot Robbie, and The Joker so completely. But that just had me flummoxed.

I was angry because I couldn't stop thinking about you, Kevin Tsujihara.

A lot of fans might be angry (and rightfully so) because you keep completely whiffing at properties that they are desperate to love and enjoy, but this is a little more personal for me. See, I am a former Warner Bros employee. I have so much respect for your studio. I love every square inch of that magical backlot, from Stars Hollow to the fitness center I always meant to use. The people I worked with during my time with your company are now close friends. On my last day, I hugged them and I told them I loved them.

I was also there in 2014, when you made the decision to lay off 10 percent of your workforce. It was a terrible year. Let me catch you up: Every morning I woke up with a pit in my stomach, because I assumed that would be the day I lost my job. Every day I saw someone packing up their desk, or carrying a box to their car. I can not describe to you the relief I felt when my department was told we were safe, or the guilt I felt afterwards walking through the halls of my office with that relief.

But out of all that, the thing that really sticks with me is the memo you sent to all of us. Let me refresh you on my favorite part:

I wanted you to hear directly from me about our plans for the studio. In recent days, we have started to hear rumors here at the company and to read misinformation in the press, so I'd like to set the record straight. I know that the hard work and dedication of every employee around the world is the key to Warner Bros.' success, and I am sorry for the distraction this situation brings to the workplace. 

At Warner Bros., we work with the world's most extraordinary storytellers, and our focus has always been to provide the creative environment and financial resources they need to realize their vision. Our commitment to that won't change. In fact, we're investing more than ever in our film and television productions.

This is how you opened a memo about layoffs. "Hey guys, we work hard for the people telling stories here and we want to make sure those visions are realized." The balls on you.

That year we pursued the storytelling vision of Adam Sandler's Blended and Clint Eastwood's Jersey Boys. Failures. We pursued a potentially great summer movie like Edge of Tomorrow and completely botched its release. Same withMan From UNCLE. We dug in our heels and hoped The Hobbit Trilogy would somehow stop being a mediocre case of diminishing returns. Talented, loyal people packed their boxes and went home while your story tellers dropped the ball.

One could argue that this was not your fault. That you inherited former CEO Barry Meyer's agenda and were merely trying to correct the course of an ocean liner heading for an iceberg.

I would not make this argument. And here's why: I wrote this letter last year. I actually started forming it in my head after Man of Steel was a box office failure instead of the modern classic tentpole you were expecting.

I kept holding off on doing anything with it because of one title: Suicide Squad. Zack Snyder's Dawn of Justice was a fiasco, but here comes this plucky little dark adventure about antiheroes. I love David Ayer. I love Harley Quinn. I love Will Smith. Put the letter in a drawer. The ship isn't sinking anymore. Everything is fine. There's no way this movie is bad.

And here we are. I got back from my screening and dusted this sucker off. You, your executive team, and the vision of your 'extraordinary storytellers' that resulted in the loss of around one thousand jobs seem intent on crashing the ship into as much shit as you can find in the ocean by making inane decisions over and over again.

Zack Snyder is not delivering. Is he being punished? Assistants who were doing fantastic work certainly were. People in finance and in marketing and in IT. They had no say in a movie called Batman V Superman only having 8 minutes of Batman fighting Superman in it, that ends because their moms have the same name. Snyder is a producer on every DC movie. He is still directing Justice League. He is being rewarded with more opportunity to get more people laid off. I'm assuming you yourself haven't been financially affected in any real way. You and your studio are the biggest lesson about life one can learn: The top screws up and the bottom suffers. Peter Jackson phones it in and a marketing supervisor has to figure out a plan B for house payments.

Your uneven Hall H presentation at Comic Con this year was a ridiculous mess that ranged from rushed to boring. When Marvel announced their full slate of films with a fun fan event several years ago, you announced yours on a shareholder conference call.

You just don't get it. And it's not just DC movies, it's your whole slate. Jupiter Ascending. Get Hard. Hot Pursuit. Max. Vacation. Pan. Point Break. Fucking PAN, you jerk. People lost their jobs and you decided Pan was a good idea. You think another Jungle Book is a good idea.

What are you even doing? I wish to God you were forced to live out of a car until you made a #1 movie of the year. Maybe Wonder Woman wouldn't be such a mess. Don't try to hide behind the great trailer. People inside are already confirming it's another mess. It is almost impressive how you keep rewarding the same producers and executives for making the same mistakes, over and over.

If I worked at a donut stand, and I kept fucking up donuts, I'd be fired. Even if I made a tiny decent one every now and then, it doesn't matter. I'm gonna get fired.

I love that studio, and you're allowing it to sink. It's not about making movies for 'the fans' and not 'the critics.' It's not even about 'ruining childhoods.' It's about protecting livelihoods.

It's time to wake up and make the fucking donuts, Kevin.

