Suicide Squad New 52 #1

With all the hype about Suicide Squad and the constant reboots it has, what time like the present to look back and see what all the fuss was about with the original run of Suicide Squad in the New52?

Nov 2011

Writer: Adam Glass 

Artist: Federico Dallochio, Ransom Getty and Scott Hanna

Colourist: Val Staples

Letterer: Jared K Fletcher

When this was first released as a promo image, the world was seemingly in an uproar. Why was Harley being so skankified and why was she armed to the teeth?

Now we're not looking to slut shame anyone, but you can't look at this cover and say 'well Harley's on the team because of her smarts and gymnastic abilities' because the focal point is how much skin she's showing compared to her other team mates and her previous bodysuit - which doesn't rule out her smarts but sure as heck isn't a good indicator of them either, especially comic wise!

 For another thing, when's the last time you saw a gymnast, or any athlete, showcase their abilities while in a tight corset designed to fall off their boobs at any given time, and while weighed down with ammunition? The easy answer is you don't, for obvious reasons.

Yep, another inappropriate costume for women, and hell, it's not even in her standard colours and she's the colour of a dead albino toad's belly.
And what is up with her face? Is that eye make-up or a skin condition?
She looks like an unattractive shark!




Now this isn't the original Suicide Squad - Ostrander came up with the comic around 1987 and this New52 relaunch is basically the fourth iteration. The New52 was essentially the reboot of the DC universe from Flashpoint and along with it came changes that fans didn't like..
Unfortunately it was more than just costumes.

There was a notable change in how the female characters were treated (hint: not good) various backstories were either changed or rewritten completely (example: Wonder Girl being a thief instead if someone blessed by the gods, or Oracle ((an amazing character of alternate abilities)) fixing her devastating spinal cord injury and walking again as Batgirl) some characters went missing entirely, relationships were broken off, marriages didn't happen and you weren't allowed to be a happy or married homosexual, books were cancelled left and right and creative talent was squandered or ticked off. Events were spawned every other week.

Female creators dropped from 12% to 1% (and that one percent was pretty much the extremely talented Gail Simone, who was controversially fired via email and then hastily re-hired when DC realised the world was against them in this) but co-publisher Dan Didio was outwardly aggressive towards fans when questioned about things like this.

As well as that, it wasn't exactly the new reader jumping on point that DC envisioned, because a lot of the new books actually required a known history of a lot of characters and previous events that may or may not have happened because of said reboot?

Basically, it wasn't good.

For someone like me, I got most of my knowledge about the previous Suicide Squad from Gail Simone's Secret Six, and I knew that Deadshot was basically the face of the team, and Harley Quinn - while most famous as a pairing, was hilariously unreliable in a team setting.

Now, I know that Deadshot is the main character, along WITH Harley Quinn even though DC had basically ignored her until she was super popular in the video games, and the Secret Six was cancelled for this series and the reboot.

I remember being pretty unimpressed with the run - the characters were flat and never at any risk of dying, the art varied dramatically, Waller was super skinny and bland while the plots were so underdone or ridiculous I found it underwhelming to the point where I would go outside on any given day, fall to my knees and scream at the sky, asking why Secret Six was cancelled for this crap!

Anyway, let's look at Harley Quinn's debut in Suicide Squad.

Aaaand our first glimpse is down her shirt because of course it is.

Oh no, they're all being tortured because reasons and background character that appears and then vanishes because obligatory cross series event coming up. We get to see the characters being tortured and then a flashback as to why they're incarcerated.

Deadshot tried to assassinate some Mayor and tangled with Batman. El Diablo is fine with killing people but fails to check for banger shorties (really?) and babies inside the house first.
Also, the cops run into the half demolished burning house to make an arrest instead of waiting for the fire brigade? Impressive, and ridiculous.


The masked people keep going around the characters to try to make them crack and spill the beans about the Suicide Squad.

I like the colouring on Harley's lips and her eyes are a nice, contrasting blue against her zombie flesh.

I don't know what's going on with her hair in the first panel though? Is that a fringe? Is it meant to show movement?
It's really unclear.

They make sure we can see her lacy bra though. Oh yes.

She makes painfully old jokes, even by her standards and then gets zapped in the face.









For some reason, both Deadshot and El Diablo have orange tinged flashbacks but Harley's is a garish pink tone that looks horrible with her new colours.

It also features Black Canary in her own ridiculous new threads and possibly the stupidest way to enter the room.

This panel copped a lot of flack for her jumping vagina first through a window, but now I'm seeing it again I think she's meant to be jumping down through a sky light. Hard to tell.

Either way there's more focus on Canary's cooch and booty than there is on Harley's back sob story which has her 'dancing' with dead lawyers because she misses Joker?

"Black Canary looked sad when she arrested me."

Not as sad as I feel looking at you, honey.





