Suicide Squad #2 – Review

Written by Adam Glass, Art by Federico Dallocchio and Andrei Bressan, Colors by Val Staples

The Story: Suicide Squad is dropped into…some stadium (they forgot to give us the name in this issue and I’m too lazy to go back to the last one to figure it out) and are instructed to kill everyone inside because they’ve all been turned into CRAZY TECHNO-ORGANIC ZOMBIES. Kid, meet Candy Shop. Candy Shop, meet Kid.

The Good: Man this was a good first issue. Oh wait…this was the second. Damn–would have made a much better first issue. In fact, after reading this, I’m really not sure what the point of issue one was. Everything a #1 issue should be, Suicide Squad #2 is. It gives us a story. It sets up the characters in a natural way, showing their characteristics unfold while the plot does. No shoehorning, no gimmicks. It’s…and this pains me to say after the first issue was handled so poorly…pretty well written. You actually get to feel for the characters this time. Deadshot is shown to be a capable leader of the team. Diablo’s pain is seen instead of shown. We don’t even have to know what he did to be so concerned with innocents (I didn’t care enough when I read it in the first issue and I still don’t) to feel his genuine need to redeem himself. Even Harley gets some nice character moments. But even while the other members are becoming more interesting, it’s still King Shark who’s the most fun. As Deadshot says, he’s the wild card. Predictably unpredictable. Willing to eat techo-zombie flesh.  The design of the character might not be great–and as someone pointed out last month, taken almost entirely from another series–but his character is great. I don’t even want to know his back-story. I’m perfectly happy with King Shark being King Shark (and I thought I’d hate this character the most). Glass leveled up since the last issue and is really bringing us some good material now. There are great surprises and the promise of an insane story. Let’s hope he can keep it up.