Is This Something?

Answer: Yes, this is something.

What This is: A long time ago, people at DC comics realized "We're not getting much mileage out of our villains. They show up to attack the good guys once or twice a year, then they're gone."

So someone in their offices pitched an idea which was totally original -- um, except to anyone who's seen The Dirty Dozen, I mean -- of forcing these prisoners to do high-risk black ops in exchange for reducing their prison sentences. The idea is that they are well-known villains; the government has built-in plausible deniability. They can just say, "We had nothing to do with that. That's the kind of stuff these guys just do."

As a bonus, it also explained why so many villains seemed to get out of prison so damn frequently.

The other thing that came together for this movie was the creation of the character Harlequin (I hate the stupid trademarkable name Harley Quinn) on the Batman cartoon in the 90s. Harley instantly became one of DC's most popular characters. Not just villains -- one of the most popular characters. And so DC definitely wanted to get her into the spotlight, in a sort of hero role.

Lately she's been leading the Suicide Squad -- official name, Task Force X -- even though one wouldn't have previously suspected she was any kind of military strategist.

But she's very popular, and very popular characters wind up getting gifted with all sorts of hitherto-unknown skills.

The Arrow TV show has featured the Suicide Squad in at least one episode. They also featured a seen-from-behind cameo from Harlequin.

But this is her first official, real appearance.

Oh, and the Joker would never be included in the Suicide Squad. He is a psychopath who wants nothing but chaos and destruction. However, the Joker is also a clingy, jealous, attention-whoring egomaniac, and tends to force his way into things when he's not invited. I assume he's going to be jealous that Harley is stepping out in the spotlight, and stepping out of his shadow, and he'll attempt to draw the spotlight back on to himself by ruining everything.

So he's kind of like a really bad version of Telly Savalas in Dirty Dozen. He'll be the enemy within the team itself.

posted by Ace at 11:32 AM

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