Sunday, March 12, 2017

Suicide Squad #13


I wish John Romita Jr. had never followed in his father's footsteps.

Katana and Rick Flag have become prisoners of Rustam. He's decided that since he was once betrayed by an employer, all employers must die and all employees set free. I don't have a problem with that. I once had a manager who cried during a salary review meeting because I wasn't her friend. I didn't get a raise. I also quit a few weeks later and while I didn't go around the world decapitating guards of prisons (why would I? Aren't they the same kinds of people who need to be set free? Rustam is a dick) and setting loose all of the criminals of the world, I have never worked for an actual employer ever again. Fuck the system. Fuck job creators. Fuck everybody except myself. Why would I want to work for companies where the CEOs look at me as if I'm a parasite and not part of the backbone of their company? I hope Rustam destroys them all!


I have a feeling a lot of people over the years have called Romita's artwork "dynamic."

That was a criticism that also cuts Rob Liefeld! Also, it's probably not a fair criticism of Romita, especially in regards to that panel. That panel is mostly fine and, quite often, Romita's art isn't even dynamic. It usually looks like he maps the scene out on graph paper and then replaces most of the ninety degree corners with slight curves. The only reason I scanned in this panel and not the terrible artwork of the first page is because I don't understand how Deadshot sees through the scope on that helmet unless he's got some kind of chameleon eye.

Rob Williams writing isn't currently doing anything for me now either. I suppose if it were, I'd look past the problem I have with Romita's work. I certainly didn't feel the need to complain (much) while reading Kick Ass.

Harcourt (the new white, skinny Waller) decides to send Croc in to break up the fight. But Croc just treats it as an excuse to remind the readers that he eats the flesh of people. That's basically his character these days. He eats guards regularly and wants to fuck Enchantress. Croc only makes the situation worse so Harcourt uses the brain bombs to stop the aggression. I suppose she could have done that initially but then she wouldn't have been able to push Croc around.


Going from twenty to eleven is not turning it up, dum-dum. You should either have said, "Brain bomb at 2. Don't make me turn it up to 11," or "Brain bomb at twenty percent. Don't make me turn it up to 110%." You need to be exceedingly clear when dealing with these savvy criminal types!

Deadshot admits to killing Waller for Rustam in exchange for his own freedom. It's almost certainly not part of a bigger plan to catch Rustam at all. Waller is dead. You must learn to live with this one, actual comic book death, the first in the pages of Suicide Squad since The New 52 began. I mean, I guess Lime of Lemon and Lime fame died. And Yo Yo died without coming back (the second time! He did survive the first death of being eaten by King Shark). And a bunch of Man-bats died. And that one guy who died immediately in The New 52 but then came back and then maybe died again and then came back but then his head blew up because he was resurrected too many times? Maybe that guy counts too. So that's three (maybe?) and a few Man-Bats in six years? Not good enough, Suicide Squad. I think the Justice League has suffered more losses than that!

After the super surprising revelation that Deadshot killed Waller while working for Rustam, the Jihad...er, I mean, the Burning World Buddies make their assault on Belle Reve. Djinn enters the system to steal all of Amanda Waller's files she uses to blackmail everybody in the world. She must have purchased them from All Star Batman's Two-face. He knows everybody's dirty little secrets because he's such an amazing district attorney. Those guys are fantastic at digging up dirt to put people away unless those people are dirty cops and then they don't try to convict them at all because working against the police would destroy the career of a district attorney who needs them on his side to do his job well. And even though you'd think good cops would want to prosecute corrupt cops, it seemingly doesn't ever work that way at all.


Anally fisting an antagonist seems like a slightly over-the-top way of stopping them.

Djinn unencrypts the files the Suicide Squad stole from The People and Hack gets a good look at them. Instead of saying whatever she discovered, she spends the time she has before she's cut off declaring how she now knows the thing that she probably needs to tell the others but didn't have time because she had to let them know she knew it first. I guess I'm supposed to be on the edge of my seat now? What is it?! What did you discover, Hack?! Oh my goodness! This tense excitement could only be better if it had been caused by Hack actually revealing something exciting instead of just teasing that she knows something exciting!

The thing she's most excited about (since she couldn't reveal the Annihilation Brigade's current location or who she finally knows whatever) is that the brain bombs have been deactivated. That means Harcourt can't turn them up to 11! It also means Deadshot gets to escape with Rustam. And also that the first part of the story is over.

This comic is still split up into two stories even though the second half now continues the current story. I guess when you're an artist like Jim Lee or John Romita Jr, you can't make monthly deadlines because you're so busy scribbling lines all over your finished art.


Do we? I think if you're asking that question, you're the villain. I know the time I was rescuing all of those orphans from the burning building, I didn't think, "Am I the hero? Or the villain?" But when I was setting the orphanage on fire, I was definitely asking that.

I'm not sure if Rob Williams knows how prisons work but he seems to think that if you blow a hole in one of the walls, every prisoner in the prison can get out. It happened at Blackgate and now it's happening at Belle Reve.

Since the brain bombs have been turned off, Croc heads back into the swamp and Digger takes off. June, Hack, and Harley head into a swamp pub to talk about relationships. Because that's what girls talk about, right?

Even though Hack said, in the last part of the story, "I finally know who...," it didn't mean she discovered who The People's spy was in the Suicide Squad. You would think that's what she meant. But it wasn't. Because after Harley calls her a hero, she has to go back to Belle Reve to figure out who it was. Now, she could have figured it out the way she usually does her thing. She could have turned digital and found the information that way. But if she did that, how could this have happened?


Whoops! Also, if you're keeping count, that's two out of the last three issues that ended with a black female being killed. Double whoops!

And they're both definitely dead! Definitely. No way either one can still be alive. Kaput!

The Ranking!
No change! Things really change fast! For a second there, I thought I was enjoying this comic book. Now there's nothing about it I like! Kay Sarah, Kay Sarah!

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