Suicide Squad Vol. 5: Kill Your Darlings by Rob Williams, Guz Vazquez, Agustin Pailla, Juan Ferreyra, Giuseppe Cafaro and Adriano Lucas (graphic novel review).
The reprints of Suicide Squad # 20-25 in this ‘Suicide Squad Vol. 5: Kill Your Darlings’ has a total change of artists. An unfortunate consequence being the first artist, so not giving names, putting Amanda Waller on a diet. Thankfully, in later issues, she does gain some of her weight back. I suspect any art corrections might have been dropped because of deadlines.
The principle basis of this 6-part story is Waller committing perjury to the US Senate and denying the existence of Task Force X and then being captured and body controlled by The People. Their leader Karla’s plan is to have multiple Suicide Squads around the world and use them to take down all the super-heroes. The controlled Waller orders her team to take on the Batman and Killer Frost. Although the brain bomb had been taken out of Killer Frost’s head, the tracking device is still in there.
As leader, Harley Quinn has lost her sense of humour and a ruthless psychopath doing some decisions, even to her own team, that should have had them lose their sense of trust in her had they not survived. With only three volumes to go, I hope some of her equilibrium is restored. It’s not as though there has never been any humorous leaders.
There is some sense of misdirection here centring more on Amanda Waller than the team in on what is going on or figuring what is going on, but then the reader isn’t informed neither so becomes a roller-coaster that you want to and end up reading in one sitting even if it is more fast food this time.
GF Willmetts
March 2021
(pub: DC Comics, 2021. 128 page graphic novel. Price: I pulled my copy for about £ 6.00 (UK). ISBN: 978-1-4012-7880-9)
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