Beware spoilers ahead!
Written by Tom Taylor
Illustrated by Bruno Redondo
Colored by Adriano Lucas
Lettered by Wes AbbottTask Force X-nicknamed the Suicide Squad-unites some of the DCU’s unlikeliest villains for its bloodiest series yet! The Squad’s new mission is to neutralize a new group of international super-terrorists known as the Revolutionaries-and not everyone on either side will make it out alive! But when the U.S. government’s most deniable team of do-badders realizes that the surviving Revolutionaries will be joining the Squad, all hell breaks loose! Who can Harley Quinn and Deadshot trust when their new teammates are the very people their crew was assigned to kill? The Suicide Squad doesn’t just need to worry about surviving their next mission… now they have to survive each other! The acclaimed Injustice creative team of writer Tom Taylor and artist Bruno Redondo reunite for the wildest incarnation of the Squad ever seen!
Who would have the thought that the team responsible for both the most endearing and most deadly depiction of the DC Universe in the form of the “Injustice” series be so well suited for a new volume of “Suicide Squad”? Most people. It’s no surprise that Tom Taylor, Bruno Redondo, Adriano Lucas, and Wes Abbott would be great at killing c-list DC villains but the biggest accomplishment is establishing an original team of characters that readers are just as worried about in a book where anyone can loose their head at any moment.
Tom Taylor’s script does a lot in creating strength in the connection between these characters both new and old in “Suicide Squad” #1. One small but crucial element he uses is the introduction caption boxes. For the new team, “The Revolutionaries,” their intro texts are extremely important because they are completely fresh. One thing Taylor does give these intro texts personality. The Aerie’s intro including their ability to talk to birds and having it undercut with “but that’s not useful in any way” is a funny joke but already gives a familiarity with them and doing this for this all new team creates a sense of endearment which is excellent in a “Suicide Squad” book. Any other writer introducing a new team in a “Suicide Squad,” you can just assume that they’ll be the ones to dies so the hype for “anyone can die” remains while keeping movie stars, Harley Quinn and Deadshot safe and sound. While this is still hypothetically what’s happening, the small narration quirks and the small moments we get with the potential expendables creates at the very least a “man I kinda liked them” when the inevitable comes.
In addition to the the familiarity in the intro captions, there’s a lot of humor and personality within the Revolutionaries and this iteration of Task Force X. Magpie and Cavalier (RIP) have good outings as Magpie swears up and down this is out of her league and unfortunately is correct and Cavalier is so over the top as a Musketeer and has an over the top death, both great examples of how death can work as a punchline in the book. Taylor also can still punch readers in the gut with death when 1/2 of the duo of Scale and Fin bites the dust by getting bitten by King Shark. While there are the successes like Fin and Scale there is still a good chunk if the Revolutionaries who don’t have much going for them in this first issue that paint a target on them in upcoming issues. The Aerie and Wink get a few solid moments, that sort of make them an obvious case that they may survive for a little while but there are those like Thylacine and Deadly Six, who barely speak in this and while I’d love to be wrong and they become fan favorite characters, I don’t think they will last long. While there’s quite a bit to say about Taylor’s character work, he does a great job in this issue of introducing themes of revolution and changing the world that aim to set this volume of “Suicide Squad” apart from the rest with his introduction of this new group of Revolutionaries and their foil/eventual warden, Lok.
Continued belowBruno Redondo, Adriano Lucas, and Wes Abbott also add a lot to ‘Suicide Squad” #1. Redondo’s line work is so incredibly clean and is chocked full of so much expression. A lot of the endearment of the short lived Scale and Fin, was their bombastic introduction where so much of their character and dynamic as twins was shown off in one panel. A great area of collaboration between Redondo and Lucas is when Redondo leaves a bare background and Lucas fills it with a stark contrasting color that highlights whatever action is in the panel. A few particular stand outs are the gorey death of the Cavalier and the final line of the beautifully named T.N.Teen. Lucas and Redondo do really great work with strong contrasts that give the book a unique sense of style. A member of the team who did a lot of great work was Wes Abbott. Abbott uses a lot of directionality in his lettering choices and a lot of excellent small choices that add to the whole. Particularly the “Wink” sound effect for Wink’s teleportation which is a small choice but adds a lot to creating a connection to that character.
Taylor, Redondo, Lucas, Abbott do an excellent job in crafting this new volume of “Suicide Squad”. Introducing a number of new characters, killing a couple of them on top of already established characters in addition to laying seeds of what this series will capital “A” be About is a difficult feat for a first issue but this team does it almost effortlessly. “Suicide Squad” #1 does it’s job so well that there’s an eagerness to tune into the next issue in order to see which one of these new and endearing character’s will die in this one.
Final Verdict: 8.0 – “Suicide Squad” #1 is a strong first issue that creates a fun new direction for the series with a number of endearing characters.
