The Conflicting Romance of Harley Quinn and the Joker

This post contains spoilers for Suicide Squad.

I was part of the record-breaking crowd that saw Suicide Squad last weekend, and I walked away from the film mostly pleased. But there was one part that stuck in my brain and that I couldn’t stop thinking about the whole rest of the day after I saw the movie. I was hooked on the Joker and Harley Quinn’s story, and as soon as I realized I was enjoying its romanticism, I felt thoroughly disgusted with myself. After some introspection, though, I’ve come to the conclusion that there’s a chance that was the film’s end goal.

Their perfectly matched crazy, best shown in GIF form

Suicide Squad: Not Bad, but Definitely a Little Lost

As David mentioned yesterday we went and saw Suicide Squad this weekend. I had been looking forward to this movie, but after reshoots and a push back on the date I was a bit concerned about what we were getting. In the end I generally enjoyed the movie and there were some moments that really drew me in, but in the end I feel like the movie was not quite sure what it wanted to be. There were starts to all of these different stories that seemed interesting, but none of it felt quite fully realized. The best comment I heard from someone is that it felt like the cliff notes version of like 10 movies. Now this does not mean that it was not generally enjoyable, but I think my biggest complaint is that none of the storylines felt very fulfilling for me.

Now I think some of the problem seems to stem from the fact that this movie seemed to start down one path and seemed to switch part way through. An example of this can be seen by simply watching the progression of trailers, which starts out somber and then all the trailers after that go an entirely different direction. In the end you can still see elements of the original somber movie, but with these weird cuts and jokes overlaid and then you have the added element of being shown after Batman V Superman, which just adds a bit of unnecessary elements.

Suicide Squad – Concerns Answered?

Opening night this last Friday, Holly and I went to go see Suicide Squad. The timing was partially just the only chance we would have to see it before an upcoming vacation, but it was also fun to be there opening night. It was a bigger crowd than the other movie we saw recently on opening night – Ghostbusters. Both have had some controversy boiling around them, so it was interesting to see that comparison.

We went into Ghostbusters low on expectations about it, as in we were open to experiencing whatever they decided to present us. However, when it came to Suicide Squad, I had a lot of expectations and concerns going into the movie. Maybe that had to do with the hype machine behind it, the huge number of trailers, Batman vs. Superman, the talk of a troubled production, and of course most recently the critical response.

I had some specific things that I was concerned about, though, and here’s the thing: I feel like I got an answer to all of my concerns. And I think that was a big contributing factor to me enjoying the film. It was satisfying to have answers to all my questions about the film within the film. So let’s go through what I was thinking about after I saw it! I’ll try to keep this spoiler-light, if you’re wanting to read and consider going to see this.

What Comics Should I Read

So I did not grow up reading comics like David did. I have only recently gotten in to reading comics, partly due to Buffy the Vampire Slayer and I did like some manga, but the problem is that it goes on for so long and can take up an entire room with comics or manga. The amazing thing that has happened is the ability to get my comics on my iPad (or other tablet devices), which means I am not taking up precious space and since there is not a comic book store in my town I can actually access comics.

So the thing that really got me started was season 8 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and I have been trying to keep up with season 9, but I just get so busy and then get behind and then I have to catch up. At the same time I have really enjoyed reading the comic version of Buffy and have read all of the Firefly continuations. Part of the other problem that I have is wondering where do I start.