Coming off two quality issues since the reboot, New Suicide Squad features an intriguing peek at where our favorite criminals will end up in five years’ time. This review will take a look at who this issue features, how the characters will have changed, and most importantly, is it good?
New Suicide Squad: Futures End #1 (DC Comics)
Sean Ryan has given us two great looks at the new Squad thus far; unfortunately, this is not one of them. I won’t judge Ryan too harshly because this Futures End event does challenge writers, especially ones that are new to a series, because they have no idea if they’ll eventually have to write up to this point or the space-time continuum will be disturbed and all these one-shots will be sheer fantasy. I personally am hoping for the latter because I would hate to see these events actually take place.
First off, the holographic cover features a scene where Waller, Deadshot, and Harley are shown in both a jail-cell and what appears to be the oval office. Despite both the cover and the blurb on DC’s site, this issue has nothing to do with the White House. This issue actually takes place in Belle Reve as well as some secret government factory. The issue begins with Amanda Waller single-handedly breaking into Belle Reve (and apparently killing all personnel in the compound because you never see an officer attempting to stop her) and reassembling the squad who has been manipulated in some way over the years. Here’s a list of updates on the team:
Deadshot: Is missing his right arm after a failed experiment on the government’s behalf to attempt to attach a gun to his arm (was the gun attached to his glove not enough? It was already essentially attached).
Black Manta: Is now almost brain dead and only knows some fighting skills from when the government attempted to cram them into his brain.
Harley Quinn: Is roided out from being injected with venom. She’s just big and angry now.
I wish it was a dream, Deadshot.
The crew escapes and gains access to the government headquarters which is Waller’s main goal: destroy a facility that is producing clones of villains to make an “army of bad guys” (bad guys? Seriously? What are we, first graders? And why on earth would the government need an army of villain clones, especially if the war is already over?). This whole issue is pretty ridiculous and the writing seems very forced.
Is It Good?
I’m not mad Sean, I’m just disappointed. The buildup from the last issues just made for an even bigger let down for this one-shot that packed a lot of potential. I will say that there are some graphically violent panels, one that makes me cringe even thinking about it so kudos to Coelho. Hopefully we get back on track with issue #3 next month.
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