Harley doesn't even have her stupid, redundant cape here.

The other bit characters only get a brief look in.

Years from now, this will be the basis for the Suicide Squad movie. Ha!

Savant - an absolute step down from his character in (again) Gail Simone's Birds of Prey 'cracks' after being tortured with the most well behaved wasp bees I've ever seen.












We see that the crew get to languish in their cells in their crime outfits.

Wouldn't that be a dead giveaway that something was going on?

You'd think maybe they were given their costumes beforehand but Savant clearly says that they come for them unexpectedly and they're knocked out.

Also, I imagine those costumes would get mighty smelly or dirty.

How long is it between missions? Days? Months? A year? There's Deadshot, wearing full armour for a year in the dark, or Harley Quinn freezing her pasty nips off in her cell.

Eeew.

Speaking of terrible fashion choices.. the team goes for a leisurely walk in the snow, and the only one wearing less than Harley is King Shark (who pales in comparison to the version we had in Secret Six... le sigh)

But wait.. is she.. is she wearing a jacket?!

She is!

So her chest, waist, thighs and hands are going to freeze but it's okay because we're giving her a jacket for her shoulders.

Also, half the team seem to be walking in different directions and no one seems to care.

Also also... spoiler alert - the shadowy figure is not real but if he was.. my gosh, do these people just assume he hasn't seen a large group of mismatched randoms walk past his window in the middle of nowhere?

I repeat... this is a secret ops squad. No one is supposed to know they're there!

The words they speak about the rogue agent coming quietly don't match up with the aggressive way they enter the home.

Here's the kicker... Deadshot's still weaing his jacket but Harley - who again, is wearing much less.. seems to have uh oh spaghetti'od hers.
The other members aren't important so they aren't added in this scene. They're probably smoking around the back.

Harley wields a larger hammer with ease but struggles to roll over a blow up doll.
I am not sure why she is on this team.

She makes an obvious sex jokes (there's one per issue! Try and find it, kids!) as well as one of the most awkwardly drawn faces I have ever seen.

Oh hey, there's the other team members, passed out in the snow.

Fat lot of good you lot are.

Oh no, it was a set up to bring them all here to the torture chamber where they can each have a reaction panel to the scene playing out before them, like we actually care what they all have to say.

It looks like Harley shaved off her eyebrows.

All the better to date Jared Leto's Joker with, my dear.

How come Black Spider gets a mask and Deadshot doesn't?

One more test to show that they aren't going to give up the Suicide Squad and the details about Amanda Waller.

One more chance to give every single member a chance to speak their mind.

Well, three members anyway. I'm sure the rest are loyal enough.

El Diablo was kind of mumbling in a foreign language but I'm sure it was nothing bad. Right?

Hey, what could possibly go wrong?

Most of this page is just hessian sacks and Harley's pasty boobs.

Yay, it was all a test and they passed!

You get immediate deployment, you get immediate deployment, you get immediate deployment, you get denied medical care!

None of them knew it was a test and we don't really have an explanation for why they didn't break.

Deadshot said earlier that he thought they were going to kill everyone anyway but he's normally good at making deals and let's face it...

Harley doesn't quit if someone she cares for is involved but make no mistake... any other time she will leave you high and dry if things go pear shaped.









Supermodel Waller with her cheeky cleavage appears and tells them to go kill a sports stadium full of people because.
....because... you'll find out next issue! Lols!

Ugh... as if anyone didn't know she was in one of the masks, there she is holding one.

I'm surprised they didn't put a text box in pointing to it.

This change got a lot of reaction too because it meant a lot less diversity because DC couldn't handle putting the one overweight black powerhouse character in their books.

Also, does no one notice the air drop of randoms into the stadium?

It's dramatic and all but surely there's a better way than that.





Eh, I'm still unimpressed with this comic. I don't know if I've become super desensitised to all the bland comics DC has been putting out or the way they treat Harley Quinn or if it's still as crap as I remember it.

I know first issues and setting things up are boring but this reboot first issue doesn't do a good job of setting up it's characters. For example, when we get to Harley's flashback she sobs in a voice-over that she's been hurt worse... by him. A little tag tells us to go and read another comic to find out why the Joker left. Why should we have to? This is meant to be a brand new start that your average reader can get into without having to know the long, details and often messed up timelines and history that Dc have weaved (or thrown) around the place - but here we have Joker and Harley already broken up and no indication of their history in this New52 setting.

I mean, it's fine if you're going to get into it later but it will all be flashback.. there's no current relationship and apparently we're going off the previous history for their relationship.. the rebooted one? Not very well thought out.

Personality wise, she comes off as a wannabe hardcore dolly which is fitting with DC's 'everything must be gritty' demands but is wrong for a character that once embodied fun and love now turned into a blood thirsty generic thug.