Why So Serious? Sorting Out The Different Opinions On "Suicide Squad"

Last Thursday, on August 4, fans gathered at cinemas around the country for the long awaited release of Suicide Squad.

It follows the mysterious intelligence officer Amanda Waller (Viola Davis) as she assembles a team of the world’s most dangerous supervillains (Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn and Will Smith’s Deadshot among them) to protect the city against other dangerous meta-humans and terrorists.

While some critics have slayed Suicide Squad with criticism, social media suggests fans disagree with their labelling of the project as ‘disastrous’. (Student Edge’s own Simon Miraudo referred to making of the film as a “kamikaze mission”.)

Differing opinions crashed head-on recently when Suicide Squad fans began a petition to shut down the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes after a barrage of negative reviews.

So, why are we seeing such a huge difference in perspective?

Was it overhyped?

Perhaps Suicide Squad was a little too talked-up over the two years it was in production and maybe viewers began to expect too much. There were a few discrepancies between the trailers and the film that have been commonly noted by critics and fans (one being that the Suicide Squad trailer almost gave the Joker more screen time than the actual film did). Were we sold a movie that didn’t actually exist? Can we blame the widespread critical disappointment on that?

Or, were the critics unfair?

Maybe we were holding the flick to an unreasonably high standard, based on previous actor’s portrayals of iconic Batman villain the Joker. Jake Coyle of GoErie.com mentioned that Leto’s diminished role “proved to be a relief”, as he lacked “both menace and wit” in comparison to the performance given by Heath Ledger as the Joker in The Dark Knight.

Maybe the fans are just fooling themselves?

Is it feasible that we, the fans, have waited so long for characters like Harley Quinn and Deadshot to be on the big screen, that we have done nothing short of convince ourselves that the picture was better than it was? The difference between fans and the critics of course, is that their profession has trained them against this sort of thinking.

Or, is it actually fine for cinema to inspire a range of opinions (and that may in fact be the whole point of art)?

Fact is, I really enjoyed Suicide Squad. The action-packed special effects were captivating and eye-catching, and the background stories of the individual Squad members helped to explain the setting to someone like myself, who has only recently become acquainted with the DC and Marvel Universes.

Ultimately, both critics and fans are viewing the film from completely different perspectives. There are aspects of feature filmmaking professional critics pay more attention to that even the greatest of fans would not notice. And there is an individual investment by die-hard fans that will sometimes supersede those criticisms.

Maybe at the end of the day, this is the answer; everyone watches movies differently. That’s why they’re so enjoyable to discuss.

Olivia Blasi is one of Student Edge’s student contributors. Learn more about the contributors program.

Photo: Warner Bros.