Like said, there are legitimate fears now that WW will also suck.

[Ramsay B.]

^^^CBG19 is awesome.

So I finally saw it yesterday and I guess it did have some decent action at least. It was obviously a muddled mess and I was pretty bored by the end but I don't think it was quite as awful as some reviews out there. Joker was flat out terrible right from the get-go, though. He was just so forced and it was embarrassing most of the time. 

 

[Kindly Old Man]

This Suicide Squad sales pitch is great:

 

[red snow]

On 12/08/2016 at 8:09 PM, Corvinus said:

A pretty brutal open letter from a former WB employee addressed the CEO http://www.vulture.com/2016/08/this-open-letter-annihilates-warner-bros-execs.html

I just put the whole thing in quotes, and in bold my favorite parts:

Like said, there are legitimate fears now that WW will also suck.

The problem with these kind of open letters is they could just as easily been written by a comic geek with google. There's nothing in there that makes me think "only a former employee could know that". It could still be true there's nothing there that makes me think Wonder Woman will suck other than they've failed with their last two (I liked MoS but still think it was a box office failure considering). If I hear anything about reshoots on Wonder Woman then I'll lose hope as it will undoubtedly mean they are changing the tone of the film post completion.

[Calibandar]

On 8/12/2016 at 9:09 PM, Corvinus said:

A pretty brutal open letter from a former WB employee addressed the CEO http://www.vulture.com/2016/08/this-open-letter-annihilates-warner-bros-execs.html

I just put the whole thing in quotes, and in bold my favorite parts:

Like said, there are legitimate fears now that WW will also suck.

That was an amusing letter.

Saw Suicide Squad myself.

Likes:

Introduction of the various members

The look of Enchantress' brother and his initial sequences

The Joker and Harley Quinn's story.

Jared Leto as the Joker was excellent and certainly as good as Ledger

The first hour in general was quite enjoyable.

Dislikes:

Pretty much everything in the second half. Just the resolution of the story was meh.

Didn't love the bar scene, felt weird.

Didn't like the way the plot unfolded and how the demon suddenly took a huge downturn in power for plot reasons.

Enchantress looked corny in the second half with all the shouting and maniacal plans that always get floored anyway.

While they tried to give everyone a bit of time, I still would have liked to see more done by Diable and Killer Croc.

The Joker wasn't in this film near enough and it suffers from it.

[Channel4s-JonSnow]

3 hours ago, red snow said:

The problem with these kind of open letters is they could just as easily been written by a comic geek with google. There's nothing in there that makes me think "only a former employee could know that". It could still be true there's nothing there that makes me think Wonder Woman will suck other than they've failed with their last two (I liked MoS but still think it was a box office failure considering). If I hear anything about reshoots on Wonder Woman then I'll lose hope as it will undoubtedly mean they are changing the tone of the film post completion.

I highly doubt that is genuine, the language is far too reminiscent of an angry internet nerd, not to say nerds can't work at WB. But really its just a geek sounding off. Having said all that I agree with a lot of what was said, although I'd argue with some of his points. While I'm sure WB have suffered losses and are losing money on movies, many of those movies made a shit ton of money, despite being simply bad movies. 

I'd also argue that Peter Jackson didn't 'phone in' the Hobbit movies, if you watch the behind the scenes videos you can see the monumental crap heaped on him and the desperation in his eyes as he attempts to make something work. I felt sorry for him as those movies were really awful in hindsight.

[red snow]

2 hours ago, Channel4s-JonSnow said:

I highly doubt that is genuine, the language is far too reminiscent of an angry internet nerd, not to say nerds can't work at WB. But really its just a geek sounding off. Having said all that I agree with a lot of what was said, although I'd argue with some of his points. While I'm sure WB have suffered losses and are losing money on movies, many of those movies made a shit ton of money, despite being simply bad movies. 

I'd also argue that Peter Jackson didn't 'phone in' the Hobbit movies, if you watch the behind the scenes videos you can see the monumental crap heaped on him and the desperation in his eyes as he attempts to make something work. I felt sorry for him as those movies were really awful in hindsight.

Plus, even if the author was an ex-employee the fact they were made redundant would jade them too.

I also agree that the Hobbit films still made a lot of money and the Adam Sandler ones probably did too. just checked and blended cost $40 million and brought in $128 million which is a tidy profit.

It also selectively ignores Mad Max (I'm guessing "max" wasn't in the failure rant?) although I guess it was just distrubuted by WB. Then there's "lego movie"and "American Sniper" to name films from the same time period.

I agree they aren't doing as well as they should with the DCEU franchise and Jupiter Ascending was awful but is the studio as much a disaster as claimed? Considering Fox is most likely to buy up WB if they were to fail would the DC franchise be any better in the hands of the recent X-men film and fant4stic? I guess Wolverine and Deadpool would be members of the Justice league though.

[Talleyrand]

2 hours ago, Channel4s-JonSnow said:

I'd also argue that Peter Jackson didn't 'phone in' the Hobbit movies, if you watch the behind the scenes videos you can see the monumental crap heaped on him and the desperation in his eyes as he attempts to make something work. I felt sorry for him as those movies were really awful in hindsight.

Yeah the BTS stuff for the Hobbit films is quite a miserable affair compared to the joy in the LOTR ones, Jackson looks so beaten down, haggard and just overwhelmed by what he's been dropped into, gave me quite a bit of sympathy for him

[Corvinus85]

Having worked in these past few years in the corporate world, I empathize with this person, if they're truthful, about what it's like not knowing if you're going to have a job tomorrow, and breathing a sigh of relief when it's not you that got laid off.

[The Anti-Targ]

I think this is going to be the first live action DC movie I don't see in theatres since... oh wait, I didn't see Green Lantern in the theatre, so it wasn't all that long ago.

I will see it though, on blu ray.

CBG19 is good to watch, though I don't watch her regularly. Looking forward to her Hunt for the Wilderpeople review.

[Rhom]

Saw it last night with some friends...  And I honestly don't know what to say.  I've still not seen BvS and my rants about MoS in the dedicated thread need not be repeated.  And yet, part of me desperately wants to like parts of the film.  It seemed like there was an ambitious project in there somewhere, but it was spliced together wrong.  The whole movie felt a bit like Frankenstein's Monster.  There were good pieces, but someone stitched them on wrong.   

Someone else mentioned it earlier, but the slow-mo shot at the climax was the most ridiculously over the top thing ever.  It might  have been okay if that sort of film technique had been used somewhere else in the movie, but it wasn't...

Overall, I still blame all three of these movies on a lack of vision.  You can tell that no thought was given to setting up an overarching narrative universe until after MoS was produced.  Nothing in that movie establishes a larger world.  Oh sure, there's a Wayne Enterprises satellite; but there's nothing to indicate that a vigilante has been taking down meta-humans for years.  It was only after the movie was well into production and the MCU was gaining steam that they decided to belatedly jump in.

ASM2 gets slammed, but I mostly liked the movie.  Right up until the final conflict with Electro and the misguided decision to cram in Goblin for the last five minutes; I thought the movie was great.  Abandoning it and their larger universe plans robbed us of a better version of the villain supergroup with a proper set up.  Sony's plans for Sinister Six might have fallen apart, but the fact that the villains were being established in the Spiderman franchise first would have lended credibility. 

WB went for the big team ups up front.  Okay, you want to go Justice League first?  Fine.  I am willing to accept that Superman, Batman, Flash, Wonder Woman and Aquaman really need no introduction.  (IF done right.)  However, how much easier could Suicide Squad have been established if we had seen the Batman take down Deadshot in a Batman: World's Greatest Detective where he has to track down a hired hitman/serial killer, Captain Boomerang with a significant appearance in Flash, Harley established in a different Batman movie, etc? No one knows who these people are and you give Slipknot an introduction that says "He climbs things"?!!?

I also think that many of the complaints in this thread regarding the unlikely bonding of the team could have been addressed with a simple montage of them going out on other missions.  Take five minutes and show the team out there taking on smaller conflicts.  Put a few shots of them butting heads in there and being villainous, but also saving each other here and there to looks of disbelief.  If you don't want to do that, have shots of them in the prison with expressions of camaraderie as the guards rough up the others.  Something to create a shared experience.

Anyways, I mostly had fun at times in the movie while recognizing it wasn't a good movie.

[dbunting]

On ‎8‎/‎16‎/‎2016 at 10:50 AM, Calibandar said:

That was an amusing letter.

Saw Suicide Squad myself.

 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

Likes:

Introduction of the various members

The look of Enchantress' brother and his initial sequences

The Joker and Harley Quinn's story.

Jared Leto as the Joker was excellent and certainly as good as Ledger

The first hour in general was quite enjoyable.

Dislikes:

Pretty much everything in the second half. Just the resolution of the story was meh.

Didn't love the bar scene, felt weird.

Didn't like the way the plot unfolded and how the demon suddenly took a huge downturn in power for plot reasons.

Enchantress looked corny in the second half with all the shouting and maniacal plans that always get floored anyway.

While they tried to give everyone a bit of time, I still would have liked to see more done by Diable and Killer Croc.

The Joker wasn't in this film near enough and it suffers from it.

 

Well, I will say that I whole heartedly disagree with your joker comparisons. I can't see any way that this one was as good as Heath Ledgers. No amount of crack I smoke will ever make me hallucinate to that level!

IMO, the Joker brought this movie down more than he did anything else. Of course the editing made the movie jumbled as well.