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SUICIDE SQUAD #3
"Pest Control"
Mildly Recommended (6/10)
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DC Comics
Writer: Keith Giffen
Pencils: Paco Medina
Inks: Joe Sanchez
Colors: John Kalisz & Heroic Age
Letters: Bill Oakley
Editor: Peter Tomasi
Price: $2.50 US/$4.25 CAN |
Quite
honestly, I'm liking this series more when only the "ground crew" are involved.
The second issue, introducing Dozer, Rock and the others, would have served as a
much better first issue than what we got, and this issue's best moments
generally come from the interplay of the team behind the microphones. The
interaction of the super-villains and their suicidal objective is interesting
enough, but the "expendable" bit is already beginning to feel old, and I
continue to be unimpressed with Medina's artwork, which seems an odd fit for
this dark series. The series may not be as poor as I thought it was when I
reviewed the first issue, but neither has it completely turned me around yet.
Giffen has always had a way with banter, and Suicide Squad is no different. The
chat amongst the squad of super-villains was a very nice way of fleshing out
these characters, half of which had never appeared outside this issue (and won't
appear anywhere else), and the back-and-forth between the mission guidance team
contains a fair bit of entertaining gallows humor. Though I'm not ready to
declare these characters favorites the way just about every cast member of the
original Squad was, the core four members of the team have already gotten my
attention.
While Medina's
manga-influenced artwork isn't a favorite of mine, that's more down to a feeling
that it's unsuited to the title than a failing on his part. His action sequences
are fluid and smooth, his designs for the characters gaudy but unusual and his
work on the more horrific sequences pretty good at showing just how doomed the
characters are. I just can't escape the feeling that the book has more of a
bright and shiny sense of humor in the art than it should.
There also continue to be some
problems with the storytelling. The use of offscreen captions happens way too
often and makes the conversations hard to figure out, and there was more than
one time in this issue when I couldn't figure out what was supposed to be going
on. For example, the fates that these characters meet is a pretty important
aspect of this issue, but I'd be hard-pressed to tell you exactly what happened
to Bolt this issue.
One thing I do have to credit
this series with so far is living up to its title. While it's going to make it
difficult to build up any kind of credible cast, Giffen is going all-out when it
comes to portraying the death rate on these missions. Previously, joining the
Suicide Squad was unpleasant largely because you might die but you'd definitely
have to work with psychopaths and heed the call of Amanda Waller. These days,
joining it is effectively a death sentence.
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