Justice League vs. Suicide Squad (2016-2017)

2/5

Not only does Justice League vs. Suicide Squad use a cookie-cutter plot setup, but it also lacks character, depth, and (quite surprisingly) the Justice League fighting the Suicide Squad.

The Suicide Squad is a team of super bad guys who are put under the control of the government to complete missions considered too dangerous to send out our own people to complete and completing these missions and living through them would give them time off of their prison sentences. However, Batman soon finds out that these criminals and brings the Justice League along with them to investigate the squad only to be caught in the midst of a revenge plan of a bigger baddy: Maxwell Lord and the original Suicide Squad.

And there you have it: A team of superheroes sort of fights a team of supervillains and then stops to take care of a common enemy. It's a simple plot and, unfortunately, Joshua Williamson (an up-and-coming author who currently write The Flash and is quite good at it) fails to add much character to the people of the story. The dialogue is flat, uninteresting, and sometimes doesn't even line up very well. On top of the miniseries of the main story, this volume also includes Justice League #12 & #13 and Suicide Squad #8-#10, bringing in the supporting writing cast Tim Seeley (author of Revival), Rob Williams, and Si Spurrier. Honestly, it was Tim Seeley's 2 issues that shined the most out of this collection due to actual characterization and fluid plot execution.

The art here is pretty standard, too. The main story is illustrated by Jason Fabok, and while his drawings are neat, his composition and page layout were a bit questionable at times. Howard Porter draws the conclusion issue and actually seemed a lot more interesting. Overall, the art here doesn't really contain sights to behold, but it is still serviceable and easy to understand what you're seeing.

This event was a bit of a letdown, which I was shocked to find out considering how DC's Rebirth line has impressed me and who was involved in this project. The title of the story is "Justice League vs. Suicide Squad", but there was more way more teamwork than fighting (unlike Marvel's "Avengers vs. X-Men") and the end was really rushed. I still enjoy Joshua Williamson writing The Flash, but not even Tim Seeley could save this story.

NEW READER APPROVED: If you are new to comics, you shouldn't have much of an issue jumping on here. The cast of characters are similar to that of the Justice League cartoons and the Suicide Squad film.

Copy was received by NetGalley.